7 days left

Actually more like 6 days, 10 hours, and 44 minutes left of my 20s. That is right folks, next Monday I will be 30! :~0 When the Hell did that happen? I swear just yesterday I was sitting in English Honors with Mrs. Giordano at Reavis and now I'm an almost 30 year old! I don't have any special plans for the day. I think I may dress in all black for the day to mourn my twenties. Seriously though, I am not freaking out that I'm going to be thirty, it is just a number anyway. I don't feel like I am almost thirty or maybe I do. Hmm, how exactly does one know when you are feeling your age? I have a few gray hairs, chronic headaches and an occasional back ache, but I think that can do more with having four kids under 8 then the big 3-0.  What does 40 feel like or even 80? After all I sometimes feel like I could be forty, but there are days when I feel like I could still be 19 and that I'm just babysitting these kids until their real parents come home. So, I'm wondering how old do YOU feel?

It is beginning to look a lot like Christmas..

however I still am not in that festive of a spirit yet. Yesterday morning I was awoken early by my little fur monster, baby, when I took her out, it was snowing! It made me happy to see it for about 2 seconds, then the thoughts of how much a pain it will be to get 4 kids bundled everyday hit me. But hey, for those 2 seconds it was nice. LOL Seriously though, I do like the snow. I love how it makes things so peaceful and not matter how cold it is outside, it never seems that bad if it is snowing. The kids were disappointed that it was all gone by the time they got home from school. Today is a new day and it is snowing again, so maybe today they can run around in it. Lucy loves the snow too.

I have my anxiety attacks somewhat under control. I had my daily medication upped and that seems to have helped. I have still had a few attacks, but not as frequent as before. Thanks everyone who showed me support.  

We put our tree up, or I should say my husband put up the tree and lights and the kids decorated it.  We put some of the more precious ornaments on top. 

I belong to a message board with a wonderful bunch of women. Every year we have an ornament exchange. This year my buddy gave me two very special ornaments. One had our names and the date under snowmen (which I love) and the other one was in memory of my mom. <3

Here is the one for my mom.

Stress

 I have been becoming more closely in touch with this evil demon than I ever wanted to be.  I have been having what I believe to be anxiety or stress attacks. Let me tell you it is not fun. I feel like I can't take a deep enough breathe, get a sharp pain in my head, dizzy and could even feel shaky. I try deep breathing, but when you can't take a deep breath it tends to make the attack worse because then I feel as if I'm suffocating. Between the kids, house, and animals, it is all taking it's toll on my body. I just feel like I am turning into this miserable whiny person and I hate it.

With the coming holidays, my mom has been on my mind constantly. I'm approaching them with happiness and extreme sorrow because she will not be here. I need to be there and make it special for my kids, but what I would really like to do is hide under my covers in bed all day. I try to think of happier holidays with her. She loved Christmas so much and her favorite character was Santa. Last year because she was sick we didn't get to do much Christmas shopping together, but I did "shop" with her over the phone. She was at her house on the internet and I was at mine, together we shopped for people. I remember her being a perfectionist when it came to wrapping gifts. I have never seen someone get so excited over the fact that the pictures matched perfectly at the seams. LOL I had even seen her take paper off a gift and rewrap it because it didn't come out just right. I thought she was crazy, after all it would just get ripped off, but I now know it was just another way of her showing us how much she loved us and how important we were to her. She would have loved the fact that she had a new baby girl to shop for. I'm sure she would have found a beautiful dress and more than likely would have picked out a baby doll for Lauren. She truly loved giving and seeing the excited faces of her grandkids when they opened a gift.

My mom and dad Christmas 2007.

You make plans and God laughs

well this week, he must have been hysterical! I set out to finish my third quilt, the camo one for Nick who loves everything army related. Everything was going good, I was almost done and only had threes rows left to sew when the bobbin case broke. UGH! The closet place that had them was 1/2 an hour away in another state, so off I went on a road trip with my two younger ones and my mother in law. Yes I could have ordered it online, but wanted to get the quilt done and was too impatient to wait for it to arrive in the mail. So I got it installed, started to finish sewing and my bobbin ran out so I had to make a new one. So apparently the joke is on me. I did end up finishing it although, I am not too happy about it. For some unknown reason, some of my rows came up short and by a lot, but have no fear I know my little army guy will still love it and he won't notice the imperfections, just the fact that him mom loved him enough to make him a special blanket.

The pile o' squares

Sewing the X on the camo

Sewing the X on the green

Then on the khaki

Sewing the squares together to make rows.

 Tower o' rows

The broken one is on the left. Can you tell where it is broke? 

                             All fixed! 

Let's get it started.... 

Finally going to finish!

That is until I had to wind another bobbin. LOL

The finishing stitch that I used around the   edge. 

Before it was washed.

Woohoo! Another one down!

Doing the happy dance. I finished Allison's quilt today. I am very happy with the way it came out. As I expected it is very big, so when she is a college student, she can bring her blanket with her. <3

The squares all sewn together.

The quilt before ragging it.

  

                                                      The back of the quilt

After the ragging

A close-up

Front and back

Next will be Nicholas's blanket and then a special project.

Bittersweet day.

We had the boys' birthday party today. It was yet another "firsts" in a long line of them. This is the first birthday party we had since my mom passed. It is quite unbelievable that it has been six months already. I got a little weepy this morning because I was remembering this time last year was when her bouts with pneumonia started. She had to come to my boys' party in a wheelchair because she was so sick. I had told her not to worry about coming because I knew she didn't feel well, but she came anyway and now I'm grateful for that. I also remember this time last year having the most horrible dream. I dreamt my mom had passed away and I remember waking up crying. I wanted to call her right then, but didn't since it was the middle of the night. Perhaps it was my subconscious preparing me for what was t come, not that you can prepare for that.

I'm starting to feel very overwhelmed in life right now. It is as if I am in this big deep hole trying to claw my way out and every time I make it up a few feet, I fall back down. I know you are thinking, well what the hell did d you get the dog for?! Actually the dog has helped a bit, at least she doesn't yell at me or give me attitude.

While we are on that subject, what the heck is it with 7 year old girls and their attitude? Holy crap! I never recall having such an attitude at so young of an age. I don't even know how to handle it. All I know is that I do not look forward to puberty and PMS. LOL

The progress on the quilts have been halted a little. I had a migraine for several days. While I could take care of the kids, the household stuff and "hobbies" got pushed tot the side. I am hoping this week I can get my house back in some sort of order so I can finish up the quilts since it is definitely not getting any warmer.

Here is a new picture of Lucy.

Just because I am a glutton for punishment..........

Meet our new family member. Little Lucy Bear joined our family on Thursday. She is a four month old Puggle. Half Pug half Beagle. Her owner had to get rid of her due to finances. She is sweet and the kids love her. Before you ask, no she is not potty trained, but we are working on it. She has had only a handful of accidents in the house. She doesn't really bark, and is an avid leaf hunter. LOL She is great with the kids and could care less about the cats. She just kind of goes with the flow if things.

So I have the fabric cut for my next quilt. It will be for Allison and I think it will turn out to be huge. LOL Oh well, then it will grow with her.

The very wrinkled khaki, I would have ironed it, but there was just too much of it.

The light green striped fabric.

Okay, do they seriously need to stamp their name on the fabric? I know where I got it from.

The pretty flower fabric and the tower o' squares. LOL

Now, I know what you are thinking, that isn't the same template, and you are correct! Good eye! This is a new larger template made from a heavy cardboard. Since the quilt was bigger I decided to make the squares 2 inches bigger. Stay tuned for more on this exciting turn of events. LOL

"All those kids."

That really seems to be the popular saying of late. It always irritates amazes me when people say this to me. The comments about how I must have my hands full are a tad annoying too. Yes I am busy, but that does not mean I want your sympathy because of it. I love my kids and if I thought my sanity and bank account could afford it, I would probably petition my husband for some more. I like to think that my hands are full of love as cheesy as that sounds. Seriously I only have 4 kids, I could see if I had 10 that people would say things like "All those kids". I just don't get why people would think 4 is a ton. Maybe it is because I grew up with three brothers that I don't see it as "all those kids". I mean geez, my brother has six and I still don't see them as having "All those kids!" So do me a favor next you are going to make a comment to people with more than 1 or 2 kids, think before you speak. Even if your comments aren't meant to hurt or be insulting, they just maybe.

One of my latest favorite sayings is "A Parent's love is whole no matter how many times divided."

One down!!!

Woohoo I finished up Alex's blanket this morning. I am not sure if I like it though. :~( I just don't know about the ragging effect. oh, well, it is done and pretty cute in my opinion. It isn't perfect, but neither am I. (just don't tell my husband. LOL)

Getting started the squares all sewn together.

And we're off!

I kept checking my bobbin, but imagine my surprise when I looked at the spool of thread.

This is all I had left when it ran out! 3 measly squares!

So, after deciding not to quit and go to the store the next day to buy more, I just used some yellow.

Quilt before "ragging"

All done!

As you can see, he loves it.

A close-up

Not too bad, if I may say so myself.

So I might have gotten in over my head.

Jo-Ann fabrics was having a pretty good Labor Day sale and I jumped at it. I have been wanting to make the kids rag quilts, but kept talking myself out of it because fabric is expensive. I decided this time though that I was going to do it. After all a blanket made by mom is way better store bought quilt. You know because of all the love put into it and all that jazz. Thanks to a friend showing pictures of her gorgeous quilt I decided that I could do it. So I went to the store clutching my $100 bill that I had found while cleaning out my husband's car (after all finder's keepers ;o) ). I was just going to get fabric for my two older since I will be repainting their room. So I picked out the fabric and took a number for it to be cut. I was a good 10 people behind and had a very antsy 2 almost 3 year old so I took him to pick out some fabric for his fire truck bed. Holy Cow! If I don't have a headache by the time I am done making his quilt I will be amazed, let's just say they aren't the calmest colors around. LOL In order to make myself get moving on these blankets, I am going to post pictures here of my progress. I decided to start on Alex's quilt first since it won't be as big as Allie and Nick's.

The fabrics

Getting started, I know you are jealous of my own homemade template. You too can have a jazzy one like that, all you need is an old plastic place mat. :)

All cut... or so I thought. I ended up having to cut some more.

Getting ready to sew. Little did I know my spool pin was snapped off.

Thankfully I have a wonderfully handy husband who ran to Home Depot to get something to fix it. :)

The batting inside, I debated back and forth about having batting, but in the end I decided to just do it.

Sewing! now you can see why I said I may have a headache from this fabric. LOL

Stayed tuned for more progress on this event.