Happy Easter

Happy Easter, this beautiful sunny day. 

I wish all of you a beautiful Easter Day. 

This is a different Easter than we're used to.  None of the kids are home.  Brandon, Dee and Riley are in Spokane.  Austin, Melissa, Logan and Landen are with her family in New York.  But it's still a beautiful, quiet, Easter Sunday.  We'll be going to church with mom and dad, then going to brunch.  Grandpa will be going to brunch with us for the first time in at least three years.  When grandma was living, he would not leave her side, nor would she let him.  I hope he can enjoy his first Easter without her. 

Baby Shower Ideas?

Thank goodness the blog problems are fixed.  That was just so frustrating yesterday.
Back to the good stuff.
 I've finally had time now to work on baby things.  As I've mentioned, we have two new grandchildren arriving shortly.  Baby girl, Leanna Rene, will be welcomed into our lives around July 11.  Our other baby will be coming in September, but we don't know if we are waiting on a girl or boy yet.  We should know that in the next few weeks.
Leanna's birth date is coming up soon, so I'm going to be giving my DIL a shower on May 8 here at my house.  This will be her third child, but the first two were boys and it's been over four years since the second boy, Landen, was born.  She needs some new pink stuff this time.  And I love pink. 
I got started on the baby quilt that I showed the fabric for last week.  It's coming along better and faster than I expected.  I like to design my own patterns.  I draw it out on graph paper first and make sure I have all the dimensions and measurements correct.  Without a finished colored picture I don't always know what I'm going to get.  I get a picture in my head, but that doesn't always translate into what the finished quilt will look like.  So far so good on this one.

I fussy cut the little teddy bears out of the printed teddy bear fabric.  I'll also use this teddy bear fabric as the border around the quilt.

There will be 12 - 9" squares total.  I now have half the squares completed.  I should have it finished in time for the baby shower.

I want to stick with the color theme of pink and chocolate for the colors and food at the shower.  I'm working on ideas for this.  Strawberries and chocolate brownies.  Or strawberries dipped in chocolate.  Pink fluffy jello salad.   I have some pink dishes - might need more.  I have pink votive candle holders.  I'll have a cute pink and chocolate cake with teddy bears, or maybe individual cupcakes.  If you have any ideas for me I'd love to hear them.  I'm just starting to think and plan on this so I'm very open to ideas.

Blogger Issues Anyone?

I have been going crazy all morning wondering why my blog isn't showing any pictures.  I've run Malware, removed programs, shut down the computer, restarted, clicked here, clicked there, and nothing.  So I finally whent into Blogger Buzz and Known Issues.  There is an issue in Blogger - Unable to upload images!  Great!  They are working on this problem. 
Well now I feel better that it's not me or in my computer, but I have now wasted a whole morning.  From now on I'll know to check this Blogger site out first.
I was going to post about something else today, but  I'm so frustrated and wasted so much time that I have to get in the shower now and get dressed for an appointment with my attorney regarding our on-going zoning issues.
More later when I'm calmed down and have more time.

Things I Need To Do vs. Things I Want To Do.

I'm struggling right now between things I need to and have to do versus things I like to and want to do.  They are not usually one and the same.  Part of the frustration is coming from being so distracted by other life events over the past month that I've gotten behind in all my normal activities under both headings that I'm maybe trying to catch up in everything all at once. 
Under the heading of Things I Like To Do, this is what I've accomplished this week:

I took pictures of a really cute hat I finished knitting while riding in the car and sitting around at  hospitals.  It's knit from sheared mink that was woven into yarn. No minks were killed in making this hat!

No makeup on this day.                                                  

Also took picture of the red tweed fingerless gloves I knit, again while sitting in hospitals, to match the red tweed hat I made.

I've also been working on a set of three mini quilted pillows for  Spring to put in my Etsy shop.

I have two of them listed on Etsy and I hope to get the third one up today.  If you would like to see my shop, please go to:  http://charmingbynina.etsy.com/

That's another thing I've been working on this week:  Getting my Etsy shop organized and some expired listings re-listed and advertising again. 

Last night and this morning I worked on a fun project of exchanging our Florida time share for a time share resort in St. Thomas for the week of December 4-12 of this year.  The daughter of very good friends of ours is getting married there and we have been invited to the wedding.  We are looking forward to this fun event and vacation.  This is where we'll be going.

This will look and feel really good by December.

I also really enjoy working out on my deck and in my yard and gardens.  It's bothering me right now because the snow is gone and the sun is out quite a bit, but everything looks so bare and dirty.  I need to get out there and trim, cut, clean, etc.  This is all on my calendar for the month of April.

Now under the heading of "Things I Don't Mind " is cleaning the house, laundry, ironing, grocery shopping, and cooking.  I'm caught up on all of this except for the ironing.  The only thing I really iron are My Bob's dress shirts.  Every one of them is washed and hanging up, ready to iron.   I really have to get to this.

I Need To:  Get the taxes done, catch up on bookkeeping for My  Bob's financial planning business, set up a new web site for My Bob,  get mailers out for My Bob, well, you get the picture. 

Now that I put it all in writing I sound pretty selfish, don't I?  As Bob says to me, "which of these 'things to do' makes us the money so that you can knit, sew, Etsy, and go on vacations?"  I know, I know.  I'll get to it.

Oh - BTW, I really LOVE blogging about it all!

Now My Washing Machine Died

The funeral for Grandma on Saturday went well, for being a funeral.  Many out of town family members came into town for the weekend, which was so nice to see.  By Sunday at noon all the family had left to return home.  At 2:00 in the afternoon My Bob left for Pittsburgh airport to then fly to Orlando for a two day business meeting.  I was alone, it was quiet, and I thought I would spend the next two and a half days just resting, cleaning and doing laundry from the family guests, and then knitting and sewing.  Well, that was wishful thinking.
Sunday night actually was very nice, relaxing and quiet.  I was just so tired that I knit for a little while and then went to bed by 10:00, which is about two hours earlier than normal for me.  Monday morning I woke up with the intent on going with Mom and Dad to the cemetary to witness the burial of Grandma.  I threw a load of sheets into the washer and as I was getting some mail together to take with me to the post office I heard a loud screech from the laundry closet, then I smelled smoke.  As I walked toward the laundry I saw smoke.  I immediately called the appliance store where we purchase almost all our appliances and they said they would be out sometime during the day.  So I didn't go to the cemetary and I waited until they showed up around noon.  The diagnosis: the clutch had locked up and you can't just replace the clutch since it's enclosed in the transmission, so they would need to order a new transmission and then take the washing machine into the shop, take it apart, replace the transmission and put it back together.  How long was that going to take and how much was that going to cost?  In the meantime I wrung out the wet sheets as best I could and threw them in the dryer.  The pile of more sheets and towels sat there to my disgust. 
This morning my handy dandy appliance man called to tell me the cost to repair would be a little over $300 and he could have me a brand new washer by this afternoon for $450.  So that's what I went with. 
Then my DIL called and she was coming into town for an appointment.  I told her over the weekend that the next time she came to town, or I went to her house, we would make a trip to JoAnn Fabrics to pick out the fabrics for a new baby quilt for Leanna, due in July.  We agreed to meet at 11:00 so that I could be back home by noon so I wouldn't miss the delivery of my new washing machine after noon.  The colors of her nursery are pink and chocolate with teddy bears,  so this is what we chose.

Won't this be cute?  The pink puffy flannel on top will be the back.

As I waited for my new washing machine to show up, I was cheered up some more by the UPS truck dropping off a package for me.  It was my Pajama Jeans that I had heard about and ordered on line a month ago.  I was so excited.  I unwrapped the package and read the attached tag that said, "Wash in cold water before wearing because of the dark blue dye."  You really realize how much you need a washing machine when you don't have one.  I tried them on anyway and instantly fell in love.  They look like blue jeans, but feel like sweat pants.  Exactly what I have been searching for!   They fit and feel so good. 

I took my own picture so it took several takes to get this.  Love Them!

Finally, the big present for the day, my washing machine arrived.  It's just a nice, but very basic white one.  I only have a small space so I can't get anything big and fancy and bulky.  But that's OK.  My laundry room is actually a double closet in my hallway right outside my bedroom.  I love it there as it's so convenient.  I fixed it up to look as much like a laundry room as possible. 

I made the little mini quilt on the right to cover up the knobs and tubes.  The little laundry hanging above the cupboards was actually a wallpaper border that I fussy cut around each little piece of clothing and then hung it up so it actually looks like it's handpainted instead of walllpaper.

After I cleaned the floor and carpeting from the mess of the appliance men, I was back in business.  My new Pajama Jeans are washed, the sheets are now all clean, and the quilt fabric has been pre-washed.  It ended up not being such a bad day after all.  I would have rather not had to spend the money for the new washing machine at this point, but what was I to do?

Now I kind of wish that My Bob was going to be away for one more day  because I think tomorrow I would have been able to finally relax a little more.  But he's due home very late tonight so tomorrow will be back to work.  For some reason when he's home it's just a lot more work --- as much as I love him!