Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Booty call

Last night a blue Ford Fiesta, quite possibly the World's Smallest Car, pulled into my driveway and when the doors opened, four people were violently ejected, propelled by the force that the stress of 14 hours of driving can produce in two adults and two small children. By the time we hit the Maryland border, I could no longer feel my feet or my ass, my hair was falling out, and I think I may have lost some teeth. Harper was practically catatonic. Only Devon was happy, with her Yo Gabba Gabba DVD on endless repeat.

We drove to Kentucky to visit some of my husband's family, and I took two days away from them to drive down to Tennessee to see my brother and sister. I need to update the Cherry Pie blog, but for now I will tell you that Jon is doing great. He is back at work full-time, he's been cleared to drive a car (but not a motorcycle), and other than a brief mention of his weekly chemo drip and a med-alert bracelet, you'd never know he was fighting brain cancer. We got to spend a lot of time together just being siblings and not clinging to each other in fear that one of us wouldn't be here soon. We still fear it, but we just weren't letting it be the primary topic that day. I think his life right now is all about being normal, and he doesn't want to be a cancer patient all the time. I can't blame him.

Naturally, any visit to my sister's neck of the woods means an after-hours trip to the quilt shop where she works. As I was picking out what I wanted, and was mulling over a fat quarter bundle, she said, "Keep in mind that you're getting a discount," and I asked how much and she said "Thirty-five percent." I said, "Really? That's more than last time." She asked what it was last time and I told her: twenty-five percent. Her boss had just told her to give me whatever discount she gave me the last time I visited, and she thought it was more than it had been. Got to learn to keep my mouth shut.

I didn't buy as much this time, but I got a few goodies:


A bundle of black and white fat quarters, for a quilt I'm planning for someone.

Some random yardage.


A layer cake. I had sworn off pre-cuts, but I really wanted a bit of all the fabrics from this line.


For applique. Kelly gave me some lessons in the kind of hand applique I want to learn, and I will need some of this to hold down all the crazy shapes I'm gonna be whipping out any minute now.


Bonus points for you if you know what this is!


Oh, and as promised, here are some shots of my roommates:














Yep. She let me sleep in the same room with all that. And how did I manage to make it out of there without swiping anything? Because clearly, I could have gone into some of those stacks and she would never know. I guess the main thing that tamped down my klepto tendencies is that I love my sister and would never do that and blah, blah, blah. But here's another. Sunday afternoon she whips out a stack of handbags she had made as samples for the store and said I could have them. ALL OF THEM. Check it out:














When I drove back to Kentucky, much of David's extended family was there and he wanted to show them all the wonders of his new car (I don"t know what they are, because I'm too girly to see them) and he told me, back in the house as we were visiting with everyone, that he showed everyone the trunk, where I still had all this stuff stashed. So I said, "Did you see my booty?" And damn if he wasn't the only one who didn't look at my butt.

18 comments:

Bert in Rice, WA said...

DING DING DING! Hera marker!

Bonus points are always welcome here. ;o)

Cascade Quilts said...

haha! I can't imagine the contraint it took not to sneak some of that stash in your luggage! I know what the white plastic thing is! It's a seam presser! They work great! I use one at my grandparents summer cabin (it has no electricity) in place of an iron :)

Betsy Lynn said...

Hera marker!
very funny blog...love reading it!

Cascade Quilts said...

OH, that *IS* a hera marker! I have a seam presser that looks a lot the same :)

Dana Gaffney said...

Do you cut chocolate cake with it? The purses are great, the first one made me drool. Beautiful.

Glen QuiltSwissy said...

Love the purses, can I have your sister? I don't have any of my own. My stupid brother refuses to quilt.

glen: oh, hera marker. I have one that is made out of a different material. I never liked it. Might have to revisit it though, now that I have more patience.

Staci said...

Your thing is a HERA marker! And those bags are wonderful! And the fabric discount! Your sister is a pretty great sister!

Hope your behind and your sanity are returning to normal. I know how you felt, we just did 15 hours each way to see our daughter. I hope you trip was more interesting though. We drove across southern New Mexico and through west Texas. Mind numbing!

Sarah Craig said...

OK, being in the same neck of the woods as your sister, which fabric store does she work at? And wow, did you haul in a lot of goodies!!!

Debbie Cook said...

OK, welcome back and everything but that is NOT the news you promised. ;-)

On a serious note, great news about your brother!

Carolyn aka Silkquilter said...

I wonder how much restraint he had to use..... LOL Love you blog, especially the bad words. I'm not brave enough! LOL

Tracy said...

I can't think of thename of it but it marks quilts for quilting them. I saw a lady at our retreat using one.
What temptation being in the same room with all that stash.
Good going on all those purses!

Joy said...

Damn they all knew the right name ... I was gonna say 'the plastic pressy thingy'. You know what I mean though don't you :o)??!!
What a fabulous stash your sister has, I wouldn't have been able to resist those spotty ones .... just LOVE spots ;o).
Hugs,
Joy :o)

Shannon said...

The Hera Marker is one of my favorite tools. I use it in so MANY ways!!!1

Anonymous said...

Deborah says:

Also known as a bone folder....used in bookmaking and (more recently) card stamping.

Sorry if someone already got it...haven't read the comments yet!

Anonymous said...

Deborah says:

Wow! I've never even heard of a Hera marker....of course I was a stamper way before I was a quilter.

We call them bone folders because that's what they originally were made out of...couple of hundred years ago.

bingo~bonnie said...

hahahaha - good thing I read the other comments b/c I was gonna say that that white thingy was perhaps a BONER? I dunno why I was calling it that.... perhaps I'm a tad bit sexually deprived these days. Sesh with twin 3 year olds I'd have no idea why that there'd be no energy for ...that.... :P

The Calico Cat said...

Hera marker...

& I thought we went far by going to Virginia!

LizA. said...

Glad to hear your brother's doing well. Just found this on sale while doing some browsing and thought of you: http://www.bighornquilts.com/cgi-bin/Store/store.cgi?cart_id=1531655.22240.s0&product=hifashion&productid=5-3269&sales=0&lastmenu=submenu-5100.html