After two nights here in Houston, we are off to Holly Beach, Louisiana this morning for two nights parked on the Gulf coast. I had a great day with Cindy yesterday. We did some visiting, some thrift shopping, and then met Bill for dinner at Olive Garden. We got back to our trailer about 7pm. Cindy looks good though I think she is having a little trouble getting herself kick-started again after losing Don. She said her laptop is old and isn't working anymore and she can't figure his out. I gave her a hug from all y'all and delivered your messages - all of which were the same thing - "we miss you and wish you'd come back!". lol! I wasn't able to see Sue. Family was arriving from out of state yesterday and they are having a private service for Kenn today.
VELDA - I think you'll be happy with your decision to have your quilt done by someone else. The last quilt I did on my regular machine cost me more in chiropractor fees than if I'd paid to send it out.
LOIS - didn't you do the Sparrows quilt a few months back? QIAD had it on sale for 30% off yesterday, with free shipping. So I got it. It's been tempting me for over a year and the free shipping offer finally got to me.
KATY - I Googled your Chicken Salad quilt. It's cute! Are you using similar fabrics? And now you did it! You talked about washing cabinets. I had an hour to kill while Bill got our tire fixed yesterday morning so I polished all the wood cabinetry and countertops in the downstairs area of our trailer. I'll do the rest of the "house" this afternoon or tomorrow after we get set up again. They get really dusty when on the road. You are a bad influence, Katy!
CHRISS - were you able to get out your driveway yesterday? And get all those errands done? Got your lotto ticket? the most important errand! I hate errands - unless they involve something fun - like quilt, thrift, or craft stores. We keep a list on the fridge of errands to do for both of us and then go to Tacoma together about once every two weeks. I haven't seen the monarchs at Pismo Beach but I have seen the swallows at Capistrano. In Austin, TX, it's the bats that everyone comes to see. I've seen some of Ken Burns' documentaries. He also narrates audio books.
JUDI - funny about the teens - and I can say that from 2,000 miles away from your teenagers! lol! I would start getting them up half hour earlier if they want to dawdle. And knowing how teens are, you might need to come armed with some polka music to play at top volume until they are actually up! I bet they would learn to get it in gear on time then! lol!
KATHY - happy to hear you passed your inspection! Now you can go shopping! I wouldn't mind a gift card to either of those two stores! I always use my ironing board to hold the weight of a quilt. I can make it the level I need. I did one 88" quilt by hand years ago. I set up my mom's old fashioned 12-foot frame which took up half of our family room for 4 months. My hands worked better back in those days. That was my first and last quilt I ever quilted by hand.
JANA - you can add the first Tacoma Narrows Bridge, "Galloping Gerty", to you list of engineering disasters. It opened in 1940 and lasted only 4 months. I believe the video of that bridge doing it's galloping act in a big wind storm and then collapsing is often shown in engineering schools. Our friend's father took that video. It was 10 years before they opened another bridge, "Sturdy Gerty". They salvaged parts of the old bridge to use in building a bridge on the Alaska Highway.
MARY Q - 4 washer loads of new fabric?? For real?? Trains Fabric at home is having a big 40% off sale through end of January. If we get home in time . . . . .
I didn't know Ken Burns had a quilt collection. You learn new things every day! We've never had Medicare or our insurance company even call us, let alone make visits. Do you think I should be offended? Have they forgotten us?? Don't they care???I will post a photo of Cindy and me at Olive Garden when I finish typing this. It was a good visit. Though her heart isn't into thrifting. She needs more training. Her DD has been trying . . .
She also has a bad hip (bone on bone) and very arthritic shoulder so she's moving a little slowly. Turns out our tire picked up te 4" blade of a small, rusty screw driver and it went straight into the tire right on the edge. Probably when we were going through construction on Wed. It wasn't repairable so Discount Tire replaced it. Bill always buys the extra warranty on tires and at $315 for one new tire, that $63 per tire warranty fee paid for itself and then some, We were lucky they had one in stock. And we were even luckier that the tire didn't go flat while we were driving! We try never to drive faster than our angels can fly.
Today we have only about 150 miles to go so we're going to let traffic die down before we hit the road this morning. Tomorrow our Seahawks play Jana's Forty-niners in play-offs. Crossing our fingers that we will get that game. Good luck to Jana's team! (but wishing better luck to ours!)
Mary Z
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Vel
