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! 

Weekend To Do List

 I found a little screw on the floor when I was sweeping the other day and hubs found one too....hmmm where do these screws go? A little detective work and here's the spot! This is the under side of our dining table. It's a lovely old table I was lucky enough to get from my family. This lever pulls the two halves of the table together when you remove a leaf. The little screws have become stripped out of the wood. I put a little Gorilla Glue on the screws and put them back in. Hope that will hold it for awhile!

 I've been wanting to do some work in the yard...look a butterfly....I love a good distraction.....

 anyways, I stopped by Lowe's to get some dirt to fill in the pots for the annual tomato plant planting. As I swung around the lot, I saw this....SCORE! $1 per bag for broken bags!!!  Load em up!

 I got some rocks for $1 too, I'm planning to fill this area out back with rocks and make it pretty instead of weeks and stuff.

 Plus then ,my gardener won't have to mow so close to the house.

And look, I got some new shoes to go on vacation. Ringo says they make a pretty good pillow.

Antiques Roadshow St Louis

So awhile back-like February, I applied for tickets to go to Antiques Roadshow. They had stops this year in Milwaukee and in St Louis, I couldn't decide which one to apply for, but went with STL. It's a random drawing, so I wasn't too optimistic. But whatdoyaknow? I got tickets!

The way it works it is, the Roadshow volunteers line up everyone and are filed into the proper assigned lines based on your ticket time. You're allowed to bring two items to be appraised. I read the on line directions carefully, they tell you things to NOT bring. They take a look at what you are bringing and assign you to the group for your item. Like glassware, paintings, militaria, toys, and such. We lucked out and had two textiles and two folk art, meaning we would only need to wait in two appraisal lines instead of 3 or 4.  Hubs took his favorite art. This table that he had made, features a carving by my BIL Steven Kelsey on a tree.

The last time I went to one of these, was with DD in Chicago-the lines were awful that time. The lines here were not too awful, but we chatted with people in our textile line that had been in line for 2 hours for militaria, and we saw the lines for glassware and watches were crazy long next to us.

 We had only about 3 people in front of us for textiles and the same for folk art too! WOW! What a great thing! So the table....I was skeptical....I didn't know what they'd say about it....Ken Farmer(We've seen him quite a bit on the show!) was called to collaborate with our initial appraiser, Nancy Druckman. They loved the burls in the wood, they loved the color and the shape. they loved the carving, they just thought it was a wonderful piece. And a retail estimate of.......$500-$700!!!! WOW!!!
Our 2nd folk art item was this set of bookends. Mom was pretty sure they were brought back from Europe when Grampa & Gramma went there in the 60's. And she was RIGHT!! Appraiser Nancy, said she felt these were created for the tourist market, likely in the northern parts of Europe and even though they aren't REALLY old, they still would be valued at $100-$200!! YAY!!!

 Then we had our textile items. Up first was this quilt that I have from my Great Aunt Grace. It's a very unique pattern, I think and all hand sewn. And I like the orange fabric.

The appraiser was Katy Kane and she also thought it was a unique design-"the stars look like pants don't they?!"...yes they do! She said that quilts are not as pricy as they may have been in the past however this one with the few flaws (a small stain and a bite out of an edge) would go for about $150. YAY!!!

And the last item we had was this Hawaiian shirt that belonged to my Grampa. He and Gramma went to Hawaii in 1959 and this shirt returned with them. I've always loved the fabric and the bright colors so I was hopeful! Appraiser Katy said it was lovely and obviously for the tourist trade with the cruise ship motifs. Another appraiser agreed and said the buttons were correct too-real coconut shell or the like. They both agreed it is in excellent condition and said it would easily retail for $150-$300! WOW! I knew I loved this shirt!!

So that's how we came out at Antiques Roadshow. Best experience ever! There was a long line for the feedback booth and  Hubs wasn't in the mood to wait in another line, so off we went!

The To Do List--Easter edition

So, DD is moving, and there is a couch and loveseat left in her condo that is just awful! I put getting rid of that mess at the top of my to do list. I warmed up my muscles and loaded them up in the pick up-reclining couches are NOT light- and made a trip to the local dump. Yes I hate to add to the landfill, but honestly, these pieces were just too awful to pass on to anyone! Buh bye awfulness!!

Then my next item was to get the riding lawn mower ready to go-the grass is growing like crazy! I knew I had a slow leak in the front tire last summer, I aired it up every weekend for my gardener. SO I got the wheel off and took it in to get it fixed. Unfortunately the leak was in the sidewall and couldn't be fixed so I had to get a new tire.

SO I got the tire back on and checked my fluids and thought I'd be ready to go....well darn it it won't start. I really should take better care of the battery, it was pretty corroded, so I got the baking soda after it and, I put the charger on it and hoped for the best!

 

Well the charger says it's good to go, but still no starting for the mower, so I went to town AGAIN! and bought a new battery.

Now only one more thing, get the old battery out and put in the new one. Wouldn't you know it the cable on the positive side wouldn't un-bolt for anything! I WD-40'd it and tried every tool I have to get it loose and ended up breaking the cable...now I wonder if my cable was bad to begin with, Oh well, I've got the battery so now I need to replace or repair the cable. Off on ANOTHER trip to town.

The cable has a little fuse wire on it and I couldn't locate a cable like that anywhere! So I just got a new end loopy thing and put that on and I got some new bolts too. Those things are a pain! You'd think there'd be a better way to connect a battery. I don't have a crimping tool, and it was HARD to get it on there but I got it!!!

Looks good-fingers crossed.....And Hallelujah! It started right up!! Too bad it's raining now! Mowing will have to wait until Sunday when I'm expecting about 14 people and 6 dogs to come for dinner. So the next to do list item is to get a table in from the garage.

This antique table belonged to my old friend who now is in assisted living. When she moved I helped her sell and move and donate almost her whole house. Nobody seemed to want this table, but I really thought it pretty cool. SO I just stashed it in my garage all this time. Don't judge...and no hoarder references please! It has two leaves and the ends drop down so it doesn't take up much space.

 

I think it was happy to have people sitting at it after all these years! It worked out perfectly!

I also needed some springy/Eastery table decor, so I whipped up a couple of the 15 minute table runners out of some fabric I had on hand. I mean, my to do list was almost done so why not stop and sew a little, right?! I love this ice cream print and paired it with the Iowa shop hop fabric from a few years ago that I had been holding on to for no good reason. Pretty! That pretty much covers the to do list for last weekend!

Other than the non blog worthy-ness of things like vacuuming, and cleaning the bathrooms. And I was totally negligent and didn't take food pictures! Hubs made one of the best hams I've ever eaten and a wonderful macaroni and cheese and cole slaw! Julie brought a delicious pasta dish, Bean brought ice cream and strawberry shortcakes for dessert and we all had a great meal. Mom brought her deviled eggs-an Easter favorite! Amen!

Sanding ...

So awhile back, like last year, I started sanding down a really pretty peice of lumber to make a table out of.
Here it is...the beginning of a wonderful idea!
Well I've gotten a few pretty cool things in my garage since then. Look I have electrical outlets! Two of 'em! Thanks to my SIL John!

 And I got a belt sander at an auction last summer and I haven't even looked at the manual yet! Well, today's the day, look here.

 I put on a new belt and tested it out on a bit of scrap wood. Now to work on my cool wood.

 Foe some reason it has this icky blue paint or stain or something on the end. Not really the look I want.

 Look now...after a couple of passes with the bel sander! Wow!

 And now, just a couple of more passes....

 And there, now that's so much better. I used my little baby sander to get in that tiny jagged place, and it looks like I want it to. Now after a little bit of sanding with a little 220 sandpaper, I'm ready to decide on a finish.

Hmmm, stain or not? Shiny or not? I better take a break and think about this!

Merry Thanksgiving!

It's a three leaf kind of day today! DD and Uber Son will be coming over for supper tonight so I added the leaves to the treasured table. This table used to be my Gramma & Grampa's. This table has seen a lot of family through the years!

 

 I coerced my younger sister to give it to me when we moved into this house. I'm so glad she passed it to me!

And on Saturday We'll be having another Thanksgiving with my folks! Merry Thanksgiving Indeed!