Late, Late Late For a Very Important Date!

Watching Frank Cut Grass

We have worked all morning to prepare for the final installation of the hall/den tile.  The room is so large!  LOL, and empty!

One of the things we had to deal with is the TV with 7 devices connected to it.  This is just the wires from only ONE of the 7!  I will now go through TV withdrawals tonight.  I stay on the sofa until about 1 or 2 AM and watch all the shows, news reports, reruns, crime shows, pawn shop shows until I fall asleep and head back to the bedroom, where Frank has been since 11 pm.

I remember walking into this  room when we were looking at houses 28 years ago

I was huge pregnant for Carrie and we had searched for months for the perfect house we could afford.  This one was nothing I wanted; it was an odd grey brick, the ugliest seafoam green carpeting, only three bedrooms and the backyard was trashed.  But it had just come on the market and our very patient agent wanted to check it out to see why it was so below price in the upscale subdivision.

Little dog in TWO beds

I walked through it and fell in love with the bathroom!  It was larger than my bedroom in the house we had just sold!  Why the tub alone was larger than the bathroom in the sold house.  I was going to live like a queen!  We had the first bid on it, followed by 5 more that same day!

Chloe is where the sofa USED to be!

Now, while it may not be a showplace, it is very comfortable and very up to date and very much mine.  We paid it off over 12 years ago using the proceeds from the company I just sold and doubling up on the mortgage payments every month for the 5 years before that.

9 yards of fun

To treat myself while in the middle of this the ultimate reorganization of my life, I went to Mia's shop for some incredible dots and chevrons.  She is at the Seattle Market and the mice are reducing the prices on something different every day!  Friday it was dots and chevrons and Saturday it was red/white/blue fabrics.  Here is my haul! And here is my report!

used this week	0
Used May	-4.5
added this week	9
added May	11
used YTD	-52.83
added YTD	34.5
stash reduction	-18.33

Plumber's Butt

The haiku is free floating silk

banana flower and tyvek

What a morning!  Busy, busy, busy!

Last night was my Fiber Group meeting. Here are some of the pieces from that meeting.  The quilt below is a project that Renee (she received a grant) is doing called Kids Quilt For Kids.  They use Marvel Fabric Markers and draw sea life, she pieces it and quilts it and it is donated to kids in need.  Don't you love it!  My piece was the fork, remember that?

The guys are grouting the tile this morning.  The dogs are at the vet once again.  My eye appointment was easy, getting there was in the morning traffic.  Madeline, my GP's nurse, called me back with an appointment time in 45 minutes so I was pretty rushed!  But I got there in time to fill out paperwork and sign my name a dozen or 50 times.  

Kids Quilt For Kids

Doc said it appeared I lifted the corner of my lasix flap.  And that was the irritation.  But the big problem was that I was reacting to the gentab ointment.  He said my eye was pretty well inflamed! But I knew that!  He advised me to stop doing surgery on myself.

New drops now feel better.  The reason I had the lasix in the first place was because I have a lazy eye and they could no longer correct for it in glasses.  I was falling off stairs I didn't know was there and stepping "down" lines I thought were stairs. My depth perception was gone.  The first lasix was for that eye, the second to hone the correction on that eye.  The third for the

other eye, and the 4th because I developed a bubble under the flap and they had to smooth it out.  Then the driver's license bureau found I had a cataract in one eye when I couldn't see a bank of numbers on their eye chart.  And the next 4 year renewal showed one in the other eye.  I was in my early 50s by that time.  Doctor said he was seeing cataracts earlier due to the air pollution.  

I had 20/20 in one eye and 20/15 in the other.  I loved it.  My eyes had kept me from getting a job with the FBI as an investigator.  I was so happy to be able to see for the first time in my life!

I had to show you this picture.  I think my tile guy, bless his heart, is auditioning for my next male nude!

Some women like  large biceps, or hairy chests and neanderthal unibrows.  I have always been a sucker for a nice tight male buttock.  But doesn't the tile look good?

We can move furniture back tonight.  And they will be here bright and early on Monday to start the hall and the den.  The dogs will have the doggy spa for the first three days.  

I Told Them Not To Leave Their Equipment Laying Around!

Eye is better today. Although it still hurts.  I guess it is better.  I can't see it and Frank says, I don't know..........geez.  If it were him, he would be in the hospital with bandages around his head like the Invisible Man had.

The dogs are once again at the kennel.  McGee refused to go back with the girls and I had to walk him.  With his Arnold Schwarzenegger
 build and stubborn determination, there is no way he is going if he doesn't want to!

Chloe was so cute yesterday and
again today.  When you open the door to the vet's office you see the desk and three or four people behind it.  She rushes up to the desk, which is booby high to me, and jumps up as high as she can to see them!  She loves seeing people.

Before the guys left yesterday, I told them not to leave their stuff laying around for McGee to steal.  They thought it was funny.  So last night he took the cover bag off their tile saw and shredded it.

And he began to chew all the corners of the tile boxes.  This morning there is ripped cardboard all over the walkway.

I told them!

Today they will finish the laying of the tile and tomorrow they will grout it.  I can't find anything.  We searched for the cat food container all last night.  This morning when I put the dirty clothes in the washer, there it was mixed in with the clothes!

Tile Installation Slowly Progressing

Last night, Frank decided I was right, we should have taken the bed apart on Sunday.  As you can see, my bedroom is of Moroccan flavor.  The Elephant Quilt will hang behind the bed at some point in time.  The bed, even though it looks small, is a queen sized bed.  It acutally dismantled fine once Frank listened to me.

Can you see the "column" on the far wall? I got three of these plaster shelves from Kirkland's from the clearance table.  Like for $10 each.  And to me they looked like the tops of columns.  So I got some molding and cut out the top so the shelf bottom would fit, and made myself three columns in the room!

I think I just saw a new way to photograph quilts!  LOL.  Hang them on the top of the bed posts and drape them down!  Yes!

See, it pays to look at your stuff in a different light.


Here is the stencil that looks like a lace curtain on the long wall.  And these guys are over the bathroom door.

This palm tree doesn't really need the rest of the trunk because I have a tall dresser that sits in that alcove.  It used to be a make up desk and mirror but who puts on make up?

Here is the carpet torn up and the floor being worked on.
Lunch!
It is about 1:30 PM and they came back from lunch ready to put

the mastic on the floor.  There were a number of cracks in the foundation that needed to be filled.  The consensus was that there should be no further settling, no doors we couldn't open and no uneven floors that are signs of problems with moving foundations.

So they are putting a mastic on the floor after filling the cracks that will allow the tile to break away rather than crack should there be more movement.  David was not concerned about future movement however.

And the mastic smells so I am glad the day is pretty and cool and we can open doors and keep the air moving.

The cat is not happy, however.

A Tour of My House Floors

Well, finally got the tile ordered and we are waiting for it to come in to schedule the installation.  We will do the installation in two phases.  I am not as energetic as PattyA is, David and his wonderful crew will do the total install.  I told Frank we could save a couple hundred dollars by doing the quarter round ourselves.  He looked at me, laughed and said, a couple hundred dollars of my time is way more valuable out servicing my customers!

So, I can sit back and eat bonbons while the crews work for me!  LOL.

David has done all the surfaces in my house since I met him 25 years ago.

Floors in my kitchen/breakfast area are pavers.

The formal dining room/quilting room is commercial carpet with a
marvelous vine.  Frank saw it in a hotel somewhere and loved it.

The den/hall is a deep maroon thick carpet that has lasted for 15 year and still looks good, despite the incredible amount of dog hair that it gathers daily!  I don't know why we actually have dog beds, they sleep on the sofa anyway.

The master bedroom is a beautiful cream carpet that is about 6 or 7 years old.  This is my reading/relaxing/getting away from everyone nook.  I am found there with two bassets slung across me. so much for getting away from everyone.  I had to look at why it looks grey around the dog's toy box.  That is sun coming in from the door to the back yard.  Odd looking, but the carpet is all the same color in there, really.

Frank's office is a thick blue carpet that makes him feel like he is on the
ocean.  Don't ask.  LOL.  It is because of the lighthouse theme in there...........just sayin'

You can see all the dust up there!  LOL. I don't dust, and I guess he doesn't either!  My wonderful housekeeper did that for 26 years for me.  And that is just a "few" of his lighthouses!

And my baths are the large ceramic tiles.

My foyer is an interesting thing.  It is the unofficial storage area for my
excess quilting stuff.  And i am slowly working to incorporate it in my studio.  I wanted a center design and looked for months to fine just the right one.  When I showed it to the tile guys the day they came to lay the foyer tile, the supervisor had a horror struck look on his face.  It seems he thought it was the sign of the devil and could not work in this house.  I assure you it is just tile!  LOL.  I do no satanic rituals in there, although there are a few people who might think otherwise!

The studio is Carrie's old bedroom.  When she moved out, and I was sure she was not coming back.........LOL..........I took it over.  She designed the cabinetry and cutting table and Frank built it.  I have Pergo laminate in there that was leftover from when we did the rent house.  Carrie and I laid that in both the rent house and the studio.  It is the only room David has not done for us.  And I love it because my office chair flies over the wood like a speedy
race car (when the wheels are clean!)

So the  den/hall/master bedroom will soon be the dark long tile on the left in the sample.  The top right piece is exactly the color of all the wood in the den.  I felt it would look like a bowl if I put that in there.  Carrie said, go darker mom, darker.  So I did.  When I called her and told her I have a southwestern rug picked out for the room, I could hear a sharp intake of breath as she held her tongue.  But I am sure her eyes rolled far back into her head!

LOL.  Gotta love that girl!  I can see her eyes rolling as I type!