What takes 10 minutes to quilt will take 4 hours to rip.  -Suzi Buggeln

There is NO shortcuts to anything worth quilting.

Matilda operates best on a steady diet of the more expensive threads...lucky me.

It isn't until I am ALL done piecing a quilt top, admiring my work that I discover that I flipped two pieces around IN THE CENTER OF THE QUILT...   "got dandruff, some of it itches!"  It is enough to make a lady want to swear...almost! 

Welcome to my blog!  Today I will be discussing my special knack...my uncanny ability to look for and get in line at what looks like THE SHORTEST, FASTEST moving line in the store...only to have it come to a screeching halt when I get into that line.  Seriously.  I have wised up and actually eyed carts in the express lane (if I know I have 20 items or less) to determine BEFOREHAND if I should get into that line, because the person who has 30 items in the express line should be shot, IMHO.  I look before I leap, I try to pay attention.  But my gift to myself is to get behind people who either...argue the price, or have family members who show up right at check out with an extra 25 items (in the express lane, no less) or the ones who gets up there, apparently the total is too much, so then they start picking and choosing what to have them void...finally get it down to like $27.00 and then they hand the cashier a $50 dollar bill.  Uhhh??  And then there is the 18 month old who can't say more than 3 or 4 words...but one of those words is "pop"...and the child throws a fit, literally acts like a junkie, has a full fledged tantrum on the floor by my feet, kicking me while his cold pop is placed at the end of the order (along with the 25 other things added by the boyfriend in the express line, no less)...finally the Mom (who speaks little English) has the clerk scan the pop and opens it up so that the 18 month old can have the whole bottle of the MOUNTAIN DEW, and then proceeds to pay with WICK.  How did I ever get this knack for such things...I have no idea.  If you ever see me in line at a store, pray that you aren't in the same check out lane as me...I have this knack for making the line come to a screeching halt.  It is my own personal detection system that I am unaware of until it is too late. 

Yesterday, that would have been June 2, cuz I am a little slow posting...I nearly froze and my fingers became so numb I couldn't blog (hahaha) but seriously, it was COLD!  No, it didn't snow here, but truthfully, it would NOT surprise me if it did, this weather is CRAZY lately.  Mark this down...on June 2, I made a big batch of chili.  And it was sooooo good!  It was perfect for the cold, damp, dark and dreary day.  It hit the spot.  And only in Colorado can chili be served in June, because it is the only appropiate food for the occasion/weather.  Only in June do you see steam coming off the pool in the morning while your kids are at swim practice...and they would rather STAY in the pool than to get out where it is cold. 

I am three days down spending my mornings driving to Fort Collins and back for Buggy's class.  No matter how efficient I am, it takes a minimum of 50 minutes each way.  Every morning there is a batch of cars that DO NOT DRIVE any where close to the speed limit.  I guess they view the speed limit as the fastest they should go IF, and only IF there was an emergency.  Instead, consistently, there are clueless people who drive 45 mph on I-25. (Speed limit is 75mph people!)  And into Fort Collins, where the speed limit is quite generous... the people directly in front of me in all three lanes ARE NOT SO Generous, effectively staggering themselves in various lanes so that not even one car can pass them....today after the third time I begin to think it might be a conspiracy...holding up traffic just for the fun of it.  They all had cell phones they were talking on too...  and this is the almost 9 AM drive into Fort Collins...and I was SO WRONG in thinking that the NOON hour traffic would be better.  NOPE, it is EVEN worse.  Everyone is out for lunch.  Either way, I don't want to commute.  And I will be a HAPPY momma when this class of Buggy is all over with!

About the time we think we can make ends meet, someone moves the ends.  -Herber Hoover.

Ain't THAT the truth!  I don't think we will ever make our ends meet...lately they seem to be polar opposites. 

A river of money runs through Bingo Planet.  Not kidding.  Inside those doors you would NEVER guess that there is recession going on.  I have yet to play a game of Bingo or buy pickles.  I don't have a moral or ethical problem with bingo...IMHO it is a loose form a gambling, and I am pretty sure that some of the people in there are addicted to gambling. Still, it is game, and for probably 85% of the people there, even the ones there week after week, it just a game, a form of entertainment.  It truly doesn't allure me at all...however, I really do like to help out and watch people.  That is entertainment to me.  But to drop $100 on pickles or bingo...nothankyou...Even if someone gave me $100 to spend on Bingo...I wouldn't do it, I would instead hit the garage sales or a fabric shop.  Tonight, we as a family are helping out for the band.  Next week will be for Buggy's class...and it is going to be busy, cuz we are about ready to give out the $10,000 jackpot.  That brings in LOTS of people.  And a river of money with it. 

Being the blond that I am...I had this all thought out in my mind....and it actually MADE SENSE in my mind...but doing this plan/schedule of mine doesn't really seem to work in reality.  My thought?  Time wages...where I do keep losing it?!?!   At the end of the day, I cannot seem to find time..  Here it is...I work about three and a half hours a day away from home (what I actually get paid to do) I get home around noon...so I would think that calculates out to 10 hours until I go to bed based on 10 PM bedtime (hahahahaha) 10 hours.  Ten full hours to clean the house, work outside in the yard, get some quilting done, make supper, and such.  Honestly, I thought that IF I spent 2 hours a day on household chores...this includesjust daily chores...you know, the same things that DEMAND attention everyday like.laundryry (washing, drying, folding, hanging up, putting up) clean up the kitchen (3 plus times a day) general pick-up, planning dinner, making dinner, etc (daily chores only) I could very easily keep up a CLEAN house and caught up laundry on two hours a day...IN MY MIND.  And in that line of thinking...ONE hour outside to weed, dead head flowers, water the neighbors flowers, looking over the garden (and water the weeds when Chris isn't around!) Observe and look at my roses, flowers and enjoy them...I should have a nice weed-free garden, nice looking flowers, and even have my neighbors yard looking good spending only an hour a day...phhfffff!  Next I would say that I spend roughly an hour on the internet (I keep trying to do less than that) SO...this should EASILY leave me 6 hours to quilt...in my perfect thought out world.  OK...first of all....my house IS always cluttered...the bathrooms always need attention, I NEVER have the laundry caught up...very time I turn around, my kitchen is a mess (again), however, in my defense, I do get my bed made every morning...that is the only thing that gets done a regular basis.  One hour outside....can easily turn into several hours, or it could be 10 minutes if the weather acts up...either way, my flowers aren't all that beautiful to look at, the garden is kinda weeded, kinda needs more weeding...my neighbors yard actually does look better than mine. I am fairly real on my computer time... until bedtime, then I get on.  I honestly don't spend much time on the computer during the day.  So, do I actually spend 6 hours a day quilting?  Yeah, right!  Do I spend 4 hours a day quilting?  Nope, guess again.  I get to spend...if I am lucky, an hour a day.  ONE hour.  So...the time wages are not adding up in real time.  What the heck do I really do all day?  I get interrupted with life.  Two kids and company who need rides, who want to hit Happy Hour, who want to play card games, who need to be refereed...who create extra messes that need attention, a neighbor that drains me, and a pancreas that demands that I stop in my tracks.  Some volunteer time.  I don't where my time goes...but it does.  And at the end of the day, I still come up short.  I am not real good at time management, I guess.         

I would rather quilt that do chores...  My standards to a clean and organized house have plunged to all time lows.  It is presentable.  I am no longer anal about my house being clean.  In fact, tonight we are having the whole Youth Group over to watch the Nuggets game.  20 or more kids...and I will just go with the flow.  Meanwhile...here is some projects I have been working on...

Dimple Cheeks asked me why if he doesn't have a sore throat, if he doesn't feel sick...why does his voice crack?  My answer..."you are puberting"   I was expecting a "what is that?!?" Instead...he just rolled his eyes and walked away.  I truly think he just did not want to "open that can of worms" where I start talking about hormones and sex and speak quite frankly about things that he totally gets embarrassed about.  I talk about "those embarrassing things" because I know that failure to talk about "those things" does not make them go away, or keep them from happening.  Because Dimple Cheeks has an older brother...I am pretty sure he knows what the word puberty means, and that is good thing.  Really.  "Puberting."  The testosterone levels around here are on the rise...proceed with caution.  

There was rumbling of thunder in the distance.  A few dark gray clouds.  Nothing out of the ordinary to suggest that the heavens were about to open up and DUMP on us.  Dimple Cheeks and I were potting flowers, C was mowing the back yard so that he could then put up the tent to let it DRY out from camping.  A few big drops, giving us about a 10 second warning, and WHOOSH...it just started pouring.  Then, because it wasn't funny enough to soak those of us who were totally oblivious to the impending deluge... (we left all the flowers out thinking it would be a quick shower and it would pass quickly) pea sized hail was added to make those of us already cold and wet scramble to attempt to save the flowers.  I think God got a good chuckle watching us scramble like we did.  Did we save the flowers?  I think OUR flowers were saved from the brunt of the hail (closest to coverage) however, the flowers I bought today that we were putting into pots look a little more begaggled.  Those were the furthest from the protection of my garage, and, unfortunately...those flowers I purchased for my neighbor to finish out a yard project we are working on for her.  Chris didn't get the tent up to dry it out...which is probably good because I am pretty sure that it would be wetter now than it was.  Ahhh...springtime in the Rockies!

God vacations here, in colorado, and I am blessed beyond measure that I can escape "the doldrums of realty" by a mere 45 minute drive, and drive right into a whole new world...I don't have to spend thousands of dollars, catch a plane, and rent a car, schedule out and plan,  I don't have to drive hundreds of miles...no altitude sickness to deal with, and the best part, I can camp in a motor home if I want (stay with my parents, sleep like a queen) I can sleep in a tent, or I can have s'mores by the campfire and be home in my own bed in 45 minutes.  I would say thousands of people spend lots of time, effort, energy and phenomenal amounts of money for a vacation that is just minutes away for us.  And I am blessed.  I love it when I feel I have "escaped" for awhile.  I love the smell of pine, the campfire, the scent of rain.... the crunch of pine needles under my feet, the sound of rushing river water, the taste of food cooked over a campfire.   Sometimes I long for far off places, but some of the best places to really disconnect with the world and connect with God, and my family, is a hiking trail some 25 miles from my house, a favorite camping spot 30 minutes away, and a leisurely afternoon ofghetto golf with a breathtaking sight of snow-capped mountains is only 45 minutes from home.  Simplicity.  The best things in life aren't things....