Mimi’s ‘Adventure Wall’

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My three babies
Finally took down the baby pictures in our hallway to the kid’s bedrooms. I mean … Ricky and Katie are married and one of them is having our first grandbaby in a few weeks. It’s time. Life is a transition, so I decided to get with the program! But what to replace them with … hmmm.

I’ve been plotting and planning an “Adventure Wall” in the family room for a while now with photos of world travels. I’ve finally got our favorites all picked out with about half of the photos blown-up. My engineer/husband has the large wall they will rest on plotted out on paper like a blueprint. Heck, I even know how many vertical and horizontal pictures I can fit on the wall before it blows up.

Carrying on with the same theme, I wanted something different for the walls vacated by my babies. It was earlier this year I decided Mimi should have her own “Adventure Wall.” She has been going to a special needs summer camp (Camp C.A.M.P. near Comfort, Texas and Camp for All in Burton, Texas) since she was eight-years-old having her own kind of adventures. Mimi will be thirty years old in July. Every year a disposable camera went with Mimi to camp for her “buddy” to take photographs. We’ve gotten some interesting photos of her fishing, petting boa constrictors, in a canoe and even hanging from a zip line. A couple of times they even got her in the pool. I think it is the splashing she detests. But by far Mimi’s favorite activity has always been horseback riding.

Obviously, Mimi on the horse is the first photograph she sees as I wheel her down the hallway to her room.

Her bobbin is busy!

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A couple of years ago I decided to kick my quilts up a bunch of notches. I started bringing all my quilt tops to the fabulous Kim Norton, of A Busy Bobbin (www.abusybobbin.com). To say she is JUST awesome is an understatement.

In the past, I tried hand quilting. It takes a long time and I wasn’t very good at it. Blame it on being a lefty! I tried doing my own machine quilting. My results were nice enough, but with limited time, I wasn’t cranking out many quilts each year with the added work.

In the past, I’d inspected the details on many lovely quilts at various quilt shows, but didn’t think any of my quilts could look that good. When my friend Angela raved about Kim, I decided to give her a try. The rest is history!

The most recent quilt Kim quilted for me is for our grandbaby-boy-to-be. He is now the size of a cabbage, as that is the thing to do these days … compare unborn babes to fruits and veggies. We’ll meet him in person in early May!

I love bringing my quilt tops to Kim. It’s a blast watching her creative juices flow as the unfinished quilt top is laid over her longarm machine. We talk about the quilt’s vision and then Kim does this little dance with spools of thread that she takes down from her spool rack. She lays strands across the quilt top to see what will work best. We chose a variegated thread. Although I have several awesome custom quilted designs from Kim, lots of the quilts use an all-over, or pantograph pattern. For the little cabbage’s quilt, we flipped through a book and picked out one called “Animal Crackers” from Urban Elementz with zoo animals all over it. I love the results. What do you think?

Help astronaunt make a quilt!

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Did you know that one of our astronauts is a quilter? Her name is Karen Nyberg. I recall seeing a photo of her in our Houston newspaper hand-piecing a square in space while on board of the International Space Station. I was impressed.

So when I saw the flyer at the Quilt Festival last fall, I certainly grabbed one. Calling all quilters! Create just one star-themed block. Make it measure 9-1/2″ square unfinished. Your choice of colors … traditional or modern. No embellishments. And don’t forget to sign your block with permanent ink on the front with your name and location. In other words, c’mon quilters, here is your big chance. Mail your block by August 1, 2014, and you too can be a small part of a ginormous quilt in Houston’s 40th-Anniversary International Quilt Festival this fall.

Address is as follows: Star Block Challenge, Attn: Rhianna Griffin, 7660 Woodway, Suite 550, Houston, TX 77063. Be there or be square … or should I say … exactly 9-1/2 inches square!

Mystery of the chewed on afghan solved!

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Chewed on

Lulu did it!
Hubby and I were sitting on the couch last night snuggled under the afghan I knitted for him several years ago. It’s heavy and knitted with two thick strands for maximum warmth. All of a sudden I heard Rick gasp. It was very unlike him to make that sound especially during an episode of “The Big Bang Theory.” After Rick pulled up one end of the afghan I sneered.

“Lulu just took a bite out of my afghan,” Rick growled in Lulu’s direction.

The yarn strands were still wet with her doggie DNA. My heart sank. Lulu is mostly well behaved … but has her moments. She is partial to shoes having taken out my favorite pair about a month ago. Now we know Lulu also likes knitted things. And that means it can be confirmed that Lulu was obviously the pooch that took the chunk out of my favorite afghan last year. The mystery is solved. Lulu is definitely on my “poop list.”

It’s for the little rutabaga

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I knew when I first laid eyeballs on the quilt kit at the International Quilt Festival last fall, it would be my first purchase. I mean … our daughter and son-in-law will have our first grandbaby in early May. Hooray! Oh, and our daughter also works at the Houston Zoo (www.houstonzoo.org). Naturally, a quilter, and grandmother-to-be, I had to run out and make a quilt for the little rutabaga.

We used to call our grandbaby-to-be a “sprout” for the longest time. It seems now all the rage is to compare their current size to fruits and veggies. Today it is the size of a rutabaga!

Picking which animal quilt option was a no-brainer, as back last October we didn’t know if it was a boy or girl. I figured the giraffe was generally gender neutral, although the pink flamingo and the monkey were also pretty darn cute. I have to say applique is not my favorite way to manipulate fabric, but I decided to jump in anyway with both feet. With the help of my trusty “Applique Pressing Sheet,” I could do this project in no time. Made it easier to build the whole giraffe and then fuse one large piece onto the quilt top.

Next step is to sew around the edges of the applique pieces before sending it on to my long-arm quilting lady!

The adorable animal quilt is published by “The Teacher’s Pet,” http://www.the-teachers-pet.com, out of Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The quilt pattern is called “Peek-a-Boo Pals” and includes all four animals in the pattern. An alphabet chart is also included. I opted not to put a name on it since the first name is not entirely settled.

2013 … a look back

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I only managed to complete two quilts in 2013. I have loftier quilting goals for 2014! The first completed 2013 quilt was a Christmas present for one of my husband’s many, many lovely sisters. Dipping into my collection of Christmas fat quarters, I used a disappearing nine-patch pattern (future blog alert) that I learned to make at our church’s prayer quilt ministry. A real stash buster and lots of fun to make! Did I mention that Becky is one of nine sisters in the family? She lives in San Antonio and runs a soup kitchen. I finished the quilt in the nick of time … only one year late!

The other quilt went to a charity gala for The Village Learning Center (www.villagelac.org). I make one every year for them. It’s the least I can do. Among other wonderful things, the Center runs an adult day program that my special needs daughter attends. Mimi’s favorite day of the week is Tuesday when her class goes bowling! Life should be so simple.

Just so you don’t think I was a total slug in 2014, I did manage to make coordinating pillow cases, dust ruffle and a little skirt for under Mimi’s television. It goes nicely with the quilt I made for her wall in 2012 with a collection of Kaffe Fassett fat quarters. The fabric on one side of the pillow cases is blue and the other green. The pillow cases were a booger to make until I learned the “hot dog bun” method of making pillow cases from my friend Angela. Now I just gotta figure out what to do with Mimi’s curtain-less window!

A twist on ‘Sharing Sunday’

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This year for ‘Sharing Sunday’ at St. Martha’s Catholic Church in Kingwood, hubby and I cashed in a year’s worth of small change before heading down to our local toy store. On the Park (www.onthepark.com) is a lovely toy store that really shines this time of year … and they gift wrap … not my strongest gift. We came out of there with 10 baby gifts. It was a new world’s record for the Frantz family. We usually wind up with 5 or 6 baby dolls.

Our “twist” to our church’s event this year was all the gifts purchased were for babies about eight months old. Yep … we are getting in some practice on what it will be like being grandparents. Our first will be born in May … so by next Christmas we will have an eight-month-old bouncing on our knees.

I wrote a column this week about this very subject for my newspaper (www.ourtribune.com) with lots more words … no photographs … because that is what columns are … lots of words. You can also check it out on the “You Gotta Laugh” tab of this blog in case you are interested.

I love my Christmas LED lights!

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I don’t know what boulder I’ve been living under. I’ve just discovered battery-powered LED Christmas lights. My friend, Gwenn, was telling us at our annual Christmas Bee Party (basically, we are friends who quilt) this week.

“I have them all over my house. I love them,” Gwenn said.

Since I don’t frequent hardware establishments unless hubby gives me a very detailed list, I didn’t have a clue what they were. Bells went off in my head as I looked at our mantle … decorated … but certainly lacking in the “sparkle” arena. Note the “before” and “after” shots.

My only complaint with the LED lights I purchased is you have to have a very teeny tiny cross-point (Philips) screwdriver (not included in the box). I struggled with my tiny sewing machine (common) screwdriver for 45 minutes before my husband came home from work. Give me a sewing machine over a screwdriver any day. I did get two screws out, but it was a struggle. Also, each LED strand requires 4 AA batteries.

Bottom line … love the lights! Get some before they run out!

Poinsettias for a good cause

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I’ve been in the Christmas spirit for nearly a week. So if you catch me humming a little Christmas tune in the grocery store … just pinch me and I promise to stop. Just finished putting the finishing touches on our home for Christmas. No presents under the tree yet. UPS and FedEx are busy assisting with that project.

The last decorating issue was the purchase of several lovely poinsettias. I bought them the other day at the Brookwood Store in Old Town Spring. The shop is open year-round, but really sparkles this time of year. They sell flowers, plants, garden statues and lots of interesting handcrafted gifts. Did I mention the poinsettias come in several different “flavors” with names like Red Glitter, Ice Crystal Pink, good old dependable red, pink, white and sometimes even exotic poinsettias called Monet and da Vinci? What I wouldn’t give to be a lady bug on the glass ceiling of their greenhouses!

Brookwood (www.brookwoodcommunity.org) also has lovely retail stores located in Brookshire, Houston, Spring, and Katy all benefitting adults with special needs. It’s an organization with a mission near and dear to my heart. They have a residential facility and vocational program located 40 miles west of Houston. I used to dream that it would be a place our Mimi would someday thrive when hubby and I were too old and crackled to care for her. That special place has yet to be revealed.

So for now … we joyfully wait … for the reason for the season!