flickr is my new bff

I have a new love affair, and it's flickr. Or you could call it a new way for me to spend too much time on the computer! I am probably late to this, but it is so fun!! I think I will call it "market research," that sounds a little more productive. Anyway, for a while I have been looking at Anna Maria Horner's flickr groups for her little folks, and good folks lines. I love to see what folks are making (and I have added to the little folks pool recently :) ). It actually is good creativity research. And recently I have been searching more and more on flickr. This picture is from the group Ikea Lovers


Ikea is the awesome swedish based furniture and etc. store. I love swedish/scandinavian style. So that has been a fun one.


Ok, this is just another beauty. I mean look at those granny squares, so colorful. I am going to make one one day!


And another. Pictures like this just make me smile. Hexagons seem so hard and I have been seeing them everywhere. You have to do what's called paper piecing, and I just don't know anything about that. But I could find out, and I just might. That is how I learned to do those granny squares. I saw a picture and wanted to be able to do that and now I know how! Learning IS fun!


So I just wanted to share the fun I've been having on flickr. I also want to wish everyone a joyful weekend and Memorial Day. I LOVE our country, and give great thanks to all the men and women who have defended her. As the saying goes, "freedom isn't free," and I am just so thankful for the peace and protection we enjoy because there are people willing to die to protect us. It is because of their sacrifice that we are free to pursue the lovely things we love.

I wanna be

Hey, hey, hey. It's Wednesday! Hope everyone is having a cheerful week. I wanna have one, and am trying to make it happen. I wanna be cheerful! And I am one big complainer, so it's not that easy.

I also wanna be a "no sugar in my coffee" person too. Actually I put honey in my coffee, and oh it's good. But the calories need to go. I can't go black, I have to have a little milk, so I am also trying to make that happen too.

Alright, well I also wanna be a thrifty girl, you know, the kind of girl that budgets really well, finds great deals, and saves all kinds of money. I am SO not that girl. I definitely have a limited budget, hello...I have six little ones, but I think I could try to save a little now and then!

I also wanna be a no tv family. Now this one has some explaining, mainly because it'll never happen. I mean I hate the tv and I love the tv, it's crazy that way. I do think about how much more we might accomplish if we just didn't have one, but then my stomach aches thinking about the actuality of not having one! But I thought I would include it in my "wanna be" post anyway.


There are truly hundreds(maybe thousands) of wanna be's I could list here in this silly post...goodness, probably millions. So I am just gonna be cheerful today, and I'm already drinking my coffee without honey!

Aren't bubbles so fun? I mean, it's classic Americana! Although we spill the heck out of them. And now that the heat is pretty much here, we are having fun with all those summery things. This summer will include a pool and I am so excited about that! My parents generously offered to give us a "pool only" membership to a local country club this summer!!!!! I mean, wow! I am so thankful to them. We have already been twice. It is a little stressful to take all(6) the kids myself cause there are no lifeguards. I didn't think this would matter too much because our last town we lived in we had a membership to a local pool, and they had lifeguards. Well I never trusted those lifeguards (teenagers) fully, they were always talkin! So I was always keeping my eye on the kids there and it wasn't too bad. But now I realize that I did trust them a little, and they were a comfort to have around. Here there's no back up and I felt like I had to watch them intently just in case. I even told a nice lady there that if I had to save someone I was going to "throw" the baby to her before I jumped in! She was nice and said that was fine. I guess I'll just pick my designated baby holder every time we go. I don't think I will tell the person that I picked them, they'll just know they "won" whenever I hand them my baby and jump in!

I also wanted to show my latest makery.

I love this pillow. Probably because of the sweet patchwork. I, again, just love those voiles. I loved patching them together to go around the embroidery. And this is the back of the pillow...

More voile, and the two square panels are her dobby dot line. I mean those colors, who does that? That girl is the color queen. This weekend is the big quilt market, so all the cool designers are all getting ready to go. OH how I wish I could go and meet them all and see all the goodies there! What fun. I guess I'll just have to wait til they blog about it all. Then I can blog about it! And the circle goes on...

And I almost forgot, but it's giveaway day at a sewmamasew! Just go to the sewmamasew blog and you have a few days to sign up for tons of giveaways. Generally it's someone's blog that you'll go to, and you just leave a comment. That's it. Now fair warning, as you probably have read before, I have signed up for TONS of giveaways and have yet to win anything...but you never know. Someone has to get picked and it may just be YOU. Then you'll get some awesome handmade goodie, or fabric, or pattern, etc. And it's great that it'll be up for several days. Time to sign up for them all, and we won't tell anyone how much time we spent on the internet to do it! Just kidding, well maybe. So I'm off to try to win, and find sweet crafty shops and places along the way.

Well our computer has been in the shop for well over two weeks now. I am hoping that we can at least recover all our pics and videos that we did not back up. And that would be including all of little H's entire 8 months!! Oh me, I can't even think about losing those, especially the little snippets of video when he was so brand new. I don't think I have any video of any of our children when they were so little. Thankfully the old computer is fine and dandy for internet access. We have no itunes on it, so all our little listening devices are out too. Anyway, I thought I would post something since it's been a while (not that anyone missed me, I mean really Kathleen, you think too much of yourself!).

Some things I have been excited about are Anna Maria's new book Handmade Beginnings. I hope to own it someday soon. Maybe I'll win the giveaway, but that's highly unlikely. I think I have entered a million giveaways and nothin' yet. Also, Sandi Henderson has her new website up and it's too pretty. I love the colors! And she has a new book too that I want. Goodness, there is too much out there, and not enough time! Or money!

p.s. the two pretty fabrics up there I actually have, and since I can't figure out what perfect project is good enough to make with them, I'll just admire them here. I don't have to cut the fabric on my blog!