Fire and Ice?

What is it with men and fire? Hey You piles up leaves, brush, logs and other miscellaneous wood item throughout the year, waiting for Burn Season.
Burn Season begins on December 1st when men gather at the local fire station to get their permits. But, they can't necessarily start burning on December 1st. The Powers-That-Be evaluate each day to determine if backyard burning will be safe. Burners must call an 800 number to find out if it's a burn day. Sunday was a burn day. I must admit, the fire is kinda cool.


And today we had snow on the tops of the nearby hills. The morning was cold and rainy but the afternoon was clear and sunny. Still very cold though.

AAQ Retreat

Last month I attended the 8th annual Alex Anderson Quilt Retreat in Livermore, CA. Due to such high demand, she actually has two sessions now. I attend both session as I am the "official" photographer.

Session 2

Session 1

Session 1 "gift" night. It has become somewhat of a Session 1 tradition for people to make little gifts for everyone. They are placed on the tables for dinner on our last night. What a haul!

The next two pictures are a couple of things I worked on while I was there.

The first one (drunkards path) was some FQ's I've had for a few years. Alex had an Accuquilt die cut machine there for us to try. Jim got pretty good at it and cut these pieces out for me. I finally got the borders on it the other day.

The second one is a kit I got at PIQF in October. Purchased in October and completely pieced by December. That's pretty good for me.

Thanksgiving

Scott, Leah, Me, Hey You, Krystle, and Becky

We had are Thanksgiving meal the Sunday after Thanksgiving. Leah and her boyfriend Scott and a couple of Leah's friends, Krystle and Becky came up to the house. I made the turkey (breast) and the kids did the rest. We also had a fire in the firepit and roasted marsh mellows. It was a pretty fun day.

Organizing the Stash, cont.

I am such a slacker. It's been more than a week since my last blog post. Sounds like confession doesn't it? Okay, five Hail Mary's and onto the next post.



I'm s l o w l y working through the stash drawers. The latest one is the black and white drawer.

This is the before. Doesn't look too terrible. There is that mysterious pink bag and a roll of yellow batik peeking out from under the black & white stuff.


This is the after. Notice the pinwheel block. I actually found enough blocks and pieces of blocks to make a little wall hanging or perhaps a baby quilt. Those blocks were made at either the first or second AAQ Retreat. Next week is the 8th annual and I'm sooooo ready for some uninterrupted quilting time with a room full of other quilters!

Pacific International Quilt Festival

Last Saturday I drove to Santa Clara and met Deb at the convention center for PIQF. We planned to meet at 10:00am and wound up driving up the ramp of the parking garage right behind one another. Talk about great timing! After wandering around for a few hours and filling up my bag, we had lunch and took the first load out to the car. I should have brought a bigger bag!

Lots of thread from Superior.

A couple of kits and some additional hand dyed fabrics
that match the kit on the left.
Hey You likes the one on the right from Bonnie Blue.
That kinda surprises me.

Marking pen, needles, glue bottle, scissor fob, dental pick (for picking out stitches).

Somewhere there are two more patterns that I couldn't find to take pictures of.

Things to come

It's been over a week since my last post. When I started this thing I told myself I mustn't let that much time go by without posting something. So here it is, a list of the things I plan to post about.

My day at PIQF
Our trip to Reno
The latest Stash Organizing accomplishment

I know you're all on the edge of your seats, but sit back, relax and I'll get to it this weekend.

New Patio

For the past week and a half, we've had a new patio installed in the back yard.

This is the back yard before we began. A small, adequate concrete patio with some built in benches and a large grassy area that required lots of water and mowing.

This was the end of the first day. They removed the old patio and the lawn.

At the end of the second day the base was down.

Day 3. About 1/3 of the pavers are down.

Day 4. The "field" is complete.

Day 6, all done. That's a fire pit in the center of the circle.

It's huge! We'll eventually do some planting around the edge but first we need to get some patio furniture. I'm hoping to find something on sale at the end of the season. We're planning a barbecue on Sunday so we'll have our first fire in the fire pit and roast marshmallows.