Oh. My. Goodness.

Lots going on in my life, beginning with dumping a large mug of water into my laptop.  whoa.  Talk about a successful derailment of one's plans!!  Thank God the laptop brain is still intact.  It contains my everything.  The keyboard is a different story.  Some of the keys work, some do not.  I now have a USB keyboard attached to my laptop.  Next week, I will be looking for a new piece of equipment.  This one was limping along to begin with.  I have just hastened its retirement.

In the meantime, I escaped some brutal valley heat (110 for days) by heading to the coast.  I parked at the Blue Whale, in Oceanside.

 On the weekend, we took a 3 hour tour around Mission Bay with Xplore Offshore.  It's a business owned by a high school friend of my husband's.  This was my first time to do anything like this, and I highly recommend it.

 The Common Dolphins love to play around the boat.  I was sitting in the bow, the front of which you can see in the bottom of the above photo.  We also saw Pacific Bottlenose Dolphins, (below.)  We were this close.  Amazing!

But the (literally) BIG fun was the Blue Whale.  We watched him surface three times, and I snapped countless photos, most of which showed only sky or water.  It was hard to take pictures and watch him simultaneously.  But I tried!

 It truly was a spectacular day out there, buzzing around offshore.  woohoo!

But it hasn't been all outdoor fun and games.  I've been working, too.  Penny's Pinwheel has come out of storage and is back in process.

 I thought I would get everything stitched down, except the jacket bottom.  (I still have to put the skirt together.)  Unfortunately, I could not get the left arm to look right.  Fortunately, I realized that the problem is piece #139.  I have no idea where it is, though I know it was bouncing around my studio for months.  I have no idea where it ended up.  I will hunt for it in both the Studio and The Annex.

The best news is that I am once again enthused about this project.  Maybe 2017 will be the year that I really truly finish it.  Goals are good!!

Busy Busy...I Do

When last I left you I was...working on the flower girl dress for my granddaughter?  The dress was finished a few days before the wedding, and here she is, trying it on for the first time.

I think she likes it!

 And then, it was November 5, and my baby was waiting for his bride.  In an unheard of turn of weather, the sky was blue, no fog to be seen, and it was warm enough to enjoy...unless you were the bride and groom, staring into the beating sun.

Here she comes, escorted by her grandpa:

 And here's the handoff...

I stopped taking pictures about this time, and picked it up again for the first dance.

All in all it was a beautiful day.  On Monday, I was able to relax for the first time in a long time.  One of these days, I'll pick up and get back to work, but for now...I'm enjoying the beautiful memories.

oops

Four of thirty seven.  Note to self:  Do not leave iPad unattended.

Busy Summer Days

Here is the promised picture of the finished quilt.  I realized I was never going to get it set up properly for a photo shoot, so this is what I've got.  Sorry!  It's awfully pretty, and most of the migrated dye came out. yay!

 Before I went to Laguna Beach, I put this postcard in the mail. 

It was finally delivered to the addressee.  Note the ink at the bottom, and the tire tracks on the pink in the upper corner and across the middle.

 How about this, where apparently it was delivered to Bakersfield !!!  The unintended recipient did NOT like that, and took his/her ink pen to it in earnest.  Apparently it was deemed junk mail, not art?

 Yesterday, this field mouse was discovered cowering in the skimmer.  I was dipping in for leaves, and YIKES!  I may have screamed.

 For the next two weeks, these are the girls who are supposed to be swimming in the pool.  Penny is here for a while, as well as a friend's daughter, Natalie.  Natalie is considering vet school, so she's riding along with hubby for much of June.

Other than that, I don't have much.  Hubby was digging through old photos, and found this one from UCDavis, 1980.  wow.  I was young!  That's my dad on the left, and my mother's father on the right.  I'm guessing Mother took the photo?  I don't remember seeing this one before.

And I guess that's about it.  There won't be much quilting going on in the next couple of weeks, as I'm chasing after Penny, trying to keep us both out of trouble.  Goals are good!

Back to the Ordinary

 This weekend saw us back in the Bay Area, returning Penny to her parents.  It's been quite the adventure to be on-the-job Gramma for the past 5 1/2 weeks.  I was sad to leave, and she was sad to see us go, but it was time.  Here I am, checking out of the hotel yesterday morning.  Looks like things are back to normal, in that the menfolk left me in charge of their computers.  They went ahead to help set up the party venue, and didn't want to leave their electronics in the car. 

I didn't want to make two trips, so I loaded up.  woohoo.

Before leaving town, we attended Princess P's Birthday Tea Party.  oh. my. goodness.  It was, indeed, the most extraordinary birthday party I've ever attended, perhaps with the exception of Debbie's 60th.  Outstanding.  The kids each decorated their own hat, with hot glue and flowers, then sat for a tea party with real china.  There was dancing, and games, and they painted their own teacups, which they planted with flowers to take home.  It was fabulous.  Here is one of the 169 pictures I took during the 3 hour event.

 All too soon, it was time to hit the road.

For the next month, it will be all quilt show, all the time.  Let's do this!

So Busy!

We're playing lots of games.  Look who won the title of Crazy Cat Lady!

 We found a sewing kit at Joann's, and have done some handwork.

 Bedtime stories - and stories all day long - are a must.

 Wendy brought over her cranky machine, and P did some cranking.

Nice to see that smile, when seated in front of a sewing machine!

 Good thing Gramma has stacks of pre-cut squares on hand.

 Look what I made!  My first quilt top...at age 4.  Start 'em young, right?

Happy stitching!

So Busy

I guess I was right, when I thought my days would be full.  There hasn't been a bit of quilting going on, though there was one day when we played a game, then stitched a label, then read a book, then stitched a label.  I stitched out seven labels, and probably read twice that many books.  And we played Pen the Pig, all day long.  The labels are pinned to the quilts.  One day they will be stitched down.  Maybe tonight?

 One day, we went out to the walnut forest.  Here Uncle is teaching P the finer points of clay/dirt/sand differentiation.

 Inside, he introduced her to the kazoo. 

 It quickly became a favorite.

 All this photo-snapping of P means that turnabout is fair play.  Really?  I'm in my jammies!  My excuse is that it's only 7:15am.

Here I am again.  She finds my camera, turns it on, takes off the lens cover, checks the image and presses the button.  She'll be 5 next month.  I was more than twice that, before I ever touched a camera.

 On Monday, we visited the home of Best of the Valley's 2016 Featured Artist, Ann Hinman.

 This is her Grandma room, where her grandkids hang out and drink rootbeer floats.  Penny settled for reading through a stack of classics.

The past two days have actually included some "real" sewing.  I'm working on a Captain America suit for a friend.  All I have left to do are the pouches for his utility belt.  It will feel good to cross that one off of my list.  Other than that, the deadline has arrived for the quilt show, so all entries need to be processed and prepared for jurying.  The jury meets on Monday 2/22.  Good luck, if you entered a quilt!  This year's selection is spectacular!

Still Zooming By

Wow.  When I titled my last post "Zoom, Zoom," I didn't realize it was going to be a prediction.  I lost a week somewhere, and am stunned that it is already February 9.  oh my.  It's going to be a fast year, if the first few weeks are anything to judge by.

My leg is healing well, and just in time.  My soon-to-be 5 year old granddaughter is here for a prolonged visit.  She arrived a week ago, and is forcing me to become acquainted with the park at the end of our street.  "Let's go to the park, Gramma!"  It's something she and her mom do daily, so who am I to mess with tradition?

 It's definitely easier to visit the park with a 4 year old, than it is with a toddler!

 You may think this is a slide.  It's actually Sleeping Beauty's castle, in disguise.

 And there is Sleeping Beauty, sleeping, of course.

 Her uncle took her miniature golfing.  Of course she wanted the pink club and ball.

Needless to say, the only quilt-related things that are currently happening are all related to the quilt show.  It is five days until the entry deadline, and most quilters wait until the last minute.  I am daily buried in paperwork, but it's a good thing, not a negative.  If you have a quilt to enter, don't forget our online entry option.  Look it up on our website, here.

And that's it for now.  If I don't post much, I'm probably at the park!  :)

SO busy

 We went to guild, then out to lunch.  Of course one of us dressed appropriately.

 Because when one is a princess, one's gown is appropriate at all times.

 For her birthday, she wore her pink dress.  (If you've seen Disney's Sleeping Beauty, you're familiar with the blue/pink competition.)

 And then, it was time to leave her with her Mama (and Dada) and head for home.

Now, to concentrate on the quilt show.  Any blogging will likely be snippets of this and that.  You can "like" Best of the Valley Quilt Show on Facebook, to see the latest thing on my mind.

Oh!  And there's also a newspaper article, that I keep forgetting about.  You might enjoy it.
Here is the link.  Gotta run.  Too much to do, not enough time.