Wow, time flies when you live in the fast lane. It's been ages since I posted! And my sincerest apologies to all of you. This last year was a huge struggle for me and my family, and I can only hope and pray that the new year blesses us with some really kick ass great news, great times an dmemories, and tons of loving families. My quilting continues, although I am dying to attend some new classes and upgrade my skills. My scrapbooking is on again off again, as usual! And my retreat business is going forward, always a blast with the ladies and always meeting new people, really enhancing my life lessons....shhh don't let them know! Well I wish everyone a very merry festive season, hope, love and joy to all. Remember, do it only if it makes YOU feel good! Cheers Rhonda

Its been awhile since my last post,  more to come later!

Where has she been?

Good Morning Vietnam!!!!!!!!!!!!! No actually it feels like a war zone in my little tiny spec of the world. I have been crazy busy, busier than usual and can't figure out why! (oh yeah, because i still can't say NO!).

(This is Joey's Retirement Quilt that I made her, Longarm Quilted by the talented Mrs. Schaffler)

Anywhooo....i've taken my two weeks vacation (in JUly) from my "real paying" job and took the time to "purge & organization" my home. Yep, under the bathroom counters, closests, kitchen cabinets, everywhere! Wow do I have alot of stuff! Not the "oh my goodness she's a hoarder" but the "do i really need this if it's been in the basement for a year" kinda stuff. Speaking of the "basement", I spent two of my vacation days getting the spare room down there all prepped and ready for our new son! Yep, we are taking in a Billet (a young hockey player) to come live with us as is "pretend family" while he reaches for the stars and his dreams of becoming a famous hockey star! He'll be welcomed to a room with great hockey favourites all hung in frames on the walls, a brand new homemade pillow case and quilt just for him.

The basement houses my new design studio, so they pushed all my stuff to one end and created their (the DH and 2 boys) own little oasis on the other end. Weight bench, excersise bike, treadmill, TV etc. They are promising to build me a wall to sheild my delicate fabrics from the horrors of teenage puberty and "ewww sweat"! Then last friday a larger than life electrical storm hit our town, bang, pow pop and the rain came down sooo hard that it busted through the seams of the window to the basement....now before all you crafty gals get heart palpatations cause you know of the "stash", the water only seeped in at the end of the basement where the weight room was! whew! guessing some higher power felt the need to cleanse that area! hahahaha...the boys had to rip out the hardwood laminate on that end of the basement and they've decided that concrete floor is fine for their weight room. (thank goodness)...so now my room (soon to have a wall to enclose me) will be the only area with beautiful hardwood in the basement!

However this has made me realize that all the bolts and bolts of fabric I have really should be stored in plastic bins....so alas, I am off to Lowes/Home Depot to see sizes, etc. to get everything safely put away and hopefully in Clear bins so I can see my stuff!

With the cleanup done, I can now start on my customer quilts that need to be done by October 1st! Whew!

Oh yeah and in the midst of this craziness, I decided July 10th to join a Gym, been working out with a trainer and 5am workouts everyday (with the exception of only 1 day missed) ever since. down 2.9lbs and the energy level is getting higher (like I could even get more energy?).

Now it's prepping 3 of the 4 kids for back to school (shopping started and stalled out) and then a welcoming party for the "new kid"!

chowsers everyone.

PS Books I have read this summer and loved soooo much I bought them after returning the originals to the library:

Scrap Therapy-Cut the Scraps! by Joan Ford. you must get this!!!!

Fix, Freeze, Feast and the Big Cook (these are cookbooks on how to cook 30+ meals in one day and freeze for later consumption! With 6+ in the house, these are amazing for eating healthy meals everynight and not indulging in crappy take out!

PSS If you live in the Sherwood Park Area, please go try my favourite "mom and pop" restaurant: Filamente (best italian food ever) just off Wye Road by Sobeys & Tim Hortons, they treat everyone like you're family and their Gnocchi and mushroom ravioli are AMAZING!!!!

chow for now and hopefully, i will start up my weekly posts again!

back to the gym for me!

My Summer Nonsense Reads where/are: Torment & Thirst #4

These Glubers are amazing, Scrapbooker use them on pages and Quilters/Sewers can use them for Fabric flowers on dresses, hats, bags, etc. WHoot Whoot!

wowser time flies

So, when time flies, you're having fun right? i've been cleaning, purging and stashing some of my great quilting items for my new studio. I will be spending the next two weeks prepping the studio for it's final wall/door combo and then viola! it will be done. I had a little "stash buster sale" and will be having another next week, to make room for my new stash must haves.

I've been completing alot of customer quilts, along with a special quilt for the billet that we'll be getting at the end of August. I thought it might make him feel more at home to have a nice comfy quilt on his bed when he arrives.

Summer has been full of thunderstorms, raging rain storms and Massive Mosquito parties. But we trudge on and when the sun does shine, we'll run out and enjoy what little we get!

Talk to you all real soon! Send photo's of what you've been up to? What's new in your world!

Swaps and More...

I've been doing a lot of swaps lately, they are fun, and i get to meet folks from all over the world, here's some pictures of some of the resent swaps!
the fabric is from a swap where we SWAPPED a pound or two or three with someone else, my swap partner lives in Denmark.

The basket/bag is from my swappartner for the quilted basket exchange, my creation went to New Zealand and the one shown here is from the Indian Ocean.

I also joined an eye spy square exchange....wowsers that brought in alot of 4" squares (400+) and only 3 repeats...great job gals/guys...this one shall be great to put together!

see you all later in the week!

Fire Victims help needed for Slave Lake

If you are not aware, a town in Alberta was destroyed by a horrible forest fire that is still going. The town is on full evacuation and 8000 residents are all displaced into many different locations. We are shocked to say the very least, I've sent up with the many trucks 4 afgans (knitted by my great friend Teddy Yates) and am in the midst of collecting quilts and afgans for the people to give them some comfort.
I am also collecting pet supplies for all the displaced and very scared pets.
If you can help email me at girlfriendsandgiggles@shaw.ca and we can arrange delivery of the items.

Thank you for your support. You can also donate at the Red Cross.

My heart goes out to those 8000 residents whom cannot go home...

Birthday week for the DIY DISH...have you visited them yet?

YOU HAVE TO VISIT ONE OF MY FAVOURITE ONLINE SHOWS...THE DIY DISH...these ladies are funny, charasmatic and down right entertaining, i love visiting their site, watching their videos and love that they seem to be speaking right to me...Go wish them a happy birthday and tell them I sent you! Enjoy!

PS Enter their draw for prizes.

http://www.thediydish.com/2011/05/its-our-birthday-and-were-giving-you-the-presents/

Mothers day

Wishing you all a Fabulous Mothers Day, hope you're all doing what you love to do!

Pretty

What makes you feel pretty?

Weird question huh, but i was thinking as i watched my little girl play with her dolls, what she thought was pretty....her dollies are identical, just different colours. The purple girl won over the girl with the blue dress.

It got me thinking what you do or wear to feel pretty, does this spill over onto your quilts and pages of your scrapbooks? It sure is an impact on mine. Which is why doing other peoples stuff can be a challenge for quilters and scrapbookers alike.

If you don't like blues, is it hard to put blue in your quilt, check your stash, which colours do you own the least (or better yet none) of? I visited Sew Divine Tuesday (a local quilt shop) and was talking to the owner, she was showing me these great new Batiks she had in, I told her I don't tend to go to the batiks...why? not sure...but that is my new challenge...use batiks and try a monochromatic quilt and scrapbook using "pattern".....The shop owner told me that this was the reason that her store didn't have alot of yellow and oranges, they aren't her favourite, but she was going to challenge herself to order some and "put herself to the test"...i am confident she'll do fine.

I want to challenge each of you, my loyal readers to a challenge....
1. Look at what you "usually" use in your quilts or scrapbooks.
2. Do the complete opposite and push yourself for your next project.
3. send me a photo of your project completed.
4. End of May I will pick a winner for the scrapbookers and 1 for the quilters.

Now, this won't hurt, it might even give you the giggles, so go ahead, try something new! I will use BATIKs by end of May!

I have the little version of this bad boy, gonna use it this month or else!

Decluttering advise

So a fellow blogger put up a Superb blog all about my favourite thing and biggest challenge I face....DECLUTTERING....o.k. so the hoarder in me is sobbing uncontrollabley as I write this, but gosh golly, The little Green Bean Blog has it going on....

Check her out at http://maluukkonen.blogspot.com/2011/03/de-cluttering-craft-room.html

She's rockin' it!

cheers
HAve a great week/weekend...I'm off to a guild retreat!!!!!

MARCH 19TH IS NATIONAL QUILTING DAY WE HAVE A GIVEAWAY

OK BLOGGING FRIENDS, FOR ALL MY QUILTY FRIENDS, MARCH 19TH IS NATIONAL QUILTING DAY AND I WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING TO CELEBRATE YOUR ARTIST AND CREATIVE QUILTY SIDE! LEAVE ME A COMMENT ON THIS BLOG AND A WINNER WILL BE CHOSEN ON SUNDAY AT 5PM MST.

DON'T FORGET TO BECOME A FOLLOWER OF MY BLOG IF YOU WANT TO WIN!!

ARE YOU QUILTING FOR YOUR SPECIAL DAY? ORGANIZING YOUR STUDIO OR CRAFTING SPACE? OR ARE YOU SHOP HOPPING FOR A BIGGER STASH?

HAPPY DAY TO YOU, DON'T FORGET THE CAKE AND WINE FOR THE TOASTS LATER!!!

CHEERS
RHONDA RUNS WITH SCISSORS!


AND THE WINNER IS ......

The ever so fabulous JUNE said:
Ya for National Quilting Day. I am planning on organizing my quilting space, or should I say tidy up, and if time remains, load a quilt on the longarm. Lots of ideas so little time. Quilt on LOL

Thanks for the comments everyone, June please send me your email and address and we'll get your prize to you soon.

In honour of your "organizing" I've put a new post up with a link to a friend blogger who is decluttering/organizing...thanks everyone...until next time!!

Jaybird Quilts is giving away FREE FABRIC!!!

Want to win fabric before it is in stores??
Well you are in luck today!!!

Hop on over to Julie's blog and see her current giveaway with Robert Kaufman (you know, beside Moda, RK is my fav) This new fabric is bright, vibrant and ohhh so yummy...Go check out Julie and tell her I said "hi ya'all" and enter and we could share the fabric!!!

http://www.jaybirdquilts.com/2011/03/treasures-tidbits-giveaway.html
cheers everyone

Retreats and overnight trips

Boy do i love Retreats....and on occasion I get to go to one as a guest instead of the organizer....at the end of March I get to join my Guild sisters in REtreat, I can't wait....I have already started planning and packing...now I get to find out what the other side of the fence is like!

What tips do you have for me as a guest?

cheers

IT'S TIME TO VOTE

I have a quilt in a contest..Voting is only until Sunday....would you please vote for me?

Click the link, then put a comment on the bottom that you are voting for Rhonda Duncan.

Thanks

http://sparrowstudioz.blogspot.com/2011/03/windowpanes-quilt-contest.html

Let all your friends know to go Vote!!

purging is for the birds

seriously, this purging thing is for the birds....all work and no play makes me cranky (or crankier for those who know me)



soon i will have my studio so i can create and play!

had to add a 2nd album to get more fabric for sale posted

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=277883&id=552912440&l=67e1050da6

is the second album on my FB to view more fabric for sale...so far I have a total of 245 pieces of quilting fabric for sale! and that's just a drop in the bucket of my stash! OH Goodness what have I begun!

Purging of the Quilters side of the studio has begun

OK so last night I started purging my quilters fabrics side of the studio, put the pics on facebook and am selling at rediculous prices.

Today I will finish with the Fabric and then go to the scrapbooking side. Watch my facebook photo album for all the deals!

OH goodness this is hard work!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=277633&id=552912440&l=e1f60e6451

And so goes the moving of the studio.....and now a garage sale for Fabric!

ok, so this is crazy, i get a bigger room for my studio and without even buying my new cabinets yet, my new space is soo full i can't move...so i spent 2 hours today, photographing fabric and measuring to sell! Some very lucky quilters are going to get a steal of a deal!

hmmm how do you organize a "multi" purpose studio?

PS I am looking for this pattern? Does anybody know where I can get it?

Moving Moving Moving, keep those fabrics Moving, RAWHIDE

OK EVERYONE, we've begun the great move. Teenagers in my house run in fear every night when i arrive home from my REAL JOB. They know each night we move another piece of furniture or stash of fabric from the 2nd floor of the house to the new Studio in the basement. Gosh I feel like a kid at Christmas.

I've come to realize that my Fabric Hoarding is a wee (way big overstatement) bit out of control. So I will have a garage sale soon!

New tables are now set up for my sewing station, and others are set up for my Scrapbooking area. Storage units have been put up, but alas, I will need more of those.

Ikea will be happy to see me this weekend, I need at least 4 Billy Bookcases for all the cottons and maybe 2 for the flannels. I was lucky to buy paper racks from a friend so my scrapbooking papers will be safe and visible and not hidden for life anymore.

I bought some artwork for the walls for inspiration, received some great mini quilts from friends for the walls and bought a new Iron. This is soo much fun, but I am really missing my 1/2 hour each night of "playtime".

And for those asking? YES I took a BEFORE picture and will take AFTER pictures for everyone to peek at!

Until next time....

Rhonda, running with Scissors and lovin' it!

This is what was in the space before...my son's Pirates of the Carribean BED and his dresser!

New Studio Toys!!!!

OK Folks, for those of you who "watch" me on Facebook, you know I am designing a new studio JUST FOR ME!!!!

OK, so I am not very excited about it (insert hysterical giggling here)...But this is an amazing adventure. This weekend the oldest son vacates the space which will soon be converted into my Studio...I suppose I should think of a great Studio name now?!

Upon him vacating, I will get to design, build and construct my ultimate crafting studio for my favourite passions of scrapbooking, quilting and a wee little bit of "everything else". I need advise, I need ideas, I need some "oh gosh don't do that's" and I need you ALL.

I will post my progress (thanks Trish for the great idea) and let you take the journey with me. Ki told me "go big or go home" so that will be my new motto...Perhaps I should print that out of my Cricut on vinyl and put it up on my wall!

Here is the first item that I purposefully bought just for my new studio!

Well, what do you think of my first Purchase...oh yeah, by the way, I will be keeping a tally of costs, so that you my friends, will be able to see what you could/couldn't and definately would/wouldn't spend your hard earned money on.

cheers...

BUSY is a four letter word!

OK, so busy I am, but I am soo Busy I can't even think straight anymore...not to mention when do i get to sleep!

New Studio being built...can you give me suggestions on what you would love for a new studio?

Customer quilts are coming along, but man oh man, am I swamped!

Making Valentines with a 6 year old for school!!!!

Life and Housework and oh yeah, that government job I have that pays for all these gems!....

In Eyeore's famous words..."OH BOTHER"

Cake completed...but the cuteness has ...

...spent the entire day in my room, sick....poor little thing...she won't see the finished product until Sunday at her party!

So our Castle Idea...didn't pan out...but....never fear...we quickly changed to a another favourite of hers.


Big Brother TJ helped mom with rolling out the fondant...(needed muscles for that)




4 layers (2 pound cake and 2 krispy treats) were layered and dirty iced...then we covered in with PINK fondant.



Next we made 4 dolly cakes and covered them with chocolate moulding and fondant.



Our new puppy definately approved...and he really wished I was sloppier and dropped more...


Last but not least we sprinkled the whole cake with baking dust in a great silver to reseamable the sprinkle dust of fairies.



(to make the tye dye look skirts on the bottom dolls...use white fondant, roll out, then spray with blue(or whatever colour you want) cake decorator spray colouring and remold and reroll...the more you reroll/remold the more solid the colour, so go easy and you'll get great tye dye effects.Icing around your edges or use licorice (we had some licorice with us...but it never made it on the cake...opps)

She'll see it tomorrow...cheers

Testing my Baking Knowledge...

So it's the little Cutenesses Birthday party Sunday..



And I am making her the cake she asked for... A PINK Princess Castle ....so off to Bulk Barn I went, bought 4 cake pans in varying sizes. Purchased Fondant, icing power for the buttercream icing, other icing, sugar flowers, decorations, fairy sprinkle dust and other decoration items.



(Some of us were not as patient as others, and may have "hit the sack early")
So I started baking, and setting up and Dirty Icing the cakes....Saturday will begin the Fondant and finer details...keep watching.




so I will try to post more tomorrow...keep your fingers crossed...and stop staring at the beaters...YES I LICKED THEM CLEAN...oh bother!!!

New quilt/scrap booking room on order?!

OK, so the teeny tiny spare bedroom I use for a studio is being highjacked!

I have now been so graciously (insert a big ol pie of sarcasm here) offered the basement! You know, the dingy, drab, dark, dust infested basement! So here is where I need you help, send me ideas on what you would do with a very low ceiling, 18x12' room? Should I punish him, making him build me the best table/storage unit known to quietly friends? Should I just haul all my crap down there and hope for the best? Or should I host a fabric garage sale, keep only my absolute FACS and start from scratch?


Help me!!!!!!

The sega continues! Tomoorow when the pirate ship bed is moved I will take photos for all you wannabe decorators.

January Eh!

Well, as many of you may know, the city I reside in has been battered and shaken by horrible winter storms. The snow fall has been extreme to say the very least. I am a mere 5'3" tall and the snow piles are now well over my head and my ability to shovel and toss. My guess is that we'll be shovelling until well into June to clear all this fluffy white goodness.

This is no excuse for my lapse in blog posts, but gosh darn it, it's hard to get in the mood to write when your teeth are chattering and your fingers are so frozen even the hot cocoa can't warm them up.

We've (meaning me and Gail and Lacey) have been quite busy on the Retreat front. Our first retreat of the year was January 7-9th. It was "oversold" so it was comfy and cozy and everyone was so productive and energetic. Then the snow dumped on us and viola, we were snowed in at retreat. Now some of you would be cheering and giggling uncontrolably right now if you had been there. However, the neighbouring farmer and his larger than life tractor came over and with the movements of a ballerina, swept all that snow away so to encourage our cars, trucks and minimom vans to brave the roads to return to our families. URGHHHH...

It always amazes me how great the country we live in is, how great our neighbours are and how super special the gals that come out and visit us at retreat are. I am truely gratefull for such a great bunch of women. Year after year they come out and join us 12 times a year for great quilting, great scrapbooking, great knitting, whatever their obsession is....they come. So in the words of a very cute actor....Build it and they will come!

Now on to this January EH! title....what do you do to keep the January BLAHS away? Do you only crafts with bright and bold colours? Do you plan summer meals? What is it that you do?

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Can you believe it...delinquent with my blog...but I have a million excuses! hahaha

Actually it seems that Nov/Dec are always chaotic for our family, but my resolution is to write at least every other day to you folks, my bloggy friends.

I have a retreat this weekend, I'll be scrapbooking Friday to Sunday with 17 gals.

Next week I fly to Peace River, AB for work, so I've convinced the airline that I NEED to take my Sewing Machine with me to avoid today Northern Boredom in my hotel room! So I will get 4 nights of uninterrupted quilty time of my own. phew! Can't wait.

Be safe, Stay Warm and remember, craft unsupervised and let your inner crafty gnome out!

Cheers