Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from the O'Kigins! I will post a picture of our little trick-or-treaters later. Right now I have chili simmering on my new gas stove. I feel like shouting: "I HAVE GAS AND I LOVE IT!" I am not ashamed. Curly is under the weather, so our festivities have been curtailed. No trek from Northern Virginia will be taken this year. But that's okay. I am still going to have a tea party on my front lawn in my witch's costume. Pumpkin tart, anyone?

Weight Loss Wednesday

Ugh. That's all I can say. Ugh. I could go into a rant about feminine problems, but I won't because at least one male reads this. Let's just say that next week will be better, right? And, it was probably the pants. I couldn't find my weigh in pants, so I had to wear jeans. Big, bulky, heavy jeans that made the scale say "Zero pounds this week, love. Cheer up. Spit spot. Chip chip, cheerio" (the scale is British).

I have a plan of attack. It's realistic, too. Zumba tomorrow night, a YMCA cameo on Friday whilst I wait for my new stove, nothing Saturday, nothing Sunday, and then a date with the elliptical Monday, Zumba Tuesday, and some Yoga at home Wednesday morning. That coupled with good point counting, and we'll hit the magical 10% off goal!

Enjoy

Enjoy National Chocolate Day. I know I will.

Oops

I broke the stove today. It is shattered. I cried, but I think it will be okay in the end.

Photo Friday

From a recent expedition to the corn maze.

Where Does She Get It?

On the way home from school today, Mini-me and I were discussing math. She loves math. She knows quite a lot of math facts. I was a little surprised with how much she knows. I said:

Me: Who taught you that?
Mini-me: Well, Jesus taught me.
Me: He did?
Mini-me: Yeah. Jesus just gave me the math fact.

There you go.

Weight Loss Wednesday

It was another banner week for me. I lost 4 more pounds. Yippee! For those keeping track, that is a total of 19 pounds. I am well on my way to my 10% goal by Halloween.

On another note, it is now after 10 pm. I am pooped. I did 6 more sets of burp cloths today, but did not get any taggies pinned. Tomorrow is another day, and I am sure I will get it done. In addition to the taggies, I hope to make some pillowcases tomorrow. I hope to get at least 4 done. The fabric I have for those is Christmas fabric, and they will be so cute!

Check!

I accomplished all my tasks yesterday, and even exceeded my goal on the burp cloths -- I got 8 sets done. Today is a really busy day. I am watching my friends little boy (who is very afraid of our dog) for about a half hour this morning, then I have Weight Watchers, then I go Visiting Teaching, then we go pick up Flower, then we eat dinner, then we have Singers rehearsal, and then I can do some work. My goal for tonight is to get 6 more sets of burp cloths done, and then pin some ribbons for taggies.

Check back later today for Weight Loss Wednesday!

Prayers Answered

Last night, I almost had a meltdown. But I did not. You see, my machine started to skip stitches. That can be a sign of a big problem. I don't have time to get my Lena serviced, so I did what any semi-frantic woman would do: I said a prayer. I now fully expect my Lena to fall apart the day after Christmas, which is when I said I needed it to work until, but that's okay with me. It is working beautifully, which makes me very happy indeed. It also reaffirms my faith and belief that God is in the details of our lives, even when our sewing machines are on the fritz.

Here is what I have planned to make today. I need to get this Pink Chocolate purse finished. Following that, which shouldn't take me that long after a trip to the store for more thread, I need to make a dozen burp cloths, which only makes 6 sets. I want to have 2 dozen sets at the trunk show. Also today, I need to cut ribbon for the taggies. Making the taggies goes much faster when you have the ribbons pre-cut. Also, I need to wash fabric. That's 4 things for today. We'll see if that's a good pace or not. I think it's not too shabby.

Back in Business

I took my machine to Wilson's this morning, and they fixed it up real nice for me. They also pointed out with the amount of sewing I do, I really ought to upgrade to an embroidery machine. I couldn't agree more. However, if we had $8,000 laying around, we would probably buy a new washer or something. They also have used models, but we'll just have to see. I would like a machine that did more stitches like mine, such as a blanket stitch for applique. I wonder how much those machines are...

Since I am behind by about a day on my work, I have quite a bit to catch up on. I need to finish a cute chocolate purse, and then get started on my trunk show. Have I told you about my trunk show? It will be mid-November in Northern Virginia. Email me (contact info under my profile) if you would like to come. I'll be posting weekly updates until then on the kinds of things you can expect to find at the first ever Molly Patch trunk show!

We Have a Piper Down

Well, not a piper. More like a sewing machine. My main machine is having trouble. I got a thread stuck somewhere, and now the stitches are off and the needle keeps pulling. I need to take it in Monday, and hopefully they can fix it. This is not a good time to be without my machine!

Finished Quilts

Two quilts, signed, sealed, and delivered. These were comissioned by a friend of ours for her two youngest children.

Photo Friday

My son, licking butter. It makes me gag just to write it.

At the Zoo

The zoo was the place to be this week. The weather was perfect -- near 80 and sunny -- and the zoo was empty.

The last time we were at the zoo, Patch was a wee bairn and threw up on himself, there was no baby panda, there was a baby elephant, and there was no zoo construction. It's been nearly 2 years.

A lot of the animals were sleeping. The mommy panda was on her back, and sea lions were asleep on a rock.

Patch got most excited about the turtles. He could see those very easily. He also liked the monkeys (which were really gorillas who wrestled with each other right in front of us) and the tiger, who was pacing in front of her door, waiting for dinner.

Mini-me liked "everything."

Weight Loss Wednesday

Today, I was prepared for a zero pound week. You see, we went to dinner at Espositos last night. I ate a mozzarella en carosa. That means "fried hunk of mozzarella" in Italian. It was delicious. I had the points for it, but I thought the salt and fried goodness would linger. Fortunately for me and the other chicks in my group, it did not. I am down another 2 1/2 pounds, which is a grand total of 15 1/2 pounds. I have to say, what I love most about Weight Watchers is that I can eat anything. If I make rolls with Sunday dinner, I can eat rolls. I can eat mashed potatoes. I can eat gravy. I can eat chocolate and cookies and cupcakes if I want. Now, I can't eat all of those things to bursting as many times as I want. No one should do that. A chocolate chip cookie that my kids refer to as a "Grandpatty Cookie" has 3 points (when made about half the size I used to make them). One of my rolls has 2 points. It is truly the lifestyle change for those who enjoy their lifestyle.

I have many photos to upload and parent teacher conference to blog about, but for now, I am going to fold some laundry (pick yourself up off the floor, Mom), and then finish the binding of a quilt.

Thank Heavens!

Mini-me has changed her mind on her Halloween costume. Happy day for me! She wanted to be Sally from The Nightmare Before Christmas, but I couldn't find one and really didn't want to make one. So, yesterday I told her that if she were Tinkerbelle, she could wear wings. That was so much more appealing to her than a yarn wig. Now I just have to find a really inexpensive Tinkerbelle costume.

Photo Friday

I know I've shown this before, but they are just too cute!*

*Opinion may be biased

That's my Bag, Baby

Here is my new Vera-esque bag of mine. Yes, I made it. It holds a lot of stuff, including a 550 page book, with room to spare. Having this bag makes me wonder just how many bags makes excessive? I mean, if I made 3 of these, would that be too much?

Weight Loss Wednesday

Not a banner week for me, but I'm still down about half a pound, which brings my grand total to 13 pounds. I am very close to my 10% off goal. I hope to reach it by Halloween. We are now 6 weeks into the program, and I am more than halfway to my 10% off. So, it seems do-able.

Fall is definitely in the air around here. We are still doing the clothing dance, with short sleeves underneath sweaters in case the afternoon gets a little warm. I love this time of year. It is such a joyful time. Halloween is so fun with dressing up and decorating everything in orange, black, green, and purple. Then we move on to Thanksgiving, which always helps me refocus and remember my blessings. After that, it's time to watch White Christmas and have the happiest holiday since Bing Crosby danced with Danny Kaye. This is the season I wish would slow down just a bit. But time marches on and I need to keep my head in the game to enjoy it all.

This is Halloween

We love Halloween!

Festivals

Frederick knows how to throw a good party. Every first Saturday of the month is called Gallery Walk. The stores stay open later, as do the galleries. Every month has a theme. In February, they do ice sculptures. Sometimes it's even cold enough for them to last longer than a day. In August, it's the dog days, where you can bring your dog down for games and prizes. October is In the Streets, where they close down the main road to cars, and open it up to over 50,000 people. Then there are the non-first Saturday festivals. In December, they do a candlelight houses of worship tour (it's not called "Church Street" for nothin'). In the Spring, there's a tour of private gardens. In June, the Festival of the Arts is held, which brings artisans and craftsman from all over the country. And those are just city events. The county also has great events, like a pumpkin patch in October, the fair, and several major craft shows.



In the Street is one of my favorites. There's always a band playing or a group dancing. The block between 6th and 7th street was for the skateboarders. At one point, there was nearly 100 kids doing tricks.

The restaurants come out and have a limited tasting menu. And, last year they added some art vendors. This year, there were about 4 different free moon-bounces for the kids.

The really neat thing about it is that it celebrates Frederick. There were maybe 5 groups who were not from the city or county. The rest were locals. With the economy slowing down (hello understatement!), it's one of my goals to buy local. I want to make sure our main street doesn't change for the worse.

Sunday Project

Today, Flower and I made a church bag. It was inspired by two things. First, I am tired of carrying everyone's stuff at church. Second, in watching Conference this weekend, I heard two things (well, more than two things, but two things that would help me with my first hurdle, which is carrying everyone's stuff at church). I heard: simplify and reverence. My kids don't need a lot of stuff to occupy them. Bells and whistles are not required at church (actually, they are kind of discouraged). Part of my job as the mom is to teach them how to behave at church. They should be listening to the speakers. I realize that Patch and Mini-me are too young to really do this, so my job is then to teach them not to distract others from listening. I bought a few notebooks and pencils from the dollar spot at Target, which will be perfect for the church bag. I also found a pattern in a quilting magazine for a crayon holder. Also, perfect for the church bag.

In the Street

Today is the In the Street festival. The city closes down Market St for about 8 blocks and has a big party. It's very fun. I was on the website and came across this gem of a sentence:

Bentz Street Sports bar will have a seafood sampler, for all you seafood lovers, VOLT is having a variety of food, including Lobster Corn Dogs, and Roy's Concession will be having food from hot dogs to funnel cakes, all of which are located in the Health and Fitness Block (2nd to 3rd Streets).

All the fattening food is on the "Health and Fitness Block"???? Either that is pure marketing genius, or someone made a huge boo boo.

Photo Friday

Go Vote!

There is a new poll on the sidebar. Please let your voice be heard! Curly suggested last night that I include some sort of middle ground on the poll. Unfortunately, there is no middle ground when it comes to monkeys.

Weight Loss Wednesday

All week I've been thinking about this post, hoping to be able to use this line from This is Spinal Tap: "The numbers go to 11." But, alas, I cannot. Because these numbers go to 12! That's right, I am down another 3 pounds to make a total of 12. I feel great. I feel cute and sassy and all the things I've been missing for a while now. Don't get me wrong, I'm still fat. But I'm 12 pounds less fat than 4 weeks ago. Booya!

The topic discussion last week was on dancing. 15 minutes of dancing adds 2 points to your daily allowance. Two points is a Weight Watchers ice cream bar. Those are good. Anyway, it got me thinking about the songs on my ipod. Most are kind of mellow (like Bing Crosby, Sarah McLaughlin, and Keane) and hard to dance to. Then I heard "Celebration" by Kool and the Gang the other day, and had to add it to my playlist. What songs get you moving? Please leave a comment and help me make a great 2-point dance list!