A Day of Giving

As we give to each other.

This is love batik from sale table at Fabric Depot before it went out of business...

A last hurrah!!

A day of giving....Sherry and Charmaine holding me up so I can survive.

A perfect place for giving away well loved items to  others..  My move in specialist showed his collection of Rivieraware....I found my four last pieces to give him...More joy in giving.  Going out to lunch is better than a trip to Paris...to clear my mind and lift my soul. Stand by Me 

 So many friends are calling  and coming by to help. I am indeed blessed.

Tomorrow morning at 8 am, the AC folks are installing my new unit..Prices have gone up 50 % since last  year.  And, availability is scarce.  People are baking in the sun with no AC for months until parts come, etc.  Tomorrow's unit for me is costing $16,000.  Can you believe it??  And I am grateful to get it...They gave it to me cuz I am an old lady with asthma....Somethings have no price tag..  Life as we know it has forever changed.  Tomorrow morning at 6 am, my daughter and her family come in on the red eye from Portland, Oregon for two weeks to help me... Amazing Grace

Today, my beloved Stitch went to live with my grandchildren...It was with great  excitement that they carried him off.  Having Stitch will ease their transition to a new place to call home after  8.5 years with me.  Here he is...getting to know you...Stitch meets new puppy, 3 other cats and a ferret ...hmmm

Getting to Know You

My sister told me to go take a nap.  Then she put my fabric in boxes for me.

Going to bed now...last night without AC. God willing.

When is Halloween?????

 My stress level is so high that I am craving chocolate...OMG.. I would make grandma's chocolate fudge recipe but it is too late and I would have to do dishes.

AC still out.

My son and his woman friend came by tonight to get some of his things out of the garage.

Chocolate triggers....AC gone.  Realtor coming tomorrow with my house such a mess still.

Red wine makes the feeling that chocolate should be next.

Feeling hopeless that the house will ever be ready.

Missing my man and my mother..

Missing my feisty youth!!!

Excitement that my girl is coming in two days.

The medic alarm went off two times in my house tonight.

The feeling that what I see is not  reality.  Instead it is sugar coated especially for me. 

Speaking of sugar. ?????  Hmmm

Good night...May we all have chocolate dreams...xo

Mama Said There'd be Days Like This

Mama Said There'd be Days Like this... 

OMG  So where is Mama now, when I need her???

Calming myself with scraps in my electric fabric cutter...So relaxing.

All these changes and stressors....Today  the AC went out.  I do not want to put $6000 into a new  unit when I might move in two months...Jeeeze Louize!!!  The lack of AC is triggering my asthma.

Tonight I spilled melted butter for my popcorn on my favorite shirt??? Who does that??  From the microwave, right down the front of me...

Stitch, my favorite cat is acting out.  He misses Boo and the kids...OMG..

Boo...it only took him one week to adjust to being  loved by my sister and Alexis..

Yay, Boo!!!!

My only recliner that I can relax in broke today.???

Just when I thought I would calm down with a movie, the TV broke...My genius mind eventually pushed the extension electrical button and bingo..It was fixed..

Jackie came by with a Subway..Her visit cheered the day!! My sister did a Goodwill de-stashing in the hot and heavy house. She is a miracle worker.

I just cannot do all this alone, without my husband...Oh, he has been dead 7 years.  I guess I am fooling myself.  I am doing it.

I have friends I can share my despair with.  My daughter and family are coming on Wed for two weeks to save me.  They do not realize I am hanging by a thread....50 wt, but still!!

This is the antique quilt I have with the faded green..

It is a top backed with plaid flannel.  It fits my entire bed, loved inspite of its damage.

Just gotta know the history .I so forget the era of the dye that turned from green to beige

I am turning from green to grey myself.

Help!!!!

That New Phase of Life

June 8, 2022

Last night was the end of school celebration at Grandma's house.  For a special event, Grandma allowed McDonald's delivery via Door Dash per  Lynsey's request.  A good time had by all.

This morning off went my dear grands to live at their mother's house.  After 8 and a half years, it is a big change for all of us.   All these friends came this morning to help them pack...How great is that!!. 

Original water color painting by artist, Norie Sanchez   xoxo

One of my favorite old quilts I made, now hanging on my wall.

It is African fabric and Australian fabric in a large snowball...

Did you not know???   I just love fabric...

I have a few antique quilts where green was faded to  brown.  I was looking online to date these quilts when I found this interesting article about the color green: Why Green Can't be Trusted

Fun article, but I still cannot find the dating clues.  One of my quilts is a red Peony from New Hampshire and the other is a Lady of the Lake quilt, half a brilliant gold, the other half that faded brown.

Moving the quilt hutch, formerly  the fabric hutch, formerly Mother;s china closet.

All this prep, let to a great display on the sofa.

Good bye picture made me cry...felt like loss all over again.

Me with my solid and smart and capable DIL

My darlings look just like their mother.

xo

Thought this was interesting ...  Masking Tape Hacks

Accepting the Life as it Comes

 

Our Stitch....OK, Lynsey's Stitch.. Stitch is sorry.....so sorry.

He was asleep on the pillow next to  me a few nights back...I must have moved my hand, because he bit me...not badly, but still a bite...and as we know, cat bites can be serious...A doctor must be seen within 8 hours...Jeeze-Louize!!

I was not going to go.  The bite was not that bad...however, trusted friends at lunch insisted...OMG

Since they are the smartest of the smart, I listened to them. One hour after I left Urgent Care, Animal Control was at my door.  He put Stitch into the computer data base to find out if he was up to date on his shots.  Even though he is, I was told to quarantine him for 10 days or they would take him to the vet at my  expense for 10 days...Lordy, Lordy.... So, he could not go with the children to their new  home yesterday .... Stitch is not a "biter".  We have had him 6 years and he is the most wonderful cat ever.  Any animal will bite if startled....Naughty Stitch...is so very sorry.

Tonight I played with scraps on my awesome electric cutter.  I cut the shapes for the bowls...

Here are the purples showing off...triangles and squares..I am so glad I bought this cutter...so is my arthritis!!

Anxiety has been keeping me up at night lately. Restless me finally got up at 10am.  A saintly friend came over to fix some screens and joined me out for breakfast.  Nothing like healthy waffles and bacon and diet Coke and fine conversation to cheer the day.  Once home, I found my trusty house cleaners hard at work on my mess.  I sat on the porch with a few quilting books and woke up two hours  later to a very clean and quiet house...Grateful, grateful me!!

Tomorrow, I look forward to my gutters being cleaned and house being pressure washed.  My sister is coming to  help me de-clutter.

Lynsey told me that it was fine to put on my blog that many girls want boyfriends, but all the boys like her....OMG  She is 13....Time is so right for her to live with her mother..

Life per Grandma O'Quilts

Aoife, my heart...last few days in Ireland at a family function.

Finally finished...took forever as I dawdled and dawdled...

 In the bright light of the day. (with backing)

In the dusk, colors fade and take on that subtle evening hue..

I had to make myself finish this top.  It has been going on and on forever.

Will now piece the backing and put it in the quilting pile.  Money may loosen up a bit with my darlings moving back with their mother.  I may choose to have a few long armed so I can gift them.

Meantime, I am all over the place trying to find places for my excess of trinkets, etc. The family collections of a life time.

As I work on downsizing, I found a huge batt of Insul-brite...cutting some of it into 8 inch squares for my beloved potholders.

Change is so hard...aging is too.

Today's relaxation on my screened in porch...lovely.

My broken heart presents this:

Addiction as a disease

I have no control

But, I can control this:

My heart that knows that love can only be given by small things with great love (Mother Teresa)

I try to spread it one potholder at a time.  If there is an outside chance that this mini piece of useful art can bring a smile to someone else....It is so worth the try. xo

All About Aoife

 Aoife posing on the rocks in Ireland.

 Dineen cousins enjoying the Irish beach.  Each girl looks like her father.  Fathers are brothers. Who would ever have known!!!??

Another day of peace in my home.  Another day of sewing and pool.  Tomorrow will be an exciting adventure!!!  A long, leisurely lunch with friends, is my very favorite thing to do!!

Recently, it has occured to me that age is upon me...no surprise to anyone but me!

As I go through my home to declutter, my heart breaks to let go of things of my grandmother, my mother, my brother, my sister, my daughter, my son, my grands and myself.

I am evidently the only one in my kinship group to consider myself, the family matriarch!!

Well...very soon I will be retiring from that too.

I will also be grateful when school is over.  I have been a bad grandmother not supervising homework.  It just was not in me this year.

Stitch still has an attitude..

Aoife and her first Irish Step Dancing video, 22 months

Just jiving down a street in Portland.

Adventure in an Irish park.

Aoife eating strawberries from the garden of her Irish grandma.

They will be back in the US of A on  Tuesday.  Yes!!!

 

 

My Blog and I

I am doing some de-stashing as the elderly often do. My sister said 12 bags of scraps are too much and I must get rid of some.

I am relaxing by proving my sister wrong. Sewing scraps together in a random way for use in my Accuquilt cutter.

My blog has been a bit neglected as we prepare for the children's move to their mother's house.  Bureaus have been moved, changes taking place and school soon over.

Messing around tonight with pre-cuts...a relaxing project for Zooming.

Self-Care for Grandma is here.  This morning I took myself to breakfast, chatted with my favorite waite-staff, then sat in my cool and awesome car by a lake to relax.  I reminded myself that I am still alive and thus will make choices for myself. I then came home to a clean house....Thank you Yadi!! My cleaning lady is the best gift to myself.

 School is out on June 8.  I have already signed my darling teenagers back to their parents.  Their mother stepped in immediately with doctor appointments, school registration, vacations...etc...Their father....not so much.  That is OK..I am going to retire from childcare in just a bit...So exciting for  me.

I live in the woods...a lovely secluded property.  Yesterday someone set the playground equipment on fire behind my house  Fire chief said it was definately arson. I took this picture from my deck.  Way too close for comfort.

My front yard  yesterday, included fire trucks...TBTG for them.

Aoife enjoying childhood in the grass in Cork, Ireland.  

                                                            Oh, to be Aoife at 22 months.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            

Cousins at the petting zoo in Cork.

Today was a lovely day of peace and quiet.

                                                                                                                                                                                                               This singer cheers my day with her beautiful voice and her antics. Anne Reburn 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  

Changes A-Comin'

 Three years ago on Mother's Day, my son brought me this.....Lisa???  Not only has it bloomed again, but evidently a seed  has spread to  another random pot.

See how love spreads!!

In our backyard, neighborhood kids...teenagers!!! OMG

Last night we signed papers for the children to live with their mother starting June 8, the last day of school.

Today, I went to the pool, to Goodwill and to the grocery store and took a nap

Such a very lazy grandmother!!

Mesh Bags for Organizing, 

I bought two sets, I  love them so!! Planning on making an Easter 16 patch....some day....The strips are already cut now for mindless sewing when I have friends visiting.

Stitch is pouting.  He knows, I think, that he will be moving to the cornfields of Union County with Lynsey soon.

Cry, Grandma, cry!!!

Thanks  to a little help from my friends...I have been able to start assembling this Patriotic top.

What a wonderful day!! My mind is  non=stop thinking...about this and that....Trying to downsize all my belongings...not my five sewing machines of course; not my 5 irons...ooops...I just dropped one on the floor and all the insides came out...Now...all my four irons!!

I tried to contact you  Mary, but the link was invalid  and came back to me..

mary@cunningsworth.fsnet.co.uk

Help Needed

Finally getting it together for this rwb top.

Maybe I am running out of red checks for the end pieces.

Help!!  What is the formula for the side triangles..

The main blocks are 8.5 inch squares!!

Help....Aoife does not like her annoying grandmother....Dear me.

The middle school grands think I am off  the mark...and the 22 month grand wants me to go away.

Poor, poor Grandma!!

And so it goes.  The last week or two of school is testing.

Right now, we are working on turning in missing assignments and

transferring school records from my local middle school to the local middle school where their mother lives.  June 8 is the last day of school in our county.

I love my grands....but I miss them when they were 8 and 10...not 12 and 13...a whole new ballgame for old Grandma.

Sewing and swimming and lunching with friends...Yeah retirement xoxo

 

Crazy

I am so losing my touch.  That is what happens when the brain does not listen to me.

Why does every quilt mistake like these busy attempts just start another quilt with the newly cut pieces?

It is like scraps...they multiply

Guess solids are in store here...Oh, well...learning thru blogging pictures.

Aoife and her daddy having so much fun.

Brothers showing their girls the tractor parade in front of their  house.

Fifty tractors out for joy...no protesting, no other motive but to wave at the country folks and make children happy...Wow!!

Aoife learning to blow Dandelion fuzz

Both of my children called to wish me Happy Mother's Day

My favorite candy mailed ahead of time from Portland

And a promisary  note for a daughter/mother lunch at one of my favorite restaurants: Le Monte when she visits in July

My daughter from Ireland and my son from a local park

I do not know why rain is coming through my eyes..Maybe because May is fraught with painful memories....ALS awareness month, my  mother's birthday, my mother's death day (tomorrow, May 9), my father's death day , My husband's diagnosis day, the day my mother fell out of her wheelchair and broke her neck, Mother's day, the big flood anniversary 

 ...All of these memories are in May  June first is our wedding anniversary...How can I get through May?

Tomorrow I must leave the house and see friends...There seems to be a committe in my mind that stresses me out...next thing I know, Pearl and her sisters will come visit....UGH

Thank God I have lunch plans tomorrow and supportive friends.  Thank God I have quilting and quilting buddies.  Thank God for a lot of  things..