Pincushion Challenge

I'm a lurker at a few other blogs and there is one called Booga J that has a pincushion challenge. Well, I took the challenge and here is my pincushion. The theme is Winter Wonderland, and I LOVE Mt. Hood. I love to see it all year, but it's especially beautiful in the winter covered with snow. Now, I can see Mt. Hood anytime I want....can't wait til I can see the real thing, tho. :)

Ok, I know I complain alot about having to live in WI, missing the PNW, blah blah blah. This is not a complaint post. This is about a couple of things I actually LIKE about living here.

Ok, now that you've picked yourself up off the floor, I can continue......

Of course I LOVE the wildlife here. I understand that some people would argue about the wildlife being RODENTS, but I happen to love the squirrels and bunnies. On a drive this summer, we saw a HUGE porcupine and we see plenty of deer ~ some are even alive, not just roadkill.

The birds here are spectacular. I've posted about the colorful cardinals and goldfinches. Hopefully we'll get to see the Indigo buntings and orioles this summer. TJ is REALLY into watching the birds. He took this picture while he was sitting on the step outside. This little black-capped chickadee came right up. He didn't even care that TJ was sitting there. These little guys are just so cute and sweet. They have a cute little song and they are real small and look darling when they're puffed up. :)

Another thing I've noticed here in SB and all over Wisconsin is the amount of HUGE American flags. Not the amount of flags, but they are literally gigantic! I don't know about everyone else, but I can get a lump in my throat when I see our flag. I am so proud to be an American. I am proud of having a husband who serves our country and being able to support him. I am so thrilled to be able to live in a house, have a 1993 Ford Aerostar (had to throw that in), be able to practice my religion, and not live in constant fear. I can't imagine what some people go through in other countries. It's a great nation we live in.

Now, there you have it. Me NOT complaining. Today I have to do laundry, clean the house and probably run the gym clothes to my kid since she left them on the counter in the kitchen, but I'm going to do it all without complaining, because I'm just happy to be able to do it all in the first place. :) hugs and kisses to all my friends.

New York, New York

Well, I'm finally getting around to getting AJ's New York pictures on here. She got to go on a Mission trip in November with the Moravian Church. The Moravian church is a lot like the Lutheran Church. 30 people went. They loaded onto a coach bus on Wed. a.m. and drove the 26 hours straight to New York.
Upon arriving in the Big Apple, they got on the Staten Island Ferry to go to Great Kills Moravian church where they camped out for the 4 days they were there. I must add, no showers were provided! YIKES.


The trip was to help those in need. They were broken into small groups and worked in various places in the city. AJ's team worked at Chips a soup kitchen, and upstairs are apartments for young pregnant teens, and teen mothers to try to get their lives sorted out. She also worked at The Methodist Church ~ a place that provides clothing for people who need it.



They got one day to sightsee and explore the city. They ventured out to see a bunch of cool sights. They went to Ground Zero, the Empire State building, Central Park, Grand Central Station, Starbucks (duh), Times Square and saw the Statue of Liberty.














It was a good experience for her. She got to see how people who aren't as fortuntate as us have to deal with life. And, got to see New York....Bonus! :)

More quilting gettin' done!

Well, I have finished another quilt. One of the girls from my bible study class had a precious little baby girl.
I pretty much just gathered fat quarters from my stash and put them together. I didn't really have an idea of exactly how this quilt would look. I usually have a picture in my head, and usually the quilts don't turn out like I THINK they will. This one was a pleasant surprise. I really am happy with how it turned out. It's bright and cheerful and I hope baby Madison will get lots of snuggle time with it.
One of the fabrics that I used has little dragonflies on it, so I thought it would be cute to quilt little dragonflies and flowers and swirly things on the border. Here's a close-up of the quilting. Now to start another project, or maybe I'll finish something that I've already started. Maybe I'll just go shopping!

Distance Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

Ok, yea, whatever...Distance makes the heart YEARN!! I was looking on line to find out where the nearest 7-11 was. I'm having a Slurpee fit here! So, I found out the closest one was in Zion, IL just out of Chicago and it is about 203.5 miles from my driveway. That's about 3 hours to drive for a Coke Slurpee. That's sick! So, it got me to feeling a little sorry for myself living here in Door County (which we have lovingly renamed Dork Ounty). Here is what I'm missing and how far it is to the closest one from my door.

Mall (in Green Bay) - approx. 45 miles
Starbucks (actually Sara has a fetish) - 47.5 Miles

Costco - approx. 220 Miles (there are several in the Chicago area)

IKEA - 328 Miles
Fred Meyer - 1674.33 Miles
Fabric Depot - 2048.92 Miles
Uwajimaya - 2064.68 Miles
Cannon Beach - 2135.37 Miles

I think those are the most important places that I miss. Of course, I miss friends all over, and that stinks. I'm going to go sew now. That will keep my mind off my desire for a Slurpee. :) tee hee

One more thing.....

Ok, I'm on a roll. Travis took this picture this morning. It's a cardinal (duh) in our tree right out our back door. We've become really crazy about the birdies here. We have some spectacular birds that visit us. Today we saw our first waxwings. They are so cool. They have a little wig like the cardinals, but they're grey with a little black mask and yellow tipped tails. The cardinals are kind of shy so we don't see them out very often. We can usually see them deep in the bushes out back.




We have a thistle bag out in the tree that the goldfinches love. We get common goldfinches and purple finches, which are more red than purple. These little guys are the yellow kind.




We have also had a Downy Woodpecker in the big tree out back. They are so cute to watch because they kind of "flit" around and peck at the bugs. We also get nuthatches. They like to peck at the bugs too, but they prefer to eat head down. We learned this weekend that there are brown creepers around and they eat sideways. The Discovery Channel is NOTHING compared to our own backyard. :)

Christmas pic

Well, I figured since I was on here, I'd put on the girls with our Christmas tree, even tho it's late. If you know me, you're used to me being late! :) Anyway, we usually get our tree on my birthday, but this year we were LATE with that too. We went out to a cute tree farm out in southern county and cut a cute little tree down 5 days before Christmas. We didn't have a big space to put it so this one was perfect. It was a nice height, and kind of narrow. Just right for the spot we cleared out for it. We just took it out today. Kind of sad but I like putting all the Christmas stuff away and getting back to normal. :)

Happy New Year!!

Well, I hope you all had a wonderful New Years Celebration. We successfully stayed up til Midnight, toasted with our Martinelli's Sparkling Apple Cider (which I can't find in Sturgeon Bay, gotta get it in Green Bay), kissed and wished each other a Happy New Year. I don't plan to make any resolutions, but I would always love to lose a few pounds, stop ragging on Travis so much, blah blah blah...we'll see if it happens. :) tee hee

We had visitors!!

My mom and my nieces, Steen and Kels, came out to visit us. It was a WAY TOO short visit, but we had fun seeing each other anyway. The cousins all got along (nothing new there) and they got to see all our wildlife. They already knew their aunt was wierd! :) Life is more exciting like that!








Anyway, the CA girls went with my girls to school on Friday to experience THAT. We spent a day shopping and on our way to Appleton we went through a little town on Lake Michigan called Algoma.

When we were in Algoma, the lake was very stormy and wavy. The water was splashing over the breakwall (I don't know if that's what it's called, but it sounds very technical, doesn't it?). There were tons of geese out there on the beach. I love watching and hearing them, but MAN, they have big poop! hee hee


We also watched as the water splashed up on the beach and it was freezing almost immediately after it hit the beach. It was really cool. Mom and I went wine tasting up in Carlsville. But I want her to come back in the summer when things up north are open. Most of the peninsula shuts down from Oct/Nov. to May. We didn't get any snow while they were here which kind of bummed us out a little too. Oh well, we had a good time together, just visiting. :)

Snow Pictures

:) I wanted to get these pictures posted so everyone can see what I ordered! :) Yea, the snow is all about me.....hee hee The only worry I have is my precious Traily has to be out in subfreezing temps all winter. I hope he survives. I have the portable heater going inside so things can thaw a little. This morning when I took Travis to work it was 13 degrees outside. The Element has a great heater, tho, so we were fine inside AND it handles pretty good in the snow.

Today the sun is out, but I think they're predicting flurries on and off for the next few days. I need to get the salt off the Element. Travis keeps wishing we could have studded tires on our vehicles. Oh well.

Everyone says I'll get sick of shoveling snow by the end of winter. I guess they COULD be right, but I'm not sure. After I got done with our driveway, I went and did the neighbor's drive (they're snowbirds). I wanted to do my other couple of neighbors' driveways, but it got too dark.





This post wouldn't be complete without a picture of my fuzzy friends. They are so cute in the snow. They dig to bury their peanuts under the snow and they even fluff up the snow over their treasure. I love, love, love watching my little squirrels. :)

Christmas Meme

What the heck is a Meme? I didn't know but I looked it up. Am I the only one who didn't know? Anyway, my sweet, little pajama friend the Happy Zombie posted this on her blog and I figured I'd put it on mine too, since she was so interested...tee hee :)

1. Egg Nog or Hot Chocolate? Neither. My warm drink of choice is Hazelnut Flavored coffee with Hazelnut Creamer in it. And I don't really like it after morning. I don't even like Hot Chocolate by a campfire..how wierd is that?!

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree? He just puts them under the tree. No wrapping. That's how we know they're from him. He does label them with names, and usually sorts them by the girls' special spots on the couches. He puts small things in their stockings, but so do the mom and dad. :)

3. Colored lights on tree/house or white? Whiteicicles on the house, colored in the big Christmas Tree in front and colored on my tree inside, IF I can find a tree to fit into this tiny house. The girls have little trees for their rooms and they have colored lights too. I would love to put lights on the entire roof, but Travis won't let me...he's mean! tee hee :)

4. Do you hang mistletoe? Um, no. We kiss enough around here! I don't want to give anyone the wrong idea!

5. When do you put your decorations up? Sometime after Thanksgiving. In this town EVERYONE puts up lights the day after Halloween. I feel sorry for poor little Thanksgiving. It's like the forgotten holiday. I even tried to find Thanksgiving decorations, and couldn't. Ok, back to Christmas decorating, I got the outside lights up. The boxes of decorations are in the basement waiting for my birthday. We have always gotten our tree on my Bday. THEN I pull the boxes out and really decorate inside.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish (excluding dessert)? Ham. I used to be a Honeyroast Ham snob, but the spiral hams they have at Costco are really good too. Unfortunately, we don't have a Costco anywhere around us, so I'll have to find something else this year.

7. Favorite Holiday memory as a child? For those of you who know me, you know I can't remember yesterday much less stuff from a long time ago! One time my dad brought snow from the mountains for my Bday, does that count?

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? What's that supposed to mean? Is there something I don't know about him? He's a jolly old elf with twinkly eyes and rosy red cheeks. He flies around in a sleigh with magical reindeer and leaves presents for all the good girls and boys! Now, I did find out the Easter Bunny is my mom. I peeked through the bathroom window and could see through the family room window and saw her putting our baskets together. I think I was about 9 or 10.

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? Oh heck yes we open a present on Christmas Eve. I usually pick which ones the girls get to open so they don't open the best one and forget about the rest!

10. How do you decorate your Christmas Tree? I have lots of ornaments that I just like. No special theme. The girls get an ornament every year, so when they move out they will each get to take their own. I guess I'll have to buy some new ones then, but for now, it's just got a little bit of everything.

11. Snow! Love it or Dread it? That's a stupid question. Other than the squirrels, that's the thing I'm looking forward to about living in this place! BRING ON THE SNOW!!!!

12. Can you ice skate? Yea, I CAN, but I don't like to fall on the ice and have a wet butt for the rest of the session, so I DON'T.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift? Fabric Depot $100 gift certificates.

14. What’s the most important thing about the Holidays for you? Family and the celebration of Jesus. I do love the food and relaxing too!

15. What is your favorite Holiday Dessert? Christmas Sugar Cookies!

16. What is your favorite holiday tradition? Sleeping in late if the kids don't get up early. Staying in my jammies all day and eating lots of food and then cleaning up all the dishes and, WAIT, that's not part of my favorite things to do. After I clean up then vegging in front of the tv, going to bed early then sleeping in the next day too. :)

17. What tops your tree?An angel holding little lights.

18. Which do you prefer giving or Receiving? Giving, definitely.

19. What is your favorite Christmas Song? I don't really have a favorite song, I like most Christmas music.

20. Candy Canes! Yuck or Yum? I like the Cinnamon flavored ones. I buy the prettiest colored for the tree. Usually, one or two get eaten, but the rest get thrown away by summertime!

Sara's quilt

Ok, I finally finished Sara's quilt. I wasn't sure I'd like it, but now that it's done, I'm happy with it. I was not so sure about the colors that she picked out but I think they really work together, now that they're all in a whole quilt. :) She's going for the tropical/beachy theme in her room. She has some accessories, but her room isn't quite finished. Maybe Santa will bring some cool stuff for her to decorate with. :) Now to work on some other unfinished projects!

Well, it's the day after Thanksgiving, and since there is NO shopping in Sturgeon Bay, we got the Christmas lights up. This is the first time we've had a really great Christmas Tree in the front yard. It's so big, tho, so it was a little bit hard getting it ALL lit up, but I think it looks ok. Now to find a place for a tree in the house!

Christmas by the Bay

So, we went to the Christmas parade the day after the tree lighting. Anisa said it was probably going to be boring (the last parade we went to lasted all of about 5 minutes and WAS boring, but this was really nice. EVERYONE was there.

Of course, the police and fire dept. started the whole thing out.






Then the Sturgeon Bay High School Band rocked the house, er, um, well, the neighborhood. :)

Here's our little piccolo player....isn't she cute??!! The band here really is good. The drummers especially like their job.

There were all sorts of floats and cars, scooters and even CAMELS!! This camel is actually a baby. Isn't she adorable?? And so calm. She just walked by without a care in the world. She's very fuzzy for the winter too.

This combo made us laugh, because....ONLY IN WISCONSIN does a beer (well, if you want to call Budweiser "BEER") truck follow a church float in the Christmas parade!

And ending the whole procession is Santa in a One Horse Open Sleigh. It was a fun morning. Luckily, it was good weather, too. Cold, but no rain or snow, although snow would have been COOL!!! :)

Christmas by the Bay

Well, I'm not one to do ANYTHING about Christmas decorating til AFTER Thanksgiving ~Poor Thanksgiving, it's like a forgotten holiday. Ok, back to the post....Sturgeon Bay, for a little town, likes to dress up for Christmas nice and early.

We went to the Christmas Tree Lighting the other night. Here's the tree waiting to be lit up...












And here it is lit up. :)

It Stuck!

Well, here's what our front yard looked like a couple hours after the "flurries" decided to hang around. It actually started sticking and it's all white now. I love that!!!! I just hope it melts tonight since I have to drive to Green Bay tomorrow to pick up TJ from the airport. I don't want to be driving with all the WI people tailgating me in the snow and slush! But it is nice to look at. Ah, winter. It's my season!!! :)

It's snowing!!

Ok, Ok, it's actually flurrying, but it's still exciting. I'm so looking forward to winter. I am not saying I won't be sick of it by May, but I'm looking forward to it right now. :) I love watching the snow. Here's a picture of the snow, it's not a great pic, but you can get an idea of what we get to look at.

Quilts, finally DONE!

Well, I actually finished!

I started the Clipper quilt (Anisa's high school is the Sturgeon Bay Clippers) when we were going to the football games and needed to stay warm. Well, football season is over, but we have a warm toasty quilt to keep us warm (since we don't have ENOUGH in the house already!). The red/white blocks are split nine-patches and were very fun to make since they went together pretty quickly. The Clippers on the bottom are just pieced ships that I found in one of my books.

This little star quilt came from a pattern I found in one of my boxes. I cut it out of a magazine ages ago and found it again, and thought, "Wow, that's cute. I should make that". So, I did. The Tiny star blocks are 1.5" finished and the little red/yellow 4 patches between the stars are only 1/4". Lucky for me, the pattern shows you to make them bigger, then cut them down so you're not working with a bunch of tinsey little pieces. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. It won't be keeping anyone warm, except the dust bunnies it's covering on the table. :)

Well, I sent my oldest baby off to the Big City! New York here she comes! She went on a mission trip with the Sturgeon Bay Moravian church. The Moravians are pretty much like Lutherans. It's not our church, but they have a really good youth group and there are quite a few of Anisa's friends who go there.

They boarded the bus at noon Wed. and drove all night to get to NY first thing in the a.m. Thurs. It's the first time I've ever let my baby go on a trip like this but we're excited for her.

The plan is they will work (there are 6 groups of one adult and 4 kids each) throughout the city ~Stanton Island, Manhattan and Brooklyn for 2 days, Sat. will be sightseeing ~one of the places they are definitely going is Ground Zero. Sunday, they'll worship with a Carribean congregation ~loud, hand clapping, feet stompin' Praisin' the Lord!! Then they'll pack lunches, board the bus, drive all night to make it home EARLY Monday morning so they can go to school. She's going to be a tired pup, but will have some awesome new memories for the rest of her life.

This is a picture of Anisa and Amm, one of her dear buds here. Amm is an exchange student from Thailand. Anisa is learning some Thai words and Amm gets to practice her english. Aren't they just the cutest??!!!

A New fuzzy friend

You've probably seen enough, but too bad.....we had another fuzzy friend in our yard. It's a bunbun! I threw out some bread crumbs for the birds and this little guy showed up. He's FAT! It's like a zoo in my backyard...I love it. There are several birds out there. I'm hoping to get a good picture of one of the cardinals, but they're kind of shy.