charging

last week as we were going to bed, spartacus tried to take his vtec phone with him, so he could stay up and play. i told him it needed to be plugged in so the battery didn't die, just like i do with mine. that was the only way he would give it up without a fight. the next day, at some point i walked into the bedroom to find his phone plugged in, using my phone charger.

later that day, when he found it again, he was so proud to tell me that he plugged his phone in by himself. such a clever kid!

miss me?

it's been quite a while since i have posted anything. i don't have anything profound to say either. i really didn't think anyone read my stupid blog, except my bro .. but, my friend mentioned to me last night that it's been a while. i had every intention to post my block of the months, took the pictures and tucked them away in a folder. so here's a brief catch up.

October

November 

December 

this quilt was supposed to be a queen size, but i really don't need another queen right now. i don't have any twin, so this was perfect for that. i did a simple sashing and matte board border. i  am really happy with how it turned out. the black really pulls everything together. and i have enough to make a matching pillowcase.

here it is all finished, ready to be quilted. 



The Cabin & The Catch

after our failed attempt at fishing earlier this year, we decided to try a different lake. Michelob's Grandma owns a beautiful cabin overlooking Strawberry Resevoir. She kindly let us spend a couple of days up there. As soon as we drove around the bend and could see water, Spartacus kept yelling at us that the water was over there, and we gotta go fishing!
As we pulled up to the cabin, we found 2 deer sitting next to the front door. Too bad my camera was packed away in the back. Grandma has a really, really nice cabin. The favorite part for the kids is that there are game machines downstairs. I'm talking Skeetball, Basketball, Pinball and Mrs. Pacman. Spartacus and Vengeance quickly found the games and we had a nice time relaxing and playing for a little while.

we then took a walk around the grounds, and found these pretties:

 

look closely and you can see ants running all over the flower and stem



i absolutely love thistles. in actuality, these are probably my favorite flower. lillies come at very close second.

on the way back from our walk, spartacus and i found these critters:

spartacus thought he would be helping the fuzzy one if he burried it in dirt, which made it curl up. you can see how well it blends with the dirt anyway. spartacus is the one that spotted it. and i found the little green one.

i had planned to meet my parent's in town, since they were joining us after the day's work. as i drove the 45 minutes to town, michelob took spartacus down down the hill to the lake. i dropped them off at the gate, they walked across the road, jumped the railing and hiked down some pretty rocky terrain to a tiny, quiet inlet of the lake. i was gonna pick them up on my way back to the cabin, but apparently the hooks we bought a few weeks ago got left at home, so they really didn't stay long. that didn't stop them from catching anything though. when we got back, spartacus was ready to show us his catch of the day.

michelob said as soon as he cast the line, 2 of this little guys attached themselves to the line. they had caught 3 this way, and kept the one to show us. i thought that was pretty cool.

we put it back in the water the next day when we all went fishing, again.

we drove around the lake to find a good spot. we thought we had found a pretty good place. there was a couple other groups near by. well, we didn't catch anything there. turned out the others were catching crawfish. the kids had a good time running around the mountain terrain and picking flowers and tall weeds. spartacus was way too curious, so my dad took him on a nature walk. after a couple hours, we decided vengeance was getting too tired and needed a nap. plus we weren't catching anything and thought we should try a new place. michelob wanted to go back to the spot from the day before. the rest of us went back to the cabin to rest a bit. about 20 minutes later, michelob called me (amazingly had cell service up there) and said to bring the camera and hooks i just bought, because he left them in the car. i hurried down to find this .. 

this is the first fish that spartacus caught! it is pretty small, and really should have been sent back, but the hook went thru its brain, so we had to keep it. he sure was protective of it! he didn't want me to take a picture, and later tried to release it.

this place was a frickin hot spot. as soon as the line hit the water, it was getting nibbles. 1 or 2 seconds in the water and we had a catch. then there would be 20 or so fish following it as the line was reeled in. it was amazing! we caught so many fish. we let most of them go, cuz they were small. it was so fun! we ended up keeping 3 fish. they were about 8inches long, thus long enough to keep, except the first one.

spartacus with another catch.
it jumped while he was holding it up for a picture and scared him.
he didn't want to hold it after that.



michelob releasing a little fish



here's my first catch of the day. itty bitty.

there was still tons of crawfish at our little hot spot. they was at least 5 by us at all times. they were poking out of the water! we started catching them with our hands, just for fun. those suckers are fast! there was even a few that started fighting with each other. i hope you can see well enough in these pictures. i didn't take my polarizer with me.

spartacus still goes "fishing" everyday. he always has some kind of rope, string or long scraps of my fabric in hand to fish with. sometimes he will get sticks from the yard or kitchen utensils. the other day we took a trip to the army/navy store to look at some things, and he found some kid size fishing poles. he would not put those things down. kept saying we needed to go fishing. he even got one out for vengeance and then ran around the store looking for the fish. he sure loves fishing!

September BOM

I guess I should get off my big butt and post my September block. It's been sitting here, waiting for a picture for a couple of weeks now. At the last meeting, I was able to pick up some fabric from the same line for my sashing, border, backing and binding. I didn't take pictures. You may have to wait until I get the quilt done.



Lovers Lane

See how lazy I am being. I didn't even crop out my ugly grey cutting mat.
A lotta stuff has been going on around here. If I can find the time to take pictures, I will show you.

 

the one that got away

The other night i was making a quick fish dinner for vengeance. she loves fish and just couldn't wait for dinner to be made. my parents were coming over and it was gonna be another half hour. i thought i would heat up some frozen tilapia for her while we waited. i've done it before in the microwave and it only takes about 4 or 5 minutes. after about 3 minutes i went to check on it and there was smoke coming from the microwave. i quickly opened the door and a huge plume of gray smoke filled the kitchen. it smelled horrible. i kept trying to fan the smoke out the back door and shoo the kids out to the living room at the same time.

here's what was left in the microwave

the fish is about half the size it started out as and as you can see, there is a hole in the plate. i know what you're thinking, and it wasn't the plate. the plate is microwavable and has been used in the microwave several times before. i really don't know what happened. michelob suspects some metal was in the fish. i hope he is not thinking the mercury content that is sometimes found in deep sea fish, but maybe he is. scary thought either way.

it's been a few days and even though i cleaned the microwave, everytime i open it, it smells like very badly burned popcorn. and Spartacus keeps saying he wants to see the fire.

August BOM

Wow! I am way behind in getting my August Block Of the Month up. I finished it the next day, and it has been sitting, waiting for a close up, for 2 weeks. I've had a busy couple weeks, trying to get a great number of quilts ready to go up on the frames. This week has been focused on getting all the backs done. these quilts range from baby to king, and i think the number is close to a dozen. i'll be even busier next week quilting them all.

Chance Encounter

I Have Skin!

i completely forgot to post possibly the funniest thing ever said.  

it happened while we were fishing a couple weeks ago.

i was walking in front of Spartacus, when i heard him say,

"Look at this! I have skin!"

"You do!" I said. "How much skin do you have?"

"I have LOTS of skin!"