Weekend Recap

Friday night - 11:00 P.M. Meghan, Justin, Bridger, and Taplin arrive after a long drive. Bridger got out of the car asking for apple juice and a movie. What grandparents could refuse such a sweet guy? Louie is happy to have company and share the pallet on the family room floor.Friday night 11:45 P.M. It might be close to midnight, but Taplin is still a happy little one. Clean jammies, a bottle, and Mommy is all it takes. He's grown so much in the last four weeks. Saturday morning, 9:00 A.M. -- Breakfast with Cherise, Jenny, and Meghan and their husbands. It's hard to believe these three graduated from Grissom ten years ago. Three fine young women, if I don't say so myself. Cherise lives in D.C., and Jenny lives in the Dayton area.
Saturday, 1:00 P.M. No nap for Bridger. It's time to play. He can build roads and race cars for hours and hours. Brrrrmmmm, brrrrmmmm. When he get tired of that, he takes a break for a puzzle or two, then back to the cars. Hours and hours of cars. 2:00 P.M. Saturday - Aunt Shannon and the boys share a moment. I guess Louie is one of the boys. Later in the afternoon -- Uncle Nathan takes a turn with Taplin. 4:oo P.M. Bridger and Taplin get to meet Nathan and Shannon's nephew, eight-month-old Mac. 6:00 P.M. - Spiderman protects his mom. He's our super-grandson!
Taplin's looking all grown up. At four months, he weighs 14 pounds 12 ounces, and he is about 26 inches long. Check out that hair!Taplin is a happy baby. He cries for his bottle or when he first wakes up, but he is usually ready with a smile. His arms and legs are on the move, and he is wide-eyed and curious.9:00 P.M. Saturday -- It's an Everette Sandwich. Don't squish Taplin!! 10:oo P.M. Two tired guys watch some T.V.
Sunday morning, we take it slow, and then the Millers, Everettes, and Etheridges head out to lunch before the boys and Justin and Meghan hit the road south.

Sieze the Day

Saturday morning, we decided that life is short. We needed to leave the laundry and cleaning and the work world behind and put some miles on our new car. Shoot, gas is down to about $3.50 a gallon, and we're getting about 34 mpg on the highway. Why not! If you don't recognize the city, it is Nashville. We went downtown to the Farmer's Market first. The colors and buzz of people made it seem more like a festival. Tomatoes were in abundance, but we didn't buy any this time. We did get green beans, new potatoes, and peppers. I don't think we can eat all of the peppers this week, but we did have one chopped up in our hash browns at lunch today. Sweet, sweet flavor. Look at the size of these guys. They are sitting in my giant dough bowl, so the ordinary sized ones look little. However, the truth is that the bigger red and yellow ones are actually giant. The market is in several buildings. We had a terrific fun in the international shop, which seemed to primarily carry Indian spices and foods. Since we ate at an Indian restaurant this summer in Denver with Allen's colleagues who are from India, we recognized many more of the items than we would have. Their prices were excellent, so we came home with a bag of treasure like star anise and colorful mint coated fennel seed. That is typically used as an after dinner mint.We opted for small bags, not the giant size like this bag of turmeric. I rarely, if ever, have used turmeric and cannot imagine why anyone would use this much unless it was for a restaurant. Shopping for food left us hungry, so on the way to the quilt store in Franklin (you didn't think we'd skip that, did you??), we ate at the Franklin Chop House. I had beef medallions cooked in garlic butter on a bed of mashed potatoes and fried okra on the side. Excellent.

Louie felt left out yesterday, I guess. Today, he had a long walk with Allen and several other short walks too, but that didn't mean he was too tired to stay out of trouble. While I was sewing, he kept attacking my foot that controls the sewing machine. Not a good plan at all! I tried sewing with him on my lap, but that was just impossible, so I picked him up and planted him on the sewing stool I have stowed under my cutting table. I couldn't tell if he was terrified or terribly proud of himself for being up there. Poor Louie. He loves spending time with me, probably even when I won't play his games, but tomorrow is a school day.

Thank goodness for weekends

If Louie could read, maybe he wouldn't be so busy stealing things. This is a catalog. Maybe he wants to go shopping. The key thing is that he can get our attention by stealing things. If we could conquer this problem, he would be the perfect pug. More or less.
This is what Louie thinks he should do on Sunday morning. It's pretty much the same thing that I like to do on Sunday morning. Of course, I actually read the paper, while he likes to snuggle down by me while I read. He enjoys having me home, and after going back to school this week and spending so many hours there, I agree with him totally.

I don't know why these pictures look fuzzy because they really aren't if you click on them to enlarge them or if you look at them on my Flickr pages.
In any event, I finished this vacation projects last night! I had such fun making this batik quilt. I hand pieced the blocks mostly while we were in Denver, and I found the green sashing material as well as the backing at the Great American Quilt Factory there. Then I machine quilted it to the best of my limited machine quilting ability, and I finished the binding last night. I am calling it Paintbox because it reminds of of a watercoloring box when the drips from one color spill into another. Right now it is hanging on the banister of our balcony.
Who is the handsome little fellow with my handsome son-in-law Nathan? Let me introduce Nathan's sister Michelle's baby Mac. He is just adorable.
I love hand pictures. Nathan and Mac are playing a duet. I don't think Mac had played on a piano before. He was a little shy at first, but he had fun with Nathan and Shannon pressing keys.
Oh Louie, you're being as tolerant as a pug can be, aren't you! Louie turned one in June, and Mac is about seven months old, born at Christmas time.Saturday was a horribly hot, muggy Alabama roaster of a day. The heat didn't keep it from being a busy day at the Farmer's Market. This is Peaches and Cream corn, just the best in my opinion. One dozen ears for $5 - a bargain this year.The pepper guy had a bounty of colorful vegetables. We bought poblano peppers (for stuffed peppers), some jalepeno peppers, and green peppers. The colors are vibrant, and the green banana peppers reminds me of my quilt. Besides the corn and peppers, we also picked up green beans, potatoes, watermelon, zucchini, onions. Support your local growers.

End of July - End of Vacation

This past weekend was great fun. We took a quick trip to Mobile to be with Meghan and Justin for Taplin's baptism. The brothers are a treat for Grandma and Grandpa! After the service, Meghan put together a little reception in the parlor after the service with cake and punch. Great photo opportunity! Taplin has on his daddy's christening outfit. He'll be too big to wear it next week. Bridger liked the cake part!
Oh well, back to Huntsville and then back to school for me. Some people say that teachers going back to school in July is ridiculous. I don't have any strong feelings about that because I enjoy having vacation begin at the end of May when the weather is so wonderful in Huntsville. Now, it is just hot and humid, and I may as well be inside. Louie stealing a back scratcher and then holding it up, well, that really is ridiculous.


This is the downhill half of the train ride that we took in LaVeta in July. I should have posted it several weeks ago, but I didn't. However, at the end of vacation (can't say end of summer when it is still July) it is bitter sweet to look back and relive some great moments.

Wrapping up some projects

This has been a wonderfully stress free, schedule free week. I puttered around the house, and I worked a wee bit, a very wee bit, on school prep, but mostly I played on the computer and spent time in my sewing room. I actually finished a few projects, or at least I am close. This is the batik quilt that I worked on during our two week Colorado time. I hand pieced the squares, a first for me, and then I found the sashing green batik at the Great American Quilt Factory in Denver with help from one very kind woman who works there. I really enjoyed the hand piecing, which I never thought I would even try. This wasn't a complicated pattern or one with points that had to match, but I might try another one.
Now I'm working on machine quilting it. I see all of my own mistakes when I quilt like this, and I get frustrated with my lack of skill in machine quilting. However, I know that once it is finished, the little problems will fade and I will like it much better than I do right this minute. I am using my walking foot, not, I repeat not, doing free motion quilting. Maybe a smaller piece after lots of practice. The red and yellow quilt hasn't progressed this week except to be moved out of the way for the moment.This was a fun pincushion project that I played with one morning. How come I find stuffing so difficult? It seems like it would be child's play. The yellow button, by the way, has been floating around in my button jar forever. It came from something my mother made at some point. Who knows. Buttons are fun.
I used the new pincushion while I put the binding on the Green Mountain Stars quilt. Last weekend, my machine quilter Lin Hayden called to say that my quilt was ready to be picked up. I took it to her last October or November, and I was so excited to finally see it quilted. I can't imagine doing one this size myself. I spent several evenings on the binding, and Louie loved pressing up against me while I worked.
It's finished! I don't have any place big enough to spread it out. It's for our bed when the weather turns cooler. Like the other bed size quilts I've done, it is a very warm quilt. Cozy. I won't be too excited to let Louie on it. This quilt took more thinking, especially the border. I am pretty proud of it. I had no idea that this quilting thing would be so addictive.

Louie's Weekend

Louie had a great weekend because we were mostly home with him.
Good boy, Louie! That's your own rawhide, not something that belongs to people. Louie loves to sleep on the red couch when someone works on the computer. He was keeping an eye on us Sunday afternoon while we hung the new quilt that I finished.It looks good, I think. I like how whole rooms look different when you change one little thing. I am getting ready for school to start, and that means I'll be in this room even more. I am pretty excited about my new Shannon Miller Creative designed school web site. Thank you, Shannon!
Oh, Louie, you love helping Allen write important email, don't you. The funny thing is that he wants to sit on our lap or on the couch or on the bed, but he can only jump up on the red one upstairs by himself. He needs a lift for anything higher, so although he asks to get up, the minute we go to help him, he evades our touch. I do, but I don't. Kind of like Bridger's two-year-old thinking. He enjoyed reading the Sunday morning paper with us, and he spent the evening on the couch helping me do some hand sewing.
Too bad the weekend is over. What???? Where are you Louie? Are you helping with Monday laundry? Is the underwear load your favorite?