Wow, it’s been a really long time since I last posted to my blog. No excuse except my laptop died and I didn’t have easy access to the desktop since my husband uses it all the time. He’s gone for the summer, so I decided to hop on and start blogging again. He is being a nanny for our middle daughter who welcomed a beautiful little girl a couple of months ago. Childcare costs for a newborn are enormous so he was asked to come north and live with our youngest while caring for the baby at the middle daughter’s house during the day. Food and gas are his pay. Pretty cheap since his vehicle doesn’t use as much as mine for city driving. He’s enjoying seeing the girls and helping them both out. We talk almost every day and I do see him once a month if I want to drive 3 hours to do so.

I have been busy working on my UFO lists. I competed the tops for 7 quilts in about two months and sent 5 off to the quilting spa. She has 3 of them ready for pickup when I get up north again. It’s over 3 hours to her house. I recently bought a new Husqvarna Viking sewing machine. I bought a Sapphire 930 that loves my Aurifil thread and is a joy to sew my projects with. Even the 100 Days of Christmas is getting finished using this machine due to how easy it is to sew tiny half square triangles on it. I am also working on the Lady Tulip BOM by Laundry Basket Quilts. I chose the precut version and I wish I’d known how easy it was to sew together. No waste scraps and easy peasy to put together. I have two more BOM coming up in August and September that will come from another online quilt shop. Can’t wait for them to start coming in the mail. I enjoy getting mail more than I ever did before. Must be the slower pace of life here in rural Emery County, Utah.

One of the downsides of moving far away from the city and into a rural community is that you have to drive quite a way to see family or friends. Doctor visits are combined with other errands too. Anything to save on the cost of gasoline right now. I pay anywhere between $4.99 – $5.29 for premium here in my area. So, it’s not cheap to fill up my tank. I even schedule visits to the local quilt shops on my days when I’m going up for doctor visits.

I’m currently working on my yard. Weeding, growing new flowers and vegetables to add to the garden, and designing a couple new beds that will help fill up the back yard and get the weedy areas taken care of. I planted a cutting garden that is about 10 feet by 12 feet. I planted 107 different bulbs and tubers. Mostly dahlias and laitris but I also put in peonies. I have lots of seed to get spread down for the front strip along the road. We put in tulips and other bulbs last year, but the weeds are taking over so I want to get the wildflowers that are perennials going in there to take up the spaces between the bulbs. I really dislike weeding!

When I’m not outside weeding or planting something, I’m downstair working on current project. Right now, it’s a Jen Kingwell BOM that I took a class on at Quilts, Etc. in Sandy, UT. My sister, Laura, took the class with me and mine is almost done where she is just getting started on her pieced blocks. I even cut out several of the months for her! Funny how we all have different ways of getting things done. She works for other people and does a lot of charity quilts. Her personal quilts get put to the back of the list all the time. I am working on one project of someone but that’s it. Once it’s done, I will probably not do any more quilts for others unless it’s family. I’m finding it really hard to do handwork due to a disease I am dealing with. If it gets resolved and I get my mobility back in my body again, I hope to do more. As it is, I have donated several bins of fabric, scraps, books and kits to the Navajo Quilt Project. I hope they were able to use them all. I may have more before I’m done too! 30 years of fabric accumulations means I have more than I could ever finish in my lifetime!

I hope life doesn’t throw too much at me in the future and I hope you all have a wonderful summer!