Daily Archives: July 6, 2014

Visiting

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My youngest niece, who is a grown woman, is visiting.  She and one of her girlfriends arrived on July 3rd, and the two of them and Dear Husband spent the day and evening on Lake Michigan for the Fourth of July.   They took in the fireworks off Navy Pier in Chicago, and were home close to 1:30 in the morning.  I had the pleasure of playing in my studio all day!

I spent some time yesterday teaching beginning quilting to the girlfriend.  S. has never sewn, and wanted to start a simple Log Cabin pattern. We talked about color layout, and designs that could be created with Log Cabin blocks, and then made a trip to an area quilt shop to buy fabric. S. has never used a sewing machine, so I hope that her mother will be able to instruct her on how to use their sewing machine.  We covered how to cut the strips, and how to sew the pattern.  I had her sew part of a block on my machine.  I sent her home with completed samples, a spare cutting mat, rotary cutter and ruler.  I washed the fabrics for her last night, so she will be ready to start cutting strips tonight. when she returns home.  I’ll work with my niece this week, who wants to try her hand at one of the star quilt patterns.

My niece has come to give us a hand packing boxes.  We’ll be working in the basement and garage, trying to get as much cleared out as possible.  I’m very glad to have the help.  The job is dwindling, but still seems very daunting.  We are moving some things that we probably should be pitching, but we wanted to see what kind of room we had in our new home before giving things up.

It’s a lot of fun to have 20-somethings around.  It’s very refreshing to see the world from their point of view!

More of the Same

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But  something different, too.

Today, we put a bid on a house.  Last Thursday we walked through three houses.  The first two were ranch houses, and the second turned out to be a two-story duplex.  If you are looking at houses, I recommend that you not assume the pictures are giving you a clear idea of what to expect!  I thought I would love the third place, and didn’t care for it at all.  We looked at the first one because it’s in the same town we live in now.  We thought it had large front and back yards, with absolutely no landscaping, and that wasn’t the case. The yards were surprisingly small, and there was some shrubbery.  Unfortunately, it backed up to a club of some kind that was for sale.  We couldn’t see that in the pictures! lol

The middle house, which I didn’t expect to care for, turned out to be lovely.  The layout is clean, and open.  It’s sunny, has three bedrooms and three full baths.  The basement is partially finished, and one of those bathrooms is in the basement.  The master bedroom suite is on the south side of the house and the two guest bedrooms and second bath are on the north side of the house, with the public areas of the house in between.  There is a two and a half car garage, and a laundry room on the main floor.  I believe the house is about 1800 square feet, about half our present house.  We were willing to look at houses much smaller than this, but this house feels gracious.

There is a brick patio off the kitchen, and a pocket back yard that is surrounded with the most incredible garden.  The bones of the garden are evergreen trees and shrubs that block our view of the house to the east of us.  There are strip gardens along the north and south sides of the house where paths lead to the front yard.  Other than the fact that our neighbors are incredibly close (compared to where we live now),  I can’t find anything to complain about.

Our agent put in a bid, contingent upon the close of the sale of our house.  IF we manage to bring our buyer to close, we would turn around and close on this house the same afternoon.  At least, that’s what we hope will happen.

I’m sure there will be more to come in this saga.  🙂