My Day Today

I usually keep grandkids on the weekends. But I was sick this last weekend and so I cancelled having the kids come. I thought I had the rest of this week til Fri without kids and I could get my house organized(I have been reorganizing and cleaning) and get some stuff done that you can't really do when kids are underfoot.
So I get a call this morning would I go get Zachary for today and tomarrow. Zach is my autistic grandson and my DDs only care giver for him when she needs something. so I go get Mr. Zach from school. He is autistic and when his schedule is interrupted it can cause problems. But he loves to come to our house as he gets one on one with Papa and me. He also gets away from his sister and brother and our house is quiet compared to their house! LOL  I keep a laptop hooked up to a printer for the kids and he regards it as his when he is here. He loves to print off pictures and then draw stories around them putting himself or his mom and siblings in the picture. So he is here now and having a great time laying on the floor drawing on his printed pictures! LOL

The need my DD had is her FIL has a terminal disease. He has Fibrosis in the lungs and it is getting progressively worse. He has been on borrowed time for quite awhile now. So he is in the hosp and DD had to be there. They all rely on her to get things done that need done. So she does all the insurance stuff and helps her MIL to be where she needs to be and is her DHs support system. My SIL Zach's dad is a Chiropractor and they live above the clinic. Her FIL has been working the office in the clinic and when he can't then DD works there. Her FIL hasn't really been able to work in the office much for some time now. So DD is a bit stretched thin at times. She also has 2 other kids with health issues that make daily life interesting. She is also the leader of her DD Rachel's girl scout troupe as well as the troupe leader for Zach's and his brother Joey's boy scout troupe. She is a busy lady!!

So when she needs me I try to be there. I keep Zachary two weekends a month anyway because I am his respite care worker for the Gov waiver he is on. It pays me to be his care giver. So we have him alot each month anyway.

LOL When he found out he wasn't going to go back to school tomarrow but stay with me he asked me if he was going to live with us now?  LOL  I think his being here during the middle of the week confused him! *Grin*

From Zach and I we wish you all sunshine and laughter!!

My Cut Down Method

I used to sell my gift items to a local gift shop. Over the 12 yrs I sold to her I made alot of pieced items. I am always on the lookout for anything that saves time and effort. 

While watching some of the Quilt shows on TV I developed my own shortcuts.

 I call it the Cut Down Method.

You cut fabric swatches and sew them together and then using a template you cut out the center into a unit I call a "Block". when I was cutting out HSTs(half square triangles) I would sew strips together and then open the strips and lay the template on there and cut out the HSTs. This was my first shortcut.

Then I thought what if we use 3 fabrics. So I experimented with 3 and this is what it looks like:

                  

                     

1. Cut swatches of fabric

2. Sew 2 together

3. Sew on the third swatch

4. Lay template on the seams

5. Cut out the block from the center with a template

6. Ta-Da! a Boston Block made with the cut down method

Directions for these are in the tabs above
 Star Point Block    Combination        Drunkard's Path
  Wings Block         4 patch Blocks     Kansas Dugout  

Each one is the same basic principle but there are slight variations. One might be 3 fabrics but cut a bit differantly One uses 4 fabrics instead of 3.

 Check them out and try making some and see what you think of the process!! 

Have fun! Rhonda

Follow up on Forums

Well I am now a member of the Quilting Around the World forum and now that I can do things on there I am enjoying it.  I plan to see  if I can post any tutorials on there but I don't see a place to do that so don't know.

Hope you are all having a good quilting day today!!

Joined a Couple of Forums

Yesterday I joined a couple of new to me forums. My Quilt Place  http://myquiltplace.com/  has been a good experience so far. I only found it yesterday tho. I have worked on my own page and made it personal to me. I have posted a few comments and had some feedback from a couple of members. So I have had a good time on  it so far. Time will tell I suppose.

The other forum is Quilting Around The World  http://www.quiltingaroundtheworld.com/default.aspx
I had some trouble. Whether it was my fault for not knowing what I was doing or if there was something else wrong I really don't know. There are several security blocks set up on this site. That sort of bothered me. I went through the registering process and still couldn't post anything,. I didn't have access to anything. I could read some of the forums but couldn't  post. I couldn't find anywhere to send a message to anyone. There is no contact info. I finally pieced together from some of the messages that  GardenGal was the admin. There was nothing to say she was the admin but she was the one in charge. So I assumed she was and sent a pm. That was the only thing I was allowed to do on the site. She did pm me back and said she fixed it and now I had access.  I haven't looked around anymore on there. I will spend some time checking it out tho before I give up on it. I'm not impressed with the site so far tho. But it could have been my own fault that I wasn't able to navigate the site. Again time will tell.

I have been a member of the Quilting Board since March 09. It is a great place to make friends and I really enjoy it. I do like to check out other forums tho. I enjoy seeing what other quilters are up to.

Wishing you all sunshine and laughter!!   May God Bless You and Keep You in His Hands!!