What I'm working on....

I have had lots going on for the past few weeks- and its been crazy but so worth it.  Since last I wrote, I've been busy preparing for our church's young women camp.  Its for ages 12-18 and this year I am the young women's camp director.  It's a coveted calling, to be sure! But I had no idea how hard it was to do on my own.  I have worked in yw camp for probably 10 years now, but this year I was the only leader and we have about 40 people going.  Thank goodness for the help and support I got from the yw leaders and my husband--he is coming along to be the camp cook and we all know what an awesome cookout champ he is!!
Here is some of the prep we are doing--














Our equipment being prepared to be loaded into our trailer


                                                                                                                                                                                              Some of the food for camp that's in my freezer..

here are some of the girls and leaders at our tie dye t shirt party-these of course are not the shirts...but there will be pictures following!

...Every now and then I had to have the president of the yw tell me, "its going to be great! don't worry!" Usually I'm pretty chill, but I keep freaking myself out thinking "I'm in charge of the fun for 40 people-and what if camp isn't fun?!?!?" Now we are down to the wire, and all I can do is all I can do.  Camp is next week, so hopefully I will have a good report when I come back!
We had a visit from 2 of the 3 grand-babies for 1 week. Of course their parents were with them...Bill and Jolena came out here for a family reunion on her side and to pick up Bill's jeep that he left here since last December.  They drove it home to South Carolina over a period of 3 days.  They are back safe and sound in Clemson, and I'm sure that all involved are happy to be home!
Here are a few pictures of the babies- I wanted to load a movie of Spencer after I gave him the Lorax quilt I mentioned in the previous blog, but I couldnt figure out how to do it, but believe me, he was happy-all he could do was dance all over the quilt! It was so adorable!

Spencer (and his dad) enjoyed the bubbles that Aunt Megan brought for him!

In the meantime, quilt-wise, I did finish the quilt for my sister to give as a gift to one of the doctors she works with:

                                                        its pretty big for a baby quilt....

                                                    cute dinosaur quilting!

my typical flannel back

I made a pillow out of a test block:

Which led to this quilt idea and I started tossing this together:

I saw a block very similar to this on someone's blog or on pinterest and loved it so I want to make a quilt with 9 blocks and these are some of the colors I want to put in it with a dark brown background:

And when Hillary was here a few weeks ago after returning from Italy, we talked about making a quilt of grays, reds and turquoises- here is the stash pull for that:

Its going to be hexagons.
Finally, the last two tidbits of news: first the boring one--I have been offered a job at the dental school as a team coordinator for the students-basically what I will do is what I do for our private practice-manage the patient flow and make sure that appointments are made to keep each student up to date meeting requirements for graduating from dental school, overseeing collection of money, just general office stuff. I accepted the job and start the day after I get home from YW camp! I hope I'm not too exhausted!
And the best tidbit of news of all: Vanessa is expecting a new baby in January! that means Donovan is going to have a baby sister or brother! We are all excited for the news!

 That's it for now except here is a little picture of our Miriam with her new missionary companion-

                                                She loves McAllen Texas Spanish mission!
until next time....ciao!!!

I turn my back for a minute and its July! warning: lots of pictures!

Yes, that is how I feel.  Every day almost I said to myself, "Self, you need to post to your blog.  You just threw a few pictures up in March and never even said anything about the awesome retreat!" And every day I ignored myself.  So now its almost 4 months later so I have some catching up to do!
So here it is in a nutshell.  And then I will post some pictures.  Not really any that show processes, but mostly finished products.
February was the quilt retreat.  Lots of fun, fabulous food, gorgeous scenery, awesome house, and great people! I got a quilt top finished for my youngest daughter Miriam.  I love that top but it was sooooo time consuming and tedious! Still the finished product is one of my all time favorites. Here it is.

 yeah, Im not Miriam's grandma but I am a grandma, so thats the label she got...

detail of quilting and some of the cute fabrics-can you tell Miriam likes cool colors? 

Here is the whole quilt-it made me fall in love with blue too! Im usually a warm color person, but this was such a serene quilt (once it was done...) I had to have one which you will see later.

 Next came March, where I tossed a few pictures of older quilts up that Miriam had taken for me while we were buried in snow... well it seemed like it to me anyway.  My husband and Miriam and Hillary (another daughter) and I went to Bellevue WA to visit yet another daughter Vanessa and her husband Jefferson and their adorable son Donovan.  here he is:

 It was a great deal of fun being around them and this little angel boy.  Here is a picture of Vanessa with Grandma Babs  and then one of Jefferson on one of their hikes:

After a few days up there in Bellevue, we drove down to Springfield Oregon to visit My sister Marianne, her husband Stan, my niece Xan and her husband Zack, and my mom Dorothy. Vanessa and Jeff and Donovan came with us and it was so fun! One of Marianne's daughter's in law was there with her 3 kids too, so it was a cousin reunion! We left from there and drove home to Utah to go back to work.... bleh.
Miriam quit her job in Henderson NV and came to live with us for a couple of weeks in April.  She got the last minute preparations done for her mission, and on April 24 she left us and entered the MTC to prepare for her mission to McAllen, Texas, where she currently is teaching Spanish speaking people about the gospel of Jesus Christ, and about our Church, the LDS church.  She has been gone serving for a little over 2 months, and she is loving it.  Here is a picture the day she arrive in Texas:

Here she is out teaching and giving out scriptures.  

 That was a tough day when we dropped her off.  that was the day that all my children (5 children and 3 in law children) were now for real grown up and gone away.  Any of you who have become empty nesters will understand that feeling. When your kids leave, you really do grieve for them. But enough on that, I dont need to get all morose.
So with that done, I decided that I needed to go see the other precious grandbabies that live in South Carolina.  In May, i went to visit them for a week.  Here is a picture of Spencer and Genevieve:

we had lots of fun just hanging out and enjoying being around each other.  South Carolina is beautiful.  And here is a cute picture of their parents:

I didnt take very many good pictures while I was there, we were too busy playing cars and reading books...

During April I made a couple more quilts.  I had the bug and was pretty prolific relatively speaking so here are the pictures of those quilts:

I fell in love with this quilt, I love it so much.  but after I made it I felt inspired to give it to a friend, so I did.   She certainly deserves a quilt.  

I think i have mentioned this quilt before, its an Ocean wave quilt that was a swap I was in about 20 years ago. I finally put the blocks together.  I had delayed doing this because I hated the idea that I had to set the blocks on point, and then I thought, "Why? they look great in a straight set!" so i did it.  I do love it so much. its such a throw back to the early days of my quilting journey!

These are from a swap from years ago too.  I love this one for the quilt design.  Im not particularly fond of 30's right now, but it did turn out nice and I think i will give it to my mother in law.  

I also got involved in a sew along by bee in my bonnet blogger Lori Holt-its a cute little barn quilt! here it is:

Its not really sewn together yet, but I will get that done.  I happen to have a daughter in law who loves barns, maybe she needs this...

Im sure Im missing something, but I think i will need to wrap this up pretty quick like in a hurry--In June we had our annual vacation to Newport Beach and usually kids come with us, but this year mim was gone of course, and Hillary went to ITALY! AGAIN! She went with Mim's friend Lindsay. here is a picture of Hillary and Lindsay:

  But back to Newport beach....Its so beautiful.  Vince and Megan joined us down there for a couple of days and here they are:

they were on their west coast trip of a lifetime.  Utah, Nevada, California Washington Idaho and then back to Utah.  they are still gone! Here is a picture of me and Doug in Old Town San Diego:

Then my sister Marianne and her husband Stan joined us for the rest of the week.  I didn't get a picture of them! I'm so sorry! But anyway, I felt like I needed a quilt for the beach, so I FRANTICALLY pieced one together in June, and sent it off to the quilter and she had it done in 2 DAYS!!! Here is that quilt, and I must say I love it so much.  It was inspired by Miriam's quilt and a line of fabric from a friend of mine called going coastal.  Some of the prints from that line are in the quilt with others I had in my stash:

I had to take a picture on the beach because it was after all, my Newport beach quilt!   Now I'm pretty much caught up on my quilt blog and the family stuff. Like I said, I know I forgot some stuff ... oh and here are the last 2 quilts I'm currently working on-Spencer loves the Lorax so I whipped this baby up for him:

Sewing fabrics all from one collection is SOOOOOO not my style, but I broke tradition and made this because I know he will love it to deathlehem right now.... and this other quilt is the blocks for a baby quilt I'm making for Marianne to give to one of the doctors she works with:

I guess that's all-I will try to keep up but I always say that don't I? 

just some old stuff..

i dont have too much time, just wanted to put a few pictures of old quilts up. my daughter took these this January.

hat's all for now,i have to o go play with the grand baby!!