Get Ready For Pictures

Many of my friends want to know why I haven't posted pictures of the many crafts items I have made, well, I don't know, so, I will take pictures today and probably post them tonight or tomorrow morning. I make ornaments and all kinds of stuff every Christmas but just never take pictures. Check back tonight. I'm redoing the curtains for my son's apartment right now.

Yesterday, Friday, hubby and I went to the Half Price Books again on Montrose and Westheimer in Houston. I bought some more movies and two books for my sister in Indiana. I had the hardest time finding books for her because we both share a love for books and we have the same taste in books so when I find something I think she will like I wonder if she all ready has it. It's actually funny because we have bought many of the same books without even knowing until we start talking about what we have bought.These are the books I got her. I just have to read them first.LOL! I read some of the first one and it was pretty funny from the start.

Dolls I Use To Make

Here's a picture of one of the dolls I use to make a long long time ago. I use to work with a friend and people would give us a picture from their child hood and we would make it look like that picture. This is suppose to be the school nurse of my son's elementary school.This doll was about three feet tall. The nurse later told me her grand kids use to just love that doll and they would sit and just talk to her all the time.Those dolls used a lot of stuffing and they were a pain to stuff because they had to be very firm. I have to look for the rest of the pictures to show you more. I'm thinking maybe I gave up making these because I prefer working with small scale things.

What Happened To The Quilting You Ask

Many of you are probably wondering why I haven't been posting any quilting stuff on my quilting blog right. Well please bear with me while I'm trying to recover from my back which has been giving me trouble . The sitting that is required with my quilting would really set my recovery back. Before I start back with quilting I have to finish my son's curtains for his New York apartment which is on the 26th floor of a building. All he has are blinds and curtains would surely help block off more of the cold right now. I'm not done with quilting yet. It's my favorite thing to do. I also have to make curtains for my kitchen.

Book Shopping

Today, Monday, hubby stayed home so we went into the Houston area to check out another Half Price Books a chain store in the Houston area that sells books,movies,cd's,games, and magazines. Everything in those stores is half off. I love that place. They have lot's of new titles and movies for $6. I'm a book addict and I guess it really shows in my face in the picture. LOL! I bought three books, THE BONE LADY Life As A Forensic Anthropologist, POISON STUDY, Yelena becomes the food taster of the commander in order to leave a life of poverty and RED GLASS,

A small boy named Pablo crosses into Arizona from Mexico. We then went to eat at Ninfa's a mexican restaurant that has some of the best fajitas. We got there at 3p.m after the lunch crowd and before the evening crowd so it was just us and two more couples. I had fajitas with rice, refried beans, guacamole, tortillas and a glass of sweet tea, and boy was it good. I bought my son an enchilada plate his favorite and on Mondays it's two for the price of one so he'll be eating good tonight after work. We don't eat there to often though only a couple of times a year.

TEXAS SIZE POTATO

This Friday and Saturday I have eaten some good food. Friday I had some bad back pain so hubby bought some baked potatoes from Kelly's a restaurant chain in the Houston Galveston area and let me tell you everything in that place in Texas size Their potatoes are so big most people don't believe me when I describe them. They come with whatever you want on them. My favorites are with grilled chicken and this BBQ beef. You really have to see it to believe it. Sorry you vegans but I do like good beef once in a while. A potato this size will last me about three to four days. My son made the pasta with shrimp and tomatoes and it was very yummy. The trail mix is Indulgent from Wally World it's very reasonably priced and boy is it good. The reason it's on my desk is because I was snacking on it. HEHEHE! You have got to try it. I have to force myself to not eat a lot of it believe me. It's got dark chocolate, peanut butter, and white chocolate chips, peanuts, almonds and cashews. It comes in a big bag so you get lot's of it. Try it!

Saturday, hubby and I went to Barnes & Noble and enjoyed some coffee, hot chocolate and cookies from the cafe. The cookies are huge and after eating half of it I just know I had a sugar rush because I had to have some water immediately. I won't be doing that again. We then went to Fry's and I bought The Tudor's first full t.v series. I've never watched it but I'm crazy about historical novels so we'll see how good it is.

Pressure Is On

I have to first say that I had some comments I hadn't posted and I apologize if yours was one of them. I had been reading them but not approving them. I know that was stupid of me. Sorry! I have been feeling better from my sciatic pain so I will be starting a quillow today for Sonia.By the way this is Sonia with her mom, my niece.

I made quillows for the older brothers when they were younger but I have yet to make one for her. I figured a quillow is fast so I'll be able to finish it by Christmas. I'm getting so excited because my middle son who lives in NY is coming home for Christmas and he's staying for a week but I'm sad to because I won't get to see my oldest who lives in Los Angeles because he's busy making paintings for events. I have so much to do and don't feel like doing it. I have been going to sleep at 3 a.m and getting up at 10 a.m. Not good! I can't help it I'm turning into a night owl and get all my energy at 10 p.m. My poor husband is an early bird, gets up at 5:30 even on weekends and by 7 p.m he crashes. Last night at 2 a.m I was walking the long hallway of my house like a fool hoping I would get tired and sleepy. It's crazy.

First Mermaid

I have always liked mermaids so that was the first thing I wanted to paint. I painted her on wood using water soluable oil pastels and acrylics. I also added some stickers and that was it. I hope to paint a big mermaid on canvas one day.

First Portrait

This is my first portrait collage. The little girl is Sonia and she's very special to me since I have no grand daughters. I painted the canvas board with white, pink and purple acrylics the I did the fairies on the top pointing down on her.I then glued tissue paper on the corners, painted flowers and sprinkled glitter on them. I her on paper for acrylic paints then cut it out and glued on to canvas board. I thought she looked to plain so I cut flowers from magazines and glued them around her. I wanted to make it really girly just like her. I still can't decide on whether to add a little glitter on the purple part of the canvas board though.

There is something totally wrong with the date on my camera. It's going crazy. I just took this picture last week and it says 1-08.

Drawing Price

Here I am with my price from the drawing at http://www.adrisart.blogspot.com/ It's my first win from the Internet ever. I just love Adriana's art. There's a another print I think I'll want to get later. Anybody reading this you have to check out her work. I have found a perfect frame for this print. I will post a picture of it once I get it in the frame.

I WON!

I am so excited for winning Adriana's drawing, if I could still do one of these I would. If I try it now I won't even be able to do the jump to pick up one leg. LOL! I love Adriana's art and I consider myself so lucky. How lucky, I look at her paintings every day to get an idea as to how she gets that folksy look. Winning just made my week!

New Inspiration

I decided to take a small quilting break because I seem to have hit a slump and I can't decide on what kind of quilt I want to do next nor what fabrics to use, that type of thing you know what I mean,so I am trying to create collages along with water color painting. I believe painting and quilting are very much alike since they both deal with color and imagination. The last time I painted was back in high school and Lord knows that was a life time ago. I have to say I'm having a great time shopping for paints and color pencils and just discovering all the new art supplies that are now available. I love them all! I still can't decide what I prefer, water colors or acrylics but I'm leaning more towards water colors. I know I don't want do oils because of the clean up. My oldest son paints but he works with oils. I am going through my scrap booking things which I hadn't done in a long while and just get so excited when I find something I can use for the collages and you can pretty much use anything for that. I plan on having many new quilting ideas after painting for a week. I went to my neighbors(also a quilter) house yesterday and she is just on a quilting roll right now. I believe what really inspires her to do more and more quilts are the 7 grand children she has. Her mother pieces the quilt tops and my neighbor quilts them. I really need to set up a weekly quilting and painting schedule so i can do both on a regular basis instead of doing just one thing.

St.Lucia

Here is a free give away if you're interested and the reason for the give away is very nice. http://ewian.blogspot.com/2008/10/st-lucia-give-away.html

BABY HEART QUILT FINISHED

This is my latest finished quilt. It's a crib size quilt made with heart blocks made with heart fabrics. I'm crazy about the color red and hearts and had been wanting to make one for a while. Luckily I was able to use all my heart fabric scraps. I used flannel for the backing since I have found out most small kids prefer quilts with flannel backing. I machine pieced and hand quilted this one.

Great Mystery Book

Journal,The Short Life and Mysterious Death of Amy Zoe Mason

I don't know if any of you know but I'm a big book junkie. I love books! I checked out this book from my local library and once I opened it and started reading it I didn't put it down till I finished it. I have never read a book like this one. It's an altered journal book so for you who like mixed media you will love it. These characters even have websites and so you can't figure out if it's a nonfiction or fiction book.

HOW SWEET

I just had to post some pictures of my trip to South TX . The little girl is daughter of a my cousin's daughter who I consider my younger sister. I cared for her for so many years when she was little.We are still very close to this day. I love her kids and being around her young daughter fulfills my desire for a granddaughter. She wanted to come home with me. Hopefully she can spend it me with me during school vacation. Seeing her 14 year old who is 6 foot 3 really made me feel old and tiny. Her middle son is my godson and boy does he look like his grandfather,my cousin. I love those kids.

AFTER IKE

Fleeing IKE At the out of town hospital Only the stilts left where houses once were

Boats on street One of my favorite antique places.

I finally have electricity and the internet again, I'm so happy. My husband, son and I left to get away from IKE on Thursday the day before it hit Galveston. There is no way I wanted to stay for that monster hurricane. I went through two when I was a kid and I remember my family taking shelter at a school and just seeing the trees swaying and branching flying by the windows. My family and I headed to south TX and had no problem with the traffic. Everyone in Galveston and Houston were evacuating north. Why, I don't know. My in-laws live in that part of TX so we got to visit with my sweet father-in-law. One of my chihuahuas was so stressed out she got severe bloody runs and I had to put her in the animal hospital. She was terrified and wouldn't eat nor drink so they had to fill her up with fluids. The vet and workers at Border Animal hospital were great. We came back home on Friday a week after the hurricane and it was and still is a mess. Thankfully, nothing happened to our house. All the shingles are on and the arbors and patio are still in tact. We did have a lot of tree limbs and debris in the front and back yard. Oh, but what was totally disgusting was the rotten food in my fridge and freezer. There was a 15 lb. turkey and 3 boxes of ice cream in my freezer so you can imagine the smell. The lady who lives two houses from mine had a tree fall on her roof. Seabrook and Kemah which are about 3 miles from us and where we go to enjoy the sail boats and buy seafood is terrible all of those seafood places are no longer there and there are boats on the street. Oh, my three cats who were left outside to fend for themselves made it through the hurricane. Don't get upset with me but they say animals are safer being free than locked up. I'm pretty sure they spent the hurricane under our shed. They learned how to hunt for their food while we were gone. I have two friends who stayed through the hurricane and they say it was a nightmare and will not ever do it again. Galveston lost four feet of the beach sand and I mean four feet deep.

GREAT BUYS

I have found some really good finds lately and when I think it's something some thing other quilter will like I'll post it in my blog under "Great Finds" The first thing I found at Michael's,well, my husband spotted it and told me about it, is this great lazy Susan letter holder, brush holder, sew gadget holder, etc... it also has little drawers on the bottom right above the black band, i just haven't removed that paper band. I love, it and what was even better is that I got it with a 50% off coupon. I'll be using these two fabrics for a baby boy's quilt. I'll do some free motion quilting on it for practice. I got this for a niece's daughter and I had great fun picking this fabric. Sonia, the little girl is into princess stuff big time. I don't make girl quilts often because I have three sons so any time I shop for little girl stuff I have a blast.

When I saw this iron I just had to buy. It's 4 inches long and it's electric which is what I liked. I think it's great for ironing small pieces of fabric but I bought for spreading melted wax on paintings by ironing it smooth. I already have another small iron for fabric. I'm a big gadget freak and usually buy anything that will make my life easier.

DAY IN GALVESTON

Yesterday my husband and I spend the day in Galveston Island. The weather was just beautiful with a very nice breeze. We walked the Stand which are many blocks of old beautiful buildings that were made into shops many years ago. The buildings are old Victorian style and most of Galveston has old Victorian homes as well. I'm standing in front of a small eating place called The Wall. There is a huge brick wall with a waterfall. You can eat inside or outside and on weekends they have live music. The prices are reasonable and the food is great.

QUILTING ALMOST DONE

I am about to be done with this baby. I am quilting 1/4" around the border. I will probably be done today. I have moved my small pvc frame into my computer room where I can be close to the computer and t.v. I had it in the living room but I'm more comfortable in this room. I swear I don't know why it's taken me so long to finish this little quilt. I'm ashamed to even say how long it's been. I spent most of the day yesterday organizing some drawers in the room that had all my computer/desk supplies. Everything was kind of just thrown into the drawers and it was driving me crazy. I also went to Micheal's to see if I could find a marker that's made by Pentel. You remove the tip and fill the tube with water so you can go over water color drawings. I didn't find it but I did manage to buy $64 worth of stuff and that's because i used a 50% off coupon on a stamp. I bought more acrylic paints, water color paper, oil pastels, and blenders. If my hubby had gone with me we both could've used a coupon but he didn't want to. What a waste of a coupon UGH! Is it any wonder I can't finish my little quilt, I can't seem to sit my booty down long enough.