It's officially finished!! lots of photos

I said to myself - I'm not posting again until Danielle's quilt is finished because you would all be sick of getting updates showing so little progress.  Well, it is done and dusted and as I type it is winging its way up to Danielle in Te Awamutu.  Our youngest son and his family are going up to visit his siblings up that way, so he is loaded down with the quilt and five beanies for delivery!!!

I'm sure most of you think I have fallen off the planet as I didn't realise it had been quite so long since I last posted.  Hmmm, been busy stitching and hanging on to my health.  But enough of that, I have a few photos to share and I hope you enjoy them.

The Beanie production line, lol.
I did have five of them, but the yellow one ended up being given to a dear friend and I am knitting another one for that dear DIL.

Love that my family like to wear them and that it is something else I can make when I'm not up to quilting.

The finished quilt for Danielle.  I am so very pleased with how it has come out.  My dear friend Catherine made a fantastic job of quilting it for me with an edge to edge pattern that let the colours speak for themselves.
It is sideways in the photos as it was too long to hold up length-ways and the grounds was still wet from the big frost we had this morning.

 I found this fantastic extra wide backing fabric at Counting Stitches in Hastings.,  It was the absolute perfect match for this quilt.

This shows a little more of the dark and light in the quilt and the flowers in my late winter garden.  The bees have been making the most of the wall flowers that seem to flower for ever and smell beautiful.

This is my incredible UFO finish.  I started this embroidery cloth when my eldest daughter was 10.  She received it at the beginning of June and Janeen is now 47 years old!!!!  only too 37 years to complete.  The  most embarrassing thing is it only needed a few inches of the crochet edging to be finished for most of the last 10 years or so.  Hehehe

Oh well, a finish is a finish and that is one less thing in the UFO cupboard.  Yay

 My mystery blocks up until May.  Had been enjoying them but had some troubles with June/July blocks and not sure what is causing it.  These blocks come pre-cut and I think there may be some small discrepancies in cutting.  Not ruling out operator error though. Lol

A small baby quilt to be sent to the preemie babies unit.  I used some left over strips from another quilt I had made and added a top and bottom border to make it to size.  Totally from my stash - yippee.  Halfway through the quilting of it and hope to finish off over the weekend,

Finally, a parade of elephants from the Tuesday Girls.  These animals are so beautiful I am almost tempted to start one,  But  I have not finished enough UFO's yet and need a project like this like I need another whole in my head.  Hehehe.


One day, as most of us quilters say about those projects on our wish lists.




I hope you have enjoyed your catch up.  I am currently working mostly on a sunflower quilt for our eldest daughter.  Not sure how long that's going to take but here's hoping not as long as Danielle's seemed to take.



Our weather is supposed to be quite horrible over the weekend and it has already become quite cold.  Big snow falls down in the South Island and we do have snow up on our ranges.  This is why we have had two boomer frosts.  Rain however is forecast and we actually have not had very much rain at all and it would be most welcome.  It is also an excellent reason for being in your quilting room!!

Bye for now and take care.  May you feel blessed in you have and do.

Clare
I'm linking to Cynthia at Oh! Scrap
and Sarah at Confessions of a Scrap Addict.  Click here to visit Sarah.  It's worth the visit.

The end of 2018

Thought I had better try and catch up with you all before the year is gone.  November/December have been hard months for me health wise and I got back home for Christmas on Christmas Eve Day.  Yay, thank you Lord.  Spent Christmas with some of our family.  Photos coming.
Might not be a lot more posts in 2019, we will see what progress I can make.  However, there is still a strong urge to kill that stash, so I'm hoping to do a little more stitching yet.  Hoping to infect (lol) one of my granddaughters with the bug as much interest is being shown.
Have started to assemble Danielle's quilt at last and did get three blocks worth together before crashing.  Today is when I'm feeling like stitching again, yippee.... so onwards and upwards people.
Now for some photos to finish the year off.

The two blocks

Danielle's blocks - one has fallen down and all the stuff has been plonked in front of my design wall.  Sorry, but you get a vague idea.
Colours are looking great.

This is Meg from our Tuesday Group who does the most amazing handwork.  Sorry about the light behind the quilt.  Meg has also done numerous hexagon quilts of all types.

This is our family at home between Christmas and New Year.  My daughter Rebecca is standing in front of her 6' 5" son Bradley along with her three beautiful daughters.  My eldest son Daryll is sitting beside me and my sister Joy has my grandson Hamish on her knee.  Love this photo except by beautiful daughter in law Dayn is taking the photo.

 On the way home Rebecca met up with her youngest brother Richard, wife Kea and daughter Marcy in Napier.  Glad they had a chance to catch up as they live in opposite ends of the country.

Suzy's quilt got finished before Christmas.  She was so completely blown away that it was hers to take away and have. I must acknowledge with such grateful thanks my helper Lynn Murphy for making and stitching on the binding for me.

Forgot to take a close up of the quilting which was a beautiful big daisy pattern.  Long arm quilter was Gael Byrne from the Quilting Shed in Hastings.  Made an awesome job and loved the way she put the red thread front and back.  It gave a fabulous two sided effect, and I jolly well forgot to take a photo!!!!

This is one of my favourite finishes for 2018.  This quilt was totally made from scraps and stash - oops, I forgot - I bought the green sashing as lack of large pieces of stash. It was quilted by my friend Lorraine Baker of Masterton who is now an accomplished long arm quilter.  The centre blocks are made from leftover bits of WOF  that I couldn't quite bear to throw away as was about an inch and a half wide.  LOL.  What a funny little lady I am, and loving it!!!












That's all folks for this year of 2018.  One of so many ups and downs for me I can truly say.  For once I am very surprised at how many quilts I managed to finish and give away to family and friends.  My stash (old) did reduce by quite a substantial amount, but alas and alack, I fear the new fabric section may have grown a little,.  Hehehehe.  It just means I will need to try and make even more quilts in 2019.
God has blessed our family constantly and I can say with all my heart that He  answers those prayers we ask of Him.  Sometimes it is in His way and time, other times we get what we asked for.  He is always good and God is love.  May your 2019 be full to the brim of love and laughter.  Love will always overcome dark.
Thank you for coming to visit my blog and I hope to see you again next year.

Hugs and blessings
Clare
I'm linking up with Oh Scrap here take a look and enjoy some eye candy.

Finished Sajou Mini quilt

I have finished my first sewalong with Lori from Humble Quilts.  Here is a link for you to visit - Humble Quilts and I'm sure you will enjoy a visit to her blog.  Two of my friends have said I should make this bigger, but then it turns into a WIP and I'm not sure I want that.  Much nice to say it is finished.  Hoping to quilt it over the weekend to be properly finished of course.  What do you think?

Best of all, it has all come from my stash.  Making some inroads here (she says positively).  LOL.  Have a great weekend everybody.

Hugs and blessings
Clare

I'm linking to Humble Quilts Here  as well.

A Winter rose...

What a lovely surprise to have Kerry bring in this lovely wee collection of flowers from my 25yr "Clair Matin"  rose.  It's the middle of winter and we have had some boomer frosts this past week.  Has been a real gift for me as I am just back from a weeks stay in hospital.

 Just a cold that decided to take a left turn instead of the exit!  All good now and the last 4 days were in our little local medical ward.  It's like being treated in the warmth of your own home, and the nurses and carers are so loving and helpful

We are so thankful to have this wonderful facility in our small town.
Today has been the most amazing winter's day - bright blue sky with not a cloud in sight all day.  Beautifully warm if you are tucked away from the winter breeze but suddenly very cold if you enter the shade.  It's one of those lovely things about winter.  Sort of giving us a reminder of the the lovely warms days of spring and summer to come and that our patch is just having a wee rest.  Hmmm, getting a bit poetic here!!  LOL.









On the patchwork front, it's all a bit of a shambles but there has been some progress of sorts...

This is my new BOM called Golden Days.  I have only just started by first block and block four just arrived yesterday, so the plan has gone to the pot quite quickly.  Oh well, it's not a race is it?  I do love the wonderful fabrics that come with this quilt.  Nice to have some new, modern fabric to play with. There are only 5 applique blocks and the rest are pieced - some with quite a challenge.

This has my knitting (son's next beanie), my challenge piece that might miss the deadline now and the next pile of HST's for Danielle's quilt.

The mystery has been revealed and I'm quite pleased with it.  Now need to choose a frame and border and then I'm going to donate it to a chap at church who is going through a cancer journey.


















So that is where I'm at right now.  Looking forward to seeing our granddaughter Marcy during these holidays coming up this month.
I trust you are all well and look forward to seeing you again soon.  Thank you for popping in.

Hugs and blessings
Clare

I'm linking to Oh Scrap here  and 18 in 2018 at What A Hoot here You will enjoy a visit to both these blogs,

A Finish at last...

I can finally show you a completely finished quilt.  This is called "River"  and was a range of fabric we sold in our shop quite a few years ago.  It was always one of my favourites.  It was a real happy chance that I found this lovely border fabric so many years ago that goes quite well with it.  My heartfelt thanks to my friend Lorraine who quilted it for me and made a great job and to Lyn who stitched the binding on for me.  These are the heavier jobs I struggle with now.

I am very blessed to have such good friends.  This is all I have for now although I have managed a few other bits and pieces, I will save them for the next post.

Take care and thanks for popping in.  Hope all is well in your world.

Hugs and blessings
Clare
and I'm linking up to Cynthia at Oh Scrap here and you can check out some great quilting.
Also linking with Sarah here at Confessions of a Scrap Addict.  Such Fun to visit.

6 old and 6 new in 2018 -Making progress in record heat!

Oh boy, our air conditioner has been working overtime in the last few days, and there appears to be no let up for the next week.  A few days ago it was is around 42C,  (107F I believe), and that is just too hot for comfort.

Here is my report for the 6 old dand 6 new in 2018, plus I have joined the 18 in 2018 too!!  Just keeps me honest or mad or something!  I did at least make a little progress.

My goodness, it takes some time to get your head back into th right space with a quilt that was barely started in 2008.  All the counting has been done so I know what I still have to cut, and the next job is to finish off all the trimming of these HST's.  I think I might be a little short of fabric in the right colours, so, (every so sadly) I think I may have to go to a quilt shop. Hehehe.

Managed to finish the little tart as well as a pie this month, and have cut out and prepared quite a few more.  This project will definitely be long term as it is quite hard on my hands.  Another way to use up quite a good lot of fabric.

The second to last applique block for a quilt that has been in the making for quite some time.  I seem to have made a mistake in the drawing out of the pattern and had sewn on about five pieces and wasn't happy.  I decided to unpick, clean off my markings and start again.  Very happy I decided to do that.  The is so close to being finished I need to make a concerted effort to finish it.

I have decided that I am going to join in with Carole and My Carolina Home blog and do her Mystery Quilt and you can click on the link to see for yourself.  I usually don't get organised in time but this time I am determined to make it and of course we are given a month for each clue to be finished.  I felt it would be a great way to use up some more of that stash I am a little tired of.

Here is the River quilt all put together.  It's not a very big quilt, but will make a nice lap quilt or even a wall hanging.  I was so pleased the way the border fabric worked out so well, as it's always a bit of a problem after you have left it about 10 years to finish!!  Oops.  Never mind, it still counts as an almost finish for my 18 in 2018 list.















Most of my other projects have not been touched, but I did spend quite a bit of time resorting my fabrics and scraps.  Over the last couple of years as we finished this house, things got moved around quite a bit.  I have now managed to start getting everything back in the right places and can find things when I want them!  Well, that's what I'm pretending, LOL.  Actually, it has spurred me on to get moving on using some of these fabrics up, because although I still like them, I'm a bit fed up with looking at the same old stuff!  Keen to buy lots of new stuff in these lovely fresh modern colours!  Haha, that's famous last words.

I think that's all for now.  Happy stitching.
I'm linking up with Lynette of What A Hoot Quilts here
and Pomegranite and Chintz of 6 and 6 in 2018 here

Hugs and blessings,

Clare

A Lovely Rain and other oddities...

We have been blessed to have had three good doses of rain this month, which is quite unusual for Hawkes Bay.  We spend most of our spring/summer/autumn praying for rain, as we are traditionally a very dry area with hot summers - well, our definition of hot anyway!  At the moment our lawns are green and still need mowing, much to DH's disgust.  However, the garden does look so fresh after good rains, and we don' t have to stand out there and water.

This day lily is so gorgeous.  It is actually a more rusty red than this shows, and has given us a magnificent display for many days now.  The one my friend gave me flowered for the first time this year and I forgot to take a photo.  It is a lovely clear orange.

This lovely little chocolate coloured Cosmos is making a lovely wee splash of colour in amongst lots of purples and pinks.  Have had to do lots of deadheading this week to encourage more flowers,

 Our snapdragons were all from very small self seeded plants from DH's sister,  They have done very well, much to our surprise.  This one is a new seedling from ours and the originals all flowered again in their second year and have now been discarded.  I love the way they are biannual, so you get great value from them.

Our Swan plants have self seeded everywhere, so this year we have an excellent supply for the Monarch butterflies.  At the moment we are trying to fight off the wasps that eat the eggs and small caterpillars.  It's quite a war to keep the beautiful creatures at viable numbers.  Next thing we will be desperate for food.!

At the end of last year our Tuesday Chat girls decided we would make Pies and Tarts something we could all join in and do.  This is the beginning of my efforts - half a pie is stitched together, one tart is ready for stitching.  This will be a bit of a long term project I feel already, but it is nice to have one or two hand work things on hand to do.  It's supposed to help use up some of my scraps, but I only totally used up one small piece of fabric when I cut some more on Thursday!!  Drats

My good friend Lorraine has taken the plunge and bought herself an Innova long arm machine.  Lucky girl.  I have been to have a play and it's beautiful.  As she is in dire need of some practice pieces, I am making the most of this opportunity to move out some of those tops on my " Waiting for Quilting"  list I made two years ago and has been reduced by very few. This top goes back to early shop days.  Naturally, no fabric was kept for the border.  I was able to find this rather nice tile fabric that has all the colours in it at the LQS, and a small piece of dark teal that I will use as a frame in my stash.  Awesome, 5 tops will get finished.  Can you see me doing my happy dance?












So there you have it.  Some progress is being made - I think!! Talk to you again soon, and thanks for dropping in for a visit.  How is your quilting going?

Forgot to sign off - goodness me and say that I'm linking up with Cynthia  of Oh Scrap , her link is also on my side bar. Also with Lynette at  Confessions of a Fabric Addict .  Do go visit them, you will enjoy it. 
Bye for now,
Hugs and blessings
Clare

A New Year and new start..

Hello everyone, no doubt you will have given up on ever seeing another post from me.  Me too!!!  However, I have decided it is time to get back to some of these things.  Will try and be less wordy and more photographic.  Did lose a few good quilt photos when I changed phones, but never mind, lots of things come along to take their place.
We had a lovely Christmas and New Year and hope you did too.  Last weekend we headed down to Wellington and had a second Christmas dinner with Richard, Kea and Marcy.  We had to postpone going down as Marcy picked up whooping cough.  Although vaccinated, there are so many new strains around due to the non-vaccinated children.  Therefore we headed off in time to celebrate Marceline's 3rd birthday on Saturday 6th.  We had a great time.

I made Kea and Marcy these aprons as a Christmas gift.  They are  double sided and have cupcake fabric on the other side.  Rattled the brain a little as I remember how to make them.  LOL.

This is the huge quilt I finally got finished for Kea and Richard.
It is about 520 inches worth of binding big!!!
Can't actually remember the size, but it's blooming big and they have a king sized bed.  Wanted it to come down to the floor too.
It is actually a family-made quilt.  They all ended up helping me to make it - Kea, Richard, Kerry, and Marcy helped Nana by pressing the scissors button, LOL.

Most pleased it is finished, and did binding by machine both sides.  They don't really care, and it was too hard for my hands to go that far around in batik,

Now have to work on their spare bed quilt, as the one I made when Richard went off to university a number of years ago, is falling to pieces.  These guys love their quilts to death by using them constantly, and really, isn't that why we make them?

The old list below, and the new above.  Here's hoping for good progress again.




















Well that's probably enough for now.  I shall finish off and try to be a much better blogger from now on.  Hope you are all having a lovely new start to your new year.

Hugs and blessings,
Clare

Stitching on...

in this very hot weather.  We had 35 C yesterday and I'm afraid we just huddled inside with the air conditioning on.  It has never been my thing - hot sunny days at the beach.  I'm an autumn, spring sort of girl and don't even mind winter that much.  Mind you, compared to some places our winters are very mild.

I have managed to do a little stitching though, and have all the blocks made on the Craftsy BOM 2013.  Now just to figure out how to put it together and what colour joining strips I'm going to use.  The HST border does nothing for me, so I'm planning on a small frame then outer border.

I'm really happy with the colours in this quilt.  They are mostly hand dyed fabrics from a class we held at our shop quite a number of years ago.  I had been looking for a project for ages and the 2011 Shop Hop fabric my pal Barbara in Kansas sent me was perfect.  Mind you, lots left over yet and keep thinking a 9 patch would be lovely too.
Then about 10 days ago I fluffed around with these 4 patches in a vain attempt to join in with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge for January. The colour was purples, so I  took all of my purple scrap 2" squares that were already cut, and stitched the whole lot up into these patches...now what!   LOL.

It was such fun, but I must not let them become another UFO!!

At Tuesday Chat today, Lynn brought along her gorgeous Hexagon quilt that she has finished.  Lynn did this as a BOM for the papers, but chose all the fabrics herself.  It is truly wonderful.

That's it for today.  The Tyson cat managed to get out of his collar overnight and now we are of 2 minds what to do with him.  His stitches had ripped open which is why he had the collar on after they were restitched.  Hoping it will heal this time without problems.  The shoulder is such a bad place for a cat.

Talk to you later.  Happy stitching.

Hugs and blessings
Clare
and I'm linking to Cynthia's here at Oh Scrap

Almost there...

I have been making a huge effort to get all the blocks finished with Bradley's string quilt...there are only 4 more to go. Just as well as my bin is getting very empty, especially with the longer strips for the middle.
It is just too hot to be outside at the moment, so apart from watering (every 2nd day, hand held hose only) I stay inside.  Means I can stitch for more hours than usual. Tomorrow I have to quilt a small top for my friend, so wont get them finished until Thursday.

Tyson was checking things out though.  You can see how dry our grass is.  No need to mow, except for the edges of the garden where we water.
The snapdragons (antirrhinums ) have really come on and are flowering beautifully.  They were tiny little self-seeded plants from my sister in laws.  All different colours too.






Thanks for popping in again.  See you again soon.

Hugs and blessings
Clare

Linking to Cynthia Brunz @  Oh Scrap   Take a look, you will love her quilts.

Happy New Year, may the scraps be with you!

Oh my gosh, it has been so long since I posted you probably have all given up on me.  My computer doesn't work very well these days and I need to figure out how to post on my phone.
The year finished with a wee flurry and I managed to get three Christmas ufos finished up.  Am so pleased with that.  My Christmas bunting never got finished in time however, so that is now my first finished ufo for 2017.  LOL.
Have joined in with #17ufosin2017 and I've made a list of those 17 projects I want to either finish or make good progress on.  Already started on grandson's quilt with another 8  blocks finished and dragged out my Agapanthus wall hanging which is supposed to be January's project. (no. 3 on the list was drawn out).

Here's a couple of photos.  The first is a 3 zipped pocket bag I made my sister for her birthday.  Used a combination of stash and bought specially fabric.  Joyce loves cats so couldn't resist the gorgeous purple cat fabric.

This Christmas wall hanging is one of the ufos I managed to finish.  Am so pleased with how it has come out I don't want to take it down...hehehe.

So there we go.  Small catch up and will try and stick to small posts in future.  Thanks for coming back.

Hugs and blessings to you all
Clare
Linking to Cynthia Brunz @  Oh Scrap   Take a look, you will love her quilts.

A little progress, sneaky fabric, butterflies and babies...

Decided today was the day to put hands to keyboard and do my blog.  I have been so slack lately with my blog but it is a bit of a tiredness thing, as I seem to slow down so fast these days.  However, I have made some big decisions in my patchwork life!!!

I have put aside the 365 Challenge for now.  It was becoming a total obsession and nothing else was getting done.  That was not what I had planned on.  The plan was to get some UFO's finished, not start something else that took me totally away from that goal.  So there you have it...I am back on track and really pleased that progress is now being made... here is the quilt I am finishing for a granddaughter.  My friend Lynn has done a lot of the stitchery for me as she loves doing them and has no daughters or granddaughters to do girly things for.  It made a big difference to my being able to see the end of this quilt that began um ? .....years ago!!

These are the blocks  that go between the stitchery.  I have 24 to make, actually only 22 left now.  I am doing these very slowly and carefully, as they are done the old fashioned way of cutting the triangles for the flying geese unit!!  Long time since I have done that, and I need these to be nice and accurate.

I have to say, one of the good things about having starting two mad projects that have small blocks - Farmers Wife and 365 Challenge - is that I have become a much more accurate patchworker.  It has also made me slow down and make my blocks and units much more slowly, and even this small thing will increase accuracy I have found. It did used to irk me when blocks would not come out right, and I think I have finally learnt some of the answers. Fast is not always first class sewing.

The other thing I did which I believe was extremely clever and funny, was at our Wine Country Quilts exhibition last month when I helped to man the Janome stand, there was an Elna Press on display.  So Clare took here 24 fat eighths that had been carefully folded up for 8 years and pressed them on it!  Wow, it was magnificent!  If I get rich anytime soon, I'm gonna buy one for patchwork!! LOL Actually, I have to confess...I only pressed about 8 of them...my friend Catherine did the others.  Mind you, it might have been the only ironing she had done during the week...just like me!  (I'm gonna run now before Catherine reads this)  LOL.

Here is my 365 Challenge stuff all neatly put into a satchel and into the cupboard.  My friend Eve showed me this neat pattern that uses 3 inch 9 patches and I have already worked out that I could use the blocks I have made and make some 9 patches to add to them and "wallah" I have a quilt done.  Hmmm, go to sleep brain.

I like these satchels.  They are transparent so you know what is in them and they stack quite nicely.  Come in lots of different sizes too.


Then, you'll never guess what happened!!!  Some blooming fabric plonked itself right into my stash!!   For goodness sake, as soon as you turn your back, you never know what might turn up!!!  Okay, I'll rephrase that for you.  I couldn't resist the pack at the Fat Quarter Shop of the Star Wars fabric...my lovely DIL is mad about all things Star Wars, and as it is her birthday next month, what better than to buy Kea some fabric and make a quilt for Christmas with it. I let Kea have a look case a quilt was not what she wanted, but it is now in my cupboard in the queue.

So, to keep this fabric company on its way to New Zealand, I felt compelled to buy this gorgeous, scrumptious, delicious collection of low volume fabrics.  I mean....who could resist?

This all means, of course, that I am now all fired up to get some more stuff finished, as I'm not allowed to start anything new without getting two things finished!!  Who made that silly rule I wonder?

I have also decided that I will only quilt my existing customer/friends quilts on my long arm, and will no longer look for new business.  It tires me out too much now, and if I get a cold like I have done in March and April, I am out for about 3 weeks while I recover.  Decision made, and now I'm happy with it.  Besides that, I will now manage to get my own quilts quilted!

In the middle of all this we have been watching our chrysalis and are so thrilled to have seen about 18 beautiful Monarch butterflies come out of their chrysalis'. this little video is of one sitting in the warmth of our autumn sunshine drying her wings before she flies away for the winter.  We were like little children, and on Thursday when about seven of them hatched, we wasted an inordinate amount of time watching them.  Mind you, sometimes you have to stop and marvel at these things.  There is no way I could believe that this incredibly complex sequence of a caterpillar totally changing its DNA to become the most beautiful of butterflies - could have been the result of haphazard evolution.

I hope the video works - as I not much good at editing these things it might be a bit long.  I hope you enjoy it though.





At the weekend, we had Richard, Kea and wee Marcy come to stay.  Richard was back to give his Dad another hand in finishing our house off.  It was so awesome that he was able to do this. Kea, Marcy and I headed off to Napier for the day.  We picked up Kea's lovely parents and headed off to the National Aquarium.  Not sure if we were impressed but it was interesting.  The weather was stunning, so that was a plus.  Here is Marcy have morning time in the "big bed" with Nana and Granddad.  She is wondering if that Granddad fellow is friendly or not...lol.

I didn't take a lot of photos as my phone was not charging properly.  Kea has lots and will send me some.  These weekends are so precious, and you realise that this time will never come again.  The little ones grow up so fast.








So there you have it - the update in the realm of the Moore's of Waipukurau.  I hope you have enjoyed reading all this most interesting stuff that makes up our lives.

What has been happening in your life?  Lots of huggy moments I hope.  Things like watching butterflies, and little girls learning to twirl, see a beautiful sunset and a chat with those who you love having in your life.  Smiling at those who need a smile and seeing it making a difference to that person. Life is a gift and we should remember to treat it as a precious thing.

Phew, well that was a right bit of the old philosophy  he he.   I think I'll go hug the cat...oops I mean my husband and see what difference it makes in his life!!

Blessings to you all
Clare
here is the link to Cythia Brunz  Oh Scrap.  Make sure you take a look, it's great eye candy.