Well, Big R's present from his Grandma and Papa came today, a day earlier than expected! Here's a video of him trying it out.

 

I also finished a present I was making for him--a Kindle Fire case with the Gryffindor crest. But I don't think he's quite as excited about it when compared to a gasoline powered scooter!

Hey there. So, just so you know, today (Wednesday) is NOT the 18th. Nope. It is in fact the 19th. And I'm sure most of you are probably thinking, "Well, of course it's the 19th." But here's a funny(ish) story. I was convinced today was the 18th. Therefore I knew today was Big R's birthday. He had a roller skating birthday with his friends last Saturday so on his actual birthday I was going to make his requested birthday meal (Jucy Lucy burgers [hamburgers with the cheese stuffed inside], mashed potatoes with hamburger gravy, and carrots with dip) and bake him a cake. So, thinking yesterday was the 17th, I was going to start preparing for his birthday by thawing the meat and baking the cake layers, etc. Except yesterday I woke up and fired up my computer to check my email. Imagine my shock when the clock/calendar on my computer told me it was the 18th, NOT the 17th! Ooops! Then it was a mad rush to thaw the meat, bake and frost the cake, put up some balloons, wrap a couple more presents...and then I realized I had forgotten to buy hamburger buns. Thankfully I managed to pull it off.
  Well, so, the roller skating party was on Saturday and we didn't have any date mix ups. Everyone had a lot of fun, though I think Hubby and I skated more than the kids! My legs were so tired! The kids skated but they also played air hockey and a game of pool (I'm surprised with all those pool sticks getting swung around that everyone left with both eyes intact). I do have some photos from the party. Let's see if Blogger will let me upload today.

pizza

Legos!

From Grandma & Grandpa, his Dad, and I--an Xbox 360

Blowing out the candles

skating

Success! I was able to post these photos without a problem. Awesome! There are a few more photos from the party that I posted on Facebook so you can go there if you want to see them.
  And then I have a few photos from yesterday (his actual birthday--the 18th!). MoMo wanted to be the photographer so we didn't get too many.

Opening card from Grandma & Grandpa

Hmmm...what's in here?

Lighting the candles-all 11! How is that possible? Really? 11!?

He's still got one more present to look forward to from his Grandma & Papa. It's supposed to come tomorrow and he's dying for it to get here and to see what it is.
  Ok, well, I better go. Lots to do. Have a wonderful day!

I've got a couple of things today. First, the photos I mentioned from our birthday camping trip.

 Wow! I'm SHOCKED that Blogger uploaded photos finally! Anyway, this was the weekend of Hubby's birthday.
  In other news (in case you missed it on Facebook), my darling daughter got the Difference Maker award at her school today. It's like Student of the Quarter. I've got a video here, though it's hard to understand what her teacher is saying so I'm including a transcription for you:

My Difference Maker for the quarter is a student of mine that has quietly been an absolute role model the entire year. My Difference Maker is somebody that will be a friend, somebody that’s always working, always quiet and peaceful and helpful  AND gets work done. My difference maker has grown so much academically and as a person and I am duly honored to say my Difference Maker is Miss McKinley. {applause} {then another teacher starts talking and we don't really care what she said...LOL}
 

 

So, there you have it. Until next time...

Hello again. Happy Memorial Day Weekend! We're having a pretty lazy weekend. Hubby went gold panning yesterday with his buddy. The original plan was for them to stay overnight and come home today but the other guy's wife got sick so he had to get home to be with her. So, they came back yesterday. When we asked the kids if they wanted to go camping/gold panning this weekend they declined. Guess they had to rest up from last weekend. Last weekend was hubby's birthday and he wanted to camp at the reservoir. The temperature was nice, not too hot, not too cold. But the WIND! It blew and howled and blew some more. That wasn't so pleasant. But the fishing was better. The last several times we've fished there we haven't caught anything. But Hubby caught a catfish and a couple of carp. MoMo had one on her line that got off. Big R also had one on the line that got away. Oh well, maybe next time. Overall, it was a pretty nice weekend. But this weekend we're just hanging out at home.
  I've been working on some projects, too. I don't even know how many projects I'm working on right now. A lot. But here's Eric's quilt. Eric's quilt I decided not to use the leftover triangles. Mainly because it would be quite a bit more work and he's already waited 5+ years for his quilt. Plus, I want to have more time to work on my other projects! LOL But I did use some leftover strips and pieced a border with those. I can't decide if I want to add another black border to the outside or not. What do you think?
  Here's a project I finished a couple weeks ago but waited to post since it was for a birthday present. But now she has it so I can share! Hunger Games iPad case I paper pieced the Hunger Games symbol then used that block to make a zippered and padded case. I also threw in some personalized notepads and stamp. So, happy birthday! I'm glad you like it!
  I also started sewing triangles together for the triangle baby quilt. I have 2 rows done. triangle quilt 2 rows But then I got a bee in my bonnet and decided I HAD to start another project and that it HAD to be done first. So, I've spent the last couple days cutting these. 168 circles, 168 squares Yep, that's right, 168 circles and 168 squares. The squares I cut with my rotary cutter so they weren't so bad but the circles are all cut by hand. Needless to say, my hand kind of hurts. I'm ready, though, to start sewing them together now. So, in a little bit (after I finish this post) I plan to do exactly that. And no one better get in my way!
  I did also want to share some more pictures of the garden. Because I know you are all as excited as I am about it! It's getting big. And sort of being taken over by tomatillos. We did not plant any tomatillos this year. But we got a TON of plants this year that came up all on their own! I obviously have lots of jars of canned tomatillo salsa in my future. :) Also, there are lots of johnny jump ups that come up on their own every year. I planted some in a pot several years ago and they have spread and spread. Even into my vegetable garden bed but I don't mind. I love seeing their cheery faces in the midst of everything else! So, here are the garden pictures...
Main garden bed
Tomatillos
Main bed with johnny jump ups
Potato planter
Spinach, tomatillos, sunflower, etc
Tiny lemon!
Ripening strawberries
Blueberries
Front yard bed
Blackberries
Volunteer pea
Giant pumpkin
And here are our girls. Well, hopefully they are all girls. We haven't discovered that any are roosters. Yet. Right now we usually get 2 chicken eggs and 1 duck egg a day. But our Valentine's Day chicks are almost old enough to start laying. Then we might get as many as 8 chicken eggs a day!
Our girls
Our girls 2
  Alright, I think that's it for now. I think we have a few pictures from last weekend but they're on the other computer so when I copy them I'll try to post them here. Hope you have a great weekend!

Hello. So, today was Big R's follow up appointment for his finger.  It truly is fractured and he ended up needing an actual cast on it. For at least 6 weeks. Yay. Well, he's actually pretty excited about it right now. He thinks it's pretty cool and "science-y." Because the cast material goes on flexible then gets hard. We'll see how he feels when it gets hotter and it gets hot and sweaty under there and he can't swim and all that. Blogger is (still) having problems with uploading photos so I'm uploading photos to Flickr again. You can just click on the orange text which is linked to the photos. He did get a manly colored cast. Blue. And a bit of red tape. So he's kind of patriotic. Big R with cast

And our gardening is going pretty well this year. We've got spinach ready to harvest now. Spinach And lettuce growing fast. Lettuce The strawberries are blossoming (blossoms) and we've even got strawberries growing. Berries I can hardly wait until they're ripe! We planted Italian (flat leaf) parsley last year and it has reseeded and spread like crazy. strawberries vs parsley In the front yard we cleared a space and planted zucchini, yellow squash, and pumpkins. MoMo had brought home a cabbage plant from school and she planted that up there, too. front yard bed We built a rough planter out of pallets and filled it with compost we had made and planted 10 pounds of seed potatoes in there, both Yukon Gold and Red Pontiac. The plants have come up and seem to be thriving so hopefully we'll be able to harvest plenty of potatoes in a few months. Potatoes We have some tomato plants but we haven't put them in the ground yet since the weather is still unpredictable. It's been mostly warm but a couple of nights ago we had freezing temps overnight. So we've been moving the tomatoes (and dwarf lemon tree and dwarf fig) inside on nights where it is likely to freeze. We've still got more we want to plant--some peppers and cauliflower and things. Maybe we'll get that done this weekend.

I've also been cutting some fabric. I signed up for another I Spy fabric swap. I had 6 fabrics from previous swaps that had enough to use for this swap. I Spy squares Which meant I had to get 4 more fabrics. I cut 20 squares from 10 different fabrics for a total of 200 squares. Then I get 200 different squares back. So, I cut the squares from the 6 fabrics I had and I'm waiting on the other fabrics to come in the mail. I Spy fabric on order I also have a big pile of triangles cut out for the triangle baby quilt, just waiting to be sewn together. Triangles I've got a couple of other projects planned, as well. May totally snuck up on me. I saw something a couple of days ago that said Mother's Day was 12 days away or something. That took me completely by surprise. In my mind it was further away. And right along with Mother's Day I've got no fewer than 3 birthdays this month. So, yeah, it'll be a busy month.

Well, I think that's all for now. Have a wonderful weekend!

Well, we just got back from the doctor's office. Big R has a new accessory. Unfortunately Blogger isn't cooperating with photo uploads--again. Irritating. Ok, then, here's a link to the photo on Flickr.
 Link to photo
Yup, that's a splint on his right pinkie finger. A couple of days ago there was a mysterious collision between said finger and MoMo's knee. Not sure how that happened exactly. Kind of an odd body part collision, if you ask me. But in any case, obviously it hurt pretty badly and it swelled some but he could move it and all so I didn't think it was broken and we just iced it. I figured it would improve in a day or two but it stayed swollen so I took him to get it checked out. They took x rays and the doctor thought she saw a fracture. She wants a radiologist to take a look for a confirmation but in the meantime Big R's sporting a splint. Unfortunately the doctor had to make do with purple bandage. She apologized profusely for not having a more "manly" color available at the time. (I went to the store promptly and purchased blue tape so when we change the tape he won't have to suffer with purple anymore) So, he's going to be in a splint for at least a week. Six weeks (or more) if it is indeed fractured. We're waiting on a phone call to get the radiologist's verdict and we have a follow up appointment next week. In the meantime, guess he's going to have to learn to write left handed!

Hey there, just wanted to pop in with a preview of my latest quilt top.

I actually started this one over a year ago. I began in January with a lot of ambition and purpose and got 4 columns done pretty quickly. Then I put it aside for whatever reason (that I can't recall now) and it got relegated to the works-in-progress black hole. But I managed to rescue it yesterday and it didn't take long to finish the last column and trim up the sides. It needs a bit more trimming to even out the tops and bottoms and they need to be stitched all together. Then I think I will add borders all around. This quilt is a long overdue one. It's going to a friend who I promised a quilt over 5 years ago! I did tell him at the time that I had a number of quilts to make before I could make him his but I totally intended to get his done a lot sooner. Story of my life, it seems. Anyway, trimming the sides gave me a pile of what I think look almost like little pennants and I can't quite bring myself to toss them.

Aren't they cute? Perhaps I could use them in one of the borders of the quilt. I don't know but I think these have a destiny beyond the trash can.