Wednesday, April 30, 2008

Quick look at what is going on.


I have some pictures to show you, but there are technical problems. I don't know where they originate, my computer or blogger. The least time conusming on my part is to hope they are with Blogger and not do anything. If they are not fixed soon, then they might be with my computer and need my time. Until then, I'll do something else.
Now it works, so here are the pictures. It's one of life's mysteries that will remain unsolved because we are busy with something else.

Sunday, April 27, 2008

saddle pads, sewing, carrot flowers

Janow got stuck modeling again! This is the one I made to keep. Very simular to the green one in the quilt show next weekend. But I wanted to make one for me, so this is it.


Janow had a make-over week. He had vaccinations, then Adequan, then the equine dentist, then the horseshoer. A good shampoo would round it out, but we both hate it, so it's not gonna happen.

I got some stuff cut out for more pads. I have five tops cut and ready for the batik to begin. I will lay out the designs today, and maybe do the first wax. I have the foundations for four embellished pads made, and the first two started this morning. I need to order the pads. These go a little faster than batik and building the pads from scratch. I found a great supplier of cotton batting. She calls herself Battwoman.com and only sells one brand of batt. I ordered a bunch.




The carrot flowers are about how they are. They are not beautfiul flowers, but interesting. Works for the carrots. Silver likes the greens.
Here are some other pictures from out yard. We are beginning to get strawberries. The birds are beginning to get strawberries too.



Remember, you can click on the pictures to enlarge them and see details.

Poppies, our state flower.
The irises are doing very well! Irises all over the neighborhood are doing well. The weather was just right for them.

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Kidango benefits!

Last year I machine quilted and bound a quilt for Piecemaker's Quilt Guild of Southern Alameda County, Community Quilts. The chairman of communtiy quilts decided that this quilt was good enough to save for a charity auction. Community Quilts organizes the whole guil to help out and make quilts for the community. These are given to different non-profits to go to people who need something just like that. Vicitms of domestic violence of house fires or......the list goes on. The nicer ones are given to organizations to auction or raffle off during fundraising events.

Guys Churn Dash went to one of those last Sunday. Kidango had the Taster's Choice fundraiser and Guys Churn Dash raised money for them.

I'm going back to the archives and see if I can pull out the pic........
.
Found it!

And, I saw both of the swallows today! They are both back. And noisy! I had forgotten how distinctive the swallow call is. WOW! How could I forget that!

Some of Daves carrots from last year's garden wintered over. The tops are now huge! I talked him into not taking them out and harvesting the tops for Silver. Well, yesterday, I looked out the window, and they are starting to bloom! I get to see what carrot flowers look like up close and personal!

Of course I took pictures.

Saturday, April 19, 2008

swallows

The swallows came back. I think. I saw one outside on the fence Tuesday. I wasnt sure because it flew away before I got a good look. Then, on Friday, the male was sitting on the edge of the nest from last year and the year before. I haven't seen the pair together yet, so I am a little worried.

Joseph is at Boy Scouts Camporee this weekend at Mt Hamilton.

This is what I'm working on today.

The vet comes for shots today, and LAFS is this afternoon. That's the sew-in at the guild. I haven't decided what project to take yet.

Friday, April 18, 2008

Interesting finds and teduim, at the same time.

As many of you know, we have been interested in a piece of property outside the city of Milpitas. It's an interesting property, but the seller has not been very cooperative. Even with his own agent. It's in probate. We went to the county records 'office' which is actually a large building in San Jose. We have been there twice before, looking for information on this property. Some of the records cannot be accessed without a signature form the owner. There is confusion about who is the person to sign, so we haven't made progress there.

It's an old farmhouse built before permits were required for structures. There is a cottage in addition to the house, we cannot find any record of that at all. There are three wells, the oldest is a hole 3x3x12 with water in it. There was a building survey in 1984, but that turned out to be misfiled and for the property across the street.

Yesterday we found some interesting information. We found when the mortgage was paid off by the deceased owner. It currently has a mortgage. Somebody needed money, and not for home improvement. We found where the roof was repaired after a fire 4 years ago. We found where the property was used as collateral for a loan for a bail bondsman to bail out somebody with a different surname. We found that the brother in the house was not the executor and the other brother had filed a lawsuit. The earliest thing we found was from 1983, when property line was drawn dividing the farmhouse parcel from a bigger property.

These are microfisches of hand written records and surveys. There are yellowed papers and maps in big files. Joseph was SO bored! I taught him how to use the microficshe reader. I explained to him that this was how everything was done before computers and the Internet, you just look through files and files, one at a time. He rolled his eyes. This was more tedious than Pong.

We had to leave because we were in 2 hour parking. Joseph and I had already made a trip down to put more money in the meter. Freddy Frugal had only put a quarter in and then forgot about the time, thus risking a parking ticket.

And more tedium. In getting Google Shopping Cart on my site, I had to link it to a bank account. The one I chose is a savings account at a credit union where we don't have a checking account. I had to call and get the routing number and the full 18 digit(or so) account number that would have been printed on my checks. My secret password didn't work! I got the account numbers I needed, but they had to send the paperwork to change my secret code. Those came, for Joseph's account! No wonder my secret code didn't work. So I am filing out forms to fix the problems that happened, and waiting for snail mail to do it's thing. It's not a big deal. It's a minor problem. Too much of my time is spent on stupid minor problems. Cumulatively, it becomes less minor.

Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Quilt show entries are in!


I got my quilt show entries in last night, at the last minute. Of course!
The quilt show is hosted by Piecemakers Quilt Guild of Southern Alameda County, in Hayward, May 3rd and 4th.

I got Georgie to model the pads so the pictures of how they will be used are with them in the show. That way the people at the show can get a better idea of why only on corner is decorated and why the are not flat.

I also entered my DOL Jacket which you have seen in my blog before.

The special exhibit this year is first quilts. Quilts we made long ago, to show how far we have come. I put in the sweater I made for my dog, Lady, back in about 1975.

Wait while I dash out and get a link for Piecemakers and the show. Got it!

Saturday, April 12, 2008

Whew!

I am done with the third pad! That takes care of the entries for the quilt show, I just need to sew on labels and submit them. I want to take them to the barn today and get pictures of horses wearing them. I hope to display these pictures with the pads at the show so the non-horse people can see how they are supposed to go. With other wearable art, it is easy to see how it can be worn by a person because everyone at the show will be familiar with clothing. But saddle pads.......

Even with the frenzy of machine acquisition and sewing, life goes on. Silver went behind the dryer last night and would not come out. Banana would entice her, but only far enough to get the banana. She did not want to be caught. I would have just figured she be fine, but Dave likes everything just so. The fact that she would not come out made him NEED to get her out. He ended up pulling the cabinets out and getting Joseph to crawl back there. We got her.

Whiskers, the ever hungry cat, snuck into the garage to raid Mary Shelley's food, of which there was none anyway. But she would not come in. So I let her stay. She was there this morning when I went out to give Mary Shelley her food. Of course, she ran right in, and I continued down the two steps to Mary Shelley's dish. Down two steps right into the cat poo. In bare feet. Hopping to the bowl to put Mary Shelley's food in also got me closer to the storage shelves where we keep stuff like paper towels. How fortunate for me.

Another morning cat poo incident logged.

Friday, April 11, 2008

Saddle Pads

I have finished up these two pads, the Mariner's Compass and the orange one.



I have made progress on these two, but they are not done yet. The green one should be done by tomorrow.

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

Further progress

Here is the range pad, further along. The Pfaff works well. Takes practice!
These batiks are for pads as well. They need some heavy rinsing. I think I will take them to the laundro-mat and do it by machine. Our new washer uses less water, no good for heavy rinsing!

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Mariner's Compass WIP

This is another of the saddle pads I am currently working on. Hope it gets done in time for the show!

Saturday I sewed some inner cotton quilts to build the saddlepad quilt sandwich with and the new Pfaff was fine. Monday, yesterday, there were problems and I ended up with the worst thread jam ever. Had to take it back to Mel to be fixed. He had a hard time! Between us, we figured out how it happened and so I can keep it from happening again.

My batik didn't go well either. By the time I got to it yesterday, it was too cold outside and the wax would lose heat before it permeated the denim.

Today, however, in the few moments here and there that I have squeezed in, things are going better!

Monday, April 07, 2008

Pfaff


Last week I bought another Pfaff. It is very exciting! I have four saddlepads in progress and I should be able to finish them up in time for the quilt show deadline on Saturday. Three of them are entered. One of the two batik ones is for me, the other goes in the show.

I should be able to get them done in time if I don't waste time on other things, like the computer........