Merry Christmas!

Need More Time...

....like about another week and then I might actually have everything done. But noooo, it doesn't look like that' s gonna happen. Neither is the weather going to cooperate. So, after the 10" of fluffy white stuff mixed in with .25" of ice in the middle, we're in for yet another storm Tuesday nite into Wednesday. Aaaaaaaaarrrrghhhhhh! That means we have to move up our travel to Dad's house. Instead of leaving Wednesday we must leave tomorrow afternoon once The Bearded One is home from work. That means that all that baking and other stuff I wanted to do just isn't gonna happen.

On a quilty note, the project mentioned in the last post did get completed this morning. Good thing. The QB Christmas party and Challenge Reveal has been postponed to next week. Hopefully the weather gods will cooperate. We've had to cancel quilting the last 2 weeks. Would somebody please remind the weather gods that this is Seattle and we're supposed to be getting RAIN, not SNOW?!?

Here are a few more pictures from our last few storms. When Arlo gets outside, he loves it. It's just getting him to go outside that's the problem. He goes to the door, I open it. He sticks his nose out, sees the snow and promptly puts on the brakes. Then he gives me the most pathetic look. Like it's MY FAULT or something! Sheesh. You'd never know he doesn't like the snow from these pictures though. The "crunchy" stuff really bothered him though. He was absolutely sure there was something burried under all that cold, white stuff. It's really fun to through a snowball into the ground and watch him try to find it!

Just in Case...

Just in case The Bearded One might read this post -- doubtful, but you never know, I had to obscure the latest project. It will be revealed next week. But see, I have been busy quilting -- you just can't see it! The top portion is complete -- now to quilt it.

Meanwhile, we are having more unusual weather for the Seattle area, that means more white stuff. This area just can't handle it. The first couple paragraphs of this article pretty much sum it up best. The city of Kent is 28 square miles and there are only 5 snow plows! Of course, the city itself is down in the valley with most of the roads up on the two hills on either side of the valley. So, when it snows we really can't do much.

Well, The Bearded One just called, he's stuck in a massive, snow-related traffic jam. Good thing I can look at traffic cams for him.

Snow!

You know how it is when you can't get a song out of your head? Well, I woke up with this little ditty going through my head.




For a lot of you, 2" of the white stuff isn't much. But for the Seattle area, it's a big deal. Even worse, is the thermometer hovering in the 20's. A certain dog did not want to go out this morning.

The Quilt Dog

Isn't he just too cute for words? Yup, that's my my spoiled boy. If there's a quilt around, he must be under it. He's happiest when he's all wrapped up in a quilt. Guess I should make him a quilt of his own one of these days.....

The Picture Says it All

Quilters really are the nicest people. A few months back Lori, from our HQChatters, list lost her husband of 47 years to cancer. We decided she needed a quilt. Today it was presented to her by her local quilting bee friends. Here she is with her Baskets of Love quilt. I think the picture truly does say it all.











Meanwhile, we finally got our Christmas tree up the other day. The timing was perfect. We had literally just hauled everything down from the attic when the doorbell rang. It was the mailman delivering the new ornament. Four years ago, when we lost Ditto, our big brown moose, I ordered the top ornament shown here with his picture on it. Since we lost Sneakers this year, we had to add an ornament with her picture. The timing was perfect.








Of course Arlo had to stick his nose in everything and inspect the tree quite closely. We had to remind him that no, we did NOT set this up in the living room so he wouldn't have to go outside in the rain. I'm really glad it's an artificial tree. Otherwise I'm sure he would try to lift his leg on it. But then, come to think of it, he did do that his first Christmas.

Here's another shot of one of my husband's favorite ornaments. How many people can say that they have a VW bus on their Christmas tree?

Challenged by the Challenge

So, here it is, another year has flown by. It's December and I have joined the ranks of the rest of the QB's struggling to finish this year's Christmas Challenge. Usually I know what I'm doing. This year I started out with little direction and no real plan. Other than it had to be green and it had to be a basket of some sort. I started out on one idea and chugged merrily along until I came to a crashing halt in September. I had NO IDEA how to proceed further. Well, I can now report that the pieces are finally falling into place. An idea occurred to me the other day while doing some blog browsing. I can happily report that the 2008 Challenge is ALMOST COMPLETE! Whoo hoo!

Meanwhile, I seem to have become a bit distracted. A few months ago Freda had a Christmas Cottage exchange. I didn't participate. But, now I keep seeing all the cottages everywhere and even a completed top or two. Well, I decided to make my own cottages, smaller, and slightly different. Now I'm on a roll. I'm thinking I'll add some trees too.

My Dark Secret

Yesterday, Mary posted about her messy sewing room. Well, that prompted me to take another look at my disaster. I admit it, I'm a slob. I'd much rather be doing ANYTHING but cleaning and straightening up. I have a sign still on the doorway of my former sewing room that states "Creative Minds are Rarely Tidy". That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Meanwhile, I'll let you in on my deep, dark secret. I hope it doesn't scare you too much. But, this is the current state of my sewing room. After looking at it from this perspective, I'm deeply ashamed of it. As soon as I run today's errands I think I will go right downstairs and try to put some order back into this chaos.

So, Mary, do I win the prize?