Tribute to My Mom

It's been 16 years ago today that my mother Dorothy Mary Repia McKenzie Buss passed away. She valiantly fought breast cancer and bone cancer for 22 years. She was in an out of remission during that time. She was an example and an inspiration to many around her. We all love her and miss her day to day influence, laughter, and love. We look forward to seeing her again someday.

I've included a few pictures of her so you can get a feel for her exuberance for life. She loved everyone and anyone. I remember the many times we would have strangers for dinner. She'd often bring someone over that she either met at the laundry mat when our washer and dryer was broken or just someone she met at the store that needed her help. My dad had a garden and before he could even pick a ripe tomato it was gone!! The peaches and raspberries were also given away before they could be canned and when they were canned she'd give jars away to neighbors and those in need.

Here's a picture of when she graduated from nursing school at the top of her class. She had lots of friends at the hospital and they all knew her and loved her and when she got sick they cried with her and took care of her when she was in the hospital. She had a smile on her face more often than not and she kept things to herself with the desire not to burden or worry anyone.

This is a picture taken the summer before I turned 20 years old. My daughter Ariel is turning 19 in a couple of months and I can hardly believe that all of that time has passed. It really does just seem like yesterday. I sure miss my mom and would love to have a visit with her. I know she would just love to play with all of her grandchildren and now great grandchildren. I try to be the best grandma I can be to the two grandchildren I have now. It's so much fun!!!

This is a picture taken when my parents were married in December of 1957. They were married in the Salt Lake City Temple. My mom had traveled from New Zealand to marry my father and hadn't been in America for very long. I'm sure she missed having her parents and sibling there with her. I know I would have missed having my mom there when I got married. I was the first one to be married in our family.

These pictures were taken on the same day of my brother-in-laws mother's funeral. She was buried in the same cemetery as my mom so after the graveside dedication some of us walked over to my mom's grave. It was wonderful to take that moment to reflect on her life and what she means to me. The girl's also shared some of the flowers from LaJoy's casket flowers. It was nice.

These are three of my sister's girls and my daughter kenna in the black, red, & white dress. My Dad is kneeling behind the girls.

My Dad and I.

Kenna was so worried about everyone's headstone being so messy, soooo, she went around cleaning off all of the headstone's and pausing to read them.

Here's a closer look at her cleaning the grave's.

Christmas Cottage Block Exchange

This is a shout out to my friend Nanette who is the maker of this SWEET & DARLING BLOCK. I'm way excited to tell you that she's starting a Christmas Cottage Block Exchange so, if you'd like to join in the CHRISTMAS FUN head on over to Freda's Hive to sign yourself up. This is definitely a block exchange you won't want to miss out on so leave her a comment today!

Just so you know I've already signed up!!! I have LOTS of fun Christmas fabric I plan on using so I'm excited to get started. The details are forthcoming so keep an eye open for updates. 

Brigitte Cookie Cutter Set

If you want one of these fancy cookie cutter's that Anna talked about on her blog today you had better hurry on over to this link on ebay to get one. The seller has 10 left and after her post I'm sure they'll sell like hot cakes.

They cost $14.95 plus shipping and are shipped right from Germany. I'm pretty excited about getting one. I remember my Aunt Claudia making shortbread for me when I lived with her in New Zealand during my junior year of High School. I love shortbread. It's especially good with a cold glass of Langers Cran-Raspberry Juice (no dipping just drinking). Thanks again Anna for the great post!!!

Here's the original post about this awesome gadget along with the recipe for shortbread from Tartelette .

Holiday Table Runner Pattern

Thanks for all of the fun comments, I do love them so! I'm happy that many of you wanted the pattern for my table runner. So you'll find it attached at the bottom. I am kind of embarrassed though, to do it this way but, I couldn't get my scanner to scan the pattern into my new computer and my old old computer is the one that holds the file. I took pictures of each page and if that doesn't work for you just email me and I will try to mail you a hard copy. It's a big file so you should be able to click on the picture and read it. Let me know if you have any trouble. If you're interested I can do a tutorial but just so you know I work full time and it would take me a week or two to get to it. Thanks for your understanding!

BTW~I was very happy to attend the JDRF auction Saturday night and see that my Halloween Table Runner sold for $90 not bad for something similar in size to a small baby quilt. One of the baby quilts there sold for about the same price. There was also a handmade quilted purse that sold for $145 (crazy but cool) it was really cute and it had a bidding war going on between a few ladies that wanted it bad! It's really nice when something you make can fetch a really nice donation for a worthy cause.

Here are pictures of the seven table runners I could find. I've had them stored for a few years so please forgive any fold lines. I threw them in the dryer for a few minutes to flatten them a bit.

From left to right are St. Patrick's Day, Valentine's Day, Patriotic, Halloween, Christmas, & Fall.

Closer View

Another Closer View

Seven Strips sewn in a 123 Center 123 pattern:

Red hearts-Cream-Red Plaid-Green w/Hearts-Red Hearts-Cream-Red Plaid

Seven Strips sewn in a 123 Center 321 Mirror Pattern:
Dk Green-Lt. Green-Dk. Green-Shamrocks-Dk. Green-Lt. Green-Dk. Green

Seven Strips sewn in a 123 Center 123 Pattern:
Red-Yellow-Green-Pink-Red-Yellow-Green

Seven Strips sewn in a 123 Center 123 Pattern:
Red-White-Blue-White-Red-White-Blue

Seven Strips sewn in a 123 Center 123 Pattern:
Red-Cream-Green-Christmas Print-Red-Cream-Green

Seven Strips sewn in a 123 Center 123 Pattern with a Variation:
Yellow-Red-Green-Orange-Green-Red-Cream

Seven Strips sewn in a Mirror Image Pattern:
Orange-Light-Black-Center Orange-Black-Light-Orange

Close-up of the machine stitching.
I varied the thread color just for fun.

I used blue and red thread on this one.

I used orange and black thread on this one.

Below are the 3 pattern pages. If you have any questions just let me know. Thanks!

This is a class pattern I made for my classes and it's pretty old so therefore the email address is incorrect but the other information is right so now you know where I live.

Talent Day at School

My DD Natalie helped me put together this video production of our youngest daughter Kenna riding her horses. On Monday Kenna has to present one of her talents to her specialty class. She has 5-7 minutes to stand, introduce herself, and then tell the class about her talent. It has to be something she's good at. Well, that wasn't hard to figure out and luckily I had plenty of video footage and pictures to choose from. As you can see we chose to do a video of her horseback riding adventures. Here's the video hot off the press! ENJOY!

I thought all of you might enjoy this little snippet from my daughters life!

JDRF Silent Auction

A few weeks ago a friend of mine asked me if I had time to make a quilt and donate it to a silent auction she was doing for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation on September 6th. I hesitated but, said YES! I don't think that people really realize how long it can take to make a quilt. I started to think about my options. What should I make? Do I have anything on hand that I'm willing to part with? Giving a quilt away is sometimes like letting your children grow up and move away to College! If you know what I mean!

Anyway, I decided to give away one of my CLASS SAMPLES that I made a few years ago. It's my "Seven Strip Holiday Table Runner" it's bright, it's happy, and it's fun! I added a cute "Trick or Treat Bowl" with Halloween Candy inside along with a darling wire spider that you can't see too well and then I tied it up with cellophane, a bow, and a Halloween BOO ornament. I'm hoping it will fetch at least $50 (min. bid) for JDRF.

7 Strip Holiday Table Runner

Trick or Treat Bowl for Halloween

I taught this class for two years at Quilts Etc. It was one of their most popular and versatile beginning quilt classes. My students loved it because they could go home with a finished quilt top and some could even get as far as putting together the quilt sandwich to have ready for machine quilting when they got home. I think I've made 20 or 30 of these table runner's out of different fabric groupings and for every holiday season.

Here's my fall runner that's on my table right now.

Close-up of my Fall Table Runner

Angled view of table runner

If you're interested in the instructions for this table runner just leave me a comment and I'll post the instructions and a few more pictures.

Oooh! Peppermint!

Oooh! Peppermint! It's only September and to my surprise I found my favorite ICE CREAM of ALL time at Walmart! I get excited when I find it in the freezer section before Christmas time. Personally, I think they ought to have it year round then I wouldn't feel like I need to stock pile it for the off seasons. I'm just kidding, I only bought two containers this time around.

Hey, has anyone noticed that Dreyer's Ice Cream containers are smaller and cost the same price or slightly higher in some stores?? I can't believe it! I wonder why they changed the container size. One can hardly afford to buy ice cream anymore. Maybe, that's a good thing!? Besides I hardly get a scoop when the kids are around anyway. Maybe, that's a good thing, too!!!

My Newest Obsession!!!

My deepest THANKS go to Anna from Thimbleanna for introducing me to my newest obsession. LOL! I think we could get into serious trouble if I lived close to you :) You know, I've always wanted to know how to make these little beauties and I even bought a necklace like this with miniature dried flowers a few years back.

You can read Anna's posts about it here and here. I spent a lot of time yesterday watching the video and going to other websites and blogs doing research. The video made by Michelle Johnson from Crafted by.us was very helpful. I don't know if you know this but here's the page of that lists the items you'll need to get start along with a few resources for a lot of the items she showed us on her tutorial video. The picture (above and to the right) is of the necklace that she makes on her video. Pretty Cute! Huh?!

The best sources that she gave for the items you'd need to get started soldering were Simply Swank and Volcano Arts. I liked Simply Swank because they sold everything you'd need to make a soldered Charm Necklace in a starter kit or a deluxe kit. Above is a picture of the deluxe kit. They have also put out a BOOK and a DVD that you can purchase as part of the kit (as seen below). On their website you can also look at their different galleries of things they've made.

I think I'm hooked!!! Real Bad! I'll have to wait for a good excuse to get it though, like my BIRTHDAY, which is coming up in a few months. Yippee!! I can hardly wait to get started!

Here's the book!

And here's the DVD!

Volcano Arts (go to page and then scroll down to product) is a great source for 5/16" Wavy Copper Foil Tape and at $16.00 for 36 yards that was a DEAL compared to Simply Swanks 5/16" Wavy Copper Foil Tape at $4.49 for 5 yards. I'll let you do the math. Volcano Arts also had the glass cutter she used along with pre-cut glass shapes.

Have FUN making Soldered Charms!

I'll upload pictures when I get around to making them. It'll probably be before Christmas this year.