Jumbles

Too much stuff to post - but decided I needed to post something ;^)

We spent a week at the beach week before last. A few photos:
Where we were - North Topsail Island, NC:


Playing in a tide pool:


Waiting to go into the sea turtle hospital:


My tween's mermaid sand sculpture:




The mid-kid turned 10 the Saturday we were there:


We got him guitar hero, but he doesn't much like it - the tween and I are having much more fun with it. I will probably take him out tomorrow for a new game that *he* picks out.

I took the tween shopping yesterday. New pierced ears, new jeans, new undergarments. Mother-daughter bonding time, definitely.

Today we went to a picnic at the local state park, a combination end-of-summer/start-of-school/going-away-of-friends party thrown by the parents of one of the tween's friends. We had a great time - good food, some time on the paddleboats.

Just not much crafty going on here. I did make some chocolate chip cheesecake brownies for the picnic, but I'm not sure that counts!

Photos from the fair last weekend

Not much quilty going on here - working on the chess quilt, and packing up stuff to work on during vacation at the beach.

This is a "highlight" of our fair - the decorated toilets. It seems as though they all get a ribbon - and they all have places. So, you can get a 13th-place ribbon in the toilet contest!


The farm equipment was a HUGE hit with the Small Man.








Hard working boy!


And with the mid-kid as well:


They had a combine set up with a slide:


Award-winning Christmas trees:


Lots of animals, of course.
Chickens! I love chickens!






Eggs hatching:


Bunnies:




Kids petting something - goats, I think.



Petting the buffalo:


Sheep:


Riding the rides:








This year, we were there at the right place and the right time for the pig races. There were also goat races and duck races.
Finish line for the pigs:


Goats - they pretty much ambled around the track.


Yum! Funnel cakes!


Leaving the fair: My daughter is almost as tall as my husband.

I have a wee fondness for fabric...

and all sorts of other craft materials as well.

The scary part? This isn't all of it. Only about 2 small bags are yard, and there's none of the beads, trim, buttons, paper crafting, or other craft supplies. Even scarier? There's a significant amount of fabric already "organized" that's not represented here either.

I got everything moved from the playroom and other assorted hiding places around the house into our bedroom so I could have it all in one place. I started washing the stuff that had been in the basement to get out the musty basement-y smell. That's nearly done.

Ah well. It'll get done and I'll be able to find things by sorting through only four or five bins instead of all ten.

Our caterpillars

We have about a dozen monarch caterpillars on our milkweed plants. This is one:




I'm hoping when they get big enough I can take a not-blurry picture. The biggest now is about an inch long; the smallest is less than a centimeter long.

This is the leaf I removed. I felt bad, but according to what I could find, this caterpillar for the milkweed tussock moth will defoliate the host plant. Sorry, guys. I need the milkweed for the monarchs.


No quilty pictures, but quilty gratitude. One of the members of the Quilt Art list offered old magazines, and she lives about 2 miles from my house! She had THREE BOXES of magazines. I'm in heaven. A lot of them are older, but those were my lost-to-children no-quilting years.

Our fun Saturday - Part 2

After lunch, we went to Star Gazing Farm, an animal sanctuary. Here, the turkeys were the surprise hit.







They did have some other animals, but we don't have pictures of them. Most of the time was spent with the turkeys.

Our fun Saturday - part 1

On Saturday, we went to the Montgomery County farm tour. First, the alpaca farm.
Alpacas:


Walking around the fence:




Alpacas:


My lovely kids:


The mid-kid took this one. I'm not sure if he *meant* to have it tilted like this:
javascript:void(0)

July UFO done!!!

Started in the mid-80s by me and my Memaw:

(My holder is taller than me by a few inches and still isn't quite tall enough.)

The back:


I think you can see some of the quilting pattern for the sashing - I just did pointy lozenges that met (sort of) in the peachy setting blocks. The blocks were quilted in the ditch in the print parts of the bear paw.

Husband and middle son are still alive

But I could've killed both of them Friday night. The mid-kid got his goo all over my quilt in progress (and I was mad at TMOTH for letting him buy it).

SO - I worked like mad, quilted the last block, finished the binding, and threw it in the washing machine. I managed to get all of the goop scraped off and it appears to be gone...

Good thing, too, because our well died Saturday morning. We finally admitted it was not fixable by us Saturday afternoon. TMOTH was going to wait until Monday, but NO, dammit, I do NOT bounce out of bed every morning and head off to work so that I can't get my well fixed when I want it. I'm sure it cost us a couple of hundred more to get it fixed now instead of next week, but it's worth it to be able to shower in the morning.

An unexpected gift

While doing the FabShopHop, I signed up for the e-newsletter at The Quilting Cottage. "Sign up and I'll send you a free gift." Well, I'm thinking a coupon, something like that. Well, THIS lands in my mailbox on Saturday!:


Two lovely coordinating fat quarters (how'd they know I like sage green!). Something simple, but I'm sure to remember them the next time I'm shopping online.

The milkweed post

I noticed this buy (a milkweed bug) on one of our plants today:


When I went over to get a closer look, I saw this!!!

Man, I hope we get caterpillars!

Later, I saw this:

We have aphids on the milkweed, so he's happy.