These are our oldest son's children who live in Texas.  We saw them over Thanksgiving week.  I will find a picture of all three of our daughter's children.  It is difficult finding them all in the same picture.

My unfinshed applique blocks.  I've been trying to get four finished in my lifetime.  They are 36" squares and without that fourth block they will never be a quilt.  Sometimes I put them out so it will remind me I need to pick the fourth pattern and get with it.  I took a class taught by Terry Thompson quite a few years ago, can you tell applique is not my favorite thing to do?

Another unfinished, after putting these together I got interested in making the blocks in a different color and they became a Halloween quilt.  But I need to add a border to the blue quilt top so it's off my shelf.

I like the colors so much better in the Halloween quilt.  This quilt was October in the 2009 American Patchwork & Quilting calendar.

I want to share some of my treasured little wall hangings from a dear friend.

 Yoshiko Kurihara lives in her home country of Japan.  She is a dear friend who belonged to my quilting bee group about 20 years ago. She and her husband moved back to Japan about 18 years ago and we have stayed in contact with each other.  She won the grand prize at the Tokyo International Quilt Festival 2006.  She makes amazing art quilts.  I feel honored to have received three of her Christmas wall hangings.  The one above is this years gift.

This is 2009 wall hanging

This is 2008 wall hanging.  Not only does she make charming little wall hangings, she also makes delightful Christmas post cards.  I will share those in the future.  Yoshiko also makes charming small bags, even one that just fits my ipod shuffle and it's tiny.  She has such talent and imagination.

Georgia, the beautiful tiny kitten, grew in the past six months.  She thought all the pretty shiny round things on the Christmas tree were hers.  She kept us busy all season trying to protect the decorations.

Atlanta had a white Christmas, the first in about 100 years.  We felt lucky to have it fall on the proper day, it never did amount to much, except it was beautiful while it was here.

The two grandchildren 4 and 10, who live in Georgia visited us for a day during school vacation.  Natalie sat very patiently adding macaroni while I put the drop of hot glue on the tree form.  She did very well for a four year old.  A good coat of silver paint and ribbon finished her tree, a gift for her Mom.  Austin worked on the candle for his Dad.  I remember almost everything about using crushed ice and a milk carton except for the wick.  We should have used a real candle in the center because the wick burnt up in a very short time.  Believe me whipping that hot paraffin made one big mess on the counter where there were no papers.

The most fun on Christmas Eve is exchanging hand made or free gifts.  Looks like the children had their share.  Free means anything you have gotten as a sample, premium, etc.,  nothing of much value usually, except for the fun of opening it.  I managed to get robes made for both children for their hand made gifts.  Think the final stitch came about 9PM on the day before Christmas Eve.  I'd rather make quilts!

This is just a small part of the new library in Burleson, Texas where our daughter, Cathy is librarian.  We visited the week of Thanksgiving and were fortunate to get the grand tour of the school.

Everything is bigger in Texas!

Christmas 2010

Ikea has the neatest things.

The mobile turns when the fans in my studio are on.  The bar can be hung straight or at an angle and you just adjust your the lengths of beads to where you want them with enclosed clips.  Thanks Ikea!

We have a new kitty at our house. Her name is Georgia.

We have welcomed Georgia into our home.  Her mother was lost or killed and a young woman found her and two other kittens under a bush.  She is about 5 weeks old and the vet says she is very healthy.  Our cat, Dallas, 16 years old, died last year and it has taken us a year and a half to be ready to welcome another cat into our lives.  She is just as sweet as can be and purrs when we pick her up, I think she'll be great fun to have around.  She is getting to be very playful and loves being on her back.

Travel in Italy

My Drex and I traveled to Italy June 11 and returned June 19. Italy countryside is very beautiful. We stayed the week in a villa in Castellina in Chianti with 13 other people. We all knew John and Beth Neidel, but did not know each other. We celebrated John's birthday and soon became friends with all of those there. Drex and I enjoyed the small villages. We saw so many beautiful buildings, flowers, and lots of good food. The people are friendly and if they didn't speak English, they always made a gracious attempt to help if we needed something. The main thing that I wanted to see was the tower in Pisa. It was magnificent and well worth the drive. The tower actually has a line of quilt blocks surrounding the first level. Who knew that way back when, someone choose to add quilt blocks in the marble.