Stuff and Things

Here is a list of things in my head...

• It's so nice to have full cupboards again. I put off the shopping for about a week too long.
• I love early bedtime
• Can't wait for summer break.
• Nachos are superior.
• I'm a little fed up with our attorney. He is less than speedy.
• What do you think Anna is doing?

• I have no idea.
• I still can't believe I got my side of the room clean.
• I have to work in an hour and 10 minute.
• I'm so excited for girl's camp.
• My friend came over tonight and gave me a scrubber brush from Disneyland. I love it.
• I'm sewing another 9 patch quilt because I am covetous of my friend's quilt she just finished.
• I have a great story for you which will be posted on Friday. Code words are poop, power tools, otter boxes and cell phone. There may be a bonus story about a fan or a washer. You'll have to wait and see. It will be worth tuning in for.
• I hate cats.
• Sometimes I like to talk like a robot.
• beep.
• We are out of brownie mixes.
• sad day.
•  okay, time to go get my bag packed for worky. It's in an hour.

finish it up friday

So here's the story of this quilt, I call it my 'fat quilt'. It could also be 'instant gratification' because it took less than 6 hours to complete from start to finish.

Here are my pretty fat quarters. I did not iron them or trim them. I opened two, unfolded them, sewed them together, rinsed and repeated. 

 I sewed them in strips and then tacked them to the back and batting in a quilt as your go style, without really measuring so it's not on perfectly straight but I don't really care.

 Here they are all sewed to the back in 4 seams.

Now this is pretty.

 Here it is. Not perfectly straight, not perfectly square, but perfectly me and I love it a lot.

I also had another finish which I am not posting because it is a present and I know that person checks my blog sometimes. The End.

Awkward and Awesome

Awkward:

• I started this post last week so I'd have a great list and I can't find it now. more lame than awkward.
• I saw the homeless people on the west side by Red Robin change shifts. There was 4 different dudes and one was giving directions to each of them.
• I was told I don't do any work at home by one of my children. It was at the end of the day after I'd completed loads of laundry-including mating socks, cleaned the toilets and made a delicious dinner. Earlier that day I'd made a queen sized quilt. I probably could have done more, but I had to sleep because I work the graveyard shift. That child is fired.
• I am teaching Matthew how to speak while he burps. My grandpa taught me so I'm passing it on. Don't judge. The other night at dinner, Anna gave the prayer. When it was over, Matthew 'said' amen and I looked at him. He looked a little nervous and I said to him, 'Do you want to try that again?' He then said 'Amen.' The next thing I said fits in the 'things I never knew I'd have to say' category. 'It is never appropriate to burp 'amen.'

Awesome:

• I have two sewing finishes to show off tomorrow and they are fantastic!
• The guy who owns our house wants to sell it. We do not want to buy it-there are too many problems. I have decided to start staging the house. We will not move until the fall and we will definitely stay in our ward boundaries, hopefully in our same neighborhood. I'm excited about this because I love a good pack job and I love throwing crap away. I told Ken yesterday to start bring home boxes.
• Girls's Camp. I'm going this year. I went to a meeting on Tuesday night and I had so many ideas I want to do, I could hardly sleep that night. It is going to be awesome.

Awkward and Awesome:

• I went over to my friends house on Sunday and we had many great laughs from both awkward and awesome conversations.  Key words from said topics were uterus, rationalization, rust, perfect pitch piano teachers, munchies after getting high and the origin of red headed children. Amy and I are going to play a piano duet in August in church. It too may be awkward and awesome. I worry that I will get the giggles while we are playing and we will conclude our piece with a riveting score of heart and soul. We shall see. Either way, she's awesome...and awkward...and humble. She told me herself.

Good Idea - Bad Idea

Good Idea: Living to be 34 1/2 years old.
Bad Idea: Not acknowledging a person turning 34 1/2 years old.
ps, today is my half birthday. I'm 34 1/2 years old. I made myself brownies and shared them with my friend Amy. It's the only way I can be her bff.

Good Idea: Expressing dreams and desires to your parents.
Bad Idea: Telling your mom, 'I wish our house was a clean as the temple.'
Result: Extra chores everyday this week to get our house as clean as the temple. [Me thinks this is a pipe dream.]

Good Idea: Playing draw something with me.

[Look at this picture I drew...best one ever!]

Good Idea: Writing your own Good Idea - Bad Idea blog post [Amy].
Bad Idea: Leaving all the awesomeness to me. Although, I can totally handle it.

In conclusion:
Hap Bir t m. Hap Bir t m. Hap Bir t mmmmm. Hap Bir t me.  Yay!! Where's my gifts?

Awkward and Awesome

Awkward:

• No filter on the things I say at Relief Society meetings...or the food I allow onto my plate. 
• Have you ever eaten a wedge salad? I need to perfect my manners for that one.
• Being shhh'd.
• Being corrected by a 69 year old man who is developmentally delayed. He was right though!
• I have been reading books lately that have more suspense than my normal book choices. I find myself scared at weird times, with no warning.  Using the restroom at Walmart, while at work in the middle of the night, at church during a prayer. I have problems. 
• Our ward choir director, who is a very talented lady, was kind of annoyed on Sunday and gave me a death glare when I didn't find my part. She was so serious, I got the giggles and missed the verse!
• Lack of comments on this blog. Don't be lame people.

Awesome:

• My friend April came over twice this week to work on her quilt. She gave me three pairs of socks for helping her. & her quilt is beautiful.
• Walking with my friend.
• I don't work Sundays anymore. I get to stay all three hours of church and I get to go to choir again.
• Draw Something. Play me! My name on there is dedrac4. Let's be friends.

Awkward and Awesome:

• Our friend, Caleb H. is hanging out with Ken and me while his mom is at mutual. He and Ken are playing Xbox and talking politics. Caleb is winning the argument.  [Awkward for Ken, Awesome for Caleb...and me]

Good Idea - Bad Idea

Good Idea: Checking out books from the library.
Bad Idea: Not returning said books on time.
Consequence: I just paid $60 in library book fees. For my big children. They owe me. A lot.

Good Idea: Cooking a corned beef in the crockpot for over 24 hours.  20 hours on warm, 4-6 on low. It's super tender and delicious.
Bad Idea: Adding carrots to the corned beef. Now it tastes like carrots.  gross.

Good Idea: Suggesting excellent shows to watch on Netflix to my Dad.
Consequence: He has spent a lot of time lately watching White Collar.
Outcome: He loves that show and has informed me I'm on his 'list.'
ps, that list if of favorite children. It's actually a plaque. My name is the only one on it.

Good Idea: Calling Gina to talk visit and inform her how clever I am.
Bad Idea: Gina not answering her phone. not clever.

Good Idea: Letting Matthew keep the rabbit he caught in the yard.
Bad Idea: I liked the dumb rabbit and then it died so we bought a new rabbit today. A black Holland Lop named Minion.

Good Idea: Calling your friend when you don't have anything to do.
Bad Idea: Ending up talking about poop because she didn't have anything to do either.
We are mature. But we really did say the word poop, several times.

a little bit of too much information.

• Right now my family is having FHE without me. At the movies. 
• Three things I hate detest don't like hate doing with my children. [I';d rather have a root canal.]

1. Going to the movies.
2. Bowling.
3. Taking them to the park.

• I wore a pair of socks today. It's the first time in over 3 months. I did not have one clean pair. In fact, I'm wearing Nicole's socks right now. Why you ask? Because she's worn all my socks and has them hidden in a deep dark abyss in her bedroom. They aren't mated and the dirty feet stains don't match the actual pair of socks. I gave her all my socks. Now I'm not upset anymore. I just don't own any socks.
• Relating to the bullet directly above this one, my feet look just like my mom's. I'm not talking bone structure here. I'm talking about extremely calloused, cracked, and an odd shade of grey - sometimes black heels. They aren't dirty. They are stained and chapped.
• To remedy the problem above, I have put away my plethora of flip flops [14 pairs in every color], which I wear all year long, and bought 2 pairs of shoes which require me to wear socks. Also, I have a pumice stone. [Are you grossed out yet? No, I didn't take a photo.]
• I don't own any socks.

Anyways.

• I feel like I've just written a warped story with the format of if you give a mouse a cookie.
• I want to paint my living room again. I'm shopping for the perfect color.
• I bought a bunny. Her name is minion. I gave her to Matthew.
• Have you watched Sherlock on Netflix? Three episodes made by the BBC. It's mostly awesome.
• I have gone on a long walk two days in a row. I almost have my quota in for the year.
• Just kidding Donna.
• Someone needs to invite me to a girls' night. I'll bring the fondue. Me too lazy to plan my own until my birthday slumber party. 
• Speaking of my slumber party, I needs to get my invites made. April 24 is my half birthday. 
• I think that's it. Have a good night.

Memory Monday Mash Up - Awkward and Awesome

Awkward:

The fact that I have the following jingles/song lyrics memorized. If you do too, this is why we are friends.

• Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun.
• I toured around the world, from London to the Bay. It's hammer, go hammer, mc hammer, you hammer and the rest can go and play.
• All 6 words in Smells Like Teen Spirit

I had the meanest Young Women's president when I was 15ish. We had a garage sale for a YW camp fundraiser and I found a witch's hat. I gave it to her and told her it reminded me of her. She wore it the whole day. It turns out she was really Christ like and I was a mean young woman. [I saw her in the temple a couple of months ago. She remembered me.]

When I was 14 I was at a youth fireside and out of no where I snorted. I wasn't laughing or even talking. It was as though I needed to sneeze but a loud pig snort came out.  I. Wanted. To. Die. .

The feeling of insecurity I had/have around teenagers. As a young child, especially as a teenager and even now. I'm so not cool enough!

Awesome [and a little naughty]:

Garen and I convinced Gina that licking the end of a 9 volt battery would taste like strawberries. She tried it. It didn't.

I made my first baby quilt when I was 12. [yes, sewing had to enter this post. I just love it. and mr. bernina too.]

Garen and I had a paper route from 12am to 4 am 5 days a week when I was 17. We ate a lot of Shari's food, watched movies at the Silverdale Hotel with Ryan, and played really bad music really loud.

I guess that's all I've got...I'm not that awesome after all.  :)

finish it up friday!

I have three finishes this week. They are all quilt tops I started in 2011. By completing these 3 tops and the 1 from last week, it means I only have 1 more quilt top WIP from last year to complete. I have also started quilting one of these tops and I hope to have them all 100% done by the end of the month. How is that for ambition? I'm also excited because I won't need to go to the store to buy batting or fabric to finish any of these. So, here are my three quilt top finishes.

A hexagon lap quilt. I'm backing this with a heavy denim so Anna can play with it outside. I may even tie it. I grew up with tied quilts and as much as I enjoy a beautifully machine quilted blanket, there is something nostalgic about acrylic yard and an ugly crazy quilt. I. Love. It.

I had a name picked out for this one, which I can't remember anymore because I now refer to it as 'the pain the rear quilt.' I have picked out more seams doing this thing than I even care to count. Thank goodness it's pretty. 

 I am using a grey sheet for the back and quilting with yellow thread. Don't be scared of this quilt job, I've also picked out everything I have quilted. Currently, I'm not speaking to this pain in the rear quilt. We will try again next week. Right now it's been shunned to a dark corner.

Lastly, I did a workshop through psiquilt and this is my quilt top finish from that workshop. It's a queen size, measuring in at 88*106. When I think about quilting this, I get heartburn. I may actually pay someone with a long arm to finish it for me.

So those are my finishes. Although the quilts are not finished, I feel victorious because of the amount of sewing I did this week while managing to make dinner each night and not neglect my children.

I'm linking up with CMQ Finish it Friday.

Awkward and Awesome

Awkward:

• Ken looks prettier in a woman's hat than I do.
• In Anna's class they have a color system to let the parents know how they are doing in class each day. Green is the best, Yellow means you had a hard time focusing and Red means you got in trouble. The first few days of this system, Anna was a yellow. [What can I say, she's a Cheney. She has things to say to her friends...all the time] We finally told her she was going to start getting in trouble if she couldn't get on the green [at least part of the time.] She has been on green ever since that day. However, when the paper for parent teacher conferences came out, it was printed on a yellow form. Anna has taken to hiding all the yellow papers which are sent home from her school because she thinks they represent her behavior. It is needless to say, I missed her conference? I found the hoard too late. Anna now knows those papers have nothing to do with her behavior.

Awesome:

• My schedule at work has changed. Although I am still working straight graves, they are security shifts. This means if the clients are asleep and my work for the shift is completed, I can sleep too. It's nice to get a couple hours while at work. It makes coming off the graveyard shift a whole lot easier.
• I completed 3 quilt tops this week.
• Chocolate covered strawberries. [awesome and delicious]
• My plan for my memory Monday [on Monday] it's going to be a mash up and I think I'm completely clever and hilarious.  Of course that last part should probably be listed on the awkward section.
• Lemon Sour Cream Pie from Shari's. To. Die. For.

Awkward and Awesome:

• naughty dog

Wordless Wednesday - AKA random photos I found on my phone.

Good Idea - Bad Idea

Good Idea: Taking candid photos with your family.
Better Idea: use a frame!

Good Idea: Loading the dishwasher.
Bad Idea: Using Dawn soap instead of dishwasher detergent. {Not so much a bad idea, she just wanted to see what would happen. We will call it a science experiment. Now she knows. And knowing is half the battle!}

Good Idea: Buying a large amount of strawberries for a good price.
Bad Idea: Feeling obligated to eat all those strawberries - with chocolate.

Good Idea: Corned beef and cabbage for Easter dinner.
Bad Idea: Boys eating cabbage for Easter dinner.
ps, I made the best corned beef of my life for Easter dinner. I slow cooked it for over 24 hours. 20 hours on warm, 7 on low. It was awesome!

Blog Challenge - Day 30

A picture of myself taken today and 5 good things that happened since I started this challenge.

I am a cheater. Here is a picture taken of me of Saturday. I have no makeup on today. You no get to see that. This is a family friendly blogdango. This is Adam and me.

5 things which have happened in the last 30 days.

1. I was made ward camp director on Sunday. I get to go to girls' camp.  I am SO EXCITED!
2. Something I new-I have no control over my consequences, only my choices. Something I relearned-I also have no control over other peoples' choices or consequences, even if they affect me.
3. I am not interested in Downton Abby. I tried it. I turned it off. The End
4. I was switched from my most favorite house at work to a different with no explanation.
5. Amazon.com replaced my kindle and I don't hate it now.

thanks for joining me in this blog challenge. I can't believe I didn't miss one day!

Blog Challenge - Day 29

3 wishes hopes/expectations

My kids will go on missions.

My kids will get married in the temple.

Someone please bring me a diet pepsi and a reece's peanut butter cup.

Blog Challenge - Day 28

Something that stresses me out.

Car Problems.

I can handle just about anything. My car better not break down. It's not allowed to need a jump. It's not supposed to run out of gas. The tires needs to stay inflated. The heat and air needs to work when they're supposed to.  The End.

Finish It Up Friday

I am linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts Finish Up Friday (for my first finish of the year!)

In December I linked up with this post, it was my 12 dresden plates and a sketch of the final blanket. Well, I have finally finished the quilt they belong on.

This blanket measure 66*88. I did not sandwich the blanket. I put the good sides together, on top of the batting (Warm and White) and then pulled it through. I quilted it by machine appliqueing the pointed dresdens into place. I am completely pleased with how it turned out.

Also, because I have finished a WIP, I am following the rule of starting 2 more WIPs to replace it. Here is one of my new ones.

What have you finished lately?

Blog Challenge - Day 27

Original photo of the city I live in:

I don't have one of the city. But here is a pic of the view.

Behold the beautiful Mt. Raineir.

Blog Challenge - Day 26

My dream wedding

One word people.

ELOPE! Seriously. Rent the dress. Get your living ordinance recommend, pick a temple and get married. Tell everyone after it's done and have a party 6 months later, after you know what you need.

Blog Challenge - Day 25

Put your iPod on shuffle and name the first 10 songs.

Here goes something awesome nothing:

1. Life in a Northern Town - Sugarland
2. If you're Reading This -Tim McGraw
3. What Say You - Travis Tritt & John Mellencamp
4. I'm Not That Girl (from Wicked)
5. Troubadour - George Strait
6. Raise Your Glass - Pink
7. Duke of Earl - Oldies
8. As She's Walking Away - Zac Brown Band w/ Alan Jackson
9. Seasons in the Sun - Terry Jacks
10. Sweet Caroline - my boyfriend, Neil Diamond, who has the same birthday as my Dad. I love them both.

Blog Challenge - Day 24

Something I've learned

 If a 5 year old goes to a basketball game and there happens to be another five year old present, said children will not be watching much basketball.

Matthew needs more practice with the clippers.

Blog Challenge - Day 23

Favorite Movie.  There seems to be a glitch. I wrote about this very topic on Day 7. So I am picking a new topic. It requires back story. Unlike Flynn Ryder, I do back story.

Ken and I have been invited to a birthday party at the end of this week.  When we RSVPd, we had to include a song that reminded us of the birthday boy. It's basically a free opportunity to roast a dear friend - my brother, Ryan. This means, 'I feel pretty' from West Side Story was completely appropriate!

For today's post, I have picked a song that reminds me of each of my 7 siblings as well as my parents. You can click the name of the song to listen to it on YouTube.

Mom The Mashed Potato Dee Dee Sharp because she's the only person I ever knew who could dance this dance, until she taught Gina
Dad Chug a Lug Roger Miller because he says it reminds him of his high school years and he's the one who introduced me to Roger Miller, whom I love.
Wendi Piano Man Billy Joel because she introduced me to this song when she bought the sheet music. I still can't play it, but she can!
Ryan - I Wish I Was a Punkrocker Sandi Thom because he owes me a nickle for knowing it. Ryan, with inflation, it's $2.00 now. I want my two dollars!
Heather - Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows Leslie Gore because we listened to this song no less than 200 times on a record, while we lived in the Fowler house in Boise.
Garen - Little Toot  The Andrew Sisters because I have called him little toot on and off since he joined the coast guard.
Adam Anything You Can Do I Can Better Annie Get Your Gun because he can do many things better than many other people.
Gina I Got You Babe Sonny and Cher because she sings Cher's part and I sing Sonny's. We ROCK at karaoke with this song and Long Time Gone by the Dixie Chicks.
Kyle - White and Nerdy Weird Al Duh!

Blog Challenge - Day 22

What's in my purse?

This is a little bit personal, don't you think?
ok, I'm going to tell you, but I won't offer any explanation. You can judge if you want. I won't be offended.

• 7 tubesof chapstick/lip gloss/ lip stuff
• an order for blood work and a mammogram  {You asked!!}
• my wallet
• fruit snacks
• mustard
• hand sanetizer
• wet wipes
• neosporin
• sleep aid
• xanax
• lotion
• many receipts from target, kohl's, joann's and winco
• gum
• sunday school study guide
• a BOM seminary bookmark
• 7 pamphlets explaining various STDs. {these are for a gag gift and not the reason I am having blood work done. I offer no explanation.}

The End.