New Arrival

This is my Nellie Belle, she is a Bailey Mid Arm Quilting machine and she has served me quite well. She has added her beautiful designs to many quilts that were donated to Seniors and Children.

 

But it is time for me to move on and up in my quilting and My Nellie Belle will be looking for a new home.  She is a wonderful machine to learn to quilt with.

 

Getting the room ready for the new arrival, furniture moved out, a fresh coat of paint and we are ready for my new toy.

Frame is here and in the process of being set up. It was a bigger then I thought and I had to move the cabinet to make room.

Finally frame is ready for Lizzy

Leaders in place, Lizzy sitting proudly on her frame waiting to go to work quilting all my charity quilts and my UFOs

Slight glitch in the system, just could not get the computer to work the way it should, waiting for the tech at Shirley Stitcher company to call back again.. We think it might be a bad connection cable.

 

Update:  Susan borrowed a cable and dropped it off last night... of course I had to give it a try, and YES  that seems to be the problem..   Susan will be back today to finish install and she will be ordering a new cable.  At least I hope that was the only problem, but Susan will check it out and get my Lizzy running like a charm

 

Love the service from Susan's Sew and Vac in Pensacola,

owner and staff are so friendly and very helpful.

Anita Goodesign Party

Last week I attended a Anita Goodesign  Embroidery Party at Susan's Sew and Vac.

This was my first time ever attending a embroidery event and I must say I had a lot of fun. There was a Representative from Anita Goodesign who showed lots of examples of items that can be created using their designs. There were embroidery machines set up at the tables and you worked in groups of 5 on two projects.  My group consisted of a mother, daughters, and niece who all happened to be teachers.

Now I have bought many designs from Anita Goodesign to use in my quilts.  I love the way the sew out and they way my finished items look using their designs.

 

This was a baby quilt for a niece who wanted frogs and dragonflies,

 The design pack was Spring Curls

These beautiful flowers were also from the spring curls designs CD and they went into a quilt for one of my grand daughters.

Here is one of the latest designs packs and I bought it at the party.  I have always wanted a quilt with the Mariner's compass but never thought I could get the quilt block done the right way.  Now Anita Goodesign has made it easy for me, I can't wait to get started on this project.

I also fell in love with a beautiful quilt they had hanging on the wall, it was made using the Floral Rings designs CD.  I know my Mother in Law will love this quilt on her bed, but then so will I.. so Yep I bought that one too..

Well, I really didn't buy the two disks above... I joined the Diamond Club at Anita Goodesign, which means I will be getting a Full collection and a mini collection every month... Plus for signing up at the event I got the two special editions CD pictured about... PLUS 10 Design collections, all together they are  valued at over 800 dollars.  Plus I also received the sample CD for attending the party, plus when I ordered my club membership I received a disk with 5 retired collections valued at over 300 dollars... Plus when you sign up for a club you get the start up kit which has retired collections and there are over 757 designs on that disk...  

and I was a winner  of a sample collection door prize drawing.

I though about the $  58.00 monthly club membership but realized how much I was getting for that price and it is a great deal.  a full collection sells for $ 69.95 and the Mini collections sells for $ 39.95 so even there it makes the membership a good value, but with all the extra designs you get the membership is a great value.

There is a Diamond club, with embroidery designs, a Quilting Club with all quilting design packs, and you can up grand to a Platinum and get the project Cd's with either diamond or quilting memberships... or there is the top of the line  VIP membership which is the best value and that is the one I will be going for next year as it wasn't in the budget for this year...

Now to just find the time to sew all these projects that are in my head using my new designs..

 

 

 

 

Replacements & our Sears Vs Lowes shopping

 

This year it seems that many of the main items around the house are breaking down.. First it was the riding mower and you just need to cut the grass so a replacement was found. My power washer was on the fritz so it was replaced. Then the  AC/Furnace unit and it had to be replaced and in Florida while a heater is not always needed the AC unit is a must..  Now the fridge decided it wanted to act up, The first time it got warm I thought it might be the control knob getting bumped so I adjusted it and the fridge was OK. Three weeks later again the fridge was getting warm... freezer was OK but the top half of fridge was getting warm. Hubby decided that it was time to replace so off shopping for a new refrigerator.  We headed to Lowe's and this is the one we decided on.  We had a delightful salesman who did a price check and found a lower price at another store so he did a price match, plus the major appliances had a gift card promotion depending on the amount of the appliance, and the final incentive was free delivery and they hauled away the old one.. oh and one last thing, the power company gave us a rebate on a energy efficient appliance.

Lowe's has been our replacement store for most of these items... We found the sales staff at Lowes to be most informed on their products and they made sure we got the best prices around.   Looks like the next thing to go will be the hot water heater..  I had also planned on new tile flooring this year as the laminate flooring is looking bad, But with all these replacements I guess I just have to put up with the shabby floor a little longer.  You can bet when we replace the water heater or the flooring we will be shopping at Lowes.

 

 

Sears VS Lowes

 

We shopped around for the best prices and while we were planning on Sears for the purchases they had the worst salesman and policy's.  Our first encounter was the Heating and AC salesman who came to the house and measured and gave a estimate that was so high, when we thanked him and told him we were shopping around and getting more then one estimate, he left without saying a word.. guess he was upset because we didn't buy from him right then..  Sears called to ask why we didn't make the purchase and we told them we were getting estimates and how rude their salesman was , we were told they would send another salesman out with better prices as they wanted our business.   Guess what, the same salesman showed up... We didn't say anything about his being rude and this time his estimate was higher then before.. We brought that to his attention and he said he didn't remember, but a few minutes later he corrected my husband on a number so we knew he had the old estimate on his computer..  We thanked him and told him again we were getting estimates and again he just left, no thank you for letting me come to your home and listening to my proposal, Nothing, he just walked out the door..  Such a rude man and because of him Sears lost the sale of a heating and AC unit.  When the mower died we stopped by the local Sears store and the man there who said he was the manager told us we could get a better price if we waited till Monday as they were starting a new promotion.. How nice of him we thought, to tell us of the sale.  We returned that Monday and the manager wasn't there, his brother was and when he started the paper work the price was not what we were told it would be, plus the free delivery would now cost $ 75.00.  So once again Sears lost a large sale as we headed to Lowes and while there I also replaced my power washer.   Now when we were at Sears store and hubby was looking at mower I was checking out the refrigerators, but when my fridge died we decided to head to Lowes first as we knew they would get us the best deal.. Sorry Sears you lost out again..  Must be nice to have a company that doesn't need to sell product or to train their employees on customer relations.   I did write to Sears and informed them on how their staff had lost sales for them and how they might need to think about training their staff on customer service, but the corporate store must not care as no one responded.  So Sears is no longer our hometown store. From now on we will shop Lowes as they know how to treat their customers right..  So if you are thinking of shopping at Sears you might want to check out your local Lowes store as you will get the best deals and the staff really takes the time to give the best customer service possible.

 

For us Lowes was the Winner

 

2013 school event

2013

This year we saw some of our grand children in a grown up fashion

First there was the proms

 

Grand daughter Heather and her date for her Junior Prom

Grand daughter Emily for her Senior Prom

Grand son Jack who escorted his girlfriend to her Junior prom

 

Then it happened, this years Graduate is

Emily

Her Cake

Emily in her cap and gown

Congratulations Emily on your graduation,

Papa and I are so proud of you.

Good luck at Pensacola State College and then at Ohio State..

 

Where did my adorable little 2 year old grand daughter go

, that little child, then tween, teen and now young lady have taken over.

They just grow up so very fast...

 

 

 

Quilt donation & puppy update

Today was the day that Peggy and I delivered the three quilts to the Baptist Cancer Center at their annual event.

 

This is one of the quilts, WOCS members cross stitched words of encouragement sent the squares to me and I used dusty rose, hot pink and pink rose fabrics to make the quilt

This is the second encouraging word quilt, stitched by WOCS members and the top was sewn by Peggy and quilted by me.. a true joint effort on this one

The third quilt was one I made in honor of my Mother who lost her battle with cancer... Dru at AriZona Embroidery Barn Designs sent me the lovely pink ribbon butterflies set which is titled Tuff Enough... In honor of her Mom...  the fabric came from a lady who I met at a yard sale she was having to raise money for her daughter who was going through Chemo for breast cancer..   A Loving tribute to those who have passed and those who are still fighting their battle against cancer..

 

Everyone who received one of the quilts today was truly touched, the one lady I saw wiping the tears from her eyes..

There was a breakfast, musical entertainment, and the Extension office brought in plants for the survivors to take home, they also handed out recipes and suggestions for healthy eating.

Door Prizes were given out and I won the garden bag. The bag held a bush tomato and a cherry tomato plant, garden gloves and a spade.. so you know what I will be doing tomorrow..  Planting more tomatoes..

 

 

Now for our puppy news..

Do you remember me showing this picture of Roxy's puppies three weeks ago??

Here they are today... Now if you look at the top photo and see the little sable puppy on the far right side, Now look at this photo and he is in front of the white puppy... YEP you are right he is so small, he has only gained .3 ozs since he was born.. he is the same size... his litter mates are all weighing in at 1 pound or more, but the little guy is less then 5ozs..  I have been so worried about the little guy, worried that the other puppies are not letting him nurse so I give him private time with his mom. I also am feeding him formula...  He is strong and developmentally keeping up with the others as far as eyes opening, trying to walk etc, he just is not growing..

This is the little boy enjoying his bottle, and yes girls your dad is feeding the little guy..

Memorial Day our other female delivered her puppies,

all three are sable, and two weighed in at 4.5 ozs, the third puppy weighed in at 2.5

so here we go again... I am now wondering which one of my males are the father or if both of them are as one of my males is standard size and one is really small..

 

'

 

Mist and her three little pups.

 

Monday one of our grand daughters will graduate from High School... I just know I will cry.  They grow up so fast, where did the time go... This starts the graduation trend as I think we will have one almost every year for awhile...