Photos 1, 2, 3

This month in Heidi's online scrapbook class she has challenged all the students to take a "daily photo", just something that happened that day that will probably just pass by almost unnoticed and soon be forgotten unless it is documented with a quick photo. So here are some of the photos I have been taking:

Day 1 "Move It" (this day and supposedly every day) I have always tried to do some form of exercise most every day. Over the years I have gone through many phases from jogging miles outside to being a gym rat with a personal trainer. Most recently, my dear 86 year- old mother bought this treadmill a couple years ago and she has finally decided that she is done exercising daily so she gave it to me. Now I have no excuse not to get up each morning and go downstairs and workout. That doesn't mean I do work out each day... it just means I have no excuse not to!

Day 2 Pumpkin Chessecake with Chocolate Wafer Crust Things like this would be the main reason I have to still deal with photo #1!

Day 3 Cache and Grandma seeing eye to eye... This was the first time that Cache had come over to my house and I was giving him the lowdown on all the spoiling that will be taking place here. I think he is a little skeptical.

I agree with him

This guy just made me SMILE! He was sitting by the side of the road at a very busy intersection last Saturday afternoon. I actually didn't notice him until I heard someone yelling something and I started looking around to see what was going on. That was when I spotted him. Before I read the sign I expected it to say something like "homeless, can't work, please share a dollar or two" so I was very surprised when I saw what the sign did say! He was yelling to the passing cars things like "I smile at you and that is one smile, then everyone in your car smiles at someone else and that spreads smiles all around", "don't cost anything to give a smile", pass the smiles forward". I just had to wonder what would possess a person to subject themself to such an attention-getting venture? I wondered if he had lost a bet or was doing community service or just a do-gooder. You will notice that he did indeed need the wheelchair since he only had a partial left leg. I wonder if I'd be smiling if I lost part of my leg? or lots of other reasons that sometimes keep me from smiling.

Then the stop light turned green and traffic got going -- everyone heading off to important Saturday business but I'm guessing that alot of people were smiling at least for a few blocks, hopefully more. I'm still smiling when I think of him.

So go ahead, SMILE, won't cost you anything and then "pay 'em forward".

Halloween 2007

Here we are all dressed up for our annual family Halloween party that Paul's sister, Karol Jean has been orchestrating for the past 25 years. Our costume this year seems quite obvious on one hand but kind of subtle so look closely. We are Tour de France champions: Paul is Lance Armstrong (complete with Lion stuffed animal and bouquet of yellow flowers) and I am Floyd Landis (notice the syringe in my arm and the sack of blood for doping in my hand). Others came as runway models, pirates, soccer stars, crazy Ute fans, Peter Pan, Captain Hook, Tinkerbelle, Beijing Olympics boosters and Daisy & Donald Duck! This is always a lot of fun. I remember bringing Quinn and Katie as brand new babies back in 1977 and 1979 and this year Cache was the newest baby in the family. We connected via webcam with the Swapps and Kylee in China where they shared with us the Halloween party they went to last Friday night.

KJ really goes all out with the decorations, starting on the outside of her house with ghosts and jack o'lanterns and glowing orange lights. She always makes a delicious dinner featuring her famous Cheese Puffs that have become the most anticipated item on her menu -- sorry she doesn't share that recipe. We played games and took photos and visited and ate lots and lots of candy and cookies and cake. Everything you'd expect for a delightful get together. Thanks KJ for all your hard work; here's to atleast another 25 years!

Quilt of the week, finally

We finally got all of the computers in our life back up and in working condition and it has only taken what -- 2 or 3 weeks! It has been a tad bit challenging but I'm putting it all behind me because now everything is nicer and better than before.

It seems like it has been a long time now since I have featured one of my quilts so I thought I'd start again with this quilt. I love fall colors and I wanted to make a fall quilt. This was back in 1999. I found this quilt pattern in a magazine at my local quilt shop one day and quickly bought the fabric and the magazine and headed home to get started. When I got home I was quite surprised to discover that this pattern had been a "mystery quilt" and the issue of the magazine that I had was the third and last portion of the instructions. I paniced for a few minutes while I called the quilt shop and asked if they had the first two issues and after being assured they did, I rushed back over to the shop and picked them up as well.

I call this quilt "Swirling Leaves". I pieced it by machine but then I did hand quilt it. It is not very big... only 43 inches square. I have actually taught this as a class a couple of times. The pattern uses some unique techniques to build the stars. They are not just tiny triangles all cut seperately and then stitched together. I'd have to pull out the pattern to remember how it was actually done but I just remember it was quick and effective. There really aren't any chopped off points on those triangles, thankfully.

I have it hanging over my desk at the office right now so I get to enjoy the greens, yellows, oranges and browns of the season both outside and in!