Spring Market 2011 - Moda Dinner

Every Market Moda hosts a dinner party for their customers. This year was my second time to go, and my first time to stay the whole time. 

I was going to make a long post about the courses served and everything, but I decided to delete that stuff and summarize.  The salad is a salad, what else can you say.  The main course was fantastic.

The dessert is always out of this world amazing. (Raspberry custard - oh I'm definitely going to look for a recipe soon!)

The company is usually always wonderful! Last year the company was kind of boring plus there were other things going on in Minneapolis so we ditched early.

The bar is available until they close the event around 9:30 - 10:00pm. 

I stayed with my new friends the complete time! In fact the DJ finally said enough was enough and basically made us leave at 11:00pm!  (Hey girls I hope you are reading this! If so send me an email suchislife (at) gmail (dot) com ! Thanks!)  We had a load of fun, maybe to much so!

The next morning was a bit rough, but a bit of chap-stick, aspirin, and water, and I was good to go!

Sample Spree

The flight to Utah was quite easy. The worse part was changing planes in Denver where it was sleeting, but even that wasn't bad because the airport was toasty.

I had kind of expected Salt Lake City to be a gray and dreary city from different people's tellings of it, but it turns out that it feels a lot like Tulsa, just a bit cleaner.

Anyway, after throwing our stuff into the hotel we headed straight for Sample Spree.  Even though our flight had been delayed were arrived early enough to get good spots in the line, and we were only about 20 people in!

This year I went with about half the amount of money as last and a general idea of my "shopping list". The truth is that I still have a lot of the fabric I bought at last year's sample spree in my stash, so there really isn't a need to add a lot more. Mostly I was looking for Japanese fabrics and maybe one more small fabric bundle.

This is what I bought. A 1/2 yard bundle of solids from Art Gallery (10 different pieces). A bundle of 8 fat quarters from Lecien. I love these because of the cotton/linen blend!  I normally don't buy patterns, but this one is of a French penguin in a snow globe. Who can resist that? The pattern company, Metropolitan Quilt, is new, so new that they don't have a website yet. However, I'm hoping I'll be able to work with them more as they get established because the patterns are so cute!

The last thing I bought was the Aurifil thread box. I actually went over budget with this by $2, but Chris was able to loan it to me. *laughs* Just to give you an idea of how much I love Aurifil thread - I usually order it from Pine Needles in Minnesota, and it cost something around $12 a spool after shipping. That is a bit much for thread in most cases, but this thread is the best I've found. I especially love it for hand sewing becuase it doesn't knot up like every other thread I've tried. Even better I've never had to "condition" it first with beeswax.  It probably would have been smarter to get more nuetral colors, but I couldn't resist these bright colors especially now that I see how well they go with the Art Gallery fabric!

Last, but not least, the wallet is from Art Gallery as well. It is so adorable. Chris bought this for me because she gets gifts for everyone each year -Super Sweet! The awesome thing about it is that I was looking for a wallet before Market, but couldn't find one I thought was worth the money. Now this one is perfect for me!

Tomorrow is the last day of Market, and I have lots of pictures to share. For now though, I need to get my bags packed because we leave Market early to catch our flight. Unfortunately, even though our flight leaves at 4:20pm tomorrow, we won't be home until almost mid-night thanks to the delays.

Good Night!

CVS on Sunday

I did 3 transactions at CVS and saved lots on Sunday. Here is the break down.

Transaction 1

2 cases of water bottles: Retail $7.98 Sale $2.44

2 Glade Automatic things: Retail $21.58 Sale $14.00 With Coupons $6.00

Total (with tax) $12.01 +plus $4 EC on next order

Transaction 2

4 Xtra laundry detergent: Retail $11.96 Sale $5.96 with Coupons: $3.96

2 Cover Girl items: Retail $11.18 with MFR coupon $8.68 with CVS Coupon $5.68

Plus I used the $4EC from the previous transaction.

Total (with tax) $6.85 +plus $3EC on next order

Transaction 3

8 boxes of brownies: Retail $8 Sale $6.76 with Coupons $2.67

16 cups of cereal: Retail: $16 Sale $13.34 with Coupons $5.34

1 box of brownies I was charged for but didn't receive $0.83

Plus I used $3 EC from previous transaction and a coupon for $4 off purchase of $20

Total (with tax) $3.28

Across the board

Retail: $77.70

Sale: $56.42

with Coupons: $31.92

With store cash coupons $22.14

A Bobbin, A Bobbin

Before I could sew anything this evening I had to clean my machine. My goodness, I don't remember the last time I did it, but as you can tell by the globs of lint, it was past time to dust it off!

After cleaning, searching for empty bobbins, and finally getting the machine threaded I was able to finish my four-patch posy blocks. I had planned on getting this quilt done last month. However, I put it in a project basket after taking it to demonstrate at the guild meeting in April, and out of site out of mind it went.

Since this quilt was just for fun anyway, I'm going to leave it on the design wall for a day or so. I don't like the distribution of dark pink in the quilt, so I'll spend some time staring at it tomorrow. It is to late to set it together tonight anyway.

Here is a fun song to wind up the evening...

New Addition

I've been busy with the newest addition to our family the last few days, hence my lack in blogging.  Everyone I would like to introduce you to Gingher! He is our Red Eared Slider turtle!

Doesn't he look pretty sharp? hehehe (People who sew will get the joke. Others may have to look up "Gingher".)

Josh found him on a ramp at the airport. He sent me a video, and I loved Gingher from the moment I saw him trying to escape the fruit cup Josh was keeping him in at the time.  Wednesday was kind of hard for Gingher because we didn't have a home or food for him at the time, but Thursday I visited the pet store and picked up everything the little guy needed.

We weren't sure we would be able to keep him at first. However, he adjusted to his new habitat quickly, and started eating his pellet food so he can stay!  Last night, we filled the bath for him, and let him swim because he is an aquatic turtle.

He swam so much I'm surprised his little flipper feet didn't fall off! After playing for 45 minutes I was ready for bed so he had to go to bed as well, which I don't think he liked to much. I've never had a turtle before, but I think this is the perfect pet. How could he not be, he's so tiny and cute!

Colorful break!

I never had a box of 64 crayons when I was a kid. I posted this on Facebook sometime last month and one of my friends, Adrianne, brought me a box at work. She said part of the fun was reorganizing them so they were in any order that I wanted, and she was right!  Thanks Andrianne!

Now I need to get back to the chores I neglected this weekend. I really meant to get them done, but I was busy then greatly distracted.

Project #2 -In Progress

I moved all the pots and pans out of the cabinet and put my make-shift recycling bins in their place. The plan is to have actual bins to sort everything into, but these paper bags are what I have for now so they will do.  The more I look at it the more I think that I need to find a better spot. For starters I'm going to end up with my pots, pans, cutting board, colander, and bake-ware scattered around in random places all over the kitchen now, and that isn't good. Second, there really isn't an easy way to set it up in this cabinet and still make all the bins easily identifiable. 

I think I might be able to set up bins in the top shelf of the laundry room instead. This would allow all the bins to be easily seen once the labels are adhered, they would still be out of site, and I would continue to have a place for all my cookware!  The only downside is that I'll need a step stool in order to reach the bins every time i want to sort something. Decisions. Decisions.

On the bright side, I did finish the labels. All I have to do is have them laminated so they will last.  Plus, they match the pantry labels because of the bird! So everything is nice and matchy-matchy, just how I like it!

As for the other project, the pantry jars: I hit a snag with covering the lids so I'm in search for the perfect ribbon to fix it. I am also trying to get the goo from the original labels off the jar. I will let them soak more tomorrow and then use lots of elbow grease to clean them up nicely.

P.S. I never did get around to writing/posting a "Flashback Friday" so maybe I'll get to it next week, who knows.