It snowed one night not too long ago, when we came out the door to go to work it looked so pretty on my front porch! Even the furniture was covered in snow.

Here's the same view when we came home from work. Hubby had it set up so the light timers when on in the morning and the evening when we were going and coming so we could enjoy the Santa, tree, sled, and lights.

About the second weekend in January we decided to take down the porch tree, but a beautiful frost covered everything outside, it was so pretty that hubby hooked up the lights again so I could enjoy the tree, sled, and lights one more week.
Can you see the frost on the fir branches on the sled.

Here's a close up of the tree.

It looked flocked.

As I was walking around outside taking pictures, I spoted P.D. in the kitchen looking out the doorway. She makes me laugh. Yes, I did let her out to join me in my adventure. Oh, and we did take down the tree the third weekend in January, it was still fresh and we probably could have left it up a few more weeks but I guess it was time to let go of Christmas.

Wear Warm Clothes

Great minds think alike!

I took these photos a couple of weeks ago so I could post my Wear Warm Clothes quilt. The other day I checked out my friend Bonnie's blog where she had posted her Wear Warm Clothes!

This was the first Block Of The Month I made, even before Block of The Month was a quilter's term.

In October of 1994, my friends and I were going to go visit Country Threads in Iowa. We all had Country Threads' book with the pattern Wear Warm Clothes, so I gave each of us a challenge to make this quilt, one block a month. Quite a few of us made it!

Below is a rather poor quality photo of some of us in Garner Iowa in 1994, showing off our Wear Warm Clothes to Mary and Connie, the owners of County Threads Quilt Shop.

I changed the cat in the pattern to a yellow lab with a floppy ear.

In Country Thread's book there was a line drawing of the finished quilt so I traced it and used it as my label.

If you haven't been to Garner Iowa to visit Country Threads, you have to make plans to go!

I've been there three times, have my quilts quilted by them, have made many quilts from their patterns, and can call Mary and Connie my friends.

Treasures and Quilted Headboard

The braided rug was made by my hubby's Great-Aunt Sue. We have quite a few things that belonged to her and Great-Uncle Tony, each item is a treasure. The Bear Piggy Bank was made by hubby's mom many years ago in ceramic class, also a treasure. The Hope Chest they are sitting on belonged to my mother. I feel we're very lucky to have received these family treasures since hubby and I are both 5th born in our families.

Hubby is tall and our bedroom is small so therefore we don't have a headboard. Our bed is against an outside wall which can be quite cold during the winter months so I decided to make a quilted headboard. As you can see from the photo the wall is slanted so I couldn't hang a quilt. Hubby came up with the idea to cover a piece of foam board with a quilted pillow case.

I'd taken a Diane Gaudynski class on how to draw feathers several years ago. That piece of fabric with it's feathers drawn on it by me so many years ago seemed like the perfect center piece for my headboard. It was as much fun quilting it as I thought it would be.

You can click on the photo to make it bigger,

use your back button to come back to the blog.

Log Cabin blocks surrounded the center feather block.

You can see I have a new octagon window in our bedroom, there used to be a full sized window in that spot which was also quite cold in the winter. I'm still in the process of painting several rooms in our house, this room has not been repainted since the windows were replaced.

We like the headboard quilt, and yes, it's doing its job, we're much warmer when we sleep.

Angels and Sweater Babies

My SIL Linda gave us the gift of two angels many years ago.

They are my most precious of decorations

and adorn my table each Christmas.

I think I like them so much because

they remind me of Linda's four sweet daughters.

Notice how I've scrunched up the lacey table runner around the angels to give the impression of snow? My hubby thought he'd help me one day and straightened my mussed up table runner, wasn't that sweet of him?

My friend Mary collects Sweater Babies.

At least that's what she calls them.
They're cute Scandanavian inspired dolls (for lack of a better word) dressed in red sweaters.

I don't have any official Sweater Babies but I do have this cute ornament that I named Olga.

Sometimes I save special tags from gifts and hang them on the tree year after year, this doggy tag was from a gift our beloved lab Dave the Dog gave to my hubby on her first Christmas in 1992. Dave of course has since gone on to the Rainbow Bridge.

We miss her more as each year goes by.

I find joy in silly ornaments such as a mouse in a stocking and a lolly pop!

New Year's Resolutions

Organization!

Isn't that what we all strive for...

the problem is that organization

takes TIME

which most of us don't have.

Since January 1, 2010,
I've organized my quilting magazines
and I've organized my thread ....

Now I just have to find the time to read
and to sew!

The thread in the above photo was purchase from Connecting Threads.

The thread holder in the above photo was hand-made by Strum Crafts, I don't have Strum Crafts info but if anyone really needs it ask me and I'll find out how to contact them. They are a man and woman owned company that venders at quilt shows in the mid-west. The quilt holder spins, and holds a lot of spools. Actually my sister Mary won the thread holder at my guild's show and then gave it to me. It's a wonderful way to keep thread organized.

Christmas Party with Friends

I'd planned a Christmas party so my friends and I could get together for the holidays. Of course there was a snow storm the day before, it snowed all day! Normally I love the snow and want it to snow all day but not when I'm hosting a party!

You can see the big snowflakes falling!

Certainly is pretty snow!

Inside, my house was prepared for company.

I'm so happy to say that my friends and sisters came to my party!

Wish List

P.D. has had this toy for a few years now

but for some reason unknown to mankind

she decided it was time to "play" with this

poor fellow. Can you guess who he was before

you get to the last photo?

Maybe Santa didn't bring her all the things she wanted for Christmas!

Not Letting Go of Christmas Just Yet

I took a few photos before we took the tree down.

Even though the tree is gone my house is still decked out for the season, will post a few more photos in coming days. Enjoy!

The following photo of my Christmas tree is what happens when you leave the shutter of the camera open and then shake the tripod.... cool!