Snippets and Threadtales:Yes, I'm Certifiable!

Have you been wondering about me? Wonder no more...I am fully certifiable, now!  Not quite sure what I am certified for..but let's just say I spend far more time in health care facilities than I do at home!

They may not have wrapped me in a white jacket yet, but I'm well on my way! Life is a challenge and that's all there is to it..but we still get to choose how we react to it, and what we do or do not choose to do with our lives.

So, yes...lots and lots of quilt therapy and the updating of all four of my active blogs., the very best I can. I also moderate a Caring Bridge site for updating close family and friends on my brother and sister-in-law and I still visit my MIL, Dorothy, who is now in hospice in end stage of advanced bone cancer.

Considering we live outside of all service areas for Internet service and don't have satellite anything, I'm lucky to get two bars out of five with my plug-in broadband internet service. Some days it's on par with the slowness of dial-up and someone flipped my dial to the wrong location!

But yes, I still blog, still update tons of photos to all of my blogs and yes...I QUILT!

Here is a worn out me, sewing with my group and here are some of the fun things I have made to donate to wonderful causes, lately:

My totally tubular streak of lightning quilts...tutorial coming soon to this blog, by me and near you!!!!

and four little leftover snippets and threadtales potholders for donation. The quilts go to the preemie ward of the Salem Hospital, the potholders are sold by my Mid-Valley Quilt Guild to raise money for other charitable causes.

And to showcase, the quilt, below......I just created a whole blog post full of links to free.....

Disappearing 9 Patch, 16 Patch and Twist/Turn Variations...so check out my blog post about them

on one of my other blogs...Free Quilt Patterns 

Free quilt patterns are always available at this site...check my sidebar, right, for tons of links to thousands and thousands of links I've saved since 2006!

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The Disappearing, or Fractured Nine Patch quilt has been finished and previously donated to charity.
Easy to make, and so much fun..and there are SO many variations...link above!!!

I made 'Breast Pockets' for Melanie Testa's projects to create awareness for those who choose not to reconstruct after mastectomies. 



Melanie is a wonderful free spirit with a rock star personality so hence the artsy and grungy grafitti look of some...as well as my usual sweet love approach forthree others. Melanie is absolutely a '10" and a 'Star' as well as a "Rock Star" for all she does to continue to educate us about women's post cancer/post mastectomy choices.

I still take daily care of Matilda, Penelope, Georgette and Gig......our chickens.  Taking care of chickens involves feeding and watering, collecting eggs, and letting them out in the morning and locking them up in their coop at night.

But in our own free spirited, Gigi's case...it also involves trying to get her to come down from trees!  My super zoom makes her super fuzzy with my small Nikon but there she is!  And yes, some chickens can actually fly..over fences, up into trees, and out of site in a single flight!

Kermit, our lone remaining cat, since the oh so very sad losses of my beloved Keira and Willow, has turned back to her true nature of only wanting to be outside.

But she and the chickens are best of friends. Well, except for Georgette, our alpha hen who literally chases Kermit across the back deck as fast as she possibly can! It's pretty hilarious and no beaking or biting is involved but still..poor Kermit!


She's a good natured gal and loves to hang with the best of them, no matter what!  Another little quilt that was made from cast off scraps from a guild member and is now a soft flannel baby quilt. I do so love my freecycle tables!

And I already showed you my Oceanside Museum of Art Prayer Flags

 

And then of course, my beloved Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative (AAQI) quilts..these two were donated for October and November as part of my   Quilt of the Month *QAM* promise.

My AAQI Quilting: Registered and For Sale Soon! 'Miss November':               12,614 - Imperfectly Perfect in Every Way! And last month's 'Miss October'
Yep, always busy...but still having fun! And did you wonder about the November AAQI Celebrity Quilt Auction??? Check out the Celebrity Quilt Auction: Final Bids.....   AMAZ.....ING!!!! Thank you Celebrity Quilters from all of us who support this wonderful cause!   And PS...Miracles continue! My brother is getting better, week by week, and day by day!!! And his wife, my SIL, Becky, is hanging in there awaiting a kidney transplant.      They just  moved Doug into a 'Respite Apartment' in the care facility. I call it the "Presidetial Suite". He says "I don't know what I did to deserve this room!" And I told him, they just discovered your no cap insurance plan." Yep, how it works with insurance!  He is probably over 5 million by now as my friend's son hit 1 million in a month. Yes, we need even more insurance reform and more equal coverage for all!  This may be very, very nice, but it does not make it fair...not even in our eyes, when he gets the room!

Michele Bilyeu blogs With Heart and Hands as she shares a quilting journey through her life in Salem, Oregon and Douglas, Alaska and all of her AAQI Quilting. Sharing thousands of links to Free Quilt and Quilt Block Patterns and encouraging others to join in the Liberated Quilting Challenge and make or donate small art quilts to the Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative (AAQI) Help us change the world, one little quilt at a time!