Hurray for mental health days!

AAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!
Long contented sigh!
It's like a breath of fresh air or sitting in a meadow on a pleasant day.
Or slipping into a hot spa when you have a tired and aching  body.

My schedule has been CRAZY for the last month (as evidenced by the absolute lack of posts here!) and yesterday I took a day just for me and
spent practically the whole day in my studio creating just for ME!
I can now face the world with  a much better attitude! 

So what have I been up to the last month?  Here's a peek:

Saturday was Thanksgiving at my house

and all the kids came over and we feasted.

Jenny made this enormous apple pie.

It was delicious even tho it was sorta juicy.

(Jenny, I think maybe we should have let this pie sit a little longer before we ate it.  Maybe it just needed to be a little cooler?)

Friday night Mike and I attended a special surprise

birthday party for my good friend Sharon.

She is a sweet and sassy lady and her

husband threw her a really wonderful party!

Isn't this the most precious little girl ever?!?

I can tell you that she truly is.

We spent all of last week together while her mommy and daddy

went on a cruise to celebrate their anniversay.

Mia and I had the best time!

Here are some of the things we did:

We ate.

3 or 4 times a day!

Then we cleaned up.

We cooked together.

We played in the sand and went down the slide at the park.

I made her do housework.

(Actually she found the mop and started dragging it behind her.

I think she *might* have been telling me that the floor was

dirty and I needed to clean it!  lol)

We played with bubbles while washing our little table.

We also did some fingerpainting, but

I didn't get any pictures of that.

We went to the duck park with grandpa to feed the ducks.

Side note:  my kids used to LOVE going to the park to feed the ducks.

But when we got to this park I decided to read the big sign at

the entrance and lo and behold.......there it was clear and simple:

Do NOT feed the ducks!

We follow the rules so we didn't get to feed the ducks, but we

did get to look at them.

Now I wonder if perhaps I never read the sign when my kids

were little.  We ALWAYS fed the ducks!

We also took a trip to McDonalds to get an ice cream cone!

My week with Mia was wonderful, but very tiring.

She was up by 6am and hit the ground running every day,

stopping only for naps and food.

She is a happy, but ornery little girl.

Moves constantly and is ALWAYS looking for the next

great thing to get into.

Jenny and Rafael joke that she is a shark since sharks are always moving.

I sure do love that little girl!

Betcha didn't know that!

The week prior to watching Mia I went to

the Houston International Quilt Festival

with 6 of my quilting friends.

Another very physically tiring and overwhelming week.

But oh. so. wonderful!

The quilts were fabulous and inspiring,

the company couldn't be better and

the shopping was great too!

Here is my haul:

Thread for embroidery, stencils for quilting,

a DVD for inspiration, some embellishement goodies and

of course a little batik fabric!

So here are the other things I have done this past month:

Accompanied my husband on 4 day business trip to Long Beach.

Caramba's party to celebrate a promotion.

Boojum Tree Halloween Party.

Project Linus Sew day at my house.

Mia helped with the quilting too!

Trick or Treating with our precious baby.

(I made Mike and I's ladybug costumes.

Mike insisted on being ladybugs since Mia was a ladybug!)

Pumpkin Patch party at my house.

Carving a pumpkin with my sweetie!

Before yesterday I felt very stressed,

but now looking back over my past month

I realize how very BLESSED I am.

I'm surrounded by people I love and people who love me.

Who could ask for anything more?

Guess what?

Christmas is coming!

Quilty blessing to you all,

tammy

 

Halloween is coming!

That's right.....

Halloween is coming.

But you sure wouldn't know it if you stepped outside.

A few weeks back we had some teaser weather.

The temperatures dipped down into the 70's

DURING THE DAY!

It was fantastic and we all hoped that perhaps summer was finally over.

It was too good to be true, we all knew it was too good to be true.

Summer does not officially end here in Arizona until after Halloween.

I remember one year I planned costumes for my kids that included black sweatpants and a sweatshirt.  Halloween day arrived and the temperature

was still near the 100 degree mark.  I knew they were going to roast in those sweats so I had to go out and buy them black shorts and short sleeved shirt to go with thier costumes.

But I digress.

Halloween is right up there as one of my favorite holiday's.

I try to add one new thing to my halloween decorations every year.

Sometimes I wait til AFTER halloween and get something that the stores have discounted and sometimes I make something.

This year I made placemats.

While visiting my DIL I noticed that she had some

really cool halloween placemats on her dining room table.

Jen's grandma had made them.

So when I found some fun halloween fabric I knew

I needed to make some placemats.

And here they are.

But kinda plain don't ya think?

I fished thru my trim box and found this fuzzy black yarn

and it made a perfect little border.

 Simple. Fast. Fun!

My table is complete!

Mia is getting ready for Halloween too!

Wishing for cooler weather,

tammy

Halloween is coming!

Today I completed our halloween costumes!

Yeah!

For the past 5 years of so my family have attended a really fun

party at the Boojum Tree which is owned by a really good friend of mine.

Last year we had a group costume......

we were a rock band.

We got together several weeks before halloween and tie-dyed shirts,

then we wore black curly wigs, a headband, sunglasses, hoop earrings

Oh, and we tied rocks to our beltloops so we could be a "rock band".

Unfortunately I don't have access to the pictures at the moment but we

looked really funny! Whoops, I mean "cool"

We are going as a group again this year too.

Pictures to follow in a few days..........

Earlier this week I attended my monthly Bunko meeting.

What a great group of ladies!

I am truly blessed as I have been friends with all of these gals for over 20 years!

Last night Mike and I got some dance lessons.

Our dentist whom we have gone to for ages mentioned that he

was teaching "couples dancing" to some of the people at his church.

So we have been going and doing "okay".

Mike and I have taken dance lessons several times over our 30 year marriage.

The first was when we were newly married and we went to a local country bar

and learned the 2 step. We were pretty darn good if I do say so myself.

A few years later we signed up for a ballroom dance class at the community college.

A little history here........

my husband is from TEXAS............

he is NOT a smooth

ballroom dancer.........

so when the instructor said that she noticed an "oilrigger"

I knew just who she was talking about........

A couple of years ago we did another stint at the

country dance lessons in preparation for

dancing at our children's weddings.

We are doing okay at these ballroom lessons,

but have decided that it is impossible to

make a silk purse out of a sows ear..............

I don't think we will ever be smooth

ballroom dancers........

there is just too much country in our style!

I live in Phoenix

And it is 10PM and 107 degrees outside!

Can you believe it?

I went swimming at 6pm tonight (it was 113 then!)

to cool off and to clean the pool.

I get in the pool with a little skimmer net and clean all the leaves

and pine needles that have accumulated during the day.

You know that little place where the water pours into to go

into the filter? Well, of course there is always a fair amount of

pine needles that accumulate there. I was just about ready to

reach in and grab them (I figured it would save it from going

into the filter skimmer basket) when I saw a mysterious black

orb. I quickly did a double take and you guessed it......

...it was a black widow spider hanging just above the water.

Do you know how many times I have reached into that basket

from the topside of the pool? AND after dark?

I can tell you this..........I won't be doing that again until

that spider is GONE!

I posted this little quilt top earlier today.

I am still wrestling with what color to use as

the inner border.

I had purple there this morning and now I am

auditioning some pink and possibly a gold stripe.

Hopefully I will get up in the morning and will

know just what to do!

I also finished block #7 of the

Haunted House embroidery project.

It is really starting to look good!

Halloween will be here before you know it........

and I'll be ready!

What a Weekend!

I started off the weekend by finishing up my last customer quilt (to be done before the wedding). I took some pictures but somehow the picture I took of the whole quilt disappeared from my camera, so here are some detail shots of this lovely southwest inspired quilt. I'll have to ask Carla to send me a picture of the whole quilt!

Friday night was of course the Halloween party at the Boojum Tree. I think that one of the things I like most about this party is that my quilting friends like to dance! We have an absolute ball! I figured that I must have lost about 10 pounds just from dancing alone, but alas the scale told me something different. Stupid scale!

Friday Night Quilters

Back row: Katrina, Cheryl & Linda

Front Row: Tammy, Kathy, Sharon & Mary

Another great thing about this party is that my whole family attends. This year Darcy joined us!

Saturday morning I went shopping with Jenny to look for a dress for the rehersal. She found a really pretty white and black dress. We went to Fry's food store to get the Coke products that were on sale. I also bought a trellis that was clearance priced for my front entry way! How cool is that? $20 was a steal! Oh! and BONUS! I took the display model and all I had to do was screw the top part back together! I already had the plants, so I installed the trellis and planted the plants that very afternoon!

In the afternoon I went with Jenny and Rafael

to thier final wedding planning meeting.

Saturday Evening I went to a Margaritaville party at Tana's house. I was a little apprehensive about going since Mike was on his way to India and that meant I would have to go alone. But I went and had a great time with the many friends who were there, some of which I had not seen in ages!

On Sunday I was up bright and early and working in my secret garden. I worked on the ground under the gazebo area, trying to smooth it out and remove any scraggling grass. We plan on doing something more permanent in that area, but really didn't have time to get it done before the wedding.

I cleaned up all the leaves, groomed all the plants picking off any dead flower heads. I completely cleaned all the unnecessay junk out of the area that we tend to store there. I powerwashed the side of the house and the furniture and sidewalks. I installed a couple more screws in the bricks so I could hang some flowers. (Major task for me! I'm afraid of the drill!) Rafael and Jenny came over and helped me cut down and haul away a bunch of dead branches from the tree and then we finished installing all of the white lights in the tree. It was a long, tiring day but the yard looks o-so-nice!

To end the Evening I went outside and sat under my twinkling tree with a margarita and had a great visit with my mom, and then with Lisa.

The weather is beautiful here now.....