I've been tagged by Chris at
Cats on My Quilts, so I've been trying desperately to think of 7 things about myself. I thought I'd do some research by reading what other bloggers wrote, so then I got involved with reading everyone's blogs and jumping to other blogs that they had links to, and the whole evening was gone. I have to watch it when I get started on blog reading or I might be lost for days. I'll If you haven't visited Cats on My Quilts, check it out, I really enjoy it. Just be careful of her "Nice Places to Visit" list on the right sidebar, as you may have lose a few days yourself!
Anyway, here's the deal~
The rules of the meme are:
1. When tagged, place the name of the person and URL on your blog
2. Post the rules on your blog
3. Write 7 things about yourself
4. Name 7 of your favorite blogs
5. Send an e-mail letting those bloggers know they have been tagged
Now about ME......
1. I home schooled two of my kids, my oldest elected to stay in public school, but now he says he wish he'd done homeschooling, too.
2. I collect old school readers and children's books, I love reading the old stories and am fascinated by the illustrations.


3. Sometimes I seriously wish I had been born Amish. As it is, I couldn't live that way because I'm too spoiled by air conditioning, ipods & the like, but if I'd grown up without electricity I think I would really enjoy that life.

4. I love puffins. I have no idea why, maybe it's their bright colors, or their funny beaks, or because they look like stuffed toys, but I find them quite charming.
5. Besides quilting, genealogy is another passion of mine. My husband doesn't get it, he calls it "digging up dead people", but to me it's like a big treasure hunt.
6. I LOVE to read, be it biographies, murder mysteries, history, love stories, or whatever. Between my Dad, my daughter & I, I'm pretty sure we have more books than some libraries. I really enjoy Earlene Fowler's quilt-related mysteries (my youngest son laughed out loud when he was at a book store with me & I told the person at the store that the book I was looking for was a quilt-related murder mystery, the brat!) For some reason he thinks I've gone over the bend when it comes to quilting, I can't imagine where he gets that idea.

7. I was fortunate enough to be able to help my daughter deliver her baby about a week ago. That wasn't the plan, she was going to just have her hubby there, but she had a hard time & needed the extra support. It was amazing!
">

Now for 7 of my favorite blogs....that's a difficult one as I have a long list of blogs I read regularly. I love reading Jenny Bowker's blog,

Postcards from Cairo. She lives a very interesting life and I enjoy living vicariously through her. Be sure to check out her quilts if you haven't seen them before, they're amazing.
Jenny at Allsorts has such a creative, fun blog, it's really eye candy. It cheers me up just perusing her blog.
Another one I enjoy is Ann Wood, just look all the way back, her creations are wonderful.
If you haven't been to Crazy Aunt Purl, go now & laugh!
Usually I like a lot of quilt content, but I really enjoy this blog, Happy Things. And how cute is this? I saved one of my faves for last, Posie Gets Cozy, you probably already read hers, but if you've missed it you should definitely stop by for a visit.

You'd think with as much as I've been stuck at home lately because of all the snow we've had that I'd be getting a lot of quilting projects done. I did have that bad flu that's going around, but I have no excuses for all the other days. I think all these dark days are getting to me, I need an infusion of spring to get me going. I need to write up a list of things to get done, then maybe I will quit jumping in different directions and starting new projects when I have too many that I need to finish already. I have done some hand quilting on a UFO and have been working on the Carr family photo albums that I'm making for my kids (I'm doing three of them, so it's slow going). I've also spent as much time as possible holding my new grandbaby, she's such a little angel. She's changing already, though, and she's not even two weeks old!

Happy Valentine's baby!

I'd like to introduce Ryla Joy, my new grandbaby! She's my first grandchild, so you can imagine that I'm a bit excited. She was born on Valentine's Day and weighed in at 7 lb. 10 ounces. I have to give my daughter a lot of credit in bringing her into the world, as she was a bit of work. She wasn't in a hurry to be born, so a few hours after my daughter's water broke they were going to induce labor, but then baby decided to go ahead and get serious about being born. They weren't able to do an epideral as my daughter had epideral abcesses when she was 19, fortunately they figured that out just as they were getting ready to do the procedure. My daughter pushed so hard that she burst blood vessels in both eyes so she will be looking a little scary for the next month or so. Mama, Daddy & baby are all doing great.
I'll post more another day, but I'm just recovering from the nasty flu that's going around so I'm going to wait until I feel better.

It was a dark and snowy night......

We're really getting the snow this year, and are supposed to get another 2-3 inches tonight. Considering the killer storms in the south, I can't complain too much about the snow. I don't mind so much if I don't have to drive in it, but my daughter asked if I'd go to town with her for her doctor's visit today. She's about a week from her due date, and I really didn't like the idea of her driving the 40 miles into town by herself in this weather. The roads were pretty nasty, it didn't look as if the road crews were doing much, even on the main roads that they usually keep clean. The doctor says the baby won't be coming tonight anyway, which is kind of a relief. Our SIL is very sick with the flu that's going around, and it would have been a bummer if the baby was born and he couldn't be in the room because of his illness. He's so excited about the baby that he'd be very upset if he couldn't hold her right away.

I probably mentioned that the baby is a girl, her name will be Ryla Joy. Her father thought up the name Ryla, and Joy was the middle name of his younger sister who died about a year ago. My daughter's name is Taiya and she wanted her daughter's name to be unique, too. I like it, I think Ryla sounds a bit mystical, like something from a fairy tale (and I LOVE fairy tales). I can't wait to meet her!

I did get another project done, but I don't have a pic of it yet. It's another baby quilt, not really a quilt technically. My daughter and I got a nice length of green Minkee in Shipshewana, Indiana at Lolly's Quilt Store and I used the leftovers from the green baby quilt I made for the baby (shown in my Dec. 2 blog). It was very simple, for the back I just used strips a few inches wide, and then tied the Minkee and the back together. It's so soft and cuddly, I really want to get myself a piece of it next time we go to Shipshy and make myself a soft lap quilt.

I finally spent some time in my quilt room getting things straightened up, not quite clean enough to take pictures yet. I can't believe how quickly that room got all got filled up, I'm really trying to finish up projects and use up fabric, but it sure goes slow. I thought the Christmas quilt top that I showed in my last blog entry would use up a lot of my Christmas fabric pieces, but you can't even tell I used any!

I'm really trying not to buy a lot of fabric right now, but it's tough with this dreary weather. It makes visiting quilt shops and sorting through the lovely, bright fabrics even more enjoyable than usual. Hopefully I'll have some cheerier pics for you next time!