I'm a winner!!.......

The other night while I was dealing with J.J.'s high numbers I get an e-mail saying I'm a winner. What a bright spot to a bad night!

What had happened was my absolute favorite quilt designer, Carrie Nelson over at Miss Rosie's Quilt Company started up a blog. She had a "giveaway". She was going to giveaway a quilt kit to a person who commented on her blog. Well, I happened to read the blog about 8 hours after the deadline. So I didn't comment. When she announced the winner, it ended up she gave away 15 kits....everyone who commented. Even those that commented late. MAN was I bummed. So I made a comment. And you know what happened next. She e-mailed telling me I was a winner too!! She is soooo sweet, and very generous!!

This is what I won!



Can you believe it?

The only problem....when I picked out this pattern (she gave us 4 to choose from)....I didn't realize it was extremely similar to a project I just put together and bought!!!



Look at that! I must have a one track mind!!!

So now I'm somewhat wishing I had picked another kit, but also wondering if I should just make both of them since they are a little different, or return the packs of fabric to Jess's quilt shop, and start over.....hmmmmm...what to do?

Are you going to blog about that?...

Having been a blogger for less than a year, my family has come to realize that they may be the target of a blog post. Sometimes after an incident I hear, "You're not going to blog about that, are you?" OR " I can see a blog post about this."

One such incident occurred on Labor Day. Now mind you, I would not share this, but the person involved keeps asking me if I have blogged about it, which makes me wonder....."Does this person really want me to share with the world what they did?" I tend to think this person does. So here is the rest of the story....

On Labor Day we went on a nice family bike ride. As we were riding along the topic with J.J. was all about wheelies. He tries to do them all the time. So someone in our group says...."I can do one.....watch."

So we all watch this person do a wheelie and hear J.J. saying over and over:

"Wow, how do you do that ______? That is soooooo cool, _______? I really want to do that. Wow!!!"

But in a matter of seconds my heart stops..... it is quite apparent that this person cannot LAND the wheelie gracefully......and ends up landing on the concrete.... shoulder and face first.

This person gets up quickly saying "I'm fine, guys, I'm fine. See, I'm fine."

But then sees blood drop from his/her forehead and quickly drops to the ground and says "I'm going to pass out." This person is extremely squeamish when it comes to blood.

The interesting part about this is that it happened about 100 yards from a group of "walkers". They didn't see the crash, but saw that we were all huddled around someone on the ground, and began walking toward us.

It was at this point the person sits up and again says, "I'm fine."

And in reality the person will be fine. Merely a few flesh wounds.....one small cut to the eye, an abrasion on the shoulder, possible broken thumb(said person refuses to get it checked out, says it will heal.), and a nasty cut on a finger.

After returning home, we decide to head to McDonald's for ice cream cones. It is on the way that we all ask this person to:

NEVER DO A WHEELIE AGAIN!!!

In my mind I replay the image of a son cheering on a father saying: " Wow!! That is so cool!!"

Then as the father crashes the son says : "NOT COOL!!"

So there you have the latest....."Oh, I can see you blogging about this........." episode.

Happy Happy Birthday Hubby!!!

WE LOVE YOU!!

Summer Recap......

Summer seems to be winding down with everyone talking about school starting up. I so had intentions to keep up with blogging....but with our internet on the fritz it made it hard. So here is a quick recap of what's been happening around here.....

FAIR.....

Jess was the only one to put anything in the fair this year. She decided to put items in two different fairs. She won a trip to state but decided to decline it this year. She received 3 grand champions as well as a few reserves in the county fairs. WAY TO GO JESS!!!

Gardening.....




The garden did really well this summer. I didn't have to water once!! We've had just enough rain to keep it going. We had many pests, though....a couple of pesky gophers and a few moles, plus various insects. Overall it's doing quite well....we hope to pick corn by the end of this week. Right now there's lots of canning and preserving going on.

Camping.....



We spent a couple weekends in August camping at state parks in Minnesota. Thankfully we avoided any major rain and had a great time.

Finger Lickin' Good....Chicken Butchering....

WARNING......GRAPHIC PHOTOS!!!!

Yesterday was THE day!! It was time to get rid of these meat chickens. Once they start attacking me.....that's it.....ON THE GRILL THEY GO!!!!

I came home from a trip and went to feed the chickens. Not a big deal until I was walking out of the pen and heard HIM.....the rooster was running after me and got my heal. I was freaked out!! So that's that....I don't need to deal with mean roosters.



We have helped butcher chickens before, and watched a friend of ours do it. We've done it both ways.....where the chicken is put in a pot of boiling water then plucked and where the chicken is just skinned. We decided to just skin these chickens.....so much easier and we tend to take off the skins anyway.

We checked on the internet and found a few sites that helped us determine where to cut, etc. This is the main one we used http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles2/grim79.html.
This site had great info!! So here we have set up our butchering station!! LAPTOP and all!!:-)



THEN.....OFF WITH THE HEADS!!



Having a degree in animal science I've witnessed a lot, but I've never personally witnessed the butchering of one OUR animals. So this was a first for me. After the first one was over with.....which was the MEAN ROOSTER......I was fine with the rest.

We ended up with 15 lbs of meat out of 5 Cornish Cross chickens----3 pullets, 2 cockerels. The males ended up giving me a ton more meat....so next time I'm buying all roos!! They are worth the few cents extra!

P.S......I have one more picture....but it's one my wonderful hubby took of the guts....or entrails for those out there that are trying to increase their vocabulary. If you're crazy....check it out here.

Quilt Surgery.....

Somehow.....someway......this grease spot magically appeared on the corner of the quilt I'm working on!!:-( Mr. NOT ME did it.....I'm sure your house has one too!!)

Thankfully I found a scrap that would work to replace the damaged piece. So.....

"Seam ripper" ....check!

"Thread".....check!!

"Needle"......check!!

"Ma'am.....the surgery was a success....thankfully the piece that needed to be replaced was in the corner....not the center....so.....you will have this quilt for many more years to come!!":-)

My Coloring Purse......

I was able to finish this little coloring purse in a little over a day!!! The pattern came together easy enough, but I did make a couple mistakes.....like putting the loop on the wrong side, and cutting on the bias (per the instructions) but should've cut with the grain to get the striping effect. Oh well, lesson learned. I did shorten the strap because my daughter wanted it shorter....but it can go at least 12 inches longer!!


One thing I would have changed on this pattern is the corners.....I think I'll round them next time instead of cutting off the corners.

Pattern: My Coloring Purse by Clothesline Quilts
Fabric: Fresh Squeezed by Sandy Gervais for Moda