IBOL box ready to go

Here is Butch looking over my IBOL (Iraqi Bundle of Love) which is ready to send. I included fabric, thread, buttons, yarn, crochet hooks, scissors and measuring tape. If any of you are interested there is still time. The deadline is September 7th.
Now onto something less serious. I found two Ziploc bags full of old wooden spools of thread. This is a small portion. I was so happy to find them. I am not sure what I am going to do with them but there is something very cool about them. I love the colors and the labels. I also got a bag of wooden spools of silk thread that I will photograph at a later time.

Busy week

It has been a wild week here. I got our exchange student registered for school and she is very excited about attending school here. She is has a full schedule of classes and a nice mix. I am pleased that she is so interested in the opportunities here for her.

I also have been working at Moose Creek and I spent a couple of days volunteering for our Hospice Organization. They have a annual Rummage sale and it was amazing. The first day they had over 2,ooo people go through the door and made $30,000 dollars the first day. I have never seen anything like this. They collect items for about 6 months and have the sale in a warehouse. I just can not believe that 2,000 people came and shopped. We live in a community of 2,500. So where does everyone come from?

Due to being so busy I have not been at my sewing machine at all. I am having withdrawal. I hope to get into the studio this week.

The photo in this post was an orchid my son gave me for mothers day. It just lost the last blossom the other day. I hope I can keep it alive to bloom again. I hope all of you are having a great weekend.

Salmon Fishing on the Rogue

This is my first salmon season here in Gold Beach. It is an amazing thing to me to watch so many boats in the mouth of the Rogue River doing a strange dance. The seem to go around in circles at a very slow speed. I have never gone out to fish for salmon myself but I really enjoy watching this.
The day I went out to take these photos there were not as many boats as I have seen but you get the idea. It is a beautiful place and I loved the low lying clouds.

I hope all of you are having a wonderful week and enjoying the last days of summer.

Fun at my favorite Quilt Store

When I traveled to Medford to pick up our exchange student at the airport I had to take a side trip to Ashland to my Favorite Quilt Shop. It is Fabric of Vision. Sandy has such fun fabric and is such a very nice woman.

These are some of my purchases. I love all of them however none of them go together.
I just thought they would be worth adding to my stash. Someday I will find just the right project for them.
These robots are just the cutest thing I have seen in a long time.
And who doesn't love the day of the dead fabric. I only got a fat quarter of this one but I am wishing I had gotten more.

Twisted Log Cabin Blocks

Here are the last couple of twisted log cabin squares for a quilt that will be donated. I made 4 squares for this quilt. I am amazed at the time it has taken to make these squares. I am not the best at very technical things and this has challenged me. This pattern was stitched on a paper pattern.
I loved sewing on the paper but I don't know if I could handle a whole quilt of it. The finished quilt will be 90 squares. Can't even imagine making all of them.

Visiting old friends and making new ones

I traveled to Ashland yesterday. I had a late lunch with my son which is always fun. I was able to stay with a good friend and go to dinner. This was the lovely drink I had. I just thought it was so pretty I had to take a photo of it. It was a lemon drop with some extras. MMMM Good.
So, today about noon I picked up our exchange student in Medford and drove the long 3 hour drive home. We spent the time getting to know each other. Miche does a good job of speaking and understanding english but it does not come easy for her. I do not speak any Spanish so we had some interesting moments trying to understand each other. She is a very sweet girl and I think it will all go well.

An added surprise when we arrived in town was the reader board at the high school, they posted a welcome for her. Living in a small town does have its benefits.

Life is about to change

I have spent the last couple of days cooking and spending time with our son and a friend. It was very fun to have a couple of young men here for a few days. I have a hard time not mothering both of them. I guess once a mother always a mother.

Now, I am going to find out if I am really into being a mother still. I am going to be picking up our rotary exchange student at the airport on Tuesday. She is 17 and from Ecuador. Neither Mark or I speak Spanish so I am hoping we can communicate. She will be staying with us for 3 months and then will have 2 other families she will be with for 3 months each. She will attend high school here and have the American Experience. I hope all goes well. We have done this before and it was a great experience but we have always been the 3rd host family not the first. I have spend a lot of time worrying if she will like us, if she will be homesick, and how we will communicate if she does not speak English. Wish me luck. The next time you hear from me I will be back to mothering a teenager.............

Iraqi Bundles of Love

I visited Jacquie's blog Tallgrass Prairie Studio last night and read her post about Iraqi Bundles of Love. This is a cool way to share your fabric, yarn, sewing notions with someone in Iraq. You can read more about the program on Kristin LaFlammes blog or her husband's blog . I thought this was a nice way to help so I am going to put together a box of goodies and bundle them up and send them on their way. I sent off a note last night for the address and received a reply promptly.

If you feel so inclined please take a look at the blogs and send along a bit of love. As we all know bundles of fabric are a wonderful thing. This is a short term project so get your goodies off by September 7th.

9 patch

My 9 patch is complete except for the boarders. This photo shows most of the quilt. I am going to put a boarder of squares similar to the strip in the quilt. I have them all assembled but I hope to get them sewn on later this week. When they get to close to being done it is very hard to go to work. But I had better be going. I hope everyone is having a good week.

I will post more after the boarder is attached. This is a queen size quilt.

Playing

This week while reading the blogs I follow I saw some work that really inspired me. Terry who has a blog called Sew It Goes posted some doodling with her sewing machine. This is my attempt. I am very new to free motion quilting so this is a beginners attempt but I really had fun. This is just a practice piece which has no real design concept but I think I learned how to move the fabric a bit with each pattern I tried.
It was a nice break from sewing 9 patch squares for my queen size quilt. I have to say sewing squares together is getting old but I just make myself do a few a day and I am getting there. I have also begun sewing squares together for the boarder.

Walking in the woods

On Friday I went with some friends to the Stout Grove. It is in the Jedediah Smith State Park in Northern California. It is just a magical place in the Redwood Forest.
Growing up in Wyoming I was used to small evergreen trees that grow in the harsh conditions in the mountains of the Rockies. To be in amongst these giant trees is amazing to me every time I see them. We had a nice drive and walk. Unfortunately I have yet to take a photo that I feel does them justice, yet I keep trying. For those of you who are Star War fans some of the scenes from the Return of the Jedi were filmed in the Redwoods of Northern California.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend.

My loom has a name

I have finally spent some more time with my loom. I have decided to name her Sophie. For some reason that seems to fit her. I have been doing quite a bit of research about my loom and I finally attached the harnesses. This loom has 4. I am still a bit unsure of how to attach the pedals but that will come. It has been a challenge to do something that I never thought I would get to do again. I learned to weave in College and have not done any since and that was 30 years ago.
Once I attach the pedals to the harnesses then the next step will be to warp the loom. I have decided my first project will be weaving some rag rugs. I have a book with some great information so I hope I can make it work.

I am happy to be progressing a bit even if it has taken me a while.

My Studio

Crazy Mom Quilts shared her studio and I thought I would do the same. I am very fortunate to have this little space for my creative side. It was a small garage at one point so as I take this photo I am standing out in the driveway. On nice days it is very nice to be able to open the garage door and have all kinds of fresh air and natural light. However on the down side when the garage door is closed there is no natural light. I am hoping at some point we can remove the garage door and put in a window and door.
This is the first time I have had a space that is all mine and I can work and leave my messes and they are not in anyone's way. I am finding that I am so much more productive when I have a space to myself.
I am also making a large cork board with wine and champagne corks. You can see to the left I have it covered but where you see the burgundy cloth there are no corks. Someday I will have it complete. I have family and friends saving corks for me. I like the way it is turning out.
This is our old computer desk which I have turned into my sewing table and it works very well. As you can see I have plenty of stuff to fill my space but I am enjoying having it all in one room.

I had hoped to sew today but instead I cleaned up the studio so I could share it with you.

A day on the river

Mark and I went up the Rogue River to spend the day. We took Butch and a picnic lunch and had a great time. Mark was out to find ripe Blackberries and he found them but they were not easy to find. Where we had lunch the ripe berries had been picked. So he had to do a bit of adventuring with the dog. However they both had fun.
Here we are. We discovered some new places we had not been to before. It was so good to find some new beautiful places close to home. There are many places to see here in Southern Oregon that are remote yet very beautiful and I am enjoying trying to find them. I hope to get into my studio tomorrow and make something but I defiantly enjoyed my day.

Photo Organization

This is a photo I took several years ago at Crater Lake here in Oregon. We hiked down to the lake from the rim and took a boat ride around the lake which is the deepest lake in North America. It was lovely. However the hike out back to the rim was killer but worth every step.

I have been trying to spend a bit of time trying to organize my digital photos. I am a terrible organizer when it comes to these things. I seem to do a good job of getting my photos downloaded but not such a good one at any sort of organization. Most of them are stored by date but at times I have tried to put them in files by subject. Now I have a mix of both.

How do you organize your photos? Now with Vista I seem to be having a hard time recognizing what is what with the folders.