I spent some time today cutting out hearts. I have been pondering in my mind how to help out our nursing home ministery since I can't attend the monthly parties they throw for the residents. I have decided to make some of the 80+ door prizes they give to the residents. Out of my stash I pulled some Valentines looking fabric. One more femine for the ladies and one more masculine for the men. I am making heart shaped baskets and will fill them with candies. I am also pondering making some small stuffed hearts with something about 2 Cor. on them. The children and I will do some baking to send also. Red velvet cake or cupcakes sounds good.

Sew Long for Now.

My skirt is finished. I cut it out and then serged the raw edges yesterday. I also marked and made the four pleats yesterday. Today I made the casing, adjusted the length, added the lining and put it all together and hemmed it. It is a fairly heavy weight denim that should keep me nice and warm.

I have been doing all manner of other things the past several days. Shopping, taking children to music lessons and 4H, getting the oil changed in the car, shopping, shipping packages, shopping, paying bills, lessons, shopping, cooking. For some one who hates to leave home I sure do spend a lot of time away from home. I have a little plaque in front of me that reads "For Everything There Is A Season." I have to keep reminding myself that this too shall pass. Life will settle down into a routine someday soon and the running will slow down.

Yesterday afternoon our little bee keeper came running in the house all excited. He and a friend had found the skull of a small animal in the woods across from our home. It is now proudly displayed in a glass box his sister gave him, right up on his dresser with his models. Today he came home with some more of the bones to the animal.

This is what is laying on my kitchen counter right now. Boys, you gotta love them.

Sew Long for Now!

It's been a week since I last updated. I have only cut out a skirt and lining to sew in that department. I have been working on knitting squares for an throw and crocheting squares for a throw. The colors in this picture are not showing up the way they actually look in real life. The General had a new computer built for me last week and he hasn't been able to load of my software back on it. This is my very own computer. Our old one is going into the family room for the rest of the family to use. This one will be just for my sewing and working. That man spoils me.

Speaking of spoiling me, he really has lately. He gets up every Saturday morning and cooks me breakfast and then cooks supper on Saturday evenings. He is such a blessing. I thank God every day for bringing this man into my life. I don't deserve how good he treats me.

My aunt passed away last week and was laid to rest today. I drove up to my folks today and attended the funeral with them. My family is a little complicated, but this lady had a large part in shaping my life in my early years. You see she was our nanny growing up. When the last child started school she married my uncle and stayed in the family by becoming my aunt. I was raised in a conservative religion and my aunt was Pentecostal. They laugh and tell of how she took me to church with her on Wednesday nights and how much I loved it because her church had an organ, music, and the people clapped their hands. Quite a difference from our church were we didn't even have Sunday School.

Oh, my oldest son marched with the VMI band and the Corp in the inaugural parade today. He has had so many wonderful opportunities at school there.

I hope to get my skirt sewn up this week and get some more sewing done. I have lots of ideas floating around in my head. They seem to center on quilts though. I wonder if these frigid temperatures have that effect on me?

Sew Long for Now!

Day In My Life

It's January 14th. Every month on the fourteenth I like to join in reading and leaving a post about a day in the life of women bloggers around the globe. This is sponsored by Little Jenny Wren.

The clock turned over to the 14th at midnight and found me working. I got off at 1:30 a.m. Before going to bed I spent 40 minutes going through e-mails and trying to reply to them all. I am very behind on things like this because with my new schedule I haven't got the hang of where to fit everything in. I will work it out though! About 2:20 a.m. I went to bed.

I woke up at 10:30. I really wasn't wanting to get up, I wanted to get "just 5 more minutes sleep." Today is one of my two days off from work this week. Since it is Wednesday though I knew I needed to get up and get going with other tasks. I got up and went to check on the children to see that they were working their way through the lists I had left them on the frig. Every night I post a list for the next days school lessons and chores on the frig. The children get up and do what they can on their own and I check what they have done and help them with other lessons when I get up. They were dilligently working through their lessons. I just received a rice cooker and wanted to wash it out so I could use it with supper this evening. I am hestitant to get small appliances because they seem more work then the time they bost in saving you.

After washing up the rice cooker and balancing our bank account, I made smoothies and did Devotions with the children. Then I took a shower and went off to get dressed and start a load of laundry. The children dusted the living room when I was doing this.

Sunlight on the "new" piano in our living room. Some one gave us this 1916 piano. It works, we do need to get it tuned after it had been left sitting unplayed for years. We are letting it set a few weeks because it on a wooden floor and then we will have the man come tune it.

While I was in my room I got together supplies to make cards with the children during art lessons because we have are behind send our thank you cards out for Christmas.

While I read out loud about the Flemish Baroque period they worked on making their Thank You cards. When I finished I made a couple for The General and I to send

A few samples. The one on the left was made by Captain Kitty, the middle one by me, and the one on the right by our little bee keeper. I checked the mornings lessons. Then I puttered a few minutes while getting ready for our afternoon read aloud.

One of the jobs I did was add water to the fountain our little bee keeper gave me for Christmas. It is a lovely fountain that I have put in the living room. I love the way it looks at night when it is dark and the light in the fountain shines. It is very soothing.

We are reading a book by G. A. Henty during read aloud called With Cortez in Mexico. About 3:15 p.m. The General came home. We spent a few minutes talking while he worked on putting a new baking element in the stove. Ours broke last week and I have not been able to use the oven until the new part came in. Then I was off to take Captain Kitty to her violin lessons. Before I left I set up the rice cooker and turned it on.

When we got home from violin lessons I checked the cooker and the rice was done. I had chicken marinating and I cooked that up while CK got out the salad that was already prepared in the frig and helped me set the table. Over supper everyone declared the rice cooker a keeper. Our little bee keeper who usually refuses to eat rice because he hates the sticky way it tastes when I cook it on the stove ate three helpings! It cooked the rice to perfection. I see this appliance being used a lot.

CK and I cleaned up from supper and then The General and I dropped them off at church for Awana and Junior High. The General took me to show me where our little bee keeper went to 4-H. He had been taking him, but I will be taking him now. Then we went to Sam's and did some grocery shopping. We went back to the church to pick up the children and then home to unload the groceries. Everyone had a snack and began to get ready for bed. While the boys were going to bed CK came in to where I was about to get on the computer and wanted to talk about all that happened tonight in JH. We spent some time talking and then I sent her off to bed. I am amazingly getting to blog this on the day it actually happend! Usually, I don't. I will be off in a few minutes to bed. Tomorrow I have the day off from my paying job, but my real job never ends and I will be here doing that as usual!

View off my front porch at sunset.

Sew Long for Now!

I spent some time the past two days embroidering warm-up pants for a basketball team. I had done pants for them last year and they ask me to do the pants for the new team members. It's a fun job. I plan to work on a skirt for me soon. I have some grey denim that I would like to make into a new skirt.

Most of this week has been spent catching up. My house work has suffered so much over the past several months. Each day this week we have worked deep cleaning a room in the house. To me this is such satisfying work. Monday we cleaned the kitchen and I rearranged how I had some items on the counters to make the flow a bit better. The General liked the new spot I put his coffee maker. Tuesday we cleaned the livingroom including pulling all the movies off the shelves and dusting them. The bee keeper volunteered to put them back alphabetically. Wednesday we cleaned the bathroom and stairwell. I cleaned out the medicine cabnet and culled it of out of date supplies. Today I finally got to clean the sewing room. I moved some things on the shelves around so I can reach often used things more easily. Tomorrow I plan on cleaning my bedroom and switching the General and my dressers around. I will also have to move my 1925 Singer Treadle sewing machine in the livingroom to a different spot tomorrow. We have been given a 1916 upright piano and the General is going to pick it up tomorrow. I think it was made by Grinnell Brothers. It is an upright and still plays. It needs tuning, but we need to put in place and let it sit a few weeks before we have that done.

I can't express the satisfaction I have from being able to take care of my home myself these days. I love to keep our little home neat and tidy. I even enjoyed cooking supper tonight. I don't often get to cook these days. Off to bed.

Sew Long for Now!

Has it really been that long since I blogged? Life here has been so hectic. Thankfully though a few changes have been for the better. We are no longer delivering papers. I had my first day off from work since March 2007 on December 31, 2008. It felt so nice to be able to sleep more than 3 hours in a row and to spend the day sewing. I spent quite a few days last week sewing and completed my daughter's dress that she wore to the Vintage Ball. This is my version of the 1910 Tea Dress pattern sold by Sensibility Patterns at Sensibility.com

She picked out the material and ask for a few alterations to the pattern such as the material meeting in the front and the length of the overskirts. I wasn't able to attend, but she was escorted by two fine looking gentlemen.

Her father and older brother. I don't know what setting I was using on this camera, but it distorted the picture terribly. They really are not as wide as the picture makes them look! I hope to be able to get on a more regular schedule sewing, blogging, and living now.

Sew Long for Now!