Not the Job fo Me

I got a new old mannequin last week, actually 4 but 3 are still at their former owner's house. I was going to meet up with her today for delivery, but...evidently she is busy getting ready for a ping pong tournament... (oh my gosh she is gonna kill me) Anyway back to the job I don't want.

I have decided to call my new friend Queenie.

I had her laying on the table while I was giving her a new "look," she is made of foam rubber and I was rolling on the paint. It was starting to creep me out because she was looking and feeling very human, if you will notice the texture of her skin ... it looks a lot like mine... I thought, this must be how it feels to be a mortician. That is not the job I signed up for, so I quick stood her up and you can imagine my surprise when I saw her tatoo!!

I finished her paint job and left her to dry!! I'm putting a skirt on her and she will be wearing jewelry on her top for the quilt show. I do what I can to make my friends presentable in public!

Hope you can come meet Queenie and the rest of my friends at the Quilt Show this Friday and Saturday at the Oregon Garden.

Just a Reminder

We have been getting lots of response abiut the blog party. The crowns will be fun to make, the Valentine is pictured on Martha's Blog and it looks like it would be fun to make. We hope you can come, party with us!

I also wanted to remind you about the Quilt Show at the Oregon Garden starting this Friday the 30th and Saturday the 31st. For additional details go to Oregon Garden and check it out.

This is a lot of fun, even if you aren't a quilter. I hope to see you there.

I Must Have Test Anxiety

I usually do well on a test that I can study for, it is a pop quiz that will always trip me up. Which brings me to the point I have been wanting to share for some time. It is those crazy letters that you have to type in on most blogs to leave a comment. Word verification, I refer to them as IQ tests. I always and I mean always mess them up, I freeze, I can seriously not tell what they are. Needless to say I find them just a little bit tiresome. I would leave more comments except the fear I have of failure...

So... the last couple of times I have tried to log on to my Blogger account, can you believe, an IQ test!! Seriously, and they were the really hard ones where the letters are connected and smashed together and in a curve, so hard I flunked!! Great.. I'm not even smart enough to get in my own account. Who's idea was this anyway?


I'm thinking I should post this each time I do a post until the Blogger Party so everyone will know they are invited. It is on my side bar, but if you a zooming through blogs like I do to get the most read in the shortest time, do you really take time to read the side bar?? Not to mention, it is so little you need a magnifying glass to read what it says. I am excited about the response we have had so far, I hope you can join us. If you are interested in the Valentine or Crown Workshop let me know.

Friday, January 30th and Saturday, January 31st I will be at the Oregon Garden for their Stitches in Bloom Quilt Show.
I will be sharing a booth with Sheila who if you check out her blog you will see what great jewelry she is making to bring, these were some she made at Christmas, and they are all so wonderful!

I'm also sharing with Jori and Celia who make felted treasures.

These are a few pictures from last years show.

There are all kinds of quilts on display

This is the second year for this show, last year was a huge success and we are looking forward to even more fun this year! Hope you can make it!

Time to Hurry!!

Occasionally I feel like I have some time to do what I want, like... well I don't really know what, but generally I have a whole bunch of things that I need to do, should do, have to do, or I really better do now! Some are really random like change the side bar on the blog, change the banner, from the Christmas one, mail letters, go to the bank, blah blah blah. The same kind of stuff we all have to do, then I get lots of fun things that I want to do thrown in on that, and add the random time eating things I do for my parents that I want to do, but take time and oh my gosh oh golly do I ever get behind. Its okay, no really its okay, honest its okay...

With all that said, I wanted to invite YOU to a Blog Party, yes I know I should have had this information out sooner but... I still hope you can come. We had wanted to do this before Christmas and it just didn't work out for all of us. But now we are ready and we would love to meet you in person.

It is so much fun when someone says I read your blog, a lot more fun than when someone asks me about what I have been doing and I say do you read my blog and they start stuttering and acting guilty... Its really okay if you don't, but of course you do... or you wouldn't know about this fun get together and, then you would miss all the fun and when you complained and I said...do you read my blog??? I'm just trying to do my part to make this world a better place... or something like that.

When I have told people about the blog party, they don't know what it is, and actually we don't either. It is a first for us but we have often said what fun it would be to get together and have time to visit with people we "know" but have never met. We talked about a restaurant, but some bloggers are loud and crazy and it would be sad to be thrown out of a public place. Some people occasionally need to be reminded to use their inside voices...

And of course on thing leads to another and what a great idea we had to have a little workshop on the same day a Make and Take Affair, we will do crowns and also a cute little valentine that Miss Martha is getting together. I will show some pictures of the Valentine a little later, the price for the crown which will include all the materials is $18 and the price of the Valentine will come with the picture.

It would be best if you sign up early for the workshop because space will be limited and after all if pays to be organized...(so they say) and if you want to leave the party sporting one of these then leave a comment or... an email to one of us and we will save you a spot. We would also love to know if you are coming to the Open House and so if you would let one of us know that we would be ever so thankful. Much like an RSVP, but that is such a hassle...

Lisa, Martha, or Isabel
I'm hoping this is all clear and if not let us know and we will answer any questions.

As for what else am I up to this year???

I see I forgot to put Coburg Antique Sale in but that isn't until September and so I will have plenty of time to make another calender before then...

This is the photo we took today for the 4 Friends sale on March 21st. We had a good time making the post card. It is so much fun to work with other people, not to mention it is a lot more likely the postcards will be mailed on time... possibly even early...

Color Me Happy

Just what I needed, a fun, money making, crazy time, followed by a national holiday for rest. Seriously... what could be better than that? I had so much fun seeing people who I hadn't seen since, it seems like forever and we laughed and talked and laughed and laughed, well you get the idea.

When I'm packing for a show I'm thinking, this is the worst, worst, worst job in the world. Nothing could be as miserable as this, why do I buy such heavy things??? Why don't I finish one thing before I start another?? Why is nothing finished??? Why do I have soooo much stuff??? Why don't I have an assistant to do this??? Why won't all of this fit in the truck? What should I take? What should I leave??? On and on and on these questions and others like them are going around and around and around in my head.

Finally, I'm on my way and all those questions are irrelevant and long forgotten. I'm on the road again and what fun will I be having. It is so worth it, who cares that I haven't slept for who knows how long? Who cares that the shop and house are left in shambles?? I'm so out of there, I'm off for a good time.

Naturally this euphoric feeling is super intense at the start of the season and starts to wane about October... Truthfully it goes away Sunday afternoon when it is time to repack all those heavy, bulky items that I either didn't sell or found to buy. I'm just a wee little tired exhausted and what did I think was so fun about all this???

Good thing I often experience short term memory loss, because the next show is in 2 weeks. I suppose one could compare this to childbirth, otherwise the world would be full of only children. I must have a severe case as I have 4 children...and I'M ALREADY LOOKING FORWARD TO THE NEXT SHOW!!

This was my sister Terri's first show as a vendor, we had the greatest time. She has helped me lots of times so she knew what to do and how to do it. She had a great experience and it looked for a while that she was going to out sell me, the seasoned professional, thankfully while I was off having a little break she made the largest sale I had of the weekend, for me and I came out ahead! Whew, that was a close one!!
We were on one end of the building and Cindy, Queen of Tarte and the Barn House Boys were on the other. We had hoped to all be together, but we were late signing up so we felt lucky to have 2 spots next to each other let alone 4. I'm sure it was coincidence that we were on opposite ends of the building, the show directors wouldn't purposely separate us too keep us from have just way too much fun. Little did they know we would spend the night with them

and YES, we had the noisy good time you would expect. I either laughed too much or talked to loud, but I had the worst sore throat, and was sooo tired the next morning. (But it was worth it!!)

Joe and Jermonne are such gracious hosts. All kinds of bizarre things were happening around us but they just kept getting funnier, and the sharing kept getting a little more outrageous as the night wore on.

What delicious food they served, have you tried these?

Who would have guessed that soybeans would be that yummy?

I enjoyed seeing my friend Lisa from Tri Cities at the show, I met her at this show 3 years ago and we have seen each other at several shows since then. I got the most beautiful wallpaper from her, a faded red toile that is going to cover a screen one day.

Here is Sylvi shopping at Joe and Cindy's booth.

I said goodbye to this little lady as she was leaving for a new home.

If you missed this show you might want to put it on the calendar for next year. It was a nice show, not too big not too small, not too far from home, and just what we needed to get the ball rolling in the new year.

I'm Getting Excited!!

This weekend is the Antique and Collectible Show at the Clark County Fairgrounds. How happy I am that its time to get out and about amongst crowds of people! Some people hate crowds, I think I must love them, with a couple of exceptions (bathroom lines, bank lines and such) but as long as the crowd is friendly, oh yipee!! You can see the times and other information about the show here. I'm not sure of all the great vendors who will be coming, but... The Queen of Tarte, The Barn House Boys, and my sister Terri will be there and myself of course, getting a start on a whole new year of shows.

A few weeks ago, Sue called to say she was working on her schedule for the year. She thought this would be an idea that might make life just a little bit easier. A schedule, I asked?? As in not just driving around randomly looking for a place to pull over and unload, hoping for customers... Well, I said, great idea!! I too must have a schedule. I've been working on it, and it will soon even be on the side of my blog.. But not today, I have to finish getting get packed and ready to head out for a show...

New Love

Call me fickle if you must, but I have a new love (sorry Vinnie), we met for the first time last night. Well, I guess we met at this stage, but we couldn't really get acquainted until last night.

Oh my gosh what a little love. I think he is the sweetest little guy ever! He looks pretty happy here, not exactly thrilled to make my acquaintance...

It appears that I was "focusing" on his hands, but aren't they sweet?

Now he is praying I won't take him from his first love (mommy)

If he had the right words, they might be...

Why is this lady so loud? Why can't she talk normal? Somebody make her stop gushing at me!

Thanks for saving me...


He doesn't seem sorry to be leaving??


No one is as obsessed with my computer dilemma as I am, but when I called for an up date it seems as though HP will be in Texas until the 13th. I wonder if those people will hurry now that I have gotten hysterical over the phone? Or maybe they will wait and see just how out of control I can really get??

That's Not Me Complaining...

Well, actually maybe just a little tiny bit. Now I remember why I got the new laptop, the old computer makes me crazy!! In case you hadn't noticed, I haven't exactly been sitting at this desk whipping out posts daily, as I had hoped would be the case. If I did, I would be sitting here all day! We are talking old and slow, not me, the computer! Well...maybe both of us?
The laptop is having a short well needed vacation in Texas, and I'm counting the days until HP returns. They said 7-10 working days... Is there any reason they can't work every day? It feels like months! But enough, I said I wasn't complaining...

I escaped this weekend and spent some fun time with Cindy, helping her get ready for the Bridal Show. If you are wondering why the pictures are a little fuzzy, could be that we were still making cakes

gluing asparagus and arranging roses
baking sweet little pink meringue kisses
and all those other little time takers that make the booth a
"show stopper"
until 4 am!



And for the record, its not the staying up late that is the hard part!
But... I'm not complaining!