Whatever the weather!!

 I found EIGHT books at the used bookstore in North Bay. And I love that ALL their titles are searchable online. Even better, you can search by author, and whatever they have from that author comes up! It's called Allison the Bookman, and I LOVE the site. I will call today and pay for the books, then they will go on the Pony Express. Yes - Our Pony Express reaches faraway places! Now, I need to update my list, and I have a couple of other bookstores to check out. Oh my -- this is super exciting! 

Oh, I should mention I found 8 of 23, so that's pretty amazing! There will be loads more, but I'll focus on seven authors at the moment. Once those are taken care of, I'll add more to my list. I don't want to have a ton of books hanging around, so I'll focus on a few authors at a time. 

Speaking of reading, I finished a Louise Penny book last night. This is one series that you MUST read in order. The books build on the characters and reading out of order would just be wrong! What is amazing is how Louise manages to tie in the storyline from this book (and all the others) to the previous books. It's an incredible talent and she is definitely a Canadian Treasure! 

She will launch her latest book this fall and has chosen to visit various Canadian cities. I planned on going to Ottawa, but that event sold out in a day! There is an event in Toronto, but I bet it has since sold out. I had the good fortune to meet Louise at a book signing in 2013. There were two hundred people in the audience. She was popular way back then and is even more popular today. 

I am not up to date reading her most current book, and I'm OK with that since it allows me to read Louise Penny whenever I want. There are so many other authors on my list. Let's just say that I did not see the end of this book coming—A Great Reckoning. WOW! Her character development is the best I've ever seen from an author. 

I got a chuckle when I was getting ready for yesterday's walk. I glanced over at Murphy's bed and saw her toy! He kind of looks happy in an upside-down way! 

Topsy-turvy

And yes, there are times when Murphy does go into a deep sleep. Not often, but there are times. I try to tread lightly in those moments, but her sleep is NOT that deep! 

Fast asleep

I ran around the house yesterday, taking pictures for my presentation. That was fun, and there were quilts all over the place. I have a spot upstairs where anything with a sleeve was hung up and photographed. Then I tossed the quilt on the floor. Look who claimed the very first quilt I threw down. Why are animals attracted to quilts? 

Mom - just holding it down so the wind doesn't blow it away

When I tossed the next one, she just lay there! Great - she's too lazy to take the quilt off her head. 

Mom - I'm scared of the storm - I'm OK

When I had to move to the bedroom to take pictures of quilts without sleeves, she was right there—ready to pounce on them. Quilts are like magnets to our pets! 

MOM - I can test that for you! 

This is what the real picture looked like, with my feet on the stool. That's why you can crop photos! So what the audience sees is a nice quilt—they don't get to see everything else in the way. And you have to love our cell phones. I have three lenses on my phone—macro (close-ups), regular, and wide angle. I love and use them all!

The rough photo

I use all those lenses regularly, and there is also a way to change the photo ratio. It's easy to get into the wrong one, and I swear from some of the photos I get for show and tell people do not understand their cameras! I should offer a course on using your phone camera! 

While taking photos of modern quilts, I almost forgot this one at the top of the stairs. It's funny how you pass something every day but then don't actually see it anymore! 

Almost missed this giant wolf quilt

And now this is the mess I have to clean up! I must also try folding my quilts differently, as many have fold lines. They used to lie flat on the bed, but it was a hassle if I needed the bed or one specific quilt. There is no easy way to store quilts. So, I will try that bias folding method and see if that helps. Also, if I donate some of them, there will be fewer to store. I'm going to tackle this pile slowly. A few a day, and that works for me. 

The aftermath of prepping for trunk shows

The presentation went very well, and again, there were great comments from the members, although it's not the same thing when you're on Zoom as in person. So, thanks to the Limestone Quilters Guild for allowing me to share my quilts!

And it sounds like everyone loves my teaching style! When you find a passion - nothing you do seems like work, and teaching/quilting is my passion! Can you tell? 

Yesterday's weather was a bit all over the place. It started snowing in the morning, and it didn't take long before we had this. 

MOM - it's snowing! 

We had about two inches of slushy snow. I decided to walk to the grocery store, as I needed some items I couldn't find the previous day. What is it with bran muffins? Why are they so popular? Yes, I could bake them, but this is my treat! You don't make treats! 

Should I take my usual route along the multi-purpose path or take the shortcut through the forest? It didn't seem so bad when I got outside, so I took the long way. I saw a white vehicle slowly turn into the gas station I was almost at and imagine my surprise when someone shouted my name. What? It was one of the instructors at the gym! She spotted me and wanted to know if I wanted a ride home! WOW -- that's the second time I was offered a ride home this week. 

Nope - I'm OK - just on my way to the grocery store. I bet Maria thought I was a lunatic! But I thanked her and went on my way. 

Then the ice pellets hit me as I turned the corner, and that final block to the store wasn't the most fun I've had on a walk. I got my muffins and headed home, but this time, the snow and ice had turned to rain, which wasn't so fun as I was a bit wet when I got home. I wasn't that wet, but enough that after 20 minutes, I changed my pants and socks. Of course, I did NOT wear boots! 

It wasn't that bad, and we must stop fearing the weather! It's here to stay; we must learn to live with it! 

As I took the shortcut through the forest on my way home, I immediately spotted a bright light approaching me. OH—a motorized vehicle that shouldn't be in the forest. WAIT—the owner was walking his bike home. I guess the roads were too slippery, or he didn't feel comfortable, so he had the bike on to help him push it home. I hope he didn't have too much farther to go! That happened to me many years ago in Montreal. I started out driving the motorcycle, and the roads were great. But it had snowed during the day. That was an intense drive! 

Snow in the forest

It didn't snow much while I was gone, as I could still see my tracks from when I left the house. You can see how wet it was. But it really wasn't bad. My feet got wet when I crossed the street, and they weren't wet; they were just damp. I'm going to make a great grandma - I can see M rolling her eyes at the thought of me taking her kids for a walk in the rain without boots! Bring on the mud puddles - we've got some splashing to do! Maybe that's why she lives at the other end of the country from me! And she doesn't have any kids yet! 

Not enough snow to cover my tracks

The other day, while prepping for the scrap quilt lecture, I saw these containers of shapes I had cut from my brown scrap boxes. 

There are actually several containers. One contains 2½" by 4½" pieces, and I know what those are for. There is one with 2½" squares, and I don't have a plan per se. Then there are 2" squares and 2" by 5" pieces, which were to go together to make something, but what? I couldn't remember. Well, I remembered when I was on the walk yesterday!

Boxes of brown scraps

As I was sewing this morning, I made one block. Hmm—I need to pause and think about value before I continue. Can you imagine what I did with 2" squares and 2" by 5" rectangles? You have until tomorrow morning to figure it out! 

And seriously! What is with our dishwasher? This is becoming very common, and I'm tired of fixing it. It might be time for a new dishwasher, but it works just FINE until it gets F11. Most of the time, I cannot find anything that clogged the drain, which is very frustrating. 

F11 - again! 

I have one more class this evening, and then there are four other evening classes for the rest of the month, two of which are makeups for March! That is amazing! And that means we can get back to our EXIT Games!! Yeah!!

I've got some paperwork to get accomplished - I'm looking for quilts for the Concurrent show at Quilt Canada. I'll be taking a recap of where I am this morning and then posting what I'm missing. OH - and I have one more overdue follow-up, but after that, I think I'm caught up on the daily paperwork. How can that be? I must be missing something!! Wouldn't it be nice if it was all done by the end of today? It should all be done by the end of the week! 

And on that happy note, I'm out of here! 

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!!!