Oh Baby! It's a Mix

My youngest GD Carys, will be 1 on the 19th of this month. She just took her first steps. I haven't seen her since she was only a couple of weeks old. They live in Kwajalein. Gosh I miss them. At home, since we put down the new well, we've been having some challenges related to the water. This picture shows the water pressure in my kitchen faucet. It's takes about 5 minutes to fill a cup! Everywhere else in the house it's fine. We've taken it all apart & can't find the blockage. We also had a mishap on Sunday evening, when Warren opened the back door, we had a big gust of wind (very high winds that evening), that blew out the pilot light on our hot water heater. He couldn't get it to light again. So Monday I had to wash up in COLD water before going in to work.

Warren tried several more times to light it. He also called 2 different plumbers trying to get them to come up & address both this & the faucet issue. No one can come. Finally I went in there today, before getting dressed, determined to make the darned thing light (after talking to my good friend Judy, the farm raised girl, who told me she's held the button down for 10-15 minutes to get her pilot lights lit). I followed Judy's suggestion, holding for 10 full minutes (it reminded me of holding pressure on an artery after removing the Arterial line). It worked! I got it lit, & had a nice HOT shower this morning! Yippieee! Boy when you have to do with out you realize how spoiled you are!

I finally found my pile of small summer quilts, & got them hung up on the walls. I had them buried under a pile of batting in my studio. I thought it was just batting! I'm glad I finally got to the bottom of that mystery! Ha! I know, bad pun, but I love bad puns.
Above is "Russian River Red"

My Fireweed above is one of my all time favorites.

& this little journal quilt looks great on the wall, with the shiny glass tile at the center, & the little mirrors in the corner add so much light & movement to the piece. It's a fun spot on the wall!

I finished this group quilt on Lily today. I have found since Lily takes up so much space in my studio, it's hard to take a good picture of my quilts. I ended up taking it out on the deck & laying it on my swing.

It was a complete joy to quilt on. I really had fun with each different block.

This star below may be my favorite.

The back is pretty too.

Some of my quilting is easier to see from the back.

This evening we went out to The Bear Tooth Grill, to eat. It'll be our last date for a couple of weeks, because Warren goes back to work, & before he's off, I have surgery, a week from today. I'm having a Uni-compartmental replacement of my left knee. That means half of my knee will be metal.

I have to stay in the hospital 3 or 4 days minimum. Bleh! When you work there, you don't want to sleep there!

Warren had his usual spinach enchiladas, & I had my favorite Portobello & goat cheese sandwich. Very yummy.

I got this fun little box of "Artzy-fartzy" stuff in the mail yesterday. Xpanadaprint, silk cocoons, & Grilon thread. I can't wait to start playing with it.

Sunday evening we had the Meyn family over, & I hit upon a brainstorm to help me fit Hope's Irish dance dress. I had measured her earlier, & made a muslin top that ended up not fitting right at all, so I split the muslin up the front, & Duct-taped her up, front & back, then cut it off, & cut it apart, & used that for my pattern. It worked, now I have a muslin that fits, to work from.

Hope just got back from Nationals in Nashville, where they placed (much to their surprise & delight), 2ND place! They were THRILLED!

Spielberg Sky & Show & Tell

It was a Spielberg sky over Anchorage today as I headed in to the Quilt Guild meeting.
I snapped a bunch of pictures of it from the church parking lot. I wished I had brought my other lens. It was fascinating.

I only got a few pictures of the Show & Tell. I was stitching on my beads & forgot myself for a few minutes there!

My friend Jackie Carley is working on a series of trees. She photo transferred the images then embellished with thread painting.

She likes to tell people she took my class, (which she did), but I think she could've done this without me.

Mary Penty Lee showed this quilt for her son, & her wonderful jacket.

Ruthie (in the red) put together this beauty, front

& back. It's going to be quilted by me on Lily.

This pair have been in our yard for at least 4 hours now. Taking their mid-day nap.

My DH whistled when I was tippy-toeing my way to get a tighter shot. Mama moose picked up her head,

then decided I was OK.

They're still there as I post.

Sorry if the blog has been a bit dull lately. The fish were all safe this weekend. We came home empty handed. It rained while we were down there, so I spent most of my time in the car with my book, & took a little nap.

Sunday I worked all day. We had 1 case scheduled & 8 more added on. Today I got over-staffed, so it's a good thing I got all that time & 1/2 on Sunday!

Yesterday it was cool & rainy. It has been that way most of this summer so far, so we went to the movies. We saw Iron Man. We both enjoyed it. I liked it better than The Incredible Hulk. Then we went & saw Wall-e. I loved it, Warren thought is was boring. He hares robots for some reason. Always had, so I was lucky he was willing to set through it for me. I thought it was cute. I loved R2D2 & 3CPO also.

Today the sun came out. It was warm enough to open windows even. I had my lunch out on the deck, but spent a few hours on Lily, continuing on my threadpainting with the UV Sun sensitive thread.
There are 2 colors on here so far. Blue & green. When I get it all finished I'll take a picture in the sun.

Here are a couple of close ups.

This afternoon, our contractor friend Richard came over & helped Warren pull our well & replace the pipes.

We had to rent this machine.

The well was only 160 feet deep. We had thought it was 240, so that was a pleasant surprise.

They got it all done & we have water running without air spitting at us FINALLY! No more getting cold air blowing on us half-way through the shower!

The water in the picture is a little dusty. They stirred it up putting the pump back down, but it has since cleared.

I also moved the kitchen cabinets out of the guest room so there is room for guests again. I hope to have my grand girl Darian come for a couple of weeks in August.

Xpandaprint Play

My DH bought these little drill bits for me, aren't they nice? How many girls get excited over drill bits!? I wanted them to prepare for my Over-the-Top Embellishments class. I've also been doing a little more experimenting with Xpandaprint.
I stamped these images with my little hand carved wine cork stamps, then lightly dusted with Pearl-ex powders. Discovered I should put something under the fabric. My cutting board has some new decor now. I scrubbed it after this photo & it faded a little, but is still visible. Oh well, live & learn.
This last one is Xpandaprint & Pearl-ex done with a little metal stencil that I bought in Shipshewana, Indiana in 1996. Finished it's 2 1/2x 3 1/2. The size of an ATC.

Today we're heading back down to Kenai to try & get a few more of those good Red Salmon. Wish us luck!

Fishing Weekend on the Kenai River

See that splash? That was a fish. We stopped on our way down to the B&B (thanks goodness we did), & Warren fished for about an hour.
He caught one very fresh, red salmon. 3 or 4 dinners worth of fish for us.

Then we went to the B&B. It was 2 twin beds. Nothing fancy. The bathroom next door was shared with a couple of quiet kids. Their water smelled & tasted of a strong sulphur mixed with iron. I gagged the first time I brushed my teeth there. I used bottled water after that. I also went to the beauty shop in Soldotna & had my hair shampooed & cut so I wouldn't have to shampoo in their water. UGH! Oh, & I think the B&B stood for Beds & Bathroom, because no breakfast... not even coffee was served. I went to Fred Meyers in Soldotna & bought bottled water, coffee, bran muffins, new pillows, & 2 little portable lights so we could read in bed & not have to get up to turn off the only light in the room, & made it through the rest of the weekend. It was cheap, so you get what you pay for!

Warren fished every day, & caught nothing but one very large Rainbow trout that couldn't even be taken out of the water for a picture. It had to be released immediately. Good thing he got the Red on the first day.

I enjoyed the scenery. Notice how the Forget-me-nots match the river color.

We discovered a brand new brewery in Soldotna. The St. Elias Brewing Co. They served really nice food & the beer drinkers in the crowd said the beer was good too.

I liked the stained glass light fixtures,

& the food too. This was the 2nd time we ate there, we met up with Ellis & his son Andrew, & 2 nurses from the hospital who were fishing with the guys.

The lake that our B&B was on was beautiful . The water was so still. I heard a loon calling every day. I love that sound.

I tromped around the lake a bit. Taking pictures of whatever caught my fancy. I love the moss hanging from the dead spruce.

Fungus really appeals to me for some strange reason too.

The end of the lake where the loon hung out most of the day, was full of waterlilies, not quite in bloom yet.

There were probably about 10 houses on this little lake, & 2 of them had float planes parked out front.

The B&B had a canoe, which I was told I was welcome to use, but wasn't given a paddle!

I stepped outside & took this picture at midnight on Solstice. The sky was pink, & it reflected in the water, but didn't show very well in my photo. Now it'll start getting dark again.

Out final day, we left early for home. It was chilly & rainy.

Just the kind of weekend that really makes you appreciate HOME!