multiples . . .

This past weekend was a loooooong, lovely weekend!  I had a retreat with my Stitcher's Etc. group at Hinkle Hill Retreat House in Bell Buckle, TN scheduled for Thursday through Sunday.  But since I knew I'd miss my boat day with Todd on Friday, I took an extra day (Wednesday), which we spent on the lake . . .

It was really a gorgeous day.  Blue skies and popcorn clouds!  We didn't get into any rain (you never know when a little storm cloud is going to pop up, because of the high heat and humidity), but we did see rain coming down on the lake less than a mile away . . .

We could even see that the water was white-capping!  It got close to use, but it fizzled out before we got any of it.  The clouds always make for glorious sunsets.

Sigh.  I could look at sunsets all the day long.  So pretty!

Thursday morning I loaded up and headed out pretty early.  My table mate *and* my bunk mate was one of my BFFs.  We came prepared to be silly!

I had my area set up like I like it . . .

We had a good group of ladies ... twelve in all.  This isn't the greatest photo, but it gives you an idea of our sewing room.

I also came prepared to be productive.  I got a LOT (for me) finished over the four days. I kitted four wool applique kits (one is not pictured) . . . 

 

I finished up my Christmas Quilt by getting the borders on it . . .

This is my August UFO Challenge project, so I'm glad it's done!  Originally I'd just planned to add borders to the long sides, because the quilt is so much longer than it is wide, but after stitching on the three borders on both sides, I decided it needed something across the top and bottom, so I used the focal print to go across.  I like the final look!

I also stitched together and trimmed over a hundred, 1-1/2" half square triangles; pieces that I'd trimmed from the Christmas Quilt when I pieced the feathered stars.  

I'm not quite sure how I'll put them together, but I'm thinking it would make a pretty pillow sham.

I free-hand put together this little pumpkin wall hanging, from start to finish, Saturday morning. 

It was fun! The pumpkins came from this Benartex panel . . .

It's got a glint of metalic, which is my happy place. I meant to use the leaves across the back of the piece, but I forgot. In fact, I just *now* remembered that was my original intent.  That's what happens when you make things on the fly!

Saturday afternoon we all did this cute little zippered pouch:

Darling, right?  And super simple to make.  I love to do a group make 'n take!  Then Saturday evening I made (or at least got a good head start on) another set of Jack-o-lantern placemats.  I gifted a set to the local grands last fall.  This set will go to the California crew.

I still need to applique the faces and quilt them, but the hard part is done!

I got some hand-stitching in, too, which was nice. We wrapped up late Sunday morning after a terrific brunch, but before gals started to leave, we made sure to get in a group photo . . .

See?  A good group!  I've already got next year's dates on my calendar!

:)

a long debriefing (and a giveaway) . . .

So it's that time of year when you *blink* and two (or more) days weeks have passed.  LOL!  Can I get an amen on that?!  I always struggle, when I finally make my way back to the ol' blog (which I always do), with what to post. Do I go back and fill in the blanks?  Or just pick up at 'today' and pretend nothing happened?

Because I use my blog primarily for me ... as a means to remember events, projects, and life, over the course of the year ... my tendency is to go ahead and fill in the blanks.  Case in point:  I just stopped blogging after my May 13 post this year.  Until October (when I got the itch).  And then I went back and BACK DATED at least twenty posts. <insert sheepish grin here>  That, my friends, is how I roll.  Which I guess answers my original question.  Buckle up . . . there are a LOT of photos!  ;)

We celebrated Thanksgiving at my folk's house this year.  It was Joc's year to celebrate on the day with her in-laws, so we chose to celebrate together on Friday. Since it's more about the giving thanks than the date, it wasn't a problem for us! One of my sisters was even able to fly in with her youngest, and celebrate with us.  

The more the merrier, right? Plus it was great-grandpa's first time to meet/hold Ezra!

Four generations . . . oldest and youngest of our family (for the time-being, anyway)! Ezra wanted to spend time with his Pawpaw, though . . .

He really wanted to get a fistful of that beard! Maybe he thought he was being held in Santa's lap??!

We missed our California crew, but they checked in from a Thanksgiving morning walk! ♥

That Sunday evening a group of us traveled out to see the light show at the Toyota Field Stadium.  It was a first for me and it was lots of fun!

We would have had a bigger crew, but Everley had stepped on a pencil earlier in the day, and broke 1/2" off in her poor little foot! She's fine ... after a trip to the pediatric ER.  Whew!

So the transition from Fall to Christmas kicked off with the lights. Next was the RV decor . . .

I love decorating our little space for the holidays!

I also love this darling little chub-a-lub!

On December 2, we had our Christmas Open House at work. Not only am I on staff, but Todd is volunteer staff, so it's a family affair. 

We didn't do it last year (covid), so we were excited to be able to advertise it this year -- but there were still some concerns for keeping it safe.  We decided to pre-bag everything we weren't serving pre-packaged. 

We did a good job (if I say so myself) and a number of guests commented how much they appreciated our efforts in that regard.  My favorite was the pretty little fruit cups . . .

I had the vision for these.  Kind of like the jar-cuterie, only done with just fruit. They were very festive looking and a big hit, plus we found we had a lot less (of everything) leftover this year!

Friday we had a most unseasonally beautiful day.  In the 70s with no winds, sunshine with just a tad of cloud cover ... we had planned to hit the lake (in DECEMBER!) but Todd was not feeling well, so we decided to stay home and I headed to the Nook.

I had stitched up a couple of the simple snowman stitchery I'd created for Ellie, and while I'd made a wall-hanging with one, the other was just sitting in the hoop.  Rather than leave him there, I decided to use him to make the center of a pillow cover for the completely-out-of-place brown pillow (see RV holiday picture above).

It looks really cute (again, if I do say so myself)!  Ellie has decided this is how she's going to finish her project, too!

I feel like we jumped into the season with both feet! Two days later we had our Stitcher's Etc. Christmas party. (This group is different from our guild group; this is a smaller subset.) We had a great group of women gathered—twenty-four in total—which is the biggest gathering we've had in a while!

There was stitching, lunch, an ornament exchange, desserts, show 'n tell and more stitching!  Grand time.  

And both my "affirmation sisters" were there, too, which was the cherry on top!

These two are precious to me.  :)

Then came late Saturday afternoon ... time for the SEC Conference Championship game.  

I won't say I wasn't a tad bit anxious going into this game (I mean -- we were the underdog!), but I sure was super-excited about the outcome!

Sunday morning was the second Sunday of Advent. My old Advent wreath was looking a little shabby and covered in candle wax, so I decided to do something a little different this year . . .

The Nativity candle will, appropriately, be my Christ candle. I think it looks pretty and fun and outside the box, which I believe Jesus was (at least as far as the Pharisees were concerned), so totally appropriate!  

If you've hung in all the way through this post ... way to go, you! To reward you, leave a comment (make sure if you're a no-reply blogger that you leave some way for me to contact you) and I'll choose one lucky winner to be the recipient of one of the sweet ornaments the girls have made this year:

This is Ellie and Evey's 6th annual ornament fundraiser! The girls made yarn angel ornaments and sold them for $5. I bought four! All proceeds go to Food for the Hungry, to purchase things like seeds, animals, tools, medication, water purification, shoes, Bibles, and more!  The girls select the items and then [Jocelyn makes] Ellie call the order in herself.  This sweet little handcrafted angel represents the fulfillment of a basic need. ♥ So I'll make a pick and announce it on Monday!

Whew ... this was long. I need to do a better job of staying on top of this thing!!

:)

wrapping it up . . .

The month, that is . . . wrapping up August!  It was a good week.  The Merkel girls went back to school this week!

I love Edith's face in this one . . .

They won't be able to call it the 'School for Girls' in a couple of years!  

Thursday I left work for a moment and skipped next door to Barb's Sewing.  Social media really does work for advertising.  They had posted some cute new fabrics on the Instagram, and don't you know I came back with yardage from several of those they advertised and some from those they didn't!

But check out those Halloween prints!  Aren't they darling??  Those two and the three on the bottom, right, were advertised.  It obviously, in my case, pays off. ;)

Friday we hit the lake.  Again, the forecast held rain, but it's so hit or miss in the summer, we hate to scrap a whole day because of it.

This time we did run into a little shower.  You know, just enough to make everything wet and have it feel more humid and stickier!  LOL!

But afternoon storms often bring . . .

Rainbows!  First we could only see half of it.  But then the clouds shifted and we got to see the whole glorious thing!

I mean — there's no other word for it — just glorious!!  Plus the stormy clouds heading out made for a most fantastic sunset:

I can't ever get enough of that sight, even though it's bittersweet (because it means we're headed back to the marina).  Todd and I talk about getting a houseboat some day.  Not sure what I'd do with my fabric stash, but otherwise, I can imagine it!

Saturday was a stitch-in with my stitcher's group.  We had a good turn out.  

I brought my machine (I brought it to retreat and to a stitch-in ... the gals thought the world was ending) and worked on the top-stitching of Ezra's pillow sham.

Today is our last day of service at Essential Church.  We've been there for a while; nearly three years.  I will miss worshiping and serving with this group.  We will take a furlough through the end of the year.  With Ezra on the way and both Todd's dad and my folks struggling health-wise, we need to have a little more flexibility.  It's all in God's perfect timing!

:)