Is it time to get back to normal yet?

No, Not quite. I finally downloaded my pictures from Christmas, so here are a couple of snaps:

Christmas Eve with the Family

Making Freezer bag omelets on Christmas morning in our jammies

Our daughter-in-laws job frequently takes her to construction sites

so Mike gave her his pink hard-hat that he got when he crewed for

the Susan G. Koman Breast Cancer walk.

This is the gift that Rafael had worked so hard on the weeks preceeding

Christmas. He would come over on his lunch hour to paint.

The day after Christmas we went to Brian and Jen's house. Here

are the boys playing Wii.

Jen fixed a wonderful homemade pizza dinner for us.

It is so fun to create your own pizza!

Fa La La La La

The Christmas rush is over! The packages have been wrapped and unwrapped.

The cookies and fudge made and (almost) all eaten.

The parties are over.....

Phew! I'm really looking forward to some time where there is nothing to cook and clean for! Seems like that is all I have done for the last 2 months

Whatever will I do with myself?????

December has been a really busy month!

This is the last quilt I finished up before Christmas:

And here are a couple of shirts that I embroidered:

This one was made for Tana's birthday! I went on-line to look for cute sayings and found this one. It seemed to fit the occasion very nicely since she is entering her 60th year and did indeed live thru the 1960's! Tana and I walked in the Susan B Koman Breast Cancer 60 mile walk a few years ago. Tana walked again this year! She is pretty amazing.

This is a Christmas shirt I made for ME!

Rafael is my model!

Poor guy.........he was over painting a picture to give to Jenny as a Christmas gift....and what do I do?

A group of friends met up at Caramba's to celebrate Tana's 60th birthday!

That was a fun night!

I also had Christmas Bunko and quilt meetings.

Here is a group shot with Chips at Cheryl's house.

We had a great potluck supper (My favorite ) and exchanged gifts.

I don't know quite how this happened but I failed to get even one picture at Bunko!

We met up at Kathy's house and FEASTED on a great meal from Bobby-Q's.

We played Bunko and also LRC. I was just seconds away from being the

big winner at LRC, but as luck would have it I rolled the

dice and Tana became the winner!

Better luck next time!

We failed to get a group shot of the Friday Night Quilters, but we had a delicious dinner prepared by Linda and then exchanged quilty gifts. Lots of fun there too! We exchange gifts by playing the stealing game. In one picture below you will see Kathy attempting to keep someone from stealing the gift she just opened by "marking" it! She wasn't successful!

Hurray! My computer is fixed!

My husband is a genius! Finally got my computer back on track. Seems to have been attacked by some sort of virus. Yuck.........why do people have to do that?

This is a picture of my lovely family. This was about 1/2 hour before I had over 23 women arriving for my annual ornament exchange. These people pictured above worked thier fingers to the bone (well almost) putting up Christmas decorations, the Christmas tree, cooking, hanging outside lights, etc, etc.

I can't thank them enough..........I am so lucky to have them!

I just don't know what I would do without them!

Ornament Exchange pictures:

We had drinks on the back porch.

Jen had set up and beautifully decorated these tables.




Quite a line formed in the kitchen to fill up our plates.

Jenny had fixed a turkey earlier in the day.

I added some gravy and stuffing and my friends all brought potluck!

We had quite a feast!

We push all the furniture back so we can all eat family style:

After we stuff ourselves with great food we remove the tables and form a large circle around the room so we can "exchange" ornaments. It never fails to move me when I look around that circle of friends. Not a day goes by that I don't stop and thank God for so richly blessing me!

This year we added a game called Left, Right, Center:

On of the many highlights of the evening for me was when my daughter-in-law went to "steal" an ornament from my friend Jo, who remarked (trying to dissuade Jen from stealing her ornament) "Jen, you used to be such a sweet girl" To which Jen's mom replied "Yeah, until she started hanging around with the Baldi's"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's true..........we've corrupted her!

Computers?!?!

Computers...........do you love em or hate em?

My computer has been very tempermental lately. I don't know if it is the "brrr" cold weather we are having. (I live in Phoenix where the low is about 40 something.....BRRRR) Or if the computer has picked up some sort of BUG! At any rate sometimes it lets me use it and sometimes it locks me out! I have lots of fun pictures from my annual ornament party, quilts that I have finished and shirts I have embroidered, but alas I cannot seem to get them from the camera onto the computer!

Mike...........my computer engineer husband has been working from dawn til after dusk. He hasn't seen the light of day for weeks now. He's promised me he will look at our computer this weekend!

Hopefully I'll be back full strength soon.........what a great Christmas present!

Until then I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!

Got Leftovers?

A couple of months ago I attended our monthly meeting of the Friday Night Quilters and our gracious hostess, Judy, served a wonderful crockpot dish called Chicken Enchilada Casserole. I immediately thought that it could replace my usual Thanksgiving turkey leftover dinner. I usually make turkey enchiladas from a recipe from my neighbor Gail. It involved softening the tortillas in oil, then filling and rolling each one into a casserole dish. With this new recipe you just layer all the ingrediants into the pot! So Easy! So Tasty!

Slow Cooker Chicken Enchilada Casserole
(great for leftover turkey too!)

3-4 lb chicken
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 T. oil
10 3/4 can cream of mushroom soup
10 3/4 can cream of chicken soup
1 cup sour cream
10-oz. can green enchilada sauce
4.5-oz. can peeled, diced green chilies
20 corn tortillas
3 cups shredded cheddar cheese

1. Boil chicken. Shred meat and discard bones and skin.
2. Saute onion in oil in saucepan until translucent.
Stir in soups, sour cream, green enchilada sauce and the chilies.
Heat until warm.
3. Tear tortillas into bite-sized pieces.
4. Layer half of sauce, chicken, tortillas, and cheese in
slow cooker, alternating layers. Repeat, ending with the cheese and sauce.
6. Cover. Cook on Low 5-6 hours, or High 2-3 hours.

It's always something...........

Like my pretty new bracelets?

About 2 months ago my elbows started hurting and of course I ignored them!

Well, I did the ice thing and the heat thing and the Advil thing.........

but I didn't do the rest thing or the doctor thing.

Since it didn't seem to be going away

I decided that I really should go and see the doc.

As expected...........it is bilateral epicondilitis.

He gave me a cortizone shot in one elbow,

pretty new bracelets to wear,

exercises to do,

celebrex

and a prescription to start Physical Therapy.

2-3 times a week for 3-4 weeks.

I HATE going to PT and I told him that!

He very nicely said that I should probably do it if I wanted to continue quilting.

So when he put it THAT way.....

I made the appointment and I start next week.

Wish me luck!

So much to be Thankful for........

Thanksgiving turned into an entire weekend for us. First we had dinner at Darcy's house and then helped her get up her Christmas decorations. I think that is a cool idea! Wish I had thought of it!

Jenny and Rafael made deviled eggs. They had a contest to see whose recipe was better. I believe that Jenny won.........but or course it was Rafael's first time at making them so I imagine that he'll get better with some practice!

Lots of food at Darcy's!

Brian and Jen putting the garland on the tree.

Rafael, Mike and Brady trying to fix up the playpen.

Mike and Grandpa Jack put a peep-hole in the door.

Grandma Lou makes the best Apple pies I have ever tasted!

Thursday night we had our annual Thanksgiving Baldi Bonfire. Unfortunately mother nature did not cooperate and it started raining about a 1/2 hour before people started to arrive. The rain stopped, but it had rained hard enough for everything to be really soggy. Mike saved the day by bringing the firepit up to between the porch and the pool. We sat on the porch and enjoyed the fire from there. However we didn't get to burn any Christmas trees this year!

On Friday we did a little shopping, but most of the afternoon was spent preparing for cooking another Thanksgiving dinner which we had on Saturday. Mike and I, Brian and Jen and Jenny and Rafael all enjoyed dinner together on Saturday night. After dinner we played marbles.

It is high time to get back to quilting! BUT my Millie and I need to make friends again! It has been so long since I quilted that we have forgotten each other! AND to add insult to injury the weather has changed drastically since I"ve quilted so we are both a little on the cold side and it is taking us a litte longer than expected to warm up! My Millie (short for Millenium....the name of the machine I have) is being a little tempermental today, so I have turned her off and will resume quilting a little later in the day.

Thanksgiving is upon us

Phew! I think that I am finally kinda caught up with things........Anyone who says that weddings are easy...........well, don't believe them! Besides all of the obvious stuff.......the planning, cooking, cleaning, etc........the emotions involved! Phew! Did I mention before that I'm glad its over?.....But I also loved every minute of it?

I've returned tables and chairs, beds and bedding and all sorts of plates, serving bowls, platters, and utensils. I've written countless thank you notes to thank all the people who helped me before and during the wedding week. And still feel like perhaps I've missed someone!

I think I've caught up on my sleep. For about a week after the wedding I would wake up in a panic thinking that I needed to do something, or be somewhere, etc, etc.

Just two days ago I returned my Quilt studio to working order by removing the beds that occupied a great deal of the space and setting my tables back up. AND I got a quilt on the frames. It feels so good to be quilting again! However, I feel a little out of sync. Machine quilting needs to be practiced on a regular basis to keep up your skills. I started with one of my own quilts to get back in the groove before working on the customer quilts that I need to have finished by Christmas.

Thanksgiving is tomorrow and my family is doing something different this year. We have been invited over to my son's in-laws house for a big family dinner. It feels so strange not to be cooking a turkey and all the trimmings...........I only have 2 dishes to make for the meal! Weird! Since we won't have any leftovers, and lets face it.......leftovers are the best part of the meal........we are having ANOTHER Thanksgiving-type meal on Sautrday. I"ve got a leftover turkey crockpot recipe that I am anxious to try.

We will still be doing our annual Thanksgiving bonfire tomorrow night! We are hoping that it won't be raining!

Happy Thanksgiving to all. I pray that you and yours will be richly blessed and truly thankful.

Here are some pictures of people that I am truly thankful for this year