DECEMBER 2

Here are the pics of day 2. It is covered in pretty paper edged with both lace and silver edging. It has a pretty cut out with a little Eskimo girl in the middle and a pretty green ribbon. Now how did she know that I originally came from the land of the frozen north? The inside of the box was lined with a silver and white paper and a silver handle. The bottom has a little green heart bead hanging with her 2 tag. Inside this was a cute candy cane also with a green ribbon. I think this month is going to go very fast.

I must tell you a a little story. When my son was here on the Wed. afternoon I received a phone call from a gal who said her name was Gail and did I know who it was? I said no and she said Gail Tibbett and there was still a silence while I frantically tried to picture who this could be. She laughed and said Gail Priest and right away I knew it was my cousin from Toronto by her maiden name. She was the daughter of my Mother's brother, my Uncle Tom. There were 3 girls and my Mother in my family so one by one as we married my Uncle Tom gave us away. Well Gail said she was visiting her brother Ernie who was staying in the Villages for the month of Nov. and another family member had told her they were only an hour or so north of Mt. Dora where we were. They arranged to come up Fri. afternoon after Dave & Kim left early Fri. morning for the airport. Now I have not seen these cousins in over 50 years. We left Toronto for Chicago 45 years ago and when we would go home this was a branch of the family we did not see. We would stay with my sister who also had 3 children roughly the same age and an inground swimming pool which was the hook. After a week there we would head up to Lake Simcoe where Harv's Mom & Dad had a cottage for another week or so then back to Chicago. No time for visiting except for brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews. I thought this is going to be strange but they arrived and it was wonderful. Was like 5 years ago instead of 50. Ernie and his wife and Gail and her husband. I had been to both their weddings but both had been married over 50 years hence the time date. Ernie is retired and had been a principal in Toronto and I mentioned going back to our old house and visiting my old school 3 or 4 years ago and Ernie laughed. He had been vice principal at my old school for 4 years in the 70's before he made principal somewhere else. What a small world. It was a great afternoon and we all promised to get together again next time they are down or we are up.

DECEMBER 1

And the fun begins. I opened up the first matchbox and what a great one. You will see from the pictures it had a little tag on it that read "not even a mouse". The box itself was covered with fabric that had little Christmas mice on it and the inside box was lined with the same I could hardly get it open and when I did out popped this incredible little hand made mouse. To think that she made 25 of these. Incredible. I hope my pictures do it justice.

I am also posting a pic of my Dec. 1 one that someone has opened today for anyone that did not see them when I posted way back end of Sept. or so.

SEWING ROOM

Here is where I spend my time when I am sewing, cutting, making messes, etc. My sewing room is actually our guest bedroom. When we first bought the house I bought a queen size bed, wicker headboard, chests, a pretty comforter, etc. Well it did not take me long to figure that unless I wanted to sew in the dinette area all I had was the wicker glass top desk and there was about 3 feet between it and the end of the bed. I put the machine on the desk and sewed there. Well I had not thought of my sewing life when I did this. Well one day I was at a friend's house and they were mentioning company and the gal said I have a Murphy bed in the den and I said WHAT! I did not know they still made such a thing. I remember them from the old movies with the small NY apts. where beds came out of the wall. Well times have changed and so have the Murphy beds. You can get so many combinations, storage space, bed, etc., as much as you have room for. Well I hauled good old hubby over to the place where they sell them and next thing I knew I had bought a Murphy bed with a storage cupboard with pull out table and storage cupboard at the other end. Out went the queen size bed and I had an almost empty room again. When I put everything away when we arrived I managed to keep it neat until Dave & Kim arrived so took some pics to show you. It covers almost the whole width of the wall and the queen size bed is the 2 double doors in the middle. They open up and fold back when the bed is open. You can still get into the storage cabinets if you need to but normally when guests are here you don't do that very often. You can see in the pic that there is a very strong table that folds up into the cupboard. It is a good weight and that is where my sewing machine goes. Plus I can sew and get good light from the window plus see what is going on.

Now my laptop is on the desk where it belongs and I have put a couple of shelves above it to hold small things. I also took a pic of the top of the cupboard where the comforter, pillow shams, etc. reside until I need to make up the bed. If you look carefully at the one picture of one of my bulletin boards you will see a pic of Allie Aller and Willa Fuller. Two good friends of mine who came out to spend the day with me when Allie was in town with her hubby for a meeting.

I am now content with my sewing area but I still do all my hand sewing at night in the living room with Harv while we watch TV. He watches and I listen. This winter I intend to spend more time doing hand sewing out in our new sunroom. Great light and very relaxing out there.

MATCHBOX SOLUTION

Yesterday I mentioned that I had received my matchboxes numbered 1 to 25 to be opened 1 a day until Christmas. It dawned on me that I had not actually taken them out of the large envelope and looked at them. Then I thought what am I going to do with them as I did not want another tree. I have 1 small one on a table in the front hallway and one mid size on a table in the sunroom. I then remembered that when unpacking the christmas boxes and taking items from the shelf that I came across this red rack. I have 2 of them and when we had the cottage I used to buy the large bag of small size potato chips, corn chips, etc. like you would put in a lunchbox and put them on this rack. Then whenever anyone wanted a snack they could help themselves. I am glad I did not throw them away. I bought one down last year and clipped Christmas cards on it. Well I counted the clips and would you believe there are 25 clips. All the matchboxes had to have a hanger of some type attached to them for hanging. Well I now know where my boxes are going to hang.

Along with all the work and swapping herself as I got her day #13, Linda sent each one of us a little goodie bag. I attached it to the top of the holder and we are ready to go. I put all the boxes in date order on a plastic baking sheet cover. Worked perfect. Here are some pics. I am as bad as the grandkids. Can't wait for Dec. 1. Last year I ordered the Lego advent toy for both of the 7 year olds. Apparently they loved it and would come downstairs first every day to see what little thing you made that day. I ordered them again this year from Lego and now we will all be opening something every day.

I will post a pic of the matchbox and gift inside every day.

THE LADY

Well here I am 2 days in a row - woo hoo. I am going to show you what I decided to put in the middle of the quilt between the triangles. It is a picture of a water nymph/lady whatever you want to call her. Because I did not follow the butterfly calender pattern at all I did not want to put a butterfly there. The only thing I am following is the layout. Now comes the math work. I cut my blocks down to 10" and the middle is 14" compared to their 12" blocks and I think 20" middle if I remember right. Their measurements will not work plus I just looked and I left that part of it home. Just bought the empty calender envelope down. Once I get ready it will be fine.

I am planning to outline her wings with beads and do some silk ribbon leaves and threaded stems. I did dye the large motif and it was all one but decided it was too large and cut it in 2 pieces. The larger one on the bottom and the top one to offset the bottom. I might do a little silk ribbon in the triangle corners. Haven't got that far yet. will keep you posted with pics as I go along. I wasn't doing much stitching for the last couple of months and now I know how much I missed doing it.

If you have been reading this blog for a couple of months you will know that I was in a matchbox Christmas swap. We each made 25 Christmas themed matchboxes with a tiny momento inside. They are to be used as an advent type calender. Open 1 each day. We had to put numbers 1-25 very clearly on the front of the matchbox. Well on dec. 1 I will show you the one I and sentfor Dec. 1 and the one I received Dec. 1 when I open it. It will be fun to blog each one until Christmas Day. I will have to go organize them somehow so I don't have to plow through them looking for the dates.

Can you image being wonderful Linda Smith of St. Louis who mothered this swap. 25 matchboxes from about 75 people and each had to be seperated into 75 piles of 25 different matchboxes for each person. Approx. 1875 boxes to do. Linda did say she had help and I bet she needed it. She is probably still recovering.

I see that the last two pics were turned sideways. I know how to rotate them when they are on my screen but not once they are posted by blogger. It does this occasionally and drives me crazy. Does anyone know the solution? Would be grateful for any info.

Giveaway Thank You

Here I am in the flesh and can't believe it has been almost a month since I posted. I want to thank all of my friends and followers for your kind notes to me after surgery. It was harder both physically and mentally then I thought it would be. Longer recovery time. Also I was so anxious to get to Florida for the winter before winter set in that I probably was pushing myself more then I should have but I am back in blogging shape. We left for Florida Nov. 6 and my neighbours down here were wonderful. They came in and had the house all opened up and everything turned on for us just as if we had walked out the day before. Thank you again to my kind neighbours who do read this blog.

The Giveaway is a Victorian Cherub Heart Brooch kit from Vintage Vogue that I bought at auction at the retreat in Colorado. Various vendors had sent items to Leslie plus CQI people gave stuff to the auction. Hideko who came all the way from Japan brought a beautiful gray and purple kimono and I bid on it and won it. I am sorry but it is back in Chicago and will have to wait until next Spring for a picture.

My son and his wife came down for Thanksgiving and left yesterday to go back. David was a great help doing the things I could not do. He put 16 bags of mulch around the trees and flower beds, did small fix up things around and got all my Christmas stuff out of the attic on thurs. so I can begin decorating.Thanks again David - you are a wonderful son. We will be staying here for Christmas again and will do like last year with an open house dinner for any neighbors who will not be going home or having family down. We did it last year and it was great fun. I baked a large ham and bought the wine and they all bought side dishes and dessert.

I am still working on the butterly quilt. I am down now to doing the center and will show a picture within the next couple of days. I laid it out with the four triangles on the black fabric yesterday and now have to decide what all to do on it. I dyed a large lace motif that I am playing with. Haven't decided if it is too large and maybe should be cut down. Also I want to bead the wings and do some ribbonwork on it. It is not a butterfly but a lady with wings.

Please leave a comment anytime over the next 2 weeks then Sat. Dec. 11 Harv will pull a name and it will be on its way to someone on the 13th.

It feels good to be back blogging. I missed it but just couldn't seem to do it.

Big hugs FredaB

Doctors, Doctors, everywhere

Back again after spending the better part of the day taking our daughter for out patient surgery on her right eye. It is not latix but surgery to try and decrease extreme dry eye that she has suffered for years. This will be the second surgery in the last couple of years but they have had great results with it and we hope it will work good for her.

While waiting for her in surgery I wandered into the hospital gift shop and they were putting out all their Christmas stuff. I found this little guy and I thought he would go good with my other bits in Florida. When I went to pay for him I found he was 40% off because he was last year's stock. Even better. You can't see it in the picture but his head bobs around. He has the cutest face. Love those gift shops. They usually have some neat stuff.

After we got her home and settled I had to leave and go to my oncologist to talk about my latest surgery. It was cancer, early 1st. stage and confined only to the polyp. They removed 17 lymph nodes and they were all clear. He determined no other treatment necessary except to keep a watch on me and see and another colonoscopy next summer. He did do a couple of blood tests today and I will get the results in a couple of days. Hopefully no surprises.

I am back to feeling almost normal with just a few twinges in that area. I go to the surgeon on Wed. and if all is well we will leave for Florida Sat. I am going to start packing tomorrow and deciding what I will take with me this year. Always my threads and beads but will cut way down on other stuff. Can always buy fabric down there. The flea market always has laces if I need any. I should catch up on my other embroideries.

I have not done anything the last couple of weeks. Just hard to put my mind to it. I am packing my knitting needles and may do a little of that. I can make hats for the cancer group or baby hats for the hospital newborns so will have something to do.

I probably will not be posting until I get settled in Florida then maybe I can get back to posting regularly and leaving comments.