Twas the night before Christmas....

 Daddy was on snowman and snow doggie making duty yesterday morning with some fresh snow.

With their creations before the rain melted them.

The elf has landed the last few days here. This is the last perch as he will fly to the North Pole tonight when Santa delivers the presents to the kids.

We had dinner last night at my sister Joanne's and a friend of hers visited with her puppy Bingley! Now he is a cutie and had a blast with the kids (and Greg!).

Off to Christmas eve mass soon and then stuffed shells, homemade french bread and salad for dinner. The kids heard on the news that Santa would be in Vermont around 9PM... so everyone has to be in bed sleeping before that (we were told we had to be asleep too!).

Wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas.

Monday design wall....

I decided to start something new..... with 2.5 inch squares in blue. This was my hand work while Greg was in between the kids on the plane yesterday. No delays and we got in early for a change. Much nicer this time and the kids were really well behaved.

Mom had picked up a stuff a bag for $3 for me! Lots of pretty purples, greens and maroons with some lovely gingham fabrics in there.

Look at the doggies, pansies and butterfly's!

The kids are having fun going up and down stairs and counting them and getting all bundled up to go play in the snow! We don't have stairs in our house.

The new header is thanks to Grammy R! Her Christmas tree this year.

RSC 2014....

I decided to finish at least ONE of my RSC quilt tops so the sampler got some walking foot attention this week and just needs the binding to be sewn down. It feels so good have an almost finish at the end of the year.

I've also made some progress on the Hugs and Kisses RSC hand appliqué project from 2013 - I have hand quilted 9 of the 49 blocks. I decided to add a few more stitches in each block by stitching on the inside of each orange peel (to make sure my appliqué stitches stay put!) - I have 3 more blocks to add those final touches to. This is my first try at using a hoop on a hand quilting project - I decided I don't care for the PCV square or the large oval hoop. The smaller round wooden hoop is feeling comfortable and nicely puts my 9 inch block inside it so I can quilt it. I still have not figured out how to get the cats off the quilt  while I am quilting but we have come up with a compromise so I can continue stitching and Max can be on the quilt at night. =)

I'm linking up Saturday morning with the RSC Challenge and on Sunday with Kathy Quilts for the Slow Stitching Sunday. Head on over and visit the links for some wonderful inspiration.

Christmas came early in the mail......

Look what arrived today! My fabrics from Vicki Welsh! I can't wait for 2015 to start playing with these gorgeous hand dyed fabrics.

Unfortunately I am home today with two sickies.... one is really sick - the boy with a good fever and rosy cheeks. It seems fifths disease is making it's way through school so I need to check him for a rash but so far nothing so that is good.

She was just a little high this morning but I have a feeling she'll be fine to go tomorrow for her party and music concert at the middle school.

I've cleaned bathrooms and been picking up the house and doing laundry..... and finishing Christmas cards (most are mailed! I just need four more stamps)...... so I took a break and pinned the RSC Sampler quilt. Time to cut the excess backing, dust and then I think I'm going to flip the coin and see if it gets free motion quilting or the walking foot treatment this afternoon while the kids watch tv. Vacuuming can be done later =)

Tuesday.......

Well, the cats had their vet appointment this morning. 2 hours total for catching and getting there and then bringing them home. The vet is maybe 15 minutes from the house. Catching them was interesting - Max peed on me and Sophie was the more difficult one to catch this morning. Yes, I had to reassemble our bed when I got home - had to pull up the bottom part to get to her. She is obese (14 pounds and chunky) so I knew that but her hip is popping so December 31 she starts her weight loss diet and will try and get her down to 8 pounds 5 ounces like she should be. Poor baby.
Max is fine weight wise around 8.5 pounds and healthy.

I spent an hour trying to find all parts to puzzles and matching games the kids have outgrown. They will be sent to the woman's shelter by my MIL as they are in need of toys and things for the kids for Christmas. I'll pull more toys tomorrow but one big black trash bag is filled. A few dolls, cars and books made it in there too. Lots more will be pulled tomorrow - and other than noticing things will be  cleaned up a bit tomorrow they probably won't even notice the missing things!
Time to hit their drawers again - Way too many clothes and Aidan is finally outgrowing some of his so time to pull shirts and clear them out. I already sent a couple of bags of toys and outgrown bikes and winter coats with her on Sunday.

A quilt photo for you - I am on round 6 for the hand pieced trip around the world quilt. I ran out of purple or I would have made more progress on this last night. I need to pull more to work on this in the car line today. I'd like to get this round completed, then I have to decide if I finish this little one off or continue. It is fun but I don't want a big rainbow one of these so I think I'll start again with a random color one.

We did Christmas with Grandma on Saturday night.... which is why I need to clear out toys! She got us this neat craft of our family. One of her friends daughter makes them. Tom and Ruthann are Greg's parents and then all our names. Just need to hang it up.

The kids had scouts last night. It was my turn for Aidan and they went singing carols at one of the rehab centers. This is the troop - tigers, bears, weblos and a cub scout or two. The tigers (1st grade) are in the front in orange and Aidan is on the left side end. Dad went with Emily to her troop Christmas party last night - I got her for caroling at a nursing home last Monday night.

Yikes - need to print out kids pictures too so I can mail out the Christmas cards. Better go do that first!

Slow stitching Sunday....

Today is a family day at home (a rare occurrence at my house). The kids had their first Christmas with Grandma H last night so we have way too many new toys in the house! I will pull a bunch of things from their rooms and the play room tomorrow while they are at school to make some room. We decided Grandma is not too great at Operation but Aidan and I rock! We each got 5 parts out of the minion without that buzzer going off!

Grandpa A will come over later this morning for a visit. After that I have Christmas cards to write out and get into the mail tomorrow (must print off the kids school pictures today to tuck into the cards). At some point I really want to watch the Polar Express since I got outvoted last week for the movie night! The kids each did their Polar Express at school this week in the library which included Em wearing her pj's to school on Friday for her movie. While I watch it I will either add some stitches into Hugs and Kisses or into my new hand piecing project of a trip around the world quilt. Maybe I will do a little of both!

Linking up with Kathy and the slow stitchers today as she reminds us each week to slow down and relax with some slow stitching.

We did breakfast with Santa yesterday morning and I got this picture of the kids on Santa's lap. They both were all smiles! I have a feeling this might be that last year for a both kid picture like this :(.

Scrappy tops are coming together....

I was able to sew the diagonal set of the churn dashes together this morning. I did take a break and grabbed Wendy's for lunch  and took it in and ate with Aidan at school in between the sewing. I've done lunch with both kids for the month at school...Another thing checked off the list!

Those tops are starting to pile up from the rainbow challenge. The bottom of the pile above is the RSC Sampler.

The middle quilt top is the 16 patch stars.

I just have another set of the churn dashes to figure out what to do with them! 72 more little churn dashes will come out to play sometime soon. I also have my birds in the air blocks from a couple of years ago wanting to be put together. The also want to be hand quilted with a baptist fan pattern so they will just have to wait patiently in the drawer until Hugs and Kisses is close to being done before they become a quilt top! Bossy little blocks they are!

I'm thinking I only need a couple of hours at work on Saturday... so maybe I'll skip out and head home and pin and quilt one of these little guys? That is probably a dream... but you never know what will happen. Saturday morning starts out with a pancake breakfast with Santa before I head to work and Greg takes the kids to Grandmas where they will go to her town's parade. We'll do Christmas with her on Saturday night. It is hard to believe the kids only have 5 more days of school before winter break!

Linking up on Saturday morning with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. Take a peek at all the links and get some ideas for next year's challenge. I think I have decided on some of the things I will be working on - the 25 patch wonky stars, a scrappy strip of each months color - 3.5 inches by 60 or 70 inches long sewn onto some muslin with a little cream strip in between each one, adding my black hexagons around the hexagon flowers from 2014 and the RSC 2015 sampler. Have you been thinking of how you will use your scraps next year?