Tuesday April 28th

It was a busy day for me. I worked on Elizabeth's #1 quilt, while

doing some laundry in the morning. Here is the quilt top. I need to do some machine applique before I quilt it. All of these fabrics were used in her room. I made curtains, dust ruffle, sheets, dresser scarf and a diaper stacker. We bought yards and yards of fabric.

Remember the wild ferns we dug up several weeks ago. There are really thriving. Most all of the old stuff is dying off. All these fonds are new ones.

This is my new billfold I picked up in town today. It not much thicker than a half inch. It will be easy to find in my feed bag style purse.





This is what I purchased today. The fabric, not the pattern. It's dated 1979. You can guess who will be wearing this christening gown. The picture doesn't do the border eyelet justice. Just take my word, it's beautiful and dainty!

One more day to sew. We leave on Thursday for the Blacksmith Association of Missouri Conference. It will be held in sedalia Missouri again this year.


10:20 63 degrees.

Monday things

First of all let's back up a bit. Remember the Lottery Power ball? . . . . .
I didn't win. So I'm back.




Then remember yesterday? BT washed both Jeeps? This is what we woke up to this morning. It has rained all day. Tonight it looks like there is an inch and a quarter in the gauge.







Today was Grandparent day at Alex's school. I won on 4 corners. He got to claim the prize. He was quite happy with his stickers. So happy that he didn't care to play another game. He did enjoy the nice fresh baked homemade cookie with M & M's on it.









Here is the finished baby quilt I made for BT's cousin Diane. She had bought the Noah's Ark panel. It was about 36 inches square. I added the double borders and paper pieced the diamonds on the bottom. It turned out about 42 by 60. That is a much better size for a baby quilt. Diane was very thrilled with it.

10:43 PM 61 degrees and past my bedtime.

What we worked on this weekend

A gorgeous weekend. Low 80's. BT forged both days. However we didn't take pictures on Saturday, if you can believe that. Besides the bottle opener in this picture, they made S hooks, a frog gig, a trigger guard and a spatula.









Today he made some really nice hooks. He hung them behind our bedroom door to hang clothes on.






This is the old fire pot he took out of the forge today. This one had been in use for 15 years. that's the second one he's worn out in 30 years.










This is the new fire pot he put in.

I worked on this quilt all weekend. I will take some full shots after it is finished. I'm still sewing the binding on. It is a Noah Ark wall hanging that I added to and made a full size baby quilt. It is for BT's cousin, Diane. She is expecting a new grand baby in a week!




Finally BT washed both Jeep # 1 and Jeep #2. Thanks Dear!

81 degrees with storms forecasted.

I won, I won, I won!!!

I have really been lucky lately. I first won from Betsy's at the movies. I received a full service car wash valued at $16, a $25 Visa gift card, and 2 tickets to the movies.


A couple of weeks later I won the 50/50 pot on payday at work. I received $43 in cash.


So I bought a $1 scratch off lottery ticket. I won a free ticket. I turned it in for 2 tickets and won $4.00. With that today I bought 2 more scratch off''s and 2 power ball tickets. I won $2 more dollars. So I won't be on here long. I'm winning the jacket pot tonight! See ya . . . .


WAIT I forgot to tell you what else I won. Linda from Two succulent sisters awarded me with a blog award. It's my first blog award ever!!! Thanks Linda.




It's been a busy week. DIL and I have had a rummage sale. This

is what it looked like the first morning. And pretty much this same way on morning #2. I don't know if it was the beautiful weather, the economy or what, that kept the customers away. I made a whopping $37.25. DIL did very well. She had children's clothes which always sells good.


Another outside shot.

Elizabeth enjoying all the coming and going at the rummage sale.

Finally (before the power ball is drawn) I need to give Marlene at Stitchin by the lake my recipe for Danish twist. Oh and check out her cute grandson too!

Danish Twist
1 cup milk ½ cup sugar
¼ c. melted shortening 1 t. salt
2 pkgs Rapid rise yeast ½ warm water
3 eggs 5 ½ – 6 cups flour
Scald milk, stir in sugar, salt and shortening. Cool to lukewarm. Dissolve yeast in the water. Add lukewarm milk mixture and 2 beaten eggs. Stir 1/2 of flour. Beat until smooth. (I use a wooden spoon) Stir in more flour to make a soft dough. Knead 8 to 10 minutes.
Place on floured surface and cover with a large bowl. Let rise until doubled. About an hour. Punch down, knead into a soft dough. Divide in half.
Roll into 2 logs about 20-24 inches long.
Spray a 13 by 9 cake pan. Take the log, holding half way and twist into a braid. Put into one side of the pan. Repeat with other half.
Spoon strawberry jam into creases and let rise. Brush with beaten egg.
Bake 350 for 25 to 30 minutes. When cool, ice with powdered sugar icing.

9:45 73 degrees.

The tooth fairy is coming tonight! *

* Another self portrait.

Sarah was home!!

So it was Sarah time this past weekend, actually for 3 days. She stayed until after noon on Monday.


Since she missed Easter, I had to bake some Danish twist for her.
Sorry I forgot to take a picture before we ate almost half of it.
Trust me it was good, strawberry jelly, powder sugar icing and
all. (I never get my way to use raspberry jam in it.)




This picture is from Saturday night at LaBamba. No, Alex isn't drinking this Margarita; it's his Daddy's. It's a monster one. Take my word for it, it's big. Just compare it to the sugar shaker near by. It's much taller than it.

Alex and Brady took turns with my camera again. Here they took some great shots of
Sarah with her new niece.

Brady took these, including the one

of Grandma looking quit dizzy.

And this one of his Mom taking his picture. After all is turnabout fair play?

I got up and went to work Monday. Sarah came and met me at 9:30. I took off for a couple of hours and we had a girl's whirlwind shopping trip. Our first stop was Dunn Brothers for her a Vanilla Latte.

On to T J Maxx, where she found 2 blouses and a kitchen whisk. However, we were in search of gray dress pants. Or is it grey? Anyway onto Penney's, only found a belt and a cami there. We tried Maurice's, no luck there or Dillard's.

Across the street to Aspen Ridge Sporting Arms shop. AKA a gun shop. There we priced some pepper spray. He only had one option, it sounded great but we needed to see our options before we decided.

Two doors down to Abiy's International liquors. We picked up several bottles of Missouri wine for her to take back to Oklahoma City.

Some of her favorites were Adam Puchta. She likes their Riefenstahler. It is a good sweet red wine, best when chilled. Summit Lake Winery, Eberbach Red another sweet red. One from Les Bourgeois Winery, Riverboat Red, of course you guessed it, sweet red.

With time to spare we stopped at Kohl's. There she hit the jackpot with a pair of gray pants and a darling spring jacket. While she was shopping my sister who is under the weather, called and asked if I could get her some Gatorade.

Leaving there, we planned our next stop. I would run in the grocery store and she would call Madison's restaurant to order their famous house salads. The house special salad is a blend of romaine and iceberg lettuce, tossed with a red wine vinegar and oil dressing, artichoke hearts, red onions, and fresh parmigiano cheese. We picked up an extra one for my

co-worker.

I drop off the Gatorade and head to work, pulling in at high noon. We had accomplished all this in just 2 and half hours.

Oh how I love shopping with the daughter.

She headed home as I had to put in my time at work. We sure enjoyed her visit at home. I just wish Rusty could have made the trip with her. Maybe next time!

Okay I'm tired after shopping and working all in one day.

10:10 55 degrees.

George Kraus Auction

Saturday morning as we literally climbed out of bed, (that story another day) the sky was gloomy and dark. It looked like it could rain all day.

We drank our coffee and mocha cappuccino and grabbed a few donut holes before we grabbed our rain jackets and headed to the auction.

We arrived about an hour before it started and already the cars had lined up. I could see the small tent with concessions. Beyond that there was a huge white tent. Under the big tent were all the household items. There were many wagons full of farm items sitting outside the tent.

Every where we turned we ran into someone we knew, including many classmates from our high school.

One of the first things we saw was an old rusty John Deere tractor. BT exclaimed, that's the tractor my Dad sold Leonard. Unfortunately a tree at some point had fallen across it. BT retrieved his cell phone from the jeep and called his brother Pat. You will see in the pictures the 5 family boys looking at the tractor. After BT came home he discovered the serial numbers indicated the tractor was built in 1939.

The auction started at 10:00 sharply with two auctioneers calling at the same time. I would go between the two rings and BT would come back and forth. Our son and his two boys arrived shortly after it started.

The rain held off until the last hour of the sale and then it was just sprinkles. The auction lasted over 6 hours.

It was so fun see the collections from 4 generations. I never bought a thing. Not that there weren't things I wanted there. It just seemed someone wanted them worse than I did. Most everything thing went for top dollar. There were 3 empty shotgun shells boxes. Empty boxes. They sold for $160.00. In the pictures you will see a stack of hats. They advertised AC tractors (Allis Chalmers). They sold for $190.00

My co-worked Lorie helped with the auction. You will see her in the red jacket in the pictures. The two grandsons sure enjoyed themselves. Between riding the equipment, checking out the concessions and rolling down the steep hill, we had two tired boys by evening.

Sarah was driving in from Oklahoma City and made several calls to us during the day. She arrived at Jeremy's house just before he got home. She got her first visit with Elizabeth.

At 6:00 the whole family went to LaBamba. I need to get used to asking for a table for 8 of us now, nine when Rusty comes.

It was an awesome day, good auction, great friends and my whole family together. I hope you enjoy the pictures of a day at the country auction.

Our walk this evening

This is rusty iron that has been laying in the woods since we moved here 16 years ago.

Of course Bentley goes
walking with us.

And then there is the scenery . . .

The O'possum that Mr Bentley had to check out.











And this is the end of the road.







Have a great weekend. We are going to what I hope will be an awesome sale tomorrow. I will try to get some pictures.


8:00 PM 73 degrees

What's for breakfast tomorrow?

Look at what BT found for me after dinner tonight! If you look close there are two little mushrooms. I already had one chillin' in the refrigerator. After this picture he found 3 more. Just enough to add to my omelet in the morning.

I was on my way outside to photograph Elizabeth's quilt, when I saw the mushroom hunter. I've had the quilt finished for a week or so, but I'd never could remember to take pictures of it.







I like to paper piece the year the quilt was made. It has become my signature. On the border of this I machine quilted the words "made for Elizabeth by Grandma Tappel". Some day maybe an historian will find the words and like the hubby says . . .wonder who Grandma Tappel is.




The back of the quilt is a beautiful piece of paisley print, I found in the remnant bin at Hobby Lobby. If you enlarge the picture you can see the detail.


10 PM 45 degrees. Will spring ever get here?

Easter 2009

Easter has come.

Sunday morning we attended 10:30 mass. Never did I expect "Oh Brother where art thou" to come into mind during church. However, a friends two young daughters were part of the children's choir. The two sisters, Kallie and Michaelah, sang "Down in the Valley to Pray". They did an awesome job. That song was written by Doc Watson. He was born the same year as my mother, 1923.

(This is where I tried to load a video of Doc Watson, Ricky Skaggs and Allison Krauss singing) It didn't work for me . . .


Also my co-worker Frank, came and sat in the same pew we were in. I started crying. Frank was declared cancer free just a few weeks ago. He is still suffering from the effects of the chemo. I'm sure Easter has a special meaning for him this year.


Easter dinner was to be at our house in the afternoon. Here is Elizabeth's first visit to Grandma and Grandpa's house. She slept through the grand entrance and then some.









Grandpa had hidden the Easter eggs before they arrived. As they got out of the car, there were egg sightings already. Here is Brady filling his sack.



Alex was quickly filling his bag too. Notice both boys have their hoods on as it was cold and a little drizzle was falling.

Lizzie is sleeping still. See her Easter outfit. Her aunt Sarah was surprised that is wasn't pink.

Speaking of Aunt Sarah, she and Rusty didn't get to come home from Oklahoma City for the holiday. She did make their own Easter dinner of baked ham! Hopefully, if the weather is not threatening next weekend, they should both be home for 3 days! YIPPEE


Grandpa and Elizabeth bonding.










Great grandmother got in her bonding time too.
In fact she wanted to hog the baby!





Hope you all had a great Easter.

Pictures are worth a thousand words

I don't think these pictures needs words. What can I say BT and I are just so taken in with these kids.

I leave you with Elizabeth sleeping, such a doll.

Wish I could take credit for thses pictures but as you know her Mommie is the professional.