I'm listening to a great book!  The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag by Alan Bradley is an awesome book.  Flavia is such a great character.   She was also great in The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie.  The stories are read by Jayne Entwhistle (don't you just love her name?!?) and her English accent makes them a pleasure to listen to. 

I've finished another block in my hand pieced quilt and I'm terrible!  I started another quilt!  We don't have a book budget at the library so I decided to donate a quilt (actually 2, one for a girl and one for a boy) to raffle off for money for children's books.  I've got the girl's quilt cut out, I just need to piece it together and quilt it.  We'll see how well they do! 

I also found one in the new Fons & Porter magazine that I want to do - the watermelon quilt on the cover.  I've always wanted to have a quilt or two to sit/lay on to watch the Fourth of July fireworks.  This one looks perfect!!! 

Time to get busy!!!

Wow!  Time sure flies!  It's May already!  Our weather has been crazy.  Nice then cold and windy then hot then cold and windy again.  Today it's cloudy. 
We had Jessi spayed Friday.  I didn't know dogs could look and act so loopy!  She's almost back to normal today.  She's prancing around and feels a lot better.
I got four block done this week, two of the hand pieced ones

and two of the Moosequilt jelly roll sampler.

I finished reading Fantasy in Death and finished listening to Apple Turnover Murder.  Great books!  Now I'm listening to James Patterson's Worst Case and reading Stella Cameron's Out of Body and M. J. Rose's The Memorist.
I got one more quilt block done.

Here are some more pictures of the flowers in the yard.  The petunias have been blooming all winter long and are starting to fizzle out now.

I love geraniums!!!  The pink one is a peppermint geranium.

These are one of the miniature rose bushes.

These are from the big rose bush in the front of the house.  They smell great!

This bush is full of blooms!

I have two more blocks done on my hand pieced quilt.

And two more on the Moosequilt Jelly Roll Sampler.

Not much work going into the quilts since I've been working in the yard and playing with the puppy.

This picture doesn't do my Iris justice and of course you won't be able to smell the gorgeous scent.  I need to get some pictures of my roses.  They're blooming like crazy!

Here's another picture of Jessi.  She's really turning out to be a good dog for us.

I'm enjoying J.D. Robb's Fantasy in Death and listening to Joanna Fluke's Apple Turnover Murder.  My allergies have been so bad, working in the yard doesn't help, that everything has slowed down.  Hopefully we'll get some rain to settle down the pollen and dust.  We can hope anyway!

I got some more blocks done on the hand pieced quilt.

A friend told our quilting group about the Jelly Roll Sampler at moosequilts.blogspot.com.  Oh what fun!  Walmart had some jelly rolls on sale so I got 2 and I'm making 2 quilts with them.  Both are batiks and I'm really enjoying how fast and easy they are going together. I can't wait till the next block is up!      

We have a dog.  Her name is Princess but we're changing it to Jessi.  She's six months old and a chihuahua/dachsund mix.  We'll see how we get along.

The trip to Vegas was fast and furious but lots of fun.  We got into town on Thursday night right in the middle of a nasty dirt storm!  It blew off a sliding door at Excalibur, destroyed a hot air balloon and knocked out the power to one of the monorail tracks.  I don't know what otherI damage was done. 
I wasn't feeling very good (sinus headache) the next morning at the quilt show but I enjoyed looking at everything.  I ordered the CD with pictures of all the quilts but it hasn't come yet.  If I lived in Vegas, I could join the doll club!  I haven't made a doll in a long, long time!
We rode the new monorail from Monte Carlo to Bellagio.

We got some yummy cupcakes at the Cupcakery at Monte Carlo.  I got chocolate, of course, and my husband got a strawberry shortcake one.  I wish I had gotten the one that was Bubbly Champagne buttercreme frosting on raspberry cake.  Next trip for sure!

We saw the largest chocolate fountain in the world at Bellagio and their cakes were awesome!

 

The cakes at Aria were amazing too!

The Bellagio Conservatory was awesome!!!  We're used to seeing it in the fall with the big water wheel and all the chrysanthemums so it was nice to see it during a different season.

Can't wait till we go back in September!!!

Time to get caught up on my posting.  A lot has been happening since my last post.  I've been reading a lot!  I just finished Thereby Hangs A Tail by Spencer Quinn.  I had read his book Dog On It and really enjoyed it.  I enjoyed this one just as much!  Another book that I read and really liked is Ghost a la Mode by Sue Ann Jaffarian.  I've been to Julian so it really made it more interesting plus, I like ghost stories!  Ghouls Just Haunt to Have Fun by Victoria Laurie was good too!  Now I'm reading a J.D. Robb book.
I finally finished my grandson's I Spy quilt .

He likes Transformers (an understatement!) so I appliqued some on the back of the quilt.

Then I got my granddaughter's I Spy quilt top pieced, I just need to get some more of the darker green for the border so I can get it finished.  Her quilt is the same and my grandson's except it's green instead of blue and she has girly blocks and she'll have Tinkerbell on the back.

Needless to say, the work on my Christmas quilt has slowed down for a while. 

On top of all that, I was given a treasure trunk last month.  I was given a yellow trunk full of fabric (most of it is a cotton/polyester blend), quilt blocks, quilt block pieces that are cut and ready to sew, and a few sample blocks that were sewn together.  Here's a picture of the trunk and some of the blocks and pieces that were sewn together.    I'll have to tell you that there is a lot of cat hair on everything (I'm allergic to cats) and there was a lot of cockroach poo too!  Gross!  Here's some pictures of the trunk and some of the blocks.  Cool, huh?!?

There are 32 star blocks that are sewn (by hand) in a hexagon shape.  I went through the fabric and matched it to the star blocks and cut borders so I could finish the quilt.  I washed the fabric before I used it but, unfortunately, I can't wash the blocks until the quilt is finished.  Here's a picture of the blocks I've gotten finished so far.  I'm really enjoying the hand piecing.  It makes me want to get started on the Jane Austen Quilted Diamonds quilt I want to hand piece.  Too many quilts, not enough time!

This weekend we're going to a quilt show in Vegas. Well actually, the quilt show is in Henderson but we're staying in Vegas at the Excalibur.  Hopefully I can find the fabric to finish my granddaughter's quilt.  I'm excited and can't wait!  I want to see the new CityCenter.