It's Been Too Long!!!

Life has a way of moving so fast that I forget the reason I wanted to do this blog in the first place.  My intent was to create a scrapbook of my life that my 11 year old daughter (who is biologically my granddaughter) can look back on down the road when she might wonder what her "mother" might have done or thought.

Seeing this lovely child in peaceful slumber as we are traveling back home from seeing family in Kansas City gives me more joy than I can imagine.  Despite being raised by "older" parents this girl is as typical a "tween" as you can get.  She loves us, her dogs, my horse (which she insists is hers), her aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, great-grandparents and loves nothing better to spend time with them. Gymnastics is a passion of hers and loves, loves, loves that she is on the competition team! 

She has lots of friends and according to her teachers is a friend to all.  My son took her camping with his daughter (8 month older cousin) and their friends and couldn't say enough about how well behaved she was.  Despite all these accolades I am spouting, she is still a typical 11 year old:  talks back to me, knows everything about everything, argues, etc but still is a delight to be around.  She enjoys most things that 11 year old girls enjoy and some that most don't care to think about:  quilting!!! Makes my heart soar when she comes down to my studio (read unfinished basement) and joins my creating awesome quilts!  This quilt she made for an Education Assistant at her school.  She also quilted it herself on the longarm.  My lone contribution was the binding.

I have quite a few finished under my belt since last visiting here:

this wallhanging is now finished!

did some barn quilts, so fun

Star Wars quilts for my grand boys

work in progress

Life continues to be a work in progress, until next time.................

Christmas is less than  3 weeks away!! Hard to believe, time is flying way to fast.

The tree is up and we are loving having it on in the evenings.

The village is nearly ready

The Elf is up to her usual mischief, we never know what she will be getting into.

I made 12 placemats for family this year, and of course, none for myself!!  Have to get on that.

Keely sang with the school choir for the Castle Rock Starlighting ceremony,  such a wonderful small town tradition and everyone loves the star shining throughout the holiday season.

One of the many joys of living in Colorado is the abundance of winter activities.  Skiing is something we enjoy as a family and had the opportunity to spend a couple days up in Beaver Creek.  The beauty of the mountains never fail to amaze me. 

It's been another year of joy and wonder having a 10, soon to be 11 year old when you are in your 60's.  She truly does keep me young and on my toes.  She is smart, funny, affectionate, loves pretty much everything I love and still loves spending time with me. I hold these days in my heart because I know that as she gets older she will probably move away from me :-(  and spread those wings that today are still wrapped around me! 

It's been a busy last month and a half.  Have gotten a pretty good amount of quilting in and loving it!!

Made Krissy some placemats from a jelly roll she picked out when we went to Missouri Star Quilt Company.  I was so excited she went with!!  She only went to keep me company and it was most enjoyable to share my passion with my daughter.  The placemats are a simple quilt as you go and are so durable.  She has requested placemats for every holiday!  That will take a while to complete as I am easily distracted by other projects. 

Skyelar it getting bigger and bigger and absolutely LOVES the snow.  She would stay out and play for hours in the cold and snow.  I am feeling for her when summer it here, with all her hair I am pretty sure she will hate it!

I work part time at a quilt shop in Aurora, CO called The Threadloft and am teaching a bargello class the end of this month.  We will be completing a table runner with the option of going to the lap throw size.  Looking forward to it, will be my first "teaching" project!  I love working at the shop and definitely spend more than I make!  The owner is an amazing long arm quilter and I have and continue to learn and improve my long arm skills from her.  I have even quilted a couple of customer quilts which is so exciting for me.  I am so grateful for her patience and experience!

One thing I love about living in Castle Rock is the variety of wildlife found here.  We have the deer, I have seen antelope, coyotes, we have but I have not seen, mountain lions and bears also.  The last two are a bit scary to think about but we have moved into their homes and have to share the land with them.  We are pretty careful with our puppies at night!!  Recently a couple of blocks away from us a family had their dog taken by a lion from their yard and one of Keely's friends dog has been attacked twice by coyotes!! 

Keely got her new bike for Easter and found a warm day to ride.  The star top is finished and on her bed.  Her favorite part of the quilt is her name I quilted in one of the white blocks, she loved it.  The quilt was made with a layer cake of Kaffe Fassett and a white layer cake.  The pink border is Tula Pink and the outer border is Kaffe Fassett also. It is stippled with a few flowers thrown in.

Until next time......................................

Go Broncos:  in honor of the Broncos winning the super bowl, I made this for my sister: 

Winter has been an up and down prospect so far this year, while today it will be in the 60's just a week ago we had this:

Was over a foot of snow, closed school for a day, which is practically unheard of in Castle Rock!! 

 

I have finished a couple of projects so far this year:

I seem to be on a roll!!!

 

Krissy asked for placemats for each season, here is the first installment just in time for Valentine's Day

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


Decided to learn how to use the Bloc_loc rulers and I have to confess I am madly in love with them!  They make half square triangles and half square rectangeles so much easier!

Bloc_loc square
 

 

 

 

My little one turned 10 last week!  I can hardly believe she is that old.  She loves gymnastics and wanted her party at Chameleon Gymnastics Academy where she takes lessons.  The girls had a blast. Keely is obsessed with gymnastics and is working diligently to make it on the competitive team.  Should happy in the spring (fingers crossed)

 

I am now working part time at a local quilt shop called The Thread Loft and am in heaven!! Spending all of my paycheck at the shop but who cares!  Playing with fabric and the long arm makes me so incredibly happy.  I enjoy quilting and creating so this is right up my alley!

 

 

fun times

So here we are, school is well under way.   As a matter of fact Keely has fall break starting a week from today!!  Summer was quick and fun.  We made it to Kansas City and my daughter and her family visited us here also.  My daughter absolutely LOVES Colorado so have high hopes that in the very near future she will be living here!

 

Went to a Kansas City Royals game with my son Jason, daughter, Krissy, and son-in-law Jeff.  We won, lots of fun.

 

 

Keely took riding lessons and this was her first time having a lesson on my horse Avalon.  She was awesome!  Avalon has such an easy sweet disposition and took very good care of her.

 

Keely rocked the first day of school in this amazing dress given to her by my sister.  I can't believe she is in 4th grade.  Time is flying way to fast.  It's amazing to go through being a parent again at my age (60), after thinking we were done.   This year she decided to call me "mom" instead of nana, makes things so much easier for her at school and after all I am her mom in all ways other than having given birth to her!  She is such a joy to me and I love every moment of being with her.

 

 

Made a few pillows and am overjoyed at how they turned out.  The named pillows are for the grands.  Keely absolutely loves hers and it has a place of honor on her bed.   Krissy wants one of the Halloween bench pillows so I have made 2!! One for her and one for me!  She informed me she wants as many or all of the pillows in that series.

 

 

Finally, meet the newest member of our family!  We welcomed Oreo (named by Keely) to our family and are thrilled to have her.  She is a mini Australian Shepherd.  Sweet as can be and so far very smart!  Loves everyone and will be a great companion for Keely!!

 

 

 

Quilty fun!

I have been obsessed lately with quilting!!

 

December 1st found me starting Bonnie's Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt, SO.MUCH.FUN!!

 Just finishing up the binding and then FINISHED!  Wow there were a lot of pieces to this quilt!!

 

 

Some other projects I have been working on lately:

 

Tote bags for the grand girls!

 

Wreath for Keely's teacher

 

Valentine wreath for front door

 

Wreath for Keely's door

 

 

 

 

 

Finally..........someone got what the most wanted for birthday this year:  (we are such suckers!)