New Look

Well.....whatcha think??

After many questions from DH about "when are you going to change that doll on the top of your blog?" type of questions, I decided to try something else.

If you don't like it say so I may be able to get it back the way it was.

Until next time

~~Fran...:c)

I'm Liberated Also!

And now before someone starts saying that this is not messy enough, well let me tell you, it's messy enough for me. See the computer monitor under the plant stand? Well there's another one behind the chair in the corner that you can just get a peek at the top of it back there. What you can't see in the photos are the dust you can write your name in, or the cobwebs in the corners of the ceiling...my mother use to call those "Irish Lace" (*LOL*) she had an Irish grandmother who use to say that if anyone was bold enough to comment on them.

AND these are just pictures of my dining room and my kitchen counters, I wasn't about to go around every room in the house to show you my stacked boxes and totes, just "waiting" to be placed in storage. It's been a long wait.:c)) And I couldn't show you stacks of dirty dishes as DH takes care of those. I know it! I'm spoiled, and I love it!

What you must all realize is that there are just the 2 of us here now and it just shouldn't be that way, but it is and I don't much care... IF it takes time away from my quilting, or my charity work at the church, it just won't get done soon. It will get cleaned and dusted when I have the time, which will not be in the near future. Probably 2 days before Christmas, before my kids start coming home for Christmas. Well I wouldn't want them to think their mother wasn't the perfect mother would I? I have to put my best foot forward....(*LOL*)

So there, I'm liberated also!

I just love this post Lila started, because it is so much like human nature to always put our 'best foot' forward, and to hide the 'nasty' stuff under the carpet or in my case behind the bedroom door (NO ONE EVER looks behind your bedroom door!

When I was first married, I had an unexpected visit from my mother-in-law and while my husband met her at the door I was frantically shoving dirty dishes in the oven. (*LOL*)...it just wouldn't have been right to have her think that her son had married anything but the perfect little homemaker....gosh when I think back... how many times have we all been guilty of hiding our 'dirty little secrets'? And by that I mean the basket of clothes that hasn't been sorted or folded, shoving magazines under the couch cushions, or closing bedroom doors hastily so that 'if' our guest had to use the bathroom', he or she wouldn't be shocked see our unmade beds at two in the afternoon.
I once had a neighbor that told me that her husband wouldn't live in my house because it wasn't "clean enough" for him! The man worked for the city and half the times in the sewers, and took a shower once a week! EUGH! I had a small 24x24 foot house with 5 growing children. It wasn't dirty, but it sure has heck was messy! Needless to say this neighbor and I parted ways.

On that note I send a challenge to the rest of you to "GET LIBERATED!" Tell the world your human and you can't do it all, nor do you really want to do it all. Life is too short, and there are so many other more important things to do than wash up the breakfast dishes as soon as possible so the kitchen will 'shine'



Till next time...



~~Fran...:c)

Mama"s Got a New Baby!!

Isn't he beautiful?? He arrived Friday evening and has been fussed over and pampered ever since. I've never had anything like it before.

It's like I've been driving old jalopies all my life and now I have a brand new Cadillac. It has so many features.....

...look at them all...

Picture is a bit blurry but believe me...:c)

It can do a blanket stitch, all kinds of quilting stitches, the old zig-zag- with pizazz, all kinds of embroidery and a whole lot more.

I'm so excited!! Can you tell??

It 's a Brothers sewing machine and many of you may not have heard of this name as it is totally Canadian. This is what I wanted. That way I don't have to ship out for parts to Idaho, or Colorado or Timbuktu. Shipping and duty really take a bite out of our dollar.

You can read all about it by going to Google and typing in Brothers Sewing Machine, a whole lot of sites will open I went to the 2 nd one down and the model # is CS5000H . Now I know that this is not the top of the line but for me the line has been brought up like 100% from what I had.

You may wonder why after I bragged about my old work horses so much that I have gone and bought a new one. Well let me tell you......

Last Thursday was the day a bunch of us girls get together at the South Cove community center and spend the day sewing and chatting. We bring our lunches and generally have a great day. Last Thursday was not so great for me! To start off with I didn't have my own vehicle (DH needed it for golf), when we got there we all picked our tables and started on our projects.

I got about 30- to 45 minutes in when my machine went Pfffft!!!! KAPLOOEE!!! GRRRRRR!!!!!

Dumb, dumb, dumb I had no hand work with me. I spent the whole day admiring what everybody else was doing and twiddling my thumbs. Not Fun, I've had fun. That wasn't it.

Hence the new 'baby' on Friday. I spent the day Saturday making 2 table runners.

I worked non-stop yesterday afternoon and finished quilting 3 care quilts for our church. Here they are ....

This was a printed piece that I added 2 borders and piano keys to. I just love this quilt it is so colorful and cozy. It's sure to brighten someones day and get them smilling. We quilt these Care Quilts right on fleece. Can you see the nice wavy stitch?

This one was pieced this summer and I added the backing and quilted it yesterday. Isn't this a nice pattern for fleece?

This was a printed panel also, but I just thought it was so cute I couldn't resist it. A nice red backing and border is just what it needed. Some lucky young mother will be happy to get this.

I hope..... Anyway I know the baby will be warm. :c)

Anyway I smoked it again today and I'm almost finished my 2 table runners and my I SPY Quilt. The table runners just have the binding to sew on.

Now, I'm going to go take a hot bath and sit down, put up my feet and sip a glass of wine and try to read a good book. Wonder if I'll make it past 10 o'clock? :c)....

Until next time...

~~Fran...:c)

PS: These are flowers from our garden that DH brought in for me when I was feeling so upset Thursday....

Goodnight once more....

Filling the freezer

Aren't these just the most beautiful cabbages you have ever seen? I thought so and picked a big one and took it home with me.


I guess it must be the time of the year but I get this urge to start preserving and filling the freezer.
After Church today I came home and made cabbage rolls.

I took a few pictures as I was making them.


Here you see the cabbage half gone. I boil it in this big pot until the leaves are soft and pliable, (yet not cooked right through). When that happens they get cut off from the stem and I end up with this..



I personally feel that it it easier to roll them if I cut a bit off the back of the center rib.

Everyone seems to have a different recipe. Mine includes lean ground beef, raw par-boiled rice, salt & pepper, about 1 tbsp of dried oregano and the same of marjoram, 2 heals of bread passed through the food processor, and the old standby, a stalk of celery and 1 large onion , minced. (The amounts depend on how many I'm making)
I mush it all together and place a bit of this meat mixture on a cabbage leaf and roll it up.



Here you see them lining up on the cookie sheet and when I'm done this is what goes into the
freezer.



When they are frozen solid I will separate them and place them in freezer bags. This way I need only take out what we can consume in one meal. When ready, I usually thaw them out for a bit then I add a can of tomatoes. I cover them and put them in the oven at 350 Fahrenheit for an hour or so, the rice should be cooked through when done. ( The time of course depends on how many I'm cooking). My family love these and it wouldn't be fall without making these up.



I had planned on sewing this afternoon but this took precedence. It has to be a primitive need in me to start filling the cupboards and freezer come September, making sure that the winter coats are all dry cleaned or washed, and that the winter boots are in good shape and ready for winter. This happens annually, like getting the furnace serviced before the hard frosts set in.

When all this is done I can sit back and sew all winter, as snug as a bug in a rug, and quite happy. A good warm feeling.

Wishing you all the same warm feeling.

Until next time....

~~Fran...:c)

Getting Ready for Fall

Well I'm kind of catching my breath. As you see I went on a major shopping spree when I went to Detroit (actually Port Huron). I've only posted a couple of pictures, but I bought too much to put it all on one post. Jo Ann's had some terrific buys on fall fabrics and I was really getting low on my solid cottons so I stocked up. Fat quarters for .99 cents, wouldn't you? I couldn't resist the black with the bright red cherries. I only bought a 1/2 yd. but I only want it for accents. I'm thinking potholders, maybe an oven mitt, or a pocket on a red apron? I just fell in love with it.

I want to make a table runner for my daughter in law for Thanksgiving., hence the gold & red fabric very 'turkey' looking. LOL :c)) In Canada we celebrate in early October and we are going to spend the holiday with our son and his family.



As you can see I've haven't posted for a bit but I have been VERY busy. Our quilt guild has started up again as has our regular quilting bees. Between those and the two quilts I'm trying to finish by the end of the month, well... not so much free time to myself. I usually take a few minutes after dinner to catch up on my favorite blogs, but even then I haven't posted responses very often. That's bad, bad, bad of me, because I do know how much these responses mean when you have a blog. "Hey! Someone reads my blog and cares enough to let me know." I will try to do better.






Last time I showed you the purse that my granddaughter made. Now this is the purse Nana made for herself. This is more my speed. LOL :c)

A few months ago I happened to be in my favorite Thrift Shop when the girl said to me "Fran, you quilt, would you be interested in this?"
"This" turned out to be a large box of upholstery samples. There must be 500 in there if not more. I asked "how much?" she said $5.00 and I had the money out of my purse so fast it practically flew out. This purse was made from some of these samples. It looks like I'm going to have a whole lot of bags to make for myself and for gifts to friends and family for a few years. :c) how good is that for $5 bucks?
Don't ya just love Thrift Shops? They're like Aladdin's cave, always full of unknown treasures if you only take the time to look for them.


Until next time....

~~ Fran... :c)

We Have a New Quilter in the Family

Yes I'm very proud to announce that we do indeed have a new quilter in the family.

This is my 18 yr old granddaughter Chelsea, and she lives in the USA but spent the summer in Canada getting re-acquainted with her family.

While she was with us I was making the 'sleepover' quilt and Chelsea fell in love with the pattern. "Do you think I could do that Nana?" I told her you CAN do anything! "Could I make it into a purse?"

"A purse! Well I don't see why not." We went shopping that afternoon and she chose her fabrics, and colors. We had so much fun. "What! That fabric?" giggle, giggle..."Yes Nana. It's going to be so cool!" Well it turned out way cooler than I thought.

That same afternoon I set her up on my spare machine and she started stitching her 'strings' together. The 'maverick star' came next and the rest is history. Here is a picture of her purse. Yes it's very big and very colorful, but you have to be 18 yrs old to fully appreciate this purse.

This is the front and now for the back

It was so much fun doing this with her and seeing her enthusiasm as she went along. She was thrilled to have done all the work by herself.

We drove her to Detroit last weekend so she could get her flight back to her home state. I was sorry to see her go, but felt good about having shared this experience with her. Now she is all gung-ho to start a lap quilt for her dad who is totally into Nascar. She is also doing her own design in black/red and white checker flags. I can't wait to see it.

So yes folks I can honestly say that the art of quilting has been handed down in our family.

I'm so proud of her. Can you tell?

Until next time...

~~... Fran :c)

MOO-SIC To My Ears

Well here we go....If chicken's can Moo in Texas, I want you all to know that cows are MOO-SIC to our ears in Canada. Wotcha think Belinda? Want to trade? he-he-he Finely got the chance to make one new pot holder, but it wont stay here long. Already my daughter wants to keep it. I need about 6 new ones so I better get busy after I finish my 'stars' on my quilt border. Maybe next week.

We've been taking a couple of days off from home to go camping with our kids. What fun! I haven't roasted hot dogs or made Smores in years.
Went fishing last night and both the granddaughter and I each caugth a fish. They were too small and we released them. But it was worth seeing the excitement in her eyes when her line started to tug.
this will be a short post , as I have to go get ready to go back. It's only a 45 minute drive from home so the old folks come home to a nice soft bed at night and return with missing supplies in the morning. Just wusses I guess, but I've done a LOT of that stuff with the kids years ago, and roughing it now for us is black and white TV. LOL :c)

Until next time ....

~~ Fran ... :c)

Seeing Stars!!!

Well that's what I'm literally doing.

For the last 2 days I've been machine quilting my sleepover quilt with my small tabletop machine. Since I'm just learning this skill, hand/eye coordination is not that great, so I decided to quilt the whole thing in country stars of all sizes. You know, primitive wonky little stars, and boy oh boy are some of these primitive LOL...;C)) Cute though, and the best part is that you can't really screw these up because they come in all shapes and sizes. My quilting teacher said that the secret to good machine quilting is to practice, practice, practice!!!! By the time this quilt is done I will be able to make these babies with one eye closed, and the tongue between the teeth is almost eliminated today... as it is I made these all night in my sleep. Hard Work!!!

Today I finished the center and now all I have left to do is the border. ALL...(she says) that border sure looks a lot bigger than what I thought it was. It's going to have to wait until Friday because I have a quilting bee tomorrow and I need a break.

It doesn't look good for sewing next week, as I have commitments Monday and Tuesday and I'm having company for the next 3 days after. Then on Saturday we drive our granddaughter to Detroit to catch her flight back to her home state. She graduated grade 12 this summer and she came and spent the summer here in Canada taking time to visit all of the rest of the family. She was 10 when my daughter and her family moved to the States and now she's 18, quite a change in my little angel. We enjoyed seeing her and getting to spend some "special" time with her.


And I guess since we're going to go across at Port Huron I might just make a fabric run at
Jo-Ann's Fabrics. Wish me luck that they have good sales. I'm going to check out on line to see if there are any quilt shops in that town. I know there are probably 1001 in Detroit city itself, but DH absolutely refuses to get off the interstate for fear of getting hopelessly lost . Can't say I blame him. I'm not a great tourist when I don't know where I'm going or how I'm going to get back. LOL....

Until next time...

~~ Fran :c)

Making Changes

Well, being new at this, I've found out that there are too many choices to make and I've changed the looks of this page several time.

I THINK I like this one. I visit so many other blogs everyday and see all the 'fun' things they have on their blogs and I want to try and figure out how to do these things on here. So you may see this page change a few more times before I'm happy with it.

Hope you will bear with me. :c) In the meantime I just want to give all of you a BIG

and I hope you will drop by often to see the many changes on this blog. LOL!!


Until next time...

~~Fran :c)

Mama Mia

Oh My Gosh!!! My daughter called me last week and asked if I would like to go to the movies with her and friend and her friends mom. Kind of mother/daughter night. I was very happy to agree. We went to see Mama Mia, and I can't tell you just how much I enjoyed this movie. Well...so much that when we got back to her place I called my husband and made a "date" with him to go see it again with him tonight so we could share the joy and laughs of this movie.

The music was fantastic, it had me bobbin in my seat. The cast was superb, and the setting in which they performed was just breathtaking. I felt as if I was actually on this Greek island with them.

It was funny to the point of laughing out loud and at the same time there were scenes that brought tears to my eye.

This is a must see movie for everyone that wants to recall the Abba days. The music is WOW!!! and the fun never seems to stop.

Boy, it seems like Meryll Streep hasn't aged a bit in the last 25 yrs. The antics of her two sidekicks are side splitting, and the young actress that plays her daughter is bright , beautiful, talented and believable.

I can't recommend this movie more. You just have to go see it for yourself.

Until next time......

~~ Fran :c)

My Grand Children's Sleepover Quilt

I say this but it really is my "Bonnie/Tonya Wanta Be Quilt"

I don't know of anyone else that could have inspired me more than these two great ladies. You can find Bonnie at Quiltville.com and Tonya is at Lazygalquilting.blogspot.com ... These are two wonderful sites and you can learn sooooo much from these gals. The stars are Bonnie's 'Maverick Stars' that I played around with and I was inspired by another of her quilts that

had 'wonky houses' going up and down. I did something wrong because my stars are tilting all the same way. But no matter, I like it anyway. The words are from Tonya's site, where she has a tutorial on how to do this. It's great!

I'm at the point where I want to 'write' something on every quilt.LOL :c)

I sent a picture of the quilt to them and Tonya asked me if she could put the pictures on her blog. I told her yes, and I was truly humbled by the comments that came back from other quilters. It gave me a warm feeling to get such praise from fellow quilters.

Here are the pictures of the border. It says's Sleepovers are Magical Childhood Memories. I designed a magic wand at the end of the word Magical. I think it's really cute. ...ahemm

I got the idea for this quilt a few months ago when I was shaking out the sleeping bags for my granddaughters, 8 and 11 yrs. old, who love to sleepover with 'Nana & Papa'. The next day I started to plan it. It had to be bright, cheerful AND easy to make. I think I got it.

I hope you like it as much as I do.

Last night I started to hand quilt this baby. Two and a half hours later and only 1/2 a star done , is when I decided that if I didn't want another UFO on my hands I had to re-think my strategy.

The answer is machine quilting. I started it this morning. It's still not going to be a 'cake walk' but at least I know I can do it.
I don't want to finish this post without thanking Belinda at
Browndirtcottage।blogspot.com for inspiring me to get going and start blogging. I must have read her first blog a dozen times or more, and she starts with "I did it" and continues with ....."Because I can".
That's when I thought "it's never to late too learn a new skill and by George, I can too!" and Belinda.... "I did it too" thanks! ....:c))lol

Till next time....I thank you for dropping by, and please come again soon.


~~Fran :c)

Getting Started

Hello everyone,

I'm just getting started and I'm still a bit shaky. lol I've been playing with this 'blog' for the whole evening and the only thing I know for sure is "I don't know beans, and I've a long way to go".

Other than my profile and letting you know the blogs I visit daily, the only thing I figured out was how to put a background picture.

This is a picture of a small quilt that I made this spring for a very special little girl. Her name is Carlie, she is 2 yrs old and has Down Syndrome. On her 2nd birthday Carlie had her first chemo treatment. She has leukemia. I sent this to her to keep her busy while undergoing treatments. The small while spots that you see on the green area of the quilt are velcro. I placed those all around so that the 'sheep' might be able to wander and that she could find them. Her Mom said she loved it. I was very happy to hear this. I was even happier to be told a few weeks ago that Carlie is in remission. Thank You God , I continue to pray that this will continue.

My profile probably tells it all, but you also have to know that I love to sit and have a cup of tea

and chat with friends old and new. So I hope you'll visit often and stop for a 'cuppa' and sit and chat awhile. The kettle is always on.

Until next time...

~~ Fran :c)