Here is the Scrabble quilt top, all finished -

                                        

                                       

It is a square, and can be held any way and still have some letters right side up.  I am going to have it machine quilted by a friend.

Then, I bought this kit for a cute, cute lap-size quilt for a little girl - hmmmm. . . since there is only one little girl in my life right now, I guess it will be for Megan!

                                        

I still have another quilt to make first, one with coffee fabric, for Betsy!

Suzanne was working on this needlepoint - a dragonfly!

                                         

Our water leak has turned out to be quite a mess!  I will post pictures next time. The drain from the ice maker leaked into the floor, and it looks like it has been leaking for some time.  We have drying machines set up in the kitchen, but the cabinets and floor on that side have all been torn out now - we have had these machines set up since Saturday night!  My poor head, sinuses, and TMJ, have been aching and aching with the dryness and the vibration involved.  Hopefully, the machines will be out of here soon and we can start planning for the repairs!

This is quite a mess, with the kitchen torn up, and the cabinets out, and everything out of place and all over my counters for now.  But, in the big scheme of things, it is only an inconvenience!  So many worse things are going on all over the world.   In my own little world, I have friends whose parents have Alzheimers, friends who have breast cancer, a wonderful elderly man in our church who has just been diagnosed with a brain tumor, and our local news tells of a house that has burned to the ground and a man killed the other night in a car wreck not far from here.  My problem is just an inconvenience that will be mostly paid for by our home owner's insurance, and the work done by my son-in-law.  And while it will take awhile to repair the damage, it will be the beginning of a kitchen remodeling job! Even that all might take awhile, as we have some other things to spend our money on!  A wedding!  And a trip for Jim to South Africa for missions.

BUT for now, my lap top is set up in the kitchen, and I haven't felt like moving it, so I only spend limited time at any one time here. . .wonder if insurance will pay for headache medicine??????  

                                          

Charlie:  "Need any help, guys?" 

                                   

Oh, my!  I was laughing and laughing!  And Charlie really did help them!  What are they doing?  Removing our ice maker -

                                   

Charlie did help, by bringing them tools, towels, whatever they needed.  He would go play, then come back and help again.  His daddy has taught him well, all about fixing things.

Before all the mess over the ice maker happened, we had invited Amanda, Sam, and kids over for a cook out.  Suzanne was home for the holiday weekend.  Here is John, sleeping in his car seat -

                                   

We had hot dogs, hamburgers, french fries, and green beans -

                                   

Charlie was happy that I had two Elmo napkins left over from a birthday party that I gave to him and Megan -

                                   

Megan was happy to be eating!

                                   

                                   

She was happier yet when, later on, she climbed onto Charlie's chair and started eating his left-over hot dog!

                                   

Aunt Suzanne was here to play with them!

                                   

Finding just the right tool from Grandma's tool box that Daddy and Grandpa might need -

                                   

Why is Grandma's toolbox pink????  Long ago, I asked for, and got, a small toolbox from Jim.  It was kept in the laundry room at at place where I could easily get to it.  Little by little, we noticed that my tools were not making their way into my toolbox and I hadn't been the one to use them!  Betsy and I would find them out in the garage on Jim's workbench!!  He would "borrow" one, and then, thinking he was putting it away, would forget that it was mine.  Now, he still denies that happened, but Betsy and I knew it had.  So, a year or so ago, Betsy gave me a pink toolbox with pink tools!  So, when Jim borrows them, he wouldn't be mixing my tools in with his!  They were very happy to have my tools handy right there when they needed them, and Charlie knew exactly what every tool was for!

So, meanwhile, while Charlie was helping the "guys", Megan was trying on Aunt Suzanne's glasses -

                                     

                                     

Charlie had arrived in his daddy's hat, and with his backpack on, so he was almost ready to leave.  But before they left, Sam went downstairs to take pictures of our now very wet ceiling, and Charlie followed him with a flashlight -

                                     

So cute!

What is NOT cute, is that the ice maker drain pipe leaked, causing water to get all down in the floor and leak downstairs onto the ceiling.  Sam found the water damage, told us to call our homeowners insurance people, which Jim did, and they sent out a "rescue cleaning" team late that evening, to stop the water damage before it got worse.  Fortunately for us, Sam has done enough repairing and remodeling work on home problems caused by  events like this one to know exactly what to do.  The team came and found where the water was (unseen, but detected by their little machine), tore up the portion of the affected kitchen flooring, and made holes in the ceiling downstairs, then set up drying machines.

The drying machines have been going since Saturday night at midnight, and this morning, the flooring under the area where the ice maker was, still wasn't dry.  They dry out everything else, though, and they are loud and vibrating, causing me to have some real issues with my TMJ, my sinuses, and headaches.

Next time:  updates on our water leak, and pictures of my Scrabble quilt!

                                   

                                   

I promised to show a few of the projects I am working on currently -

I found this Scrabble fabric, and I am piecing it together, using a Turning Twenty Again pattern.  It is for Suzanne to use for her classroom, just for fun, to hang as a demonstration of a theme they are doing that has to do with Scrabble -

                                      

                                      

                                      

I am hoping to have the quilt top finished in the next day or so, and then I will take pictures of it.  It has been a lot of fun to sew, and it was nice to do something simple, as I needed a break from this project -

This is a Thimbleberries from a couple of years ago, that I am just about finished, except for the borders.  It has been the most difficult quilting project I have done, and I am still trying to figure it all out, especially since just when I thought I had everything cut out and pieced together, I found another instruction for piecing another part of the border!

                                      

                                      

Another long-term project is this Grandmother's Flower Garden, which I have shown before.  I love working on it!  It is all hand pieced using the English paper piecing method.  The fabric is reproduction feed sack fabric, given to me many years ago by my friend, Lois.  Thanks, Lois!!  And how far have you gotten on yours??  Some people look at it and think it is too tedious or boring, but I love the way it comes together, and it is mindless, meaning that it takes no planning or thought, just cutting, basting, and sewing.  I can do it in the car, or in front of the TV (that rarely happens - I watch very little TV!), in an office waiting room, or at one of my stitching groups where we do more chatting than paying attention to our sewing, and so simple is better!  I have 26 flowers finished.  I need a lot more!

                                         

                                         

                                         

And then there is this - many, many years of hand piecing and hand quilting, that gets neglected when I need to finish another project, or take it up to make room for guests in my guest/sewing room.  But I have been slowly and steadily working on it lately, so there is hope that it will be finished someday!

                                         

But, uh oh - I gave in to temptation - sigh. . . sometime I just can't help myself. . . and I just purchased a new quilt kit online to make the absolutely cutest little girl lap-size quilt in cupcake fabric!  I got an e-mail today that it has been sent!

I finally got over to Amanda's house and took a cute picture of John, who as asleep when I was there -

                                           

He was all snuggled up in the blanket that Amanda made!

Charlie, Megan, and Amanda have been sick with whatever crud - fever, cough - is going around.  Megan was feeling a little better today and was playing while I was there -

                                           

Charlie was resting a little, but then he did get up some while I was there -

                                          

Trying on his Daddy's big shoes -

                                          

Then he decided that Mommy's were easier to wear!

                                          

Last week, for Jim's birthday, Betsy sent him a crossword puzzle bow tie!  Jim is known around here for always wearing a bow tie!

                                          

Hope everyone had a nice Valentine's Day!

                                           

I have not taken any pictures of my adorable new grandson to post yet!  I am so sorry!  Life has just been soooo busy, and when I have been with him, I have forgotten my camera!  But I really couldn't have stopped everything to get a good picture anyway.  So, my blog will have to do, without pictures, but I will see the kiddos this week, and I will do my best!

Since John was born last Sunday in the early hours of the morning, life has been crazy busy around here for part of the time, and then has given me time to get some other things done, for the rest of the time.  They are all doing okay, and John had his first check up appointment, and all was well.  But Charlie and Megan have been sick with colds and fevers - it is going around here - and so they have stayed home and rested for the most part.  I have gone over to their house with groceries, and I have held baby John, and I have held Megan who didn't feel good at all and just wanted to cuddle with Grandma.  Amanda has had meals brought to her by her church family, and she seems to be doing fine.

I spent a lot of time this week making all kinds of arrangements for Betsy's wedding.  She is having a very small ceremony in Colorado on May 13th, with just immediate family - and Andrew has a pretty large family, so it will be a nice size wedding!  I have been sending deposits, signing contracts, and - the most stressful of all - working with a travel agent to get 7 tickets on the same flight at a reasonable price with long enough layovers and do-able times.  Why is this stressful?  Because you have to make immediate decisions, and when the travel agent needed complete names and then birth dates for the kids, I was forgetting everything!  I completely drew a blank on Megan's birthday when I needed it!!  I had to text Sam on my cell phone while I was talking with the travel agent on my landline, to make sure I had those birthdays correct.   Finally, though, we got the tickets reserved.  And that doesn't include Suzanne, who will be traveling on a different day!  Hers will be much easier because we won't have to coordinate it with ours.

Then, I reserved hotel rooms - suites, actually, and that went well.  We still haven't decided how many cars to rent, so I am actually letting Jim handle that one.

Then, we are having a reception here at the end of July so that all of the other friends and family members can come.  So, I have had to start planning that as well. 

And I am going to Colorado to visit Betsy in between now and the wedding, so I had to make all those arrangements too.  Nope, I am not driving this time!

So, I spent a lot of the week on the phone and the computer!

I have also been doing a lot of quilting and hand sewing - ooops, I need to get some pictures of those projects as well.  I went to my sign language study group on Monday night, out to dinner with Jim for his birthday on Tuesday night, smocking guild on Wednesday night, and a Silent dinner on Friday night.

And in between all of that, Jim and I have been cleaning out our downstairs - organizing things the girls have left here, throwing out what we know we can, making a pile for a future yard sale, and I did some major vacuuming, in preparation for shampooing the carpets soon.

I skyped with Betsy today!  My technological skills are improving.

Jim has been cooking more lately!!  He has been having fun with grilling things, even in the cold weather!  Tonight it was pork chops and baked potatoes, with some vegetables that I steamed in the microwave.  He was cooking for himself long before he met me, and he is a great cook!

So, that was my week!

Happy Birthday to my wonderful husband, Jim today!  He is 58, which makes him a year older than me - we always tease about how for 3 weeks (after my Jan 19th birthday) we are the same age, and then he is a year older!

My new grandson was born early this morning at 2:33!!  John Levi weighed 6 lbs, 12.2 oz.  He and his mommy are doing fine; Daddy arrived home to get some sleep, and this Grandma came home from staying with the kiddos to get some sleep too.  Then I will go back over and bring Charlie and Megan to my house in the morning.  Well, it IS morning.  The REAL morning.

More later!

Since the Steelers won last night, Jim went to work looking like this today -

                                     

When he came home, Charlie was here and said, "Grandpa, you have on a bumblebee shirt and a bumblebee tie!"

In the mail today, I got this little framed picture from Suzanne -

                                     

I love it!  And it will have a place of prominence on this ledge between our kitchen and living room!

I got this picture in the mail from Betsy, for my birthday!!

                                         

Not a very good picture of the picture, but it is of an empty nest with just feathers left, and it says, Empty Nest?  It's not an empty nest until they get their stuff out of the basement.   Oh, my, what a perfect present!!  Here is another view of it -  

                                            

It is so true for us because all of the girls still have their "stuff" in our basement!!! 

Betsy made the picture - she found the quote, paired it with a picture, and printed it, framed it, and sent it!  It will have a prominent place in my kitchen area!

Meanwhile, here are some pictures of my favorite two kiddos from the morning of my birthday!
                                           

                                           

They look quite angelic together on that truck, but trust me, we have been working for months on sharing it and taking turns on it without crying!

                                           

                                           

Here are some pictures of some of the quilts that were worked on, or finished up, at our quilt retreat last weekend.

                                    

                                    

                                    

                                    

                                    

Kathy was working on one that kept progressing from small pieces, to blocks, to this beginning of putting the rows together -

                                    

To this -

                                    

To this!  Isn't it beautiful?

                                    

Several were making these large bags -

                                    

                                    

And many were making these "Ten Minute Table Runners" -

                                    

                                    

None of those were mine.  I had decided, because of the busyness of the weeks around Christmas, then my trip to Colorado, and the fact that I had nothing really ready to machine sew, and my machine had been put away for a few weeks, that I would just bring handwork with me on the retreat.  I finished 3 of the Grandmother's Flower Garden flowers that I am working on, and I did some of the cross stitch on my granddaughter's Christmas stocking (remember that it was her 2nd Christmas that has just passed and a new baby is due next month, so this grandma is 2 babies behind in Christmas stockings for them!)  It was very relaxing for me, and I was able to move around with my handwork and chat with everyone!  One of these days I will take some pictures of those things!