Project # 6938 and counting....

Well, ok, maybe I don't have quite that many projects going, but sometimes it seems like it. Many of them actually do get finished, though many more get started! Here's one of the latest ways I've been frittering away my time. I saw the pattern on a quilting website and thought I could replicate it at home pretty easily. Except for that sticky part about math and seam allowances, it's gone swimmingly!

Isn't this material nice?  I just love the bright, fun colors.  My Mom loved it, too.  Maybe I'll give it to her.  When it's all done it should look a bit more like this:

I have 2 complete strips sewn together and it's turning out well! Yay!  Alas, it will not be worked on for a couple weeks, as I'm away from the house.  (That would be the "and going somewhere else once in a while" portion of this blog coming up!)

Life with The Girl-Child

Yesterday we successfully got The Girl-Child off to the airport.  It's funny calling her that these days, as she's farther away from the child part than ever.  A friend dubbed her that years ago (obviously) and it became one of many humorous references over the years.  (The poor kid, she put up with a lot!) She pretty much managed to do everything and see everybody she wanted to see over the course of a long weekend.  On the trip home from the airport when we picked her up, we could hear mutterings from the back seat-- something to the effect of, "Ugh, I feel like death."  (It's a 2.5 hour drive...remember, we live in the sticks.)  On the eve of her departure, she went out with friends, but made it a more low-key event. She declared, from recent experience, that Dramamine was bad enough without a hangover to go with it! Hmmm... could this be maturity speaking? (The Girl Child's Parental Units are savoring this moment!) 

Easter Eats

Easter has come and gone at our house...with nary a hard-boiled egg in site.  Just didn't get around to dying any this year. :(  Although we did have a nice dinner with my Mom and the girl-child (blowing in from Virginia and sporting that big, honkin' diamond these days).  We had Ham Loaf instead of ham because, simply, we like it better.  I have a killer ham loaf recipe--it has stuff like graham crackers (known as "brown crackers" around here, for some reason dating back to my husband's early childhood) and beef in it. Yum!  It was my Grandma's recipe and she could walk on water as far as I'm concerned!

My Mom (age 92 as of the day before Easter, and yes, there was a party) had some good Grandma time with our daughter.  She's reminisces a lot and someone of lesser patience and intelligence might consider that boring, but her memories are generally pretty entertaining and her sense of humor is subtle, yet hilarious (in true Scandinavian fashion).  Mom remembered how she and her sister took Home Economics courses in High School and discovered that their mother (my sainted Grandma) really didn't know how to cook at all!  Why, she was making her pie crusts from lard....and they were flaky and pretty much perfect...but they weren't made from Crisco. Shame on her! And Grandma was so old-fashioned that she didn't know who Betty Crocker was. Geesh! Mom assured us that Grandma did get a clue about her shocking lack of cookery skills...it took about 10 years or so, but she mysteriously got better at it. Well, thank heaven!

I will sign off with a quote from the brilliant Mark Twain:

"When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished by how much he'd learned in seven years."