October 8!!!

On October 8, 1959 in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, a little girl was born to Les and Mary Jo Walker, their first. Les was 24, Mary Jo was 21. It's hard to believe I am 50 today, I really actually CANNOT BELIEVE IT because I feel so much younger, how did that happen? Well, I'm trying to feel good about it. My father got a scanner that scans old slides and sent me these photos, they are amazing.


My grandfather delivered me, here he is outside the Operating Room. Love the purple feet from the dye.


My mother was all of 21 here, eek. She looks so rosy cheeked and perhaps a little unsure of motherhood.


And my father, all of 24 and looking like a member of the rat pack!

My grandfather was an Obstetrician in the small town of Pine Bluff but he also had a passion for art. The story goes, he went to college to study art but when his mother found out he was drawing from nude models, she made him quit. So he became and Obstetrician/Gynecologist! I don't know if that's true or not but I love it! He was an artist and did beautiful pastel portraits of all his grandchildren and his beloved dachshunds. I still have the portrait he did of me in my bedroom. He also did needlepoint and I have a pillow he made. He died in the 1970s.

My father followed in his footsteps and went to medical school and also became an OB-GYN. And like his father, was also very artistic, which made him a good surgeon but he also had a model railroad and spent hours making the scenery, painting the cars and engines to look realistic. He still has one today, an outdoor version.

My mother went on to have 3 more children, pretty close together, so she spent her younger years pretty much driving car pools, cooking and doing laundry. When the last one of us moved out, she was only 50 (notice I say only???) and she and my father eventually retired out here in Colorado and they live on a mountain overlooking a gorgeous canyon and they hike almost daily.

And here they are today! The reason I am who I am and have come halfway to the century mark (eek) Of course my mother is wearing one of my aprons. :)

GNOMES on DINNERWARE

I just found this dinnerware on a site I had bookmarked (P.O.S.H Chicago) but hadn't been to in awhile, oh my gosh are they cute! Here's a little more about the store. Lots of other fun stuff there.

Blog Love

Melanie at Fabric Shopper posted this the other day and I almost missed it! Thanks for the compliment!

And while you're on the Fabric Shopper blog, click on the Christmas 2009 Idea-Zine link on the right side of the page. It's a pdf download with ideas for Christmas sewing projects. And I am also featured there.

Happy Monday.

Crafty Things

Driven partly by my husband putting a wet glass on our desk, I decided to make some drink coasters using fabric and cork rounds. I had the idea for awhile and finally found some cork thingees locally (they are easy to order online but I wanted immediate gratification) at Michael's.


I used Cicada Studio fabric, lovely hand printed fabric by Michelle Engel Bencsko. This fabric is linen and hemp.



I just traced the cork form onto the back of the fabric, cut it out and used Mod Podge to glue it on. Then after that set awhile, I brushed on a few more layers of Mod Podge to seal it. The Mod Podge completely sealed the edges so there is no way the edges will ravel, pretty cool. Although we do use them now, there are a few things I might do differently next time.

The cork is dark so when the light colored fabric is on the cork, it does darken the color a little. I would use some white cardboard next time to a) lighten the fabric color and b) give the cork some more stability. Which is the second thing I would change. The cork is kind of flimsy and I was envisioning a more stiff coaster so I think a thick piece of cardboard would do the trick.

And one other problem I can't solve. If the glass is sweating, it sticks to the coaster, annoying. Not sure how to fix that.

Fall

It's been a crazy few weeks. First we were able to go on a last minute much needed vacation to the beach in Mexico. It was hectic getting ready and all and the travel was a little crazy but we arrived and prepared for a great time when my petsitter called to tell me my sweet pup Rocky had died. It was pretty devastating but his health had been deteriorating the past year and though his spirit was strong as ever, I could see his body wasn't keeping up. I made a tribute to him here.



We managed to enjoy the vacation, worrying a bit about the pup left behind who has never been alone but the sand and the surf helped to ease the anxieties.

Now on queue, as the last day of Summer rolls out and the first day of Fall arrives, it has turned downright chilly here! Yesterday we even had a few minutes of SNOW. Eek. But it's making me think quilts and other warm things.

And speaking of quilts, I finally finished my Mod Sampler quilt!

NEW PATTERN

It's in my shop.

Attention!

I have a confession. Since this will soon be leaked out to the press, I wanted to tell my loyal fans first. As you may or may not have already suspected, I have to admit that I am, and have been for awhile, an agent in the FIA (Fabric Intelligence Agency). In case you don’t know about the FIA, it is a covert agency, started in the 60s during the Cold War when the Communist regime in Russia threatened to make all fabric gray and only gray. Thanks to the efforts of this small and secret group, the war on fabric was won and color restored to fabrics throughout the world. The FIA is determined to protect fabric and never allow this threat to happen again.

More recently, a new threat arose from the Textile Mafia, a criminal faction that has been methodically stopping print production on the most popular fabric lines (think Heather Ross Lightning Bugs and Denyse Schmidt Flea Market Fancy). Fabric designers who stepped in to stop the mafia were shot (with textile inks, very messy and permanent) and manufacturers were threatened by ink wielding thugs who threatened to replace all colored ink with you guessed it, Cold War Gray. Although not general public knowledge, FIA agents throughout the world have been working to stop this new insurgence of evil.

And finally, you may have heard in the news that with the new regime change in Washington, the old regime is being investigated and the FIA has not escaped scrutiny. We are being investigated for fraud and extortion. Allegations include; bribing popular fabric designers to produce so many fabric lines per year that consumers are going broke, purchasing Munki Munki pajamas on the black market and reselling for exorbitant prices on eBay and the lowest blow of all, FIA agents have allegedly participated in the ‘fabric mortgage business’, taking cuts from the bank who has loaned money to fabric buyers who clearly cannot afford it, thus driving up the prices of fabric and creating a fabric bubble!!

Of course, these are only allegations. I cannot believe any of my fellow FIA agents would participate in any such crimes but we are also human. Overall, I am confident that justice will prevail and the FIA will be seen in a positive light once more.