A little retail therapy

There is a large thrift store in the next town over that I used to love going to. The building they are in used to be a Publix supermarket so you can imagine how large it is. They have a holiday room, furniture section, clothing section, and a quite large craft room. I used to go and shop in the craft room every few weeks. I haven't been in a long time though so I asked my daughter if she wanted to go out and about with me. Of course she said yes. We always have a good time when we go out. 

This time I wasn't impressed. Yes, they had a lot of craft supplies like ribbons, beads, cross stitch, and tables of fabric but the prices were not very good. I know it's for a charity and I'm fine paying a reasonable price but when they have things from Dollar Tree and are charging $1.50 I'm not impressed. I'm not going to pay $2.50 for an old looking maybe partial skein of Redheart yarn. 

There was a lot of little girl bow making supplies like ribbons and iron on decorations. I did find these cute mustache and Hello Kitty ribbons. I haven't opened them to see how long the ribbons are but there are 3 packs of ribbon in each bundle for $1. 

What made it totally worth the trip was these three Smurf glasses I stumbled upon. I have always LOVED the Smurfs. I used to watch the cartoons every week and I've seen the movies a few times each. I believe these glasses were from a Hardee's promotion back in the 80's. I know we had a full set when I lived at home but they weren't mine so I wasn't able to take them when I moved out after high school. No matter. I have these now. Papa, Smurfette, Brainy, and Clumsy were my favorite. I remember there was one that had Gargamel and Azrael on it too. I loved the 80's lol. I now have Papa, Clumsy, and Baker Smurf. I'll just have to keep an eye out for the rest. With a little Google research I see that there were 8 glasses in total (1983) and they had Papa, Gargamel/Azrael, Jokey (another fave), Smurfette, Grouchy, Brainy, Lazy, and Hefty. I guess I can say that those 8/9 were all favorite characters of mine. I do think there were a few others from 1982 but maybe they were from somewhere other than Hardee's.  I have a few little figurines and I used to have a stuffed toy at one point too. I've been slowly collecting Smurf memorabilia. While the new movies are wonderful to watch I prefer the way the original Smurfs looked. The new ones are still recognizable as Smurfs but with modern technology they have changed a bit but that's okay. 

McDonald's, Hardee's, and Burger King among others have done several glass promotions over the years. I came across this site that shows the 13 best novelty glasses from the 80's. Or so they say. Either way it was fun to see the list. We had many of them lol.

After thrift shopping we hit the stores. I didn't buy anything exciting (cleaning supplies, chips, etc.) from the first two stores but I did find somethings at Walmart. I wanted to get back into knitting stuffed animals but I wanted some of the new crazy yarn from Redheart. This yarn stripes nicely for hats so I think they will be fun for stuffies.

I also found some fat quarters to add to the stash. This is how they are packaged.

 They're pretty nice when opened up too.

I don't have much Fall fabrics so these were a nice find.

This is the one that surprised me. The picture on the label of the folded fat quarter was a bit small and my eyes are bit old so I didn't realize that it would be this one large picture. I thought it maybe had a bunch of the "S" symbol all over the blues. Nope. I'm not sure what I will make from this. Maybe a pillow? The center of a wall hanging?  I guess it will rest in the stash until I figure out what to do with it.

What was your best thrift store garage sale find?

New Followers button

Google friends is being discontinued as of February 29th. There has been some rumors that it might leave before the end of the month. In order to still have a  followers button I went on a search. I saw on a couple blogs that they are using Linky Followers so I thought I would give it a try. It's supposed to do more than Google Friends did but I haven't had a chance to play with it yet. The new button is over there on the right side.

Because a blog post needs a pic here is Suzi. She was going crazy outside playing with the kids. Don't you love our brown grass? 

Stocking Winner

I waited for Robbie to come home from school today to draw the winner of the stocking I made and all it's goodies hidden inside. I printed out all the comments (103), cut them up, folded them, and put them in a bowl. Shook it like crazy, picked up the one that fell out (hehe) and let Robbie loose on the bowl. After he swished the papers around a bit he chose.....





....JANET !!!  Janet's favorite song is I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day. Congratulations Janet, I've sent you an email for your address. If for some reason I do not hear from Janet in the next three days I will have Robbie choose another winner.

I want to thank all the bloggers who joined me this year by giving away a stocking on their blog! I would also like to say thank you to everyone that entered all the giveaways! I found so many new blogs to follow. There are so many talented and fun bloggers out there and not enough time in the day.

Rugs & Runners Workshop giveaway

Becky over at Patchwork Posse is having a giveaway for an upcoming workshop. The winners (yes there will be two lucky winners) will be announced tomorrow so hurry on over to enter.

Just to give you a heads up on what you will be winning:

• · Rugs & Runners Online Workshop. For 4 months, a new pattern for a Table Runner + an adjustment for a Mug Rug will be posted. These are exclusive patterns by super talented designers! Each month the patterns will feature a different season. The workshop site is available 24/7 allowing you to sew on your own time and in your own home. Besides the patterns you will have access to a gallery to post your photos, a forum to ask questions, and a community of worldwide members. Don’t miss out on these great patterns by your favorite designers!

Happy Memorial Day

Pattern Winner

When I was getting ready to chose the winner of the sewing patterns my Daughter asked if she could chose the winner this time. Sure no problem. The lucky winner that Mandy chose is......Barb!


Tomorrow is Mandy's birthday!! She will be 20. I guess that means she is no longer a little girl. We tease her about being "all grown up" now that she is no longer a teenager. What a wild ride!

I thought you might enjoy a few pictures that I happen to have on my laptop.....

This is Mandy and her older brother Justin. I'm guessing Mandy was around 2 and Justin around 5. Justin has always been very protective of his baby sister.

Here's Mandy at Publix (4) with their Mascot Plato. When Mandy was little she had very blonde hair with hints of strawberry blonde here and there. Adorable.

Justin and Mandy were both in one of my sister's weddings. Mandy has only worn a dress a handful of times in her life. She was always too busy getting dirty and climbing trees to worry about looking pretty.  Such cuties.

And then they grow up lol.

Some of you might remember that Mandy met John Stamos recently. Another couple of cuties.

Mandy (the one on the left in a tan t-shirt) and a few of her friends (and her little brother-not in this picture) spent yesterday at the paintball range celebrating her and her friend Beth's (red t-shirt on right) birthdays. They came back with welts and bruises and big smiles.

Happy Birthday sweetie!! I can't wait to see how you grow over the next 20 years.

Hoppy Easter!!

Phill-A-Me-Na Flamingo and I want to wish you and your family a very safe and Happy Easter!!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful time with friends and family this weekend. We are having our traditional ham dinner. We will probably spend most of our day playing video games and watching movies together.  Good Friday started Spring Break for our area. It will be great to hear all the neighborhood kids playing outside. I love listening to the kids laughing outside. Some will be riding bikes and others will be swimming. My son has a couple friends and they like to play basketball. Hopefully the low humidity will stick around for awhile so the kids can run around without getting over heated.

Phill-a-me-na Flamingo is one of my favorite friends over in the shop. 

Hello!

Hello everyone! I've started to feel a bit more motivated lately and I am ready to come back to blogging. I love blogging and I have missed blogging and chatting with everyone. I just didn't have the energy or motivation for awhile as I'm sure some of you have noticed. Let's see if I can get on a roll with some new posts.

Last month I won this DVD over at Dragon Threads blog. Libby Lehman has some stunning quilts on her blog Threadplaying. I have to admit that I haven't watched the DVD yet. I am very interested in the appliqué section though. I've just been too tired to actually enjoy the DVD so I have been waiting.

CSN Stores Winner

I let Hubby chose the winner this time because Robbie was busy on the computer. He chose commenter #1. The first commenter isn't usually chosen so it was nice to see it happen this time. The lucky winner of a $40 CSN Stores gift certificate is Gene. Congratulations Gene!  Gene is a wonderful quilter so stop by his blog and see what he has been working on lately.

I haven't been on the computer much lately due to shoulder troubles. I'm still having trouble with my right shoulder that I hurt back in January at work. I've always heard that dealing with a Workman's Comp injury takes a long time and now I know first hand that it is a slow process. I've been doing physical therapy for a few weeks but it just seems to make it worse. It's very painful and keeps me from playing on the computer for more than a couple minutes. Plus, it keeps me out of the sewing room. Not much fun happening around here.

I do have some projects to show from before though. Plus, I have been lucky enough to win a few give aways. I won two Go! dies from A Few Scraps last month. I chose the Drunkard's Path 7" die and

the Go! Critters Die. I have seen so many fun quilt designs using the Drunkard's Path die that I just had to try it out for myself. I've also been looking at all the gorgeous quilts Barb has made using the critter dies. Plus, she has made some great Drunkard's Path quilts using her stash of Samoan fabrics. Now to I just have to wait until the shoulders can handle cranking the Go! handle. I might just have to put Robbie to work cutting fabric for me. I'm also thinking about buying the Dresden Plate die. I have a few ideas for mini quilts and the die would make the process much easier.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend!

And the Winner is......

I asked Robbie to pick a winner this time. I asked him to pick a number between 1 and 10 and of course he said 24. He said that means 6. Then he says minus 5 plus 4. Sometimes this kid just drives me crazy.

So....the winner is Pam from Gingerbread Snowflakes!!!  Congratulations, Pam I sent you an email. 

It's all about me today

Today's my birthday! I have been hanging out here for 42 years. I stopped celebrating birthdays a long time ago.  When the kids were younger it was always just another day. Now that they are (mostly) grown I've been thinking about celebrating again. Now that I am older I have this urge to celebrate (or decorate) all special days and Holidays. While wandering around the web I found something that will help me with this....

I found this on Amazon and I just had to order it! I've always loved Sunbonnet Sue and now I can enjoy her each month. That is if I ever make any. I've been wanting to make some mini quilts to decorate around the house. I love to change things out each month so these mini quilts would be perfect. Plus, the designs are just so cute.

I have no appointments today so I am hoping to spend a good part of the day in the sewing room. The boys can eat leftovers from all the Super Bowl cooking I did yesterday. I'm itching to go and do a bit of fabric shopping though. JoAnn's has all their Valentine's fabric on sale right now and my stash could use some more reds and pinks.....

In Search Of...

My Niece in Tennessee has requested a new quilt. Her and her Hubby are looking to buy their first house and would like a new quilt. They even picked out the colors and design. Pretty good for a young couple. They are about the same age as our oldest.

Stacey saw this one from JCPenney. I think she picked out a gorgeous quilt. We were discussing how much longer a handmade quilt lasts compared to the store bought ones lately. I'm sure it all depends on how much you spend but ours always seem to fall apart or loose the softness of their batting.

OK now for the part where I need help. From what I can see it looks like the center of the quilt is a section of a wedding ring design. Then some triangles and squares, borders, etc. Has anyone seen anything similar to this? I can wing it and that is not the problem. It's how much fabric to buy. It's times like this that I wish I had EQ7.

The other big part is fabric selection. While I love these colors, they are not normally something I buy. Does anyone know of a line that has these kinds of soft colors? I'm guessing they are country?

Thanks everyone!

Retail Therapy

My floss supply was a bit low so I picked up a nice size variety pack. I've been following everyone's progress over at the Birdie Stitches block of the month and I want to make the blocks but I just haven't decided on colors yet. My February partner over at Block Adventure requested Civil War fabrics and those are fabrics that I never have in my stash so I ordered a charm pack.  The monster fat quarters were ordered on a whim but I do have a plan or two for them.

Still Here Just Napping

I thought I would pop in and let everyone know that I am doing fine after Monday's surgery. I haven't been quite myself as you can imagine. The anesthesia fog is clearing so that is a good thing. I can now have a normal thought and stay awake for more than a couple hours at a time lol. The shoulder is stiff/swollen and of course it hurts alot and often but it is doing just what it is supposed to be doing. I am being a very good patient and following my therapist's and doctor's orders. I can now type for a bit so you might start hearing from me again. I do want to thank everyone for checking in on me, I appreciate it. Please take this as a big hug and thank you to everyone!! Soon I will be able to write more blog posts and actually answer individual emails. I'm already sketching some new ideas in my quilt sketch/idea book and can't wait to get at my sewing machine again.

I leave you with this picture of my get well plant from my sister. She was determined to make me dinner, dessert or buy me any kind of snack but I refused. So, she showed up at my door with this plant. She did good too because this plant is one of those hard to kill kind. It doesn't like much sun or water so it should be safe at my house. I do tend to either pay too much attention or not enough attention to my plants.

Surgery Day

Today's schedule goes a bit like this....

9:00 am - go to doc's office to get the surgery site marked
10:30 am - be at hospital to sign in for surgery and start pre-op prep
12:30 scheduled time for surgery but it might not be until 1:00

The surgery is scheduled to last 1.5 hours depending on what the doc has to do once he gets in there. At this point he is expecting to fix the bicep tendon tear, remove a bone spur and trim the end of the clavicle, and some debridement as necessary. If everything goes as expected then I should be home sometime around 5 pm. Then I can expect a week full of appointments and naps.

I hope everyone has a great week and gets lots of crafting done. I will be visiting everyone's blogs so even though I can't sew, I can at least look at all of your wonderful projects and plan my next one. I need to find a sketch book so I can get some of these ideas out of my head and into a notebook. Right now I have a bunch of little pieces of paper with some quick sketches floating around the sewing room getting lost and forgotten.

Free Patterns

HomeSpun Threads is offering all their patterns for free right now. I don't know how long this will be available. The only thing they request is that you follow their blog and pass the word.

Apple core die

I wasn't planning on buying anymore dies for my Go! cutter but after buying the 30's repro fabric I just had to pick up this apple core die.

I was thinking of mixing in some white and pastel-ish fabric with the 30's and making at least a baby size apple core quilt. I will also be cutting up some of my scraps for an apple core quilt or table runner.

A little Christmas Shopping

*If you are here looking for the stocking give away go to this post*


Rob and I were discussing Christmas presents yesterday. Normally we do not buy for each other but this year since the big kids (22,19) are adults and we just have Robbie (11) to concentrate on, we decided it was time to treat each other. Rob knows I have wanted a Mother's ring since the big kids were toddlers. My Grandmother had one and I have always loved it. I have realized over time that a ring is not practical for me though so I have been looking at necklaces instead.

Now, I love Rob dearly and he tries very hard to buy me something that I really want or need but sometimes he misses. It's partly my fault because I have a tendency to say out loud when he is around "Oh, I like that" or "isn't that pretty". It's not that I want those things, I just think they are nice or pretty. So I decided that I had better be involved in picking out my Christmas present.

I did a little internet searching and found a nice Mother's necklace that works well for me. I found a shop called Things Remembered that has many wonderful pieces of jewelry.

With a quick search I found this:

It has a modern feel to me with the circle piece and the tree. They allow you to engrave both sides of the circle piece. On one side I chose the three kids names- Justin, Mandy, Robbie. On the other side I went with A Mother's Love is Forever. Our family tree will have 5 birthstones.

It also comes with a free filigree box:

I was being cheap and didn't have the top of the box engraved. Plus, I wasn't sure what I wanted engraved. If I decided I want something on the box I can take it to a local jeweler and have it engraved later.

I know what I am buying Hubby for Christmas I just need to go to the store and pick it up. I can't tell you what it is because sometimes Rob is sneaky and visits my blog.

In the mail

I was very lucky and one a copy of the new 100 blocks book over at Antler Quilt Design. I bought the first volume and while there are 100 wonderful blocks not many of them called out to me. With volume 2 I found more than half of the blocks were ones that I wanted to make. This is a wonderful book to pick up if you have the opportunity.

I won this book on Sunday. Sent Doug my address on Monday. Received my book on Wednesday. Amazing!! It came right from QuiltMaker.

I also received this book last week. I ordered it from Amazon after seeing it on someone's blog. There are lots of fun and quick projects in this book. I really enjoy hand sewing and working with felt. I saw several patterns in here that I want to make. 

Thrift Shopping

After the doctor's on Monday I rewarded myself with a trip to the thrift store. I knew I wanted to pick up a couple golf clubs so I can test out my golf club cover pattern. The golf clubs were only $1 so I grabbed a wood and a putter. Good thing they were marked because I know almost nothing about golf. At this thrift store if you want to use a credit/debit card you need to purchase a minimum of $10. I did have some cash in my wallet but of course I wanted to wander around and see what else they had since I hadn't been there in awhile.

I like to browse the pillow case section. They call it pillowcase but what they put there are the covers you use to make throw pillows. I found the one realistic duck pillow case and then the 6 country duck covers in the lower left. The country duck covers are all double so there is 2 ducks on each. That gives me 12 ducks to make a quilt with.

I also picked up some fabric and a cute wooden reindeer. I found a knit stocking (commercially made because I can see where they cut off the tag inside) that I liked. I might use this as my stocking for the Stocking give away next month.

See those two scary pillows in the back? I think they are the kind that come with those scary looking couches from back in  my childhood. They look like they are in pretty good shape. I squeezed them and they felt new inside. What I plan on doing is removing the covers and make new fun, funky and bright covers for them. I have been wanting throw pillows for the couch but I always forget to look at pillow forms when I am out.

I bought all this for just over $15 I believe. Not too bad.