Extreme Home Makeover

I know the housing market has tanked, but I don’t care. I built 36 houses this weekend. It’s a good thing they’re not for sale.

They are cute though. I’ll bet I could sell them! So I now have 36 house blocks and no idea for the neighborhood. They’ll probably go in a box until I have a development meeting for them. I do have some ideas, but no time right now.

I also worked on my taupe and white just a little bit, but I just wasn’t in the mood. Here’s a little glimpse.

This quilt is for a two color challenge that Nicole started. I think it’s supposed to be done by August 1st. Hey Nicole, it’s not going to happen!

We have lots of travel coming up in the next two month. We’re spending next week in the Black Hills. We have a trip to the Sonshine Music Festival in a couple weeks. That’s a whole two miles! In August, we’re making a trip to the Northwest. Our goal is to see the whole United States (minus Alaska and Hawaii). We’re getting close. So I’m guessing there won’t be much quilting going on.  I’m all about knitting because it travels well.

Oh, and I ordered Kid 4’s homeschool material this weekend. I think I’m officially scared!

Coming Soon: A photo shoot of my Hyrna Herborgar.  And guess what?  There are new projects!

This Is A Quilt Retreat, Isn’t It?

I was going to work on my taupe and white quilt. I had it all set out, ready to go. But something else was calling my name. I’m easily swayed by talking yarn.

It’s Hyrna Herborgar. And I love it. I promise you I’ll do a better post on it soon!

You have to see this beautiful quilt. I’m so happy with it.

The only problem is that I didn’t make it and it’s not mine! Dianne made this Monterey Medallion using Moda Chocolat. Actually, I made one of my own and finished it this winter.

Oh, and Georgie had a girlfriend over today too. Meet Phoebe!

Let me tell you. It was like canine Nascar around here for a while. Those girls raced!

It’s 1:45 AM and I need to sleep fast, because there is quilting going on around here in about six hours! G’night!

And Then There Was Silence

With five kids, three of them teenagers, it’s almost never silent in my house. It’s silent right now. You see, honey left me and he took the kids with him. And I’d sing the Hallelujah Chorus except that would make noise and I can’t sing.

Honey and the kids leave me once a year for a long weekend. On that weekend, a swarm of quilting and knitting women invade my house. There goes the silence!!! We remodeled our house in 1997 and rewired the basement and added lots of lighting just so I could host quilting retreats. This is the 12th annual retreat!

One good thing about this retreat is that my basement gets cleaned. Normally the basement looks like Toys-R-Us threw up! We even cleaned the carpets, thanks to my darling puppy! I’ll bet you want to see it.

This year there will be about 15 women around. I think our record is about 25. A few of them stay overnight, because some of us morons heartier souls sew until 3 AM.  We start on Thursday morning, and by Saturday evening, we can’t even see straight!

It’s amazing what you see when you look at a photo. Gotta love the 1970’s wood wall. I’ll post a photo later that will show you why we like that wood wall! I see a nice rip in my old leather couch. Gotta love those kids! There’s a broken ceiling tile too, from a ball. Oh, and the photo on the wood wall….Monsters, Inc. “We scare because we care.” And at the far end of the room is college girls room. Well, it was her room. I stole it for my Gammill quilt machine! Her bed is still there though.

I’m not sure of everything I’m working on this weekend, but I have the first project on the table by my machine. I started a two color challenge with Nicole. I’m doing mine in taupe and white.

I’m pretty excited about this quilt. I think it’s going to be really elegant.

I’ll probably pull out some projects that haven’t seen the light of day for a while. Nicole has been turning out projects like crazy lately. She’s really inspiring me to finish some projects.

I’m off to make sure everything is ready for tomorrow, and then the puppy and I are going to bed!

I love silence, but I’ll sure be happy on Sunday when the crew comes home!

Anything Lace

That’s all I want to knit right now.

Summer of Socks has started. So I started my “I Love the ’80’s” sock. The yarn is called Red White and Loops from the Tempted Yarn club. The pattern is Sweetpea from Knitty 2007.

It’s ugly. What can I say? I debated frogging this sock, but it’s so bad, I’ll probably wear them with a pair of my collection of clear shoes. I don’t know that I’ll be knitting many socks because my elbow started bothering me almost as soon as I started knitting these. Something about sock knitting just doesn’t work for me. I think it’s much tighter.

Now on to a project I’m just loving.

This is Hyrna Herborgar by Sigrudur Halldorsdottir. How’s that for a name??? I’m absolutely loving this shawl. The book is written in Norwegian. I ordered the book and it was supposed to have come with the English translation. It didn’t and I wanted to start it. So I did a little research online and figured it out. (The English translation showed up yesterday.)

The yarn is Dream in Color Baby, colorway Lipstick Lava. It’s really nice to knit and has a lot of stretch. It’s not a very big shawl. I’ve finished 70 of 126 rows. I’m just going to knit this thing. No beads!!!

I have so many projects I want to do. And I did another bead order early this morning.

I have lots of cleaning to do this week. I have a big event coming up this Thursday, Friday and Saturday. More about that in a few days!