Another quilt project done!

The colder the weather gets, and the more I read other quilting blogs, the more I want to sew.  Just tonight, I finally finished this little quilt that I started last spring!

 

 

Once I have it quilted, it's going to hang on the wall in our lower level family room -- we still need to do some decorating down there!

Tomorrow, I'm off on a Quilt Shop Road Trip with 3 of my sisters.  I'm actually getting up at the crack of dawn to get to Toledo by 7:15am to catch a bus.  Then it's the 4 of us and about 50 other women heading off to 7 different quilt shops around northeast Ohio . . . over 12 hours!  At least we don't have to drive!! LOL  It's going to be a fun day!  We're all looking forward to it!  I'll let you know how it goes . . .

Apple time!!

It's certainly been fall-like (actually more winter-like!!) around here this last week!  The weekend was decent (mid-50s, but sunny), and we managed to get some outside work done.  The asphalt around our mailboxes (on the right-of-way to the county road) was breaking up pretty badly, so Tom and the boys cut it out and we bought some cold patch and filled it back in.  It turned out pretty good, for a couple of amateur road-repairmen.  In the next week or so, we have a guy coming over to fill some cracks in the road, and he said that he would go around the area that we patched as well.  That should seal the edges nicely.

Other than the road repair work, and the usual laundry, we didn't do too much.  Today the boys had a half day off school, so we decided to brave the 45 degree day and go pick apples.  The three of us go every year -- we pick a bushel of apples (golden delicious are our favorite, but we also picked some northern spy to make pies), and then get a dozen donuts and a gallon of cider -- YUM!  This year, since it was so cold, we opted for hot cider to warm us up!

Here's Bryce, waiting for the tractor driver to come back and take us into the orchard. 

Nicolas, too . . .

Both of the apple varieties we were looking for were at the same tractor stop, so we quickly filled our bags.  We all had an apple snack -- there's nothing better than an apple picked right off the tree!  YUM! 

Here comes the next tractor! 

Better get back here, Bryce!

Now that Nicolas has braces, he has to cut up his apples.  So, he brought along a pocket knife so that he could have an apple snack, too. 

This was record time for apple picking this year!  Less than 40 minutes and we were back out of the orchard!  I'm not exactly sure how I did this back when these guys were both toddlers and I had to carry two 1/2 bushel bags of apples, and keep track of the boys!!

Well, that was our excitement for the day.  After taking the apples to the car, we got our donuts and hot cider, and then headed home.  I had put together a crockpot of chicken noodle soup before we went to the orchard, so all I had to do when we got home was to add the noodles and meatballs.  It was a great dinner for a chilly day!!

Birthdays and a Car Show

Oh, man . . . the Tigers just lost to the Twins!!  Bummer!  What an exciting game, though.

OK, on to my post . . .

Last weekend we celebrated 3 birthdays . . . Bryce's 11th, and his cousins' -- Kathleen, also 11, and Joe, 7.

The family all gathered at Tom's brother and sister-in-law's house for dinner, followed by cake and presents.  Look at all those candles!!!

Money seemed to be the theme of the night . . . it's so difficult to buy for kids this age, especially when everybody knows that we are trying to minimize the "stuff" we have.  Bryce got a kick out of this $200 bill . . . LOL

On Sunday, we went to a car & bike show at the local Community College . . .

the day was gloomy, and we got rained on a few times, but it was still fun.  This college has a degree program in custom bike and car fabrication, and there were several cars on display that had been built by the students, including this Shelby that was being raffled off at the show.

We saw lots of cool stuff outside, too . . . Tom was dreaming big on this bike . . .

This is NOT your father's Mercury . . .

and I loved this little vintage Airstream!

On Monday, the boys were off school, so we had a few of Bryce's buddies over for another birthday party.  They played pool for awhile, had pizza and ice cream, and then went outside to play football.  We lucked out and had a pretty good day -- it was cloudy, but no rain, and not too cold.

Well, that was our busy weekend.  Now we're back to school and work, and waiting to hear from Duncan RV about our camper.  As of Friday, they were still waiting on some parts for the landing gear, and we haven't heard anything new since then.  We were hoping to be able to pick it up this weekend, but we'll have to wait and see, I guess. 

"Hi!" to everybody in Kerrville at the RV-Dreams Rally -- wish we were there!!