Christmas Catch UP!

 Ben stopped over to visit the other day, so I asked if he wanted to put together a Christmas present for Dylan. Sure! 

There is a little copy cat here..... Anyways, It's a table and chairs set I got for Dilly. Assembly challenged the adult and amused the toddler.

Here's the finished project.

I took Ringo for a nice Christmas Day walk at Kent Park. The weather was very nice! 

I sewed small string backpacks for the kids to put their Christmas haul in. It's a very cute, handy project. The directions can be found at Sew Can She. 

We had supper at our house on Christmas Day and handed out the gifts.  Not that we handed out appliances or anything, but, I paid for Bean to have these beautiful appliances installed at their house. 

For some reason I didn't take pictures of presents opening!  Only this one!

And the annual family snapshot...always a challenge.

At least Bean looks happy in their picture!

It was a bust few days wrapping up with Soup and sandwiches at Julie's house. 

I rolled up the saran wrap game once again. They seemed to like it pretty well again. 

This year I had smaller items to roll in the wrap, so a smaller ball.

Everyone had fun with that.

Phew! I'm going to go sew a little bit now and relax! 

The annual Bonnie K Hunter Mystery Quilt is in the works, now's my chance to catch up on this rainy day!

Waiting for the predicted snow to arrive and prepare for another week of Dilly Duty! 

Winter is Coming

So, I went out to put down the Heat Trac mats, in preparation for the winter and found that my extension cord had ruined the outlet! Yikes!

 Ben, the wonder son, stopped over and relaced it in no time at all. I purchased a new extension cord with heavier wire (10) off of Amazon and we're good to go again. 

There! All plugged in and good to go!

Ringo thinks it looks pretty good. I had stored the mats rolled up in the boxes they came in, but they seem to be laying pretty flat now that they are warmed up. I guess I better go blow some leaves away pretty soon, it never ends, does it!

Hospital Stay

 Well! That was a crappy birthday! I spent 2 days in the hospital to get a kidney stone removed. I think they did a good job getting me in and the surgery completed.

I'm home and slowly getting better. Just one hole left in my kidney, and that will get closed up (hopefully) in two weeks. 

Look at this cute graphic Ben sent me! 

And I got this cute baby quilt quilted before I went in the hospital.

I love that tie dye fleece backing. 

Hopefully, I'll feel well enough to sew soon! 

The Blooming Bunch Quilt & Yard Day

 

Here it is all done!

I just love this quilt!

Now look at that beautiful quilting design! My longarmer did a really beautiful job! Debbie Heckert at Happiness by Design is just a wonder!

Here's the back, you can see the green thread pretty well. 

Anyways, this one is done now and I've got another one in the works....

My kids and their kids all worked hard over at Grandma & Grampa's 

Julie, the BOSS-she worked us hard! 

We cut down trees, picked up sticks and the big kids got to use the chain saw.

Look at her go!

And Dilly had a dirty good time!

My knees are still recovering from all the yard tromping, but it's enough for now.

Maintenance

 Well it sure seems like we're just falling apart around here! I went to water the tomato plants and the watering wand leaked water out the handle-more came from the leaking handle than came out the sprayer end! Sooo I emailed the Melnor company with my Amazon reciept from last year and this picture of the leaking place,

and LITTLE MIRACLE-they are sending me a new one! YAY for 2 year warranties!  The front storm door got badly bent a few weeks ago, so we ordered a new door from Menards. It took almost a moth to get here.

 Then the guy we thought was going to come install it couldn't come, so we had to get another outfit in here to do it. I know, you're thinking, you could have done that job yourself...but I didn't want to.

So, isn't it pretty! It matches the shutters and has a hidden roll up screen in the top. We also switched the side it opens on, making it easier to navigate Huibby's scooter or wheelchair when it's needed. 

I need to move the door bell over to the other side now though! One more maintenance job to do!

 Hey, look at my invention at work! We have to wear bump hats, and a mask as well as ear plugs and hairnet too, and my head had enough stuff hanging off of it, so I got some tiny nuts and bolts from the storeroom and fixed my tired ears! That's a genius maintenance!

Dannie's Jeep needed some tires-she was having weird wobbles when driving so I took it in to get tires while she was at work. I had the folks at Discount Tires put on the same as she had before because that is what they had on hand a few weeks ago, and then decided we needed to get something different because they did not last as long as the warranty-supposed to be 60,000, and she had about 30,000. SO this week she dropped it off to get some better tires. We went with some Goodyears this time I hope they hold up better. The folks at Discount Tires are sure good about these things- no hassle at all, and I got a good price too! So that's done!

 So we had another breakdown with the riding lawn mower, so Hubby said, he didn't want to put any more money into it and we should get  a new one, so we did.

 We looked at green ones at the John Deere dealer and went with the yellow Cub Cadet instead. Oddly enough, several dealers in our area were completely out of stock and were not optimistic about getting any in stock this season at all.

 It's a 22HP, with a 42" cut, same as our old Troy Bilt-which did serve us well for nearly 10 years, but it was time to get a new one.

 My gardener took it on it's first run today!  It does a nice job and runs very well.
 I also had to tighten up the mailbox to it's post-I think the mail carrier bumps it once in awhile and it gets kind of wobbly. And the handle on the sliding patio door was getting loose, so I got it tightened up too. Too Much Maintenance!! And the last maintenance item was to replace the door knob on the front door. Hubby wanted one that looked more like the one on the storm door, so we got a latch style knob and Ben came over and installed it with a little help from his partner! Jaymie is a pretty handy kid!

Well I hope that's all the maintenance I have to do for a little while! It's always something though isn't it?!