Merry Christmas!

 Well Christmas is over for another year - TG! I'm soooo happy I took home this table topper I made for mother. I always liked it - the red polka dots really stand out, and it looks so nice on my coffee table. The blue & white striped loveseat in the background will be history soon as I have decided to take the mater's condo sized sofa and chair. I'll piggy back on Dad's move into Chartwell (coming early in Jan) and have the movers make a stop @ my place.

The season started off with Christmas Eve dinner with the Pater at his house - maybe our last in his dining room. We had Tourtiere, made by Val, the pater's step daughter, and salad and an apple cake made by me! His Christmas table runner and placemats were quilted by me a couple of years ago and look so nice on his table. After dinner we watched some TVO programs about the Royals, then back to my place to sleep over. Breakfast was eggs & bacon and more apple cake - yummm.


Dad had a restless night so I let him nap while I made the first of two hors d'oeuvres for the day at my sister's. I dropped Dad off at his place so he could go down and visit Dorothy @ her home, then off I went across town to pick up "the boys". I gave Mark his $20 Star Trek collector coin and the equivalent to David so he can go have a beer on me! Then back to my place to make the beef/horse radish roll ups - yummm. One more trip and we're finally at my sister's for the BIG celebrations :)

 William was his usual sleepy boy, and Claire was, considering all the excitement, well behaved for most of the day. Here she had just opened her Miss Prickly (hedgehog) plush toy, one of many toys to come!

William finally opened his eyes, so was able to get a family pic (Claire was too busy running around!). Chaos ensued as we opened presents and tried to have a family dinner, but Claire wanted to watch TV instead so Vince ate with her in the Den. Kids eh! All in all it was a busy, tiring but fun day. Dad and I got home by 8:00 pm, which is late enough. Enjoying Boxing day in my kitchen and don't intend on going out for at least one day! My TV is dying, so I'll need to go shopping this week to get a Boxing day deal. Wish me luck!

TTFN

Week before Christmas

So it's the week before Christmas and as usual I'm soooo busy :(. Thought that things would calm down and I would have some time for myself once I retired - HA! Monday I was with the Pater and we finished his holiday shopping, banking, post office chores. Father has decided to go into a retirement home in 2017, so this means lots of arranging and decisions to be made. January will be busy!! Tuesday was a bone density test for me then furniture shopping. I'm trying to decide whether or not to take over the mater's condo sofa and chair or just get my own. I kinda like hers - the size is good and the colours will work in my living room, and it's free (other than the cost to move it here). On the other hand, I've waited so long for something new for myself .... What to do, what to do ... Wednesday was another Dr appointment then off to campus for more drugs. Stopped in and visited my former colleaques. I made then gave this candle mat to my former boss. Here's me doing a Show-n-Tell @ guild night.

Later in the afternoon I dropped over to my sister's place with the new candle mats I made last week. The black & green one is for my sister and the red and grey one is for my niece Lisa. Had some problems with one "slice" on the black one so the centre is not perfect :(. They both have the same green backing fabric.

 I also finished off two more Lucy Boston POTC blocks - woohoo!
I really like the one on the left, thanks Susan for finding the perfect black/brown/gold batik print for this one! The one on the right was a hard one. I chose the funky beige/grey fabric to match the blue/grey flowers in the brown fabric. Not sure it makes the statement I was looking for. Hmmmm.
Well, Christmas 2016 is shaping up to be OK. First holiday without mother which will be different. But then again, it will be the first holiday with baby William!

TTFN

I

Snow !

So, yesterday we got 20 centimeters of snow 😕.  Normally this would send me into a tizzy worrying about how I would get to the car and get  it cleaned off in time for my Monday morning commute, but wait! I'm retired now so no worries - Yippee! I do have to go out tomorrow for a CT scan @ 6:30 pm so will be cleaning off the car at some point today.
Since it was a "snow day" yesterday I decided it was appropriate to sit at home and sew. I put  my Lucy Boston blocks on the design wall and decided 4 of my blocks were too white :( so am in the process of remaking 4 blocks. Here's yesterday's block

The star bursts come from a Christmas fabric, believe it or not! The other 3 blocks are all cut and basted and ready for sewing. Loving it and getting my Lucy POTC mojo back on. That's good as I have decided to also do the 150 Canadian Women  sampler quilt. These should keep me busy this winter !
TTFN

Busy busy busy!

Well, my first couple of retirement weeks have been busy! Met with the new Doctor = new round of tests; met with new financial people = new headache trying to keep up with all their jargon/quoted dollar stuff, and some fun stuff = several lunches and a day of shopping with a friend. No complaints here!

 It's blossom time at my house, the Pater gave me a lovely flowering "Christmas" cactus to celebrate my retirement. And of course my own decided it should blossom also! For the last couple of years I have put this plant on the patio for the summer. It seems to like that as it grows several new stems and flowers every year now! Me likey :)

I did manage to get into the sewing room for a few minutes and completed these Christmas place mats. This is the last of the black with red Poinsettias fabric. I backed them with this peace/love/hope/joy fabric and used my new binder clips when doing the binding, THANKS Walter ! (I used his gift certificate to purchase a 50 pack of binder clips!)

I've been having a "week". Thursday was back @ Western for a luncheon with the ladies from one of the committees I used to be on. Of course I multi tasked and got several other tasks done before going back home. Once home I completed an hour of ironing then finally collapsed to watch some TV. What the heck! My TV remote decided to quit! This required a quick trip out to Walmart for new batteries as  those I had were all the wrong size. Phew! Friday got over to Dad's and finally figured out how to turn on Closed Captioning for his flat screen TV. Only took 3 months to get that task accomplished! Then we started scanning several (at least one generation) of his genealogical photos. Took awhile as I needed to remember how his scanner works, then how to import into Picassa to caption! We rewarded ourselves with dinner @ Swiss Chalet. Half way home after dropping Dad off I realised I was missing my winter hat! Oh No!! So another trip out, with a flash light, and I lucked out - there it was against the curb - Yippee. When I got home, for the second time I noticed my hat's "flower" pin  was gone :(.
So, Saturday afternoon off I go back to the Swiss Chalet parking lot and got lucky again - there it was, wet but intact! Since I was already out I took a trip over to the cemetery to check up on mother's stone.

Because the weather has been so mild they were able to get it into the ground before the spring. We purchased a "large" plot and decided to have my (real) name also engraved as this will be my resting spot some day. Being single it made sense to make the arrangements ahead of time. Sorry if this posting is a wee bit ghoulish. We went with a Lighthouse as many of mother's Manitoulin relatives were lighthouse keepers, and added both our "maiden" names so future genealogists will be able to figure out who we are!
TTFN,