Another Dinner, Another Steak

Aye chi MAMA!!  I thought we were into spring.  Someone please turn up the thermostat!!  We are back down to 43 degrees and C O L D!!  It looks like that's where we will stay for the next ten days.  

Though sometimes I think I could stay under the warm covers all day long, it was not to be.  SOMEONE came scratching at my shoulder.  GET UP MOM!!

He's SO demanding, Mr. Cooper is.  What can I say.  He's spoiled rotten and it's all my fault.  On the other hand, he's the best company ever!!

After no breakfast other than a cup-o-joe to wake me up, I stared at the puzzle for all of ten minutes before giving up.  I think you have to be in the mood to work on those things, and I had too much on my mind.  Mail my taxes ... the worst of the worst ... try not to think about CAKE ... and get in some exercise.  Doesn't getting up and down from the sewing machine count as exercise?

I did that a lot yesterday.  I have a request for the Coast Guard.  They don't MAKE those little panels in that flavor.  So I bought a flag.  I'm hoping that I don't get thrown in prison for cutting up a flag.  Three more borders and this one should be ready to quilt.  Possibly today, though my motivation is waning.

Yup .. it's RODEO time and I've been sneaking in to watch the bull riding.  Actually, I found myself glued to the couch for WAY too long.  They have invented a World Rodeo, bringing in contestants from rodeos in Brazil, Australia ... any country that has cowboys.  These guys ... they can RIDE ... and are winning the big bucks.  Can you imagine a 20 year old going back to Brazil with a million bucks?  That's what happened last year.  

Time went by like a 50 mph wind.  I almost forgot it was Lodge Night ... this time celebrating our Law Enforcement.  It was HUGE, as you can imagine.  We sold 205 New York steak dinners for $20 each and gave away something like 50 raffle prizes.  It was a madhouse of noisy hungry folks!!

Lucky me, this time I got one of the Deputies to take dinner tickets, otherwise I would just now be getting my cold food.  It was delicious ... and cooked to perfect rareness.  I brought most all of it home.  

The meeting afterwards was less than exciting.  I did get some ugly looks when I requested we hold off on an expense for 7 days.  But no, they brought it up, meaning I had to stand up and ask 15 questions.  Do you have a contract, is there a guarantee, how long will it take, what products are you using ... things like that.  Sometimes the Trustees job is kind of fun, when you hear the answer was no to all of the above.  Surely I can't be the only one who thinks about those things.

The meeting ended and I was out the door in a flash.  These late dinners are killing me, and my desert found fitness is fading fast.  Mr. Sleepy Boy agrees ... it's couch time Mom.

I'm determined to get out to walk this morning, in spite of the cold and in spite of the couch yelling my name!  It's also time to take the rig for a drive.  I wonder if it will drive itself to the quilt store?  

Storms and Stitches

 GOOOOOOD morning!!!!  Boy did I ever hate those words when I was a kid.  It meant getting up really early, eating cold cereal, bundling up so much you could hardly move, and taking the long walk to the barn to catch the horses.  I never understood why everything on a ranch had to be done at 4:30 in the morning.  

Moving cattle from field to field (they were all numbered and we had to remember which one was which), gathering cattle for different things like branding, vaccinations, fly spraying ... it all began in the cold dark of morning.  

There's nothing like riding your horse across the irrigated pastures and being completely covered with mosquitos.  Folks that complain about mosquitos now, don't even have a clue how bad they can really be.  We would spray the horses before we went out because they would be absolutely covered with them, as would WE.  I think I lost a pint of blood every time.  The most words I heard in my life were YOU WILL LIVE.   

Mosquitos ... you will live.  Fall off the back of the truck while moving ... you will live.  Have a horse fall and roll over you ... you will live.  Break your leg ... you will live.  Get smashed in the chest by that cow they said would NOT run over me ... you will live.  Almost cut your finger off cleaning fresh caught fish ... you will live.  I suppose I have to admit they were right, since I'm still here.

I rather think that's what they say back East when these big storms roll through causing flooding and tornados.  I'd rather have the mosquitos.  I watched this yesterday every 30 minutes or so as Patsy and Bill were right in the midst of it.  We had a little rain off and on, but nothing like this crazy storm.  

I spent most of the day on the couch.  I can say with absolute certainty that it was boring.  I can only attribute it to a late night at Bingo ... and this quilt.  It took about 90 minutes to actually quilt on the machine before beginning the task of binding.  

That binding part, though many do it by machine, is all done by hand in my house.  That means at least five hours sitting on the couch.  Truly, that's okay because it also means I get to snuggle with Mr. Cooper.

How could I not love this?  It also means lots of OUCHES when I stick myself with the needle.  It's even worse since I got a NEW needle ... one as sharp as sharp can be.  OORAH for the Marines ... this one is now finished.  

The only other interesting thing, though not all that exciting, is I've lost a few pounds.  How you ask?  Since I'm always complaining about diets?  Well one of the gals at the Elks Lodge, under doctor's order of course, is fasting one day and eating carefully the next.  Not a novel idea I guess.  

I never in a million years thought I could go all day without eating.  It made my day LONG and BORING.   I've always said I eat for something to do.  Especially when I'm not on the road and bored to tears.  That made it pretty tough not to head to the kitchen and cook something, just to wile away the hours.  

Of course I'm not counting my chickens before they hatch, but I've lost five pounds.  That's like losing a Costco chicken!!  The next day I eat very carefully, half of what I used to.  Mostly I'm doing this so I can fit in that penguin tuxedo a little more comfortably.  If I'm going to sit through a two hour meeting, I'd rather not be squeezed in the middle until I can't breathe!

And so the day ended with a little sunshine as I drug my big living room rug back inside the house.  Yup I washed it in my big machine, but it won't fit in the dryer.  The hot concrete seems to be the best place to dry it out.  Too bad I didn't see all those little spiders BEFORE I brought it in.

After about five minutes, I realized there were things moving on the rug.  There was a flurry of swatting and crazy dancing until I saw no more movement.  Note to self ... next time hang it on the patio chairs!

April Fools Day ... A Mystery

It's April Fools Day ... and boy did we get fooled!!  The really nice weather turned into cold, wind, rain and hail that covered the ground like snow.  We didn't see THAT coming!!  It's also time for the Magic Castle of Bingo!!

Truly I expected sunshine and roses.  I would have pictures, but most of that happened when I was at the lodge.  Bingo folks came in soaking wet holding their heads from the hail.  It's like the post office ... nothing keeps them from their appointed task of playing bingo.

But first ... let's look into April Fools Day.  Not much to see, since no one really knows where it came from or why.  They just know it's been around for a long time.  Some say it goes back to 1500 France when they decided to change the Julian Calendar (think Julius Caesar) from it's New Year date of April 1st to the Gregorian calendar day (think Pope Gregory) to January 1st.

The Caesarites didn't get the message because travel took so long in those days, so the Gregorians made fun of them for still celebrating in April, calling them April Fools.  Now you know!!  

I was no fool when my friends called up to say let's go to lunch at ... Dan knows this one ... In and Out.  Every time I have ever driven by there, no matter what time of day, there is a long line through the parking lot and out the driveway, left and down the street for a whole block.  

You would think it's because of the food ... and you would be right ... but mostly it's because this meal costs $7.14.  It's the cheapest ... best burger in town.  I admit though ... they are a little light on the sauce and the cheese.  I ate most of the fries, but they are not my favorite.  I wonder if they will change to beef tallow oil to fry them?  This was GOOD EATS!

After a quick return home to feed the kid of the house and give him some extra snuggles, I was off to Bingo.  Though I expected a huge crowd since it was "payday", only 115 folks materialized.  That was plenty enough to run up a total of over $4,000 on the debit card infernal machine.  I think that's a record, and meant I was going to run short of cash.  Everyone gets cash back which they spend on pull tabs.  I have to borrow from Pull Tabs to pay the jackpots.

Weirdly, I think half of the peasants on this day were strangers.  We have our regular crowd, along with a long list of players, but this day I didn't recognize hardly any of them.  We've never had turnover like this before.  

And then it happened ... April Fools on US.  None of the television/bingo screens would work.  I made a panic call to the Knight that knows, because the peasants were becoming restless.  He came down early and discovered the problem.  Someone had pulled a plug out and broken the "holder".  After some super glue, we were back in business and the peasants put away their knives.

A few minutes later one rather boisterous lady came in with her wig in hand.  Yes, it was a spectacle.  Apparently the wind and hail wreaked havoc and it came off.  YIKES!!  Yup ... I've seen every kind of wig you can image, from short short to curls two feet long.  It's a thing for these ladies young and old.  I don't know ... maybe I should get one too.  With a little help, she got it back on and went right to picking out her cards.

It went well for awhile, but I wasn't April fooled into thinking all was well.  The new caller couldn't hear well, so everyone was screaming out the numbers to make sure theirs was a winning card.  That brought out the pitchforks quickly.  He was taking too long to verify the winners.  Then ... horror of horrors, he called the letter O instead of G.  Mayhem erupted!!  Players stood up!  That's a bad sign when they stand up!!

If they didn't need those dobbers to play their cards with, I'm sure they would have thrown them at his head.  Peasants are PROS and will not only tell you when you make a mistake, they even know if a card is the real winner or not.  It's crazy I tell you!!  Lucky for him he's up on a stage, and so couldn't be reached.

There were only two April Fools jokes.  They picked out all their cards and couldn't find their money.  APRIL FOOLS!!  It happens quite often really, and usually results in me never seeing them again.  On the other hand, we have one sweet lady who comes every week, picks her cards and pulls out a wad of money.  OH LOOK she says ... my husband gave me money.  In truth, she has Alzheimers.  She used to play many years ago ... and that's what she remembers the most.  

Husband drops her off, she buys the same cards, and plays all night long.  When we're finished, she goes to the back door where he meets her and takes her home.  We keep an eye on her, she gets to have a great time playing (she remembers every card and every game) and he gets a night off.  

And so ended another night with screams of joy yelling BINGO!!!  What could be better!!

Great Minds Think Alike!

You know those mornings when you don't want to get out of bed but you are wide awake?  There is absolutely NO chance you might go back to sleep, so you toss and turn until the King of the House says I NEED TO GO OUT MOM!!  

So up I got, stumbling to the door, brain not engaged.  The SIREN was exceptionally loud on this day.  I'm sure the neighbors appreciate that early morning wake up call.

After no breakfast, since I had a mind to see just how long I could go without eating, I set up the next quilt on the longarm.  Rex if you are reading this, check your last blog post.  I left a message for you.  Hopefully I will have time to finish this one today since you KNOW what day it is once again.  It's BINGO time tonight!! 

I actually headed out at 8:00 to Wally World to return two pair of jeans.  One was too big and one was too small ... both the same size.  I figured I might as well get a few groceries while I was at it.  Bacon sounded quite tasty.  Of course you now get 14 ounces instead of 16, for a higher price.  On the other hand, eggs are down from $12 to $11 for 18.  I mean really, you would think if anyone ... Wally World would bring down the prices like Costco does.

Upon my return, I heard strange noises coming from the back yard.  I think I have mentioned in the past that the neighbor with the drinking, drug using friends, raises and sells goats for 4-H.  Great minds think alike.  I too had the crazy idea I could get a couple of their goats to roam the back yard and clean up the weeds.  

How apropos ... one of my fence boards was shoved over to one side and there stood a goat!!  Okay,  how much trouble could they get in?  I already have water to the corrals, and all they would have to do is throw a little hay over the fence.  How could they turn down free feed?  So I called to ask since the goat had already broken my fence.  These guys can be pretty destructive.  They said okay, but didn't offer to make any repairs.

The first thing this one did was run around the exterior fence trying to find a way back to his buddies.  Oh great ... this is going well.  He went right under the fence onto my lawn.  The food is THAT way kiddo!  After a few minutes, he calmed down.  I'll let you know how it goes.

While keeping an eye on the goat, hoping Cooper didn't see him, which would bring about a daily round of barking, I finished sewing the binding on this quilt.  I now have two good examples to take to the Vets Chairman at Bingo to make sure they are what they want.  From here on out, I only have 18 to make, possibly 22 if I can find someone to embroider names.  It shouldn't be too bad since I can easily make one in a day using the big panels.  Little do they know at this point that the money they gave me will only cover HALF the cost.  

As for not eating, it actually worked out quite well.  I was surprised I wasn't starving so much that I ate everything in the fridge.  I picked up two pieces of salmon at Wally World, on sale of course, mostly to feed the King of the House.  Turns out it's pretty tasty, so I ate one, giving Mr. Cooper little bites.  He loved it!  

It's not as tasty as my ex-father-in-laws freshly caught salmon from the ocean, but then I didn't have to clean it either.  Just cook and serve!!

Other than the goat, rain kept me inside most of the day.  I kept going out on the patio to make sure he had not escaped nor eaten my roses.  There was a tiny slice of moon in the sky, making it rather creepy.

Wasn't I shocked this morning to find NO goat in the back yard!!!  How could he possibly have escaped?  APRIL FOOLS!!  Probably because there wasn't any goat in the back yard.  

I actually thought of this and tried it ... but these goats would not eat a single blade of grass.  They only ate the grain the neighbor fed them.  I guess I would choose ice cream over salad every time too.

Time for my Bingo armor ......... hope you have a GREAT day!

So-So and Sew!

 Well .... it's a deep subject ..... here we are at the end of another month that was six days long.  Maybe I should do absolutely nothing all day so they would last a little longer!!  It feels like we are at peregrine falcon speed diving for a fishy dinner!!  240 mph!

It was a dark overcast day once again, with rain off and on.  We've got two more days of this scheduled, which is okay with me since I love the "cool".  The breezes got a little carried away yesterday, but for the most part, it was stellar.

I started yet another quilt on the machine.  This is really more fun than sewing the quilts together.  There was a glitch when I discovered I only had one roll of thread.  You need two ... one from which to wrap bobbins for the bottom thread, and one to sit on the machine for the top thread.  Things didn't go according to plan, and I had to unwrap about 300 yards of thread.  Oh yeah, that was fun!!

About two hours later I realized I wasn't hearing Jeeves any more.  Truly, I was surprised that he came on at all after the last time I kicked him out from under that chair.  This time he died before he could get back to his house.  Yes, his name changes depending on how good he does his job.  He's not stuck on the carpet, he's just dead.

I could hear the funeral dearth as I carried him back to his house, but amazingly, two hours later, he was back at it.  Good boy Jeeves.  He does a so-so job, so I think I'll run him more often.

I still have some weed spraying to do, so thought I'd show you what is involved.  This is my back yard horse corrals.  Quite the expanse and full to the brim with weeds and grass.

When I had horses, they took care of this for me.  There was never even a tiny piece of green.  Not so much now.  It grows like ..... well ..... weeds.  It takes three pictures to show how big it is.

I really wouldn't care about the weeds, I would just let them grow and die.  BUT I have stupid neighbors all around that think it's fun to shoot fireworks ... the big ones ... off in their back yard, aimed directly at MY back yard.  It's a huge fire hazard in June/July ... and so I spray mucho gallons across both corrals.  NOT my favorite pastime.

By noon I had completed another quilting job on this quilt.  Cooper approved yet again.  This one is for an Air Force Vet.  It's a good thing poodles don't shed!!

I was trying to rest up after overeating that huge meal and standing in high heels for seven hours, but my brain said get that one finished.  So a sewing I did go, finishing off the binding.  It's ready to be approved at Bingo tomorrow.  If the Veterans Chairman likes it, I will get the assembly line going.  Of course now I have no place to STORE them, so that will be one of today's quests.

By 5:00 I realized I had not eaten all day.  How did THAT happen?  I'm usually at the fridge door 38 times.  Strange that I'm not craving SOMETHING.  If I could keep that up I might just squeeze into my tuxedo a little easier!!

The sun went down, faster than usual I'm sure, as little drops came down from the sky yet again.  It's now Monday ... the day I hate because of that four letter word WORK.  Oh wait ..... I'M RETIRED!!  It's COUCH TIME!!

Pomp and Pose!

 Tap tap tap tap tap .... that's the rain hitting the bottom of the downspout 5 feet from the head of my bed.  Mother Nature is having one last winter blast.  At least I HOPE it's the last one!  Yessiree ... it's raining.  She just can't decide whether to smile or cry.  It makes me smile though because the sprinklers are still OFF.  Oh yes, here we go with another summer of sprinkler angst.

Here's another big smile that happens every day, all day long.  My body guard keeping a watchful eye out for intruders.  Yes, he's sleeping because it's his break time.  Being the Watch Pup is a hard job.

I spent an hour in the morning quilting the latest of the Vets quilts, now ready for binding.  I love this panel, and hope the Vet that receives it does too.  Today I'll be working on the next two ready for the longarm.  

Very early in the afternoon ... like 2:00 ... I was headed off to the Elks Lodge once again.  Truly, I feel like I live there, I just can't throw stuff around on the furniture.  It is the end of the year and a new set of officers is going to take over.  It would be so much easier if the same person stayed in the head position.  Changing them out every year means most everything is run differently.  

I've luckily made friends again with several couples who don't mind a single gal in their midst.  We sat in the bar, waiting for the entourage to land on the back steps.  It was so noisy that I ghosted the entire event and hung out with our oldest member ... 95 year old Floyd.  What a great guy!!

How can I describe the installation.  Those new officers have to take an oath of office and are walked around the room while lots of clapping ensues.  You'd have to be there to experience the racket.  There are two stops for pictures, followed by seating them at their appointed chair. 

I'm included in the group since I'm back to First Year Trustee, having been here WAY too long.  Yes, I volunteered once again because none of the other four trustees have ANY accounting experience ... and that's their job.  So this "walk" is all pomp and circumstance.  

I on the other hand, am not a fan of the pomp part, so when I was escorted to the picture spot, I held up my hand .... wait ... WAIT ... I have to pose for this ... doing my best model impression.  The crowd broke into laughter.  So much for the circumstance part.  From then on everyone was laughing and posing for every picture.  It certainly made it a LOT more fun!!

After that, we all headed downstairs for dinner.  There was a little panic there since I was probably the only one in the building who did NOT buy a ticket.  My plan was to head straight home.  I sat down where the Secretary told me to, but there was a big mixup in the seating arrangement.  Luckily it wasn't because I was there.  You could cut the tension with a knife.  Thankfully, someone didn't show up at the table next door and we were saved.

THIS was dinner.  A buffet affair with the best roasted veggies I've had in ages, salad, little red potatoes with parmesan cheese and a big honking piece of BEEF.  Prime rib to be exact.  Just wow!  This is the best piece of prime rib I've seen in forever.  Cooked perfectly and very little fat ... melt in your mouth goodness.  All for $30.00, which I will pay for first thing Tuesday.  I think the officers got off scott free, but that's not my nature.

That was followed up by our famous peach cobbler with ice cream.  No kidding ... people come from lodges all across California just to eat our peach cobbler.  

Of course I brought half the beef home for the Guard Pup, but he may have to share.  Today I'll be back at the longarm quilting the next two quilts and resting up from eating WAY too much food.  And thankfully, I'll be watching the rain from INSIDE the house since I get to stay home all day long!!!

LET'S EAT CAKE!!!

 It's interesting to me that our weather forecasts never seem to materialize.  Though we were scheduled for seven days of rain, our first epic day only resulted in clouds.  They started out dark and ominous but ended up sunny and warm.  Never let the weatherman suggest your clothing options for the day.

First things first, I hit the morning running at a fast pace, hoping to get three quilts quilted before heading out to the latest dinner donation.  I love this quilt pattern and think I will make one for the lodge, to hang over the stage.  It's amazing how the fabric looks folded and wrinkled here, but in actuality, it's perfectly flat while I quilt.

Never far away, Mr. Cooper waits patiently until I'm done so he can christen it with his little feet while I take a picture.  Not quite yet however, since I have company.  That delayed quilting for the rest of the day.

In the afternoon, I went one way and she went another.  Sadly, I didn't have any extra dinner tickets for the event I was attending.  This is Love INC (Love in the name of Christ) ... the biggest and best organization in our local area.  They have an entire crew that works every day helping people get their lives together.  They have classes on budgeting, saving money, how to balance a checkbook, how to get a job, how to get a place to live ... and anything else they need, all for free.  You ask, they give.

It's one of the Elks favorite donation projects.  This once a year dinner is the biggest around, including several auctions, silent and LOUD!!  It's a major task to put on this event ... and they do an amazing job.

The building was packed to the brim, a full size basketball court and then some, filled with 55 tables.  We should take lessons!  We started out with an appetizer bar that was HUGE, with nacho containers you could fill to the brim.  When everyone was seated, the entire building was fed in less than 30 minutes.  Salad, tri tip beef, garlic mashed potatoes, green beans with tomatoes and garlic bread.  It was so loud we were actually texting each other.

Then came the dessert dash!!  My favorite!  You write on the envelope how much money you want to spend.  They pick them up and put them in amount order.  As they call your table number by order of how much you bid, you run up to the long tables and pick which dessert you want.  I think we were the fifth number called. 

We paid $450 for this amazing coffee chocolate cake.  It was probably the best I'ver ever eaten.  The Elks and I split this donation.  I like what this organization does and donate all I can.  All of the extra furniture I brought back from Arizona went to them also.  

Next up was their BED auction.  So many people around here cannot afford furniture for their apartments, including one lady with 11 ... that's ELEVEN children.  They found a donor who bought bunk beds that this group hauled to the house, put together and plunked mattresses on top so the kids didn't have to sleep on the floor.  And so they ask for donations of $100 each to buy beds and mattresses.  They collected 40 donations, plus even larger donations for bed and dressers.  It kind of makes you proud to know there are this many folks willing to help this organization.

Their latest project is the purchase of two big showers on a trailer.  I think they have two trailers now.  They haul these around to the areas where homeless hang out and offer them a free shower.  That's a first.  

At any rate, we demolished the cake since we had 16 Elks attend and left plenty of donation money at the counter.  I headed home to find my company's car in the driveway, so I quietly snuck in and turned the alarm on.  In no time I was out like a light.  

But my phone kept buzzing and waking me up.  In disgust, I finally got up to see what it was.  Company wasn't home after all, but was on their way.  It would not have ended well if she tried to come in the back door with the alarm on!!!

There's no rest today since the installation of new Elks Officers will be held starting at 2:00.  Ugh ... there's no time to rest.  I'll be gathering up my penguin suit.  

Death and Taxes

 What a beautiful day THAT was!  Warm and sunny until it turned cold and dark.  I thought the rains would fall any second.  Even got a warning or two on my phone about an "event", whatever that was, but like me, it ghosted the crowd and went home.  They say the same will happen today.  It amazes me how many times they are incorrect around here.  It's okay though ... that's one less day of rain.

My roses think it's lovely.  They are covered with buds and beginning to blossom.  Weird roses ... they have the color and the thorns, but just don't look like roses to me.   

We didn't spend much time outside however ... there was sewing to be done.  When I'm on a roll, I try to keep going.  Otherwise I'll stop in the middle and procrastinate!!

This one for an Air Force Vet is ready for the longarm.  Gee ... only nine of these to go!  

These on the other hand, not only take longer, but take a lot more calculating.  Turns out the center squares are not square.  For example, 17-1/2 inches wide and 17 inches tall, or 18" wide and 18-3/4" tall.  That means lots of math trying to figure out exactly how big to make the squares before cutting and sewing.  I could make them really big and just cut them down, but that wastes expensive fabric.  

I hope to have five of these quilts with names, places and rank embroidered on them ... if I can find someone to embroider.  At this point, they may end up generic because so far I haven't found anyone for that task.

So much to do ... so little time.  Return to Walmart, return to Home Depot, company coming, drivers license renewal, none of which got done on this day.  Oh and groceries.  Seems every time I look in the fridge I'm out of food!

To make my day, I got my tax returns back from the accountant.  Though I wish I could do it myself, I have these investments from 30 years ago that are overseas.  I suppose the good news is they have always made money.  The bad news is I have to pay taxes on money I never see.  I'm taking withdrawals, but for some reason I always seem to have to pay MORE tax on it.  

I admit, I have a good retirement.  Bought and paid for by 58 years of hard work in a time when you didn't get paid the BIG bucks, but the benefits made up for it.  The trouble is, the more you make, the more you pay.  It makes me really happy that much of those government money laundering schemes are being killed off by DOGE.  I'm all for helping out people in OUR country, but it seems we've been helping out people in other countries more than ourselves.  I won't even get into that part.

Even writing off my little quilting business gets me nothing.  I suppose I should be thankful I have enough to buy food, make my house payment and buy diesel at the end of the day.  Single people have to pay for everything by themselves and still pay all the taxes with fewer deductions.  

Elva says I should get one of my single friends to marry me on paper, NOT live together, and see how much taxes I could save.  That just might be an idea worth investigating!!!   I won't say how much I have to pay, but I could easily buy a car with it.... or TWO longarms!!  Sadly for the folks doing my job today, they receive basically NO benefits and get paid less for the same work.

Anyway ... death and taxes are inevitable I guess.  After stitching up two more quilts, they are ready for quilting.  This one is loaded and will be done this morning.  As for the other two ...  company called and needed a place to stay, so I don't know how much I will actually get done.

My poor scroungy kid slept like a baby next to me for the remainder of the night.  He's such a snuggle bunny ... but only when he wants to be!!  

Just for fun, I put the game camera out last night to see who has been coming around.  Mr. Cooper thinks someone is trespassing on HIS property.  There are WAY too many smells on his backyard route.  Maybe we'll find out who it is today.  In the meantime, I have a 4:00 function to attend ... which will include good food and a dessert auction!!  OH YEAH!!!

Changing It Up

 If you don't like the weather, just wait a few days.  At 5:00 this morning it was 57 degrees.  Uh oh ... it's going to be a toasty one.  I may have to actually turn my AC on.  Not for long however, because Mother Nature isn't going to let us get away that easily ... it's supposed to rain for the next six days straight.  So much for laying out in the sun!

Mr. Cooper and I were off before the sun came up.  

That didn't last long however since it wasn't windy or even breezy.  That meant it was a good day to spray weeds.  I have called the usual company twice, but they keep telling me it's too early.  By the time they think it's perfect, I'll have a five foot tall jungle in my back yard.  No kidding, the weeds are almost up to an elephant's eye!

This is definitely not my favorite "man" job.  The shoulder straps on this thing are too wide, so it constantly slips off my shoulders.  It doesn't spray enough either, like my old one did.  It works, but takes much longer.  Yes, it's really heavy too ... but a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do.  It took about an hour to empty it out.

Then I pulled a bunch of weeds in the garden, and admired this beauty.  I had three of these pretty gazanias, but only 1-1/2 remain.  They looked great until winter came.  Maybe it's too cold for them here.  This one made my day!

With that all done, I was off to the fabric shop.  I got a couple of ideas from the Elks crowd and an OK on the new panels.  But first ... I needed fuel.  I always check around town, but no one ever beats the price 15 miles down the road.  It's always jammed with cars and big trucks, mostly because it's $1.00 cheaper than any other station within 50 miles.  So if they can have cheaper fuel, why can't everyone else?  $4.45 today for diesel, down from $5.50 a couple of months ago ... and this is CALIFORNIA.  Land of BIG taxes and trains to nowhere.  

By the way, to get the train from L.A. to San Francisco, about 380 miles, the original price was $33 billion So far they have some bridges completed, hoping to get it just 160 miles from Merced to Bakersfield, which at this point has cost $128 BILLION.  Is that $800 million dollars per MILE?  Too bad they haven't bought any train CARS, or have high speed tracks down yet. Oh but wait .... he needs $100 BILLION MORE to finish it.  I think that would end up costing us $600 million per mile.  Maybe someone should check my math.  

On the other hand, Newsom now has a new $9.1 million dollar mansion to live in on the coast.  Thank goodness the Federal Government said NO MORE MONEY.  Oh, and that's not counting the $3.4 billion he's begging for to replace the Medical money he spent on illegal aliens.  You know, the money California CITIZENS need for THEIR medical care?  Okay, enough of that.

Happy about the reduction in fuel prices, at least a little, I was off to the fabric shop.  I wanted to pick up some solid colors to tone down the "busy-ness" of the quilt panel.  Fabric isn't cheap ... this is $200 worth ... but at least it hasn't gone up in over a year.  

In no time my sewing room was a disaster!!  I tried to get a little organized since I now know I need ten anonymous quilts and ten designated for specific people.  

Here's what I've got so far.  Since those little squares from each branch are now considered antiques, the only ones I could find with a specific branch i.d. were these.  Way down at the bottom you can hardly see Air Force.  See what I mean by busy?  Believe me, it's worse in person.

I thought the best thing I could do was just add several borders to make it the 40 x 50 size required.  

I tried the plain border above, but liked this one a little better.  It adds a little pizzaz to it.  I've now got two complete and two ready to quilt.  Hopefully two more will be added to that pile today.  These go pretty fast.

In the meantime, I am again out of Cooper food.  That kid eats more than I do, so I'll be cooking up a storm today, sewing in between.  Then I'm going outside to watch the weeds die.  How fun is that???