I truly don't know where to start! Well, I guess it all started with a post right before Christmas. I had been diagonsed with Graves Disease, long story short, I have 3 tumors on my thyroid. I was terrified about all of this. The doctor said that I needed to have radiation treatments to kill the tumors, since they could not be removed because of the location. If they try to remove them, I will have paralysis in my face and will affect my speech. The worst part about having the radiation was I was told that I could not hold my children or interact very much with my family because the radiation would be transferred through my pores. This upset me greatly, because I am very close to all of my family and my boys. We are a very huggy-lovey family.



Since this post, I have not yet had my radiation. I have gone to a different doctor and he, of course, wants to do his own set of tests. At first, he didn't think that I would need to have the radiation, but now he says that he thinks it in my best interest to sooner or later have the radiation. I will be on several medications for my thryoid and other things...bp, etc. Right now the doctor wants to do a biopsy, but it is the needle biopsy. I forgot the medical term for it, but he wants to schedule that after I have my MRI and Ultrasound of the thryoid area.



Now that you know the background of the story, let me tell you what has happened today...I recieved a box delivered by UPS today. I open it up and I am brought to tears!!! Now in this box was a beautiful fabric panel, a wonderful name tag, delicious Godiva Chocolates, a card, and a QUILT!!!! Now I'm dragging this quilt out and start seeing all these names on these blocks and I immediately start crying! My boys are with me looking at everything. Andrew asked "Mom, why did they send you a quilt?" My response "I don't know" I see a label on the quilt, but I am crying so hard that I can't read it, so Andrew has to read it to me. The label reads....



Kristie, thoughts of you in each tiny stitch,

Stippling, Binding, Stitch in the Ditch,

This quilt brings thoughts of love so true,

From around the world, especially for you.



This quilt has been quilted with love

for Kristie Layne of Kentucky in the year 2008

by Hazel, Nancy, Jill, Gina, Maureen, Rhoda, (for some reason I can't connect to Rhoda's blog, but she posts on http://www.myquiltblog.com/)

Moniek, Michelle, Cindy, and Jen.



Top Assembled and Quilted by Jen

Binding by Cindy.



Now how sweet is that? The card said that they decided to make this for me as a comfort quilt. I have cried and cried. I have never in my life had anyone to do something so precious. I hope you all realize how much I love this quilt. I called my mom to tell her, we were both crying on the phone, she can't wait to see it.

Now, I don't usually post any photos of myself because I am so paranoid about how I look. I have gained alot of weight in the past two years due to my thyroid. And you can see in the photo how thick my neck looks. I have 3 tumors in it so I guess it has to be big. There is a big difference in this photo of me now and the photo at the top of my blog, www.quiltingcowgirl.blogspot.com which was only about 2 years ago. But hopefully, after I get all of this taken care of with my thyroid, I will loose this extra weight. But here I am sitting proudly with my new quilt. And no, I don't think I had brushed my hair, I had only been up for a few minutes and I still have my PJ's on. :)

Here it is hanging up on my wall so that I could take a photo of it.

And here are to other precious goodies that were in the box. A lovely panel, delicious Godiva Chocolates, that are almost gone already. A name tag, that I will proudly wear at my next guild meeting, and a heart touching card that I will cherish forever.
This just goes to show what great people quilters are. I truly thank you all from the bottom of my heart.
Kristie

This morning while out shopping with Mom, I bought an embroidery machine. It is the Brother Disney Computerized Sewing & Embroidery Machine. I had been researching it on the internet and found both good and bad reviews, but I thought the only way that I would know is if I tried it myself, and if I didn't like it I could return it. Now I've never had a computerized sewing machine before so this scared me. I got home, got it out of the box and looked at it for probably 30minutes before I even turned it on. I figured the best thing for me to do was READ the manual. So a couple of hours later, I will say that I LOVE IT!!!

I needed a new sewing machine anyway, but I honestly didn't think that this one would sew regular straight stitches that well since it was an embroidery machine, but it does a great job and converts from regular sewing to embroidery very easy. I will have to start buying lots of embroidery thread now to stock up. Today I only bought a spool of black, just to see if I could work this thing. So all of my practice designs are black, but that is okay because I am still having fun with it. I probably won't get alot of actual quilting done the next few days because I will be busy playing with this.
Kristie

Okay first off, the meaning of YBR...it stands for "Yellow Brick Road"  That is the name of the pattern.  I know you are thinking my quilt didn't have any yellow in it, but I have seen them made in a ton of colors. 

 

I took Breanna home this morning and while I was out I stopped and did a little fabric shopping. I had a few small projects that I either need to do or to finish so I bought fabric to do that.

The"TMNT" fabric and the wildlife fabric are for pillow cases for the boys. Hunter loves Ninja Turtles and Andrew of course loves to hunt so these were perfect for them.



These are just some pinks that I bought to add to my stash. I know I didn't really need them, but you know how hard fabric is to turn down.


Here are some blues that I bought to go with what I already have in my stash. I plan on making a quilt of blues, either a YBR or a 4 patch flip. I haven't decided on which pattern to use yet.

I bought a few yards of each of these fabrics for borders. The green is to border the "Thimbleberries Month-by-month sampler" The middle fabric is actually dark brown, but doesn't look like it in the photo. I got it to border my "Cowboy Boot and Hat" quilt. And the blue print...well, I'm not sure yet, I may use it for my Blue quilt that I am going to make.

That is all that I bought today. I just really want to get some of these things finished and ready to be quilted. I still need to clean the house up more today and I think my MIL is coming tomorrow. Hopefully, I can get back to sewing after all of that.

Kristie

I just got finished adding borders to my YBR top that I pieced a while back.  I also went ahead and cut my binding for it.  Now it will go in my pile of tops that need to be quilted.  I have a few more tops that I need to buy border fabric for, maybe I will get that done after Christmas.

 

That is all of the sewing that I have done today.  Right now we are all watching some movies that we rented and spending some family time together.  Richard and the boys are going to pick up the hog in the morning, maybe I will get to sew a little bit before we start doing our Christmas thing.

Kristie

 

Okay, I just got a phone call from a friend of ours that owns a warehouse down South.  The warehouse is a sewing factory that made bed comforters!  Now, he has an industrial sewing machine that has a 22 1/2 in throat!  Now I was thinking that it would be perfect to put on my quilting frame that Richard is going to make me.  So here I was all excited, and he even guaranteed it to work.  But now my question is.....He said the motor was underneath the machine.  Now can he modify my frame for that machine to work?????  He lives up here down the road from me, but his son still lives down South.  He is going to take some photos next week and email them to me!!!  So please if you have any suggestions please let me know.

 

Now I need to COMPLAIN!!!   Most of you all know that I live on a farm and enjoy doing alot of things the old way.  We usually have a hog or pig, whatever you want to call them.  And we butcher at least one a year for meat.  Back in the early Spring we bought a small pig and it died a couple of days after we bought it.  We got it from a friend of ours so he was very nice about it and said he would give us another on when we wanted it.  Now we only paid $45 for it then, so he called last night said he had one that was 300lb and was ready to butcher.  He said he wanted $100 for it but we could pay him $50 and we would call it even.  Now where Richard and Andrew both killed deers this year I don't have alot of extra room in my freezer.  So Richard called another friend of his and asked if he wanted to buy half of it and we both split the meat.  He said yes and Richard is picking it up in the morning and we are butchering it this weekend.  Now when I say WE butcher it, I mean we kill it, cut it up and package all of the meat ourselves.  This is a BIG job and a BIG mess!  But at least we know how it is handled and know that we get all of our meat back.  So the deal was that they come out and help us and take half, his wife just called and said she would buy the packaging supplies but she wasn't doing any of it.  Now that really pisses me off.  I don't think it is fair that I should have to package ALL of it up.  300 lbs is alot of meat of one person to have to package by themselves.  Richard said for me to throw their half in a garbage bag and send it to them.  Am I wrong to be pissed off??? 

Kristie

 

As most of you know I have been a little lazy with my Christmas sewing.  Actually, I haven't done any Chistmas sewing.  Now at the last minute I am in the mood to give a "quilty gift"  so I have been digging through my piles of quilts and have decided on 4 quilts to give.  I still have a few more that I need to pick out quilts for, but at least this is a start.  All four quilts are Queen size.

 

I can actually go ahead and show these since none of these people read my blog.

 

Quilt 1 ~ Tennessee Puzzle~~ goes to Richard's Aunt Carol.  She lives with and takes care of his Grandmother, so I feel she deserves one.  Actually, this will make her 2nd quilt from me.

 

 

 Quilt 2 ~ Spinning Pinwheels~~ Goes to my MIL.  This is her 2nd quilt from me.

Quilt 4~ Butterflies and Roses, goes to Richard's Grandmother.  This will be her 3rd quilt from me. 

This is what I got done today!  I have made 8 of these blocks.  Two of each set of fabrics.  I now have a total of 8 blocks and they will be set on point.  This will make a nice lap-sized quilt.  By the time that I add my setting triangles and a border, it will be the perfect size.  I had planned on making it larger but I just don't want to make anymore and I don't want to put it in my UFO pile so I will stop now and add the borders.  This is only one block but you will see the others when I get it all sewn together.

 

I got the pattern out of an old magazine that I have.  It is an early 2001 issue of "Traditional Quiltworks"  I loved the quilt in the magazine and had planned on making it for a long time, but just never got around to it.  The blocks measure 15 inches and is called "Friendship Baskets"  I dug out some setting and border fabric that I've had for a while.  It is just a solid olive green fabric.  I'm sure something else would look better but I don't want to have to buy anymore until I use some of this other fabric up.  I'm not sure if I will work on it anymore tonight or not, right now I am just tired and am starting to get a headache.  If I start feeling a little better I may try to finish the top, it won't take that long to do it. 

 

The boys have been cleaning their room ALL DAY and it still isn't clean.  It was a mess, there was just a small path from the door to the bed.  I don't know how they could stand it but I swore that I would not clean it.  It was their room they can keep it clean. 

Kristie

In between all of my running around today I did manage to sew a little.  I made this "Coloring book caddy" for Hunter.  I just used some fabric that I had here at home.  I plan on making a couple more of them.  One for my niece and nephew.  She is 5 and he is 18 months.  I think on his I will change it to hold the large crayons.  And I will sew the strip that holds the crayons in a coresponding fabric.  I just didn't really have anything that went very well with this Batman fabric.  Anyway, Hunter loves it.

 

I check Andrew out of school early today so that he could go to Hunter's school with me.  He wanted to go see some of his friends and old teachers.  He and one of his old teachers sat and played the guitar the whole time.  Andrew took his guitar over there so they could play.  They had a blast!

 

Hunter's party went great.  I don't know how some of the teachers stand it.  Those kindergardener's were WILD!  They got a few gifts and lots of snacks (CHOCOLATE) Maybe the chocolate is what made them so wild.  The teachers loved their gifts that Hunter and I made.  The teacher's aide in Hunter's class bought them all gifts.  The girls got baby dolls and the boys got remote control cars.  She even put the batteries in them, so I thought that was nice.  That is when it got really wild.  All of the boys had their cars running around all over the classroom. 

 

We haven't been home too long.  Richard got home about 10 minutes after we did.  So now I am just trying to fix some quick cheeseburgers for dinner.  The boys are off school now until January 2nd.

Kristie

 

I have been busy this evening.  Thank you all for your ideas on gifts for Hunter's teachers.  I thought he wanted me to make one for his homeroom teacher, but he wants a gift for all of his teachers.  I ended up making 3 sets of coasters.  I didn't do them in Christmas fabric, so that they could be used all year.  I bought 3 coffee mugs from the Dollar Discount to put them in.  I will either add some candies or take Michelle's advice and put a couple packs of hot cocoa in them.  Hunter is very pleased with them. 

 

I also took an idea from one of Jill's post.  I made a Rice Heating Bag.  I called my sister while she was in town and had her to pick up a bag of rice for me.  Richard put his back out this morning working at the sawmill, so he is using it now.  He said it really works.  I think I will make several more of them for my family.  Mom and Chantal use heating pads alot. 

 

 My sister, Chantal finally has a boyfriend!!  I know she will kill me if she reads this.  I had mentioned before about her being so lonesome.  Anyway this is a guy that she has known for a long time, I think they went to school together.  They have been talking for several months now, but I guess it is official that they are a couple now.  She seems to be so happy!  He is a really nice guy, but there is one problem.  He is in the National Guard and will be leaving for Afghanistan in February.  He will be gone for a little over a year.  She will be so sad when he leaves.  I love her so much and hate to see her so upset.  Hopefully, all will go well for them both.
 

My little Hunny Bun has a "Horsey Quilt" that I made for him when he was a baby.  He is now 5 1/2 and is still very attached to this quilt.  The only place that this quilt doesn't go with him is to school.  It is very worn but very loved.  This is probably the most important quilt that I have ever made, at least I know that it is loved more than any other.  It is a crib size quilt with a piced horse head in the center.  I hand quilted it, which didn't take too long since it is only a crib size.

 

This quilt has been through everything in the world.  Dragged through the mud, vomited on, anything you name it, it has been through it.  Now it is in need of repair.  I knew it was getting shabby, but when I got it out of the dryer a few minutes ago, I really realized that I needed to do something before it gets any worse and he is not ready to give it up yet. 

 

You can see it has several holes in it and the binding is shot.  I have more of this brown fabric but of course the quilt is so faded that it doesn't even look the same.  I will eventually replace the binding, but what do you think is my best bet to do for the holes????

 

 Of course he has several other quilts but none of them will ever take the place of this one.   I never knew when I was making it that he would love it so much.

 

Okay, now on to something else....I had Christmas Dinner with Hunter this morning at school.  He enjoyed it so.  After leaving school, I drove on in to town.  I had a mammogram this afternoon.  They said it would be a few days before I got my results back.  But one thing for certain, those things hurt! 

 

I have another doctor's appointment tomorrow in Ashland, which is about a 1 1/2 hour drive.  It is an appointment that I dread!  I will post about it later since it will take a while to explain it all.

Kristie
 

 

 When Richard left this morning at 12:30am the snow had not started but when I got up to get the boys up for school at 6:30am we had about 2 inches of snow.  It melted off pretty quick, but this afternoon we got another dusting.  They said the roads were very slick this morning.  Chantal didn't go to work all she had to drive was Mom's car and she was afraid to try it in it.  Chantal has a 4WD but she has a flat. 

 

I rearranged the living room today.  I had to move somethings around so that we can put the tree up on Friday.  I moved the computer desk over to the other side of the room but I had to unhook everything to move it.  That took forever to unhook and then hook it back up.  So now everything is ready for the tree. 

 

I sewed my 2 Celestial Migraine BOM blocks today.  They are both the same.

After the boys got home from school today and did their homework we decided to start decorating for Christmas.  For some reason I just really haven't been in the Christmas spirit and had only planned on putting up a tree.  Then last night mom gave Hunter a couple of little decorations and he sat there looking at them for hours.  That really got me and I told myself that I really needed to decorate for the kids.  So I drag out the decorations from the outbuilding and Hunter had a blast.  The fireplace is about all that we got decorated tonight.  Well Hunter sat a bunch of other decorations out but I will have to sort through them later.  So here is a photo of the fireplace.  I wanted to hang our matching stocking but Hunter insisted on these.  We will put up the tree this weekend.  My artificial tree broke last year so I had to throw it away.  I think this year we are going to go with a real tree. 

 

Oh, that is a "Wild Boar" hanging over the fireplace.  Andrew killed it a few years ago.  Richard went with him since they get so mean after they are shot.  They had a great time hunting. 

 

Went out to Mom's this evening.  She has already started packing to leave on Friday.  We decided to celebrate Christmas with Mom January 6th.  She comes home on the 5th so we are all going to meet at her house on Saturday. 

 

No sewing for me today.  Just really can't get in the mood.  I guess no one will recieve a "quilty gift" from me this year.  I can't seem to get with it this year.  There is always next year I guess.  Hopefully I will get an earlier start then.

 

 

I didn't get a whole lot done today.  Seems like I piddled all day.  This evening I did make 2 sets of coasters.  I made these for Quilt Guild.  One set to put in the gift bag with something else and the second set is for our little auction.  We were told to bring something small that we had made or some type of sewing item that we don't want anymore, just things that wouldn't go for over $10 in the auction.  It is just mostly for fun at our Christmas Party.

 

As I said before I have been pretty lazy today.  I did fix a big breakfast this morning, but after that I did nothing.  I felt like I had a restless feeling all day.  Oh well, who knows...

 

After Richard went to bed this evening, the boys and I did go out to Mom's.  We had a nice time just sitting around talking.  It was really nice.  I am going to miss her soooooooo much when she leaves.  She leaves out on the 8th and won't be back home for 28 days.  I cry every time that I think about it. 

 

When we got back home we had such a mess!  Well first off, you know that I am not used to having a dog in the house, but I am trying to adjust.  So while we were gone Ida Belle decided she wanted to get in the kitchen garbage.  She had garbage all over the kitchen and living room, it was a MESS!!!  Not only had she scattered it everywhere but she chewed it up into tiny pieces.  And the part that made me so mad was the fact that when we got back home she wouldn't come up from behind the recliner.  She knew that she had done something wrong.  Anyway the boys helped clean it all up and she is out running through the house. 

Kristie

 

It is never a good sign when you see a photo like this!

I got my machine out this morning to sew and the needle adjustment would not work. You know the adjustment that moves your needle for different size seam allowances. Well, my needle would not move. I wanted to CRY! It worked fine last time that I sewed on it which was just a couple of days ago. So, I started taking it apart...and I DROPPED IT!!! Yes, I dropped my sewing machine and it hit the floor!
As you can see it busted a few pieces off of the bottom of the machine. Then I did start crying, that was about the time Richard came in the door and saw what had happened. His answer was "Baby, don't cry, just go buy you another one" Well, I did want another one, I really like this machine and it is just the fact that I was careless and dropped it and then I also thought it was breaking down on me too.

But I do have good news and a little bit funny! After I dropped it the first thing that I did was turn it on to see if it would still work. Guess what! It worked just fine and after I dropped it the needle adjustment started working! How weird is that? So now I will put all of the pieces back on it and try to get some sewing done today!
Kristie

This is the only sewing that I did yesterday.  I already had it quilted so all I needed to to was add the binding.  So probably 3 minutes of sewing and I was done. 

 

Mom and I took Ida Belle to the vet this morning.  Vet said she was very healthy.  She is 8 wks old and weighs 12 1/2 lbs, so she should make a good sized dog.  She will be going outside with Fred when she gets a little older.  I am not used to having a dog in the house so I have used a ton of air fresheners and cleaners. 

 

Today we had a scheduled power outage in our area so that they could replace some poles.  So our electric was off for a few hours.  I couldn't sew so I cleaned and reorganized my sewing area.    It sure looks alot neater.  Afterwards I sat down to read a nice historical romance novel.  It is a really good book about the Norse and Scottish.  I read about half of the book before Richard and the boys got home.  I will probably try to finish it tonight. 

 

My mom got some really great news today.  I really can't say much about it yet but I can in a few more days.  But I have been so HAPPY all day.  She is really excited too!  It is a GREAT thing. 

 

I guess that is about all for today.  The boys are fighting, as usual so I had better get off of here and make them stop before they drive me crazy.

Kristie

 

I got a little more done on my "Jewel Box" quilt.  I have two more blocks finished that I haven't sewn on to this part yet.  I have been sewing them into blocks of 4's and then sewing them together.  It seems much easier that way.  I still have more cutting to do.  I am still cutting from my scrap bag and haven't used any of my yardage fabrics yet.  I'm hoping to just use up my scrap bag on this. 

 

Oh and here is a quick photo of Hunter during his fiddle practice this evening.  Andrew was sitting there beside him playing his guitar, but you know how 14 yr old boys are, they don't want their photo taken.  I'll have to sneak and take a photo of him when he is not expecting it. 

 

 This morning was our Guild meeting.  It was very interesting.  Our Christmas Party is scheduled for the 17th.  Instead of exchanging names we are each bringing a gift and drawing numbers to see who gets each gift.  Our limit is $15 so I will have to go shopping :)

 

We also learned how to make a "ruched flower"  It is very different from what I am used to.  We made a practice flower today and I would show you all but it really doesn't look that good.  We are doing a block challange using this method.  They also gave us some challange fabric that has to be used.  The fabric is WAY out of "Comfy Zone"  It is a dark purple with metallic gold lines going everywhere.  Anyway, I guess within the next few days I will be practicing making these.  I may have my hair pulled out before it is over with.  We don't HAVE to make the blocks for the block challange, but I do think I will try. 

 

Don't think I will sew alot tonight, I will probably be cutting more pieces.

Kristie

 

 And here is 4 blocks sewn together.  This section is only 24 inches square.  Not very big yet.  I still don't have enough pieces cut, but I have a good sized pile and will cut more as needed.  I get tired of cutting and don't want to cut more than I need. 
I also have a plan to use the pieces that I cut the wrong size.  I will work on that along the way also.  Tomorrow morning is my Guild Meeting.  We are making a tote bag, but I don't think I will make it, I'll probably just go in and sit around with them.  Not everyone makes the projects so I'm sure I won't be the only one.  We are also drawing names for Christmas tomorrow.  That will be hard for me since I don't really know any of them that well.  But then again a quilter should be able to buy a gift for a fellow quilter. 

 

I will probably work a little more on my quilt tonight.  The boys have to get in the bed early since they have school tomorrow.  Hunter is already throwing a fit not wanting to go. 

Kristie

 

Finally after tons of extra cutting I got my first block sewn together.  As you can see I am doing a very scrapy look.  So far I have not cut any out of my yardage fabrics it is all out of my bag of small scraps.  I still need to press this block that is why it looks a little funny.

 

Not sure what size this will end up, right now I am thinking lap or twin.  The first one that I made was a queen size.  The block in the photo measures 12 1/2 inches so there are a bunch of little pieces in it. 

 

Right now I am going to straighten the house up and will probably do more sewing this evening.  Have to get up early in the morning to take Ida Belle to the vet for her shots. 

Kristie