Mini Bling!

Ooooh - I almost forgot! Guess what car bling my Mini Cooper is sporting!
My new, super-custom VANITY PLATES!
I waited over a year for special order 7-character license plates to be available from MyPlates and finally, for 7 days only, the first week in March, they began taking orders. A little pricey for one year, but if you did it for 10 years, the price amortizes out to the regular price per year for vanity plates. You just have to spend that chunk all at once.

As soon as it hit 7am I was all over it! I've spent a year looking at all the different plates, styles, colors & logos and I absolutely knew what I wanted. I was petrified that something would go wrong - the power would go out - my credit card wouldn't go through - I'd oversleep. I know. What a geek. I can't help it. Had the plate design, had the text. Just had to click on Order. Click. Nothing. Click! Nothing. ClickclickclickclickCLICK!!! #$%^&!!! Sure enough - my #$%^ browser locked up! Couldn't back out, couldn't place the order. All I could do, was delete my plate from the cart. I was beside myself. Hysterical. In a total panic. I know, I know...but I really, really wanted those plates. My resident techs were still in bed (how could they sleep through the screaming?!), the dog was hiding, and I was a raving madwoman! (I know, right?? Hard to believe.) I closed Firefox and opened up Safari. Started over. I had the same knots I get in the pit of my stomach when I place what I hope will be the winning bid in the last 32 seconds of an eBay auction. ( I love my jadite!) The planets must have all been aligned, because it went through in about 10 seconds. But I couldn't relax til I got the confirmation email. Then, I was on pins & needles for the next two weeks waiting for them to arrive at the local tax office.

When I finally went to pick them up, the creepy guy next to me was picking up his:

Yeah. That's not really his actual plate. But it looks just like it. I told you: he was a big scary-looking dude and he didn't look like he'd want me taking his picture. But you get the idea. Oh. And his plate suits him.
Anyway - if you're driving around the Houston area and see this - wave!

(Don't honk. That might elicit a somewhat ummm...negative reaction. If you get my meaning.)

A New Day

I don't know if it really counts as a new day if I haven't been to bed yet. It's more like a continuation of the old one. Finished that quilt at 6:30 this morning, woke MJ up to go to Lowe's for boards for his sign business and 2 replacement panes of glass for the Cabin Too. Had some grits and coffee and started to wake up. Not much, but enough to add quilting to one of the skinny inside borders on the quilt I already finished! Ugh. When will I learn? The 30 seconds it took to quilt 10 teensy motifs, took 2 hours to rip out. Took a quick picture, trimmed it, packed it and ran it to the Post Office. Done.Now back to the quilt I took off the frame so I could squeeze this one out. I need to have that one done by Sunday.
Scary-full schedule for the rest of the week and into next, and as soon as dinner's out of the oven and I've had my fill of chicken 'n rice, I'm hittin' the sack. I don't care if I am doing the senior early bird dinner thing - I've been up for almost 37 hours and it all starts again tomorrow at 6. Daylight is over-rated.

It Came to Pass...

It's just past midnight and I should be in bed enjoying the reward of an impossibly busy and frustrating day: sleep. Deep, calming, refreshing sleep.But I'm here in my studio, working on a quilt that has to be on its way home tomorrow. Today. In too few hours.
Listening to Bach's Sonatas and Partitas for unaccompanied violin. Feeling sorry for myself and fighting the tears that will just interrupt my quilting.
Overtired, overwhelmed, over-extended and over-worked.
Ahhh - the Chaconne. So sweetly sad, yet resolute. Determined. That's how I feel. Life's bittersweet trials leaving me exhausted and fearful - but at the same time knowing - knowing in my soul - that I'm strong enough to get through this. It won't last forever and I'll just keep on keeping on til life moves on and picks on someone else for a change.
I was in a ladies Bible study some years back when someone told the story of a man who said his favorite scripture was "It came to pass." That didn't really make much sense - what's the 'address' of that verse? He said it was all through the Bible. Over and over again God tells us that it didn't come to stay, it came to pass!
I like that - and I'm counting on it. It doesn't feel like it right now, but I know it's true.After I finish this quilt and finally sink my head into my pillow I might be able to convince myself that all this chaos, confusion and consternation really did just come to pass.
Anytime now would be good for me.

April 2011 Desktop Calendar

Here's a cute little bunny and eggs just in time for Easter. The bunny and carrots in the corners are from Robyn Pandolph's Book/CD entitled Stitched With Love, an adorable collection of whimsical patterns and gorgeous projects. It's a free-standing CD, but, if you have the Electric Quilt, you can import the blocks for use/manipulation in that program. Then you can make even more projects - so that's pretty cool.
Click on it to expand the image to full size, right-click and choose Set as Wallpaper or Background. To really jazz up your desktop, right-click on your background and choose a color that coordinates with the calendar.