I have spent the last 2 days doing everything except what I wanted/needed to do. I did, however, get something work-related done. I've just put Everyday Best on the site as an ePattern. I'll send a newsletter to spread the news in a few days but for now, you're the first to know. Click here.

Mom is feeling a bit better – as long as she is loaded with pain meds. You know, I'm still amazed at how much damage an 8 lb dog can do. If he comes home to her (and that is a very big if) he's going to have to be carefully watched around Jack and Elanor. 

Now for something quilt-related! I've got my next AAQI auction quilt drawn. I'm doing another house-related quilt. This one is loosely based on a more traditional needlework sampler.

These sorts of samplers need at least one person and I decided to add my grandmother, Mabel Eckroat. I used this photo, one of my favorites of her, as the basis for the drawing…

I drew over the image in Adobe Illustrator, but you could do the same thing with tracing paper and a pencil…

Here's a section of my pattern with my grandmother in it…

I love the way the simple line drawing captures the feeling of my grandmother! 

I'm not going to try to make the appliqued figure be photorealistic. In fact, my plan is to sort of fade the figure into the background. Or not. I won't know for sure until I start working in fabric… which was my plan for today. But, like Scarlet said, tomorrow is another day!

I hope you all had a lovely Easter and/or Passover holiday. Ours was great! We got to attend the Tooleys annual Easter Egg Hunt. More than 500 eggs, races, prizes, food, beverages (some adult beverages) – great fun! I appointed myself as the event photographer and got lots and lots of great photos. A good camera and digital technology make that pretty easy to do.

Easter Sunday started with baskets and mass followed by another egg hunt. Then the kids all went home and Steve and I had a laid back afternoon. Until Mom called, in a panic, at 5:30. The dog bit her.

Taz was Christy's dog and Mom promised to take care of, and love, him. Taz is a mean-tempered 8 lb pure blood Yorkie. He's a bit overweight because Mom gives him table scraps. He ought to be nicer to her!

She was playing with a ball with him. The ball got stuck. Mom reached out to un-stick the ball. The excited, sharp-toothed dog got her in the right forearm. 3" gash, deep enough to nick an artery. You know those CSI crime scenes? There you go. Except that Mom had the presence of mind to only drip on the laminate floor. Way to go, Mom!

So picture Steve and me running down the alley. Steve took Mom immediately to the emergency room. I cleaned up and then took his place at the hospital. After 2.5 hours (not bad for an ER visit), several stitches and steristrips, we headed home for dinner. 

It hurts when the pain meds wear off which happened this morning. After seeing her regular doctor, Mom is dosed up and feeling not much pain. She's not moving much either which is good. It will get better.

But wait. There's more! 

This afternoon, we lost Elanor. She was at my house with her mom. I ran errands, came back, said "Hi" and "Where's Elanor?" Lorna said "she's here." She wasn't. No Elanor. Not in the pool, not in hollering range. Lorna ran to Mom's – not there. She was GONE. I called 911, which is becoming a depressingly familiar number to dial.

Chris was home and not answering his phone. Lorna waited for police as I zoomed over to check with Chris who was nonplussed when I hammered on the window asking if he knew where Elanor was. (I think that is the first time I've used the word nonplussed.)

She was with him. HIs phone was charging in a far room in their house and he didn't hear it. Elanor said she told her mom she was leaving, Lorna says that no, she did not. I'm guessing that there will be better communication from now on.

The police came and went. I took deep breaths. I don't know what I used to hope for but these days I would really love lots of days in a row where nothing happened. I feel like this:

NOTE: That's Jack in front in the 4 and under foot race. He's really big for 4 so had an unfair advantage in this race. But he was happy to come in first! The little girl in the pink shirt is Lucy, one of his very good friends at Montessori school. They're Irises.

Our next book, Applique With Attitude, should be available in mid-May. There are some very cute quilts in this book if I do say so myself. Soon I am teaching one of the blocks from the Chirps! pattern shown on the cover of the book. Linda made Chirps! so I've been working on my own version of the quilt to travel with. I thought I'd share the process I went through as I was deciding how to set the blocks together.

I made these four blocks:

That red background is by Liesl Gibson from the City Weekend collection from Moda. It's a very nice choice for this block. Linda used the same fabric in 3 different colors for her mini-quilts.

Normally I would have chosen the sashing and border fabrics before I started the applique but this time I just couldn't get that done before I had to start the sewing. I knew I'd be able to find something, the question was what.

I really liked black and white prints with these blocks so I sashed them in b/w. Idon't know why, but this big dot really called to me for the borders.

It's way over top, more so in person. So I wondered about using a colorful print…

Interesting, but not wonderful. I had the big dot in red…

…but it was the wrong red. The little print on the right was sort of good…

…but I realized when I saw more of it that it was too busy. So I went back to black and white.

I liked this, but decided to try other prints before finalizing my choices.

What these photos illustrate very well is that there is never one 'right' way to make a quilt. Many of the fabrics I tried could have worked well and there are so many more that I didn't even consider. But what's true for you is true for me – I had to decide which of my choices I liked the best. I couldn't help it – I still liked the big black dot. This is where the quilt ended up:

I think it needs a dark binding – either black or red, probably a print, not a solid. I hope I can get it quilted before I leave for California.

Ami Sims says to try Songify for a little fun. It's an iPhone App where you speak a few phrases into your phone and it creates a techno-digitized song to fit your words. Sounds like you are singing. Kind of. Ami used it in the video below… 

The latest news from AAQI is that the 10,000th donated quilt has been or is about to be donated. You can see what's up on the AAQI facebook page. I'm so happy that quilters are making a difference in hunting for a cure for Alzheimer's.

This is what hope looks like: little periwinkles planted where they will get the full force of the Texas summer sun…

I planted 3 flats of periwinkles at my house and 2 more at Mom's. They are everywhere!

I had great luck with periwinkles last year. They fill out and flower all summer long and really can take the heat.

Mom and I went flower and shrub shopping Friday morning. After cleaning house, I spent the rest of Friday and a good part of Saturday getting everything in the ground. I have to say that I am glad to have it done! 

This is a Knock-Out Rose, above. We planted 2 of them at Mom's last fall and they are already flowering. This rose bush should grow to be about 3'-4' in both directions.

You can't really see it but I planted a lilac bush just beyond those pink salvias. It should be around 4' tall if it survives. I have not had much luck with lilacs but the man at Twin Oaks said that he had had luck with this variety. To me that lilac is the essence of hopefulness.

And here are the kids, in the pool for the first time this summer (taken last week). 

The other excitement this weekend is that I lost Mom. She didn't know she was lost – she just forgot that we had a lunch date. I've done a similar sort of thing but what she didn't know was that 3 of her good friends from OKC were coming to lunch to surprise her. The big surprise was that I couldn't find her. Luckily they were running late.

I had about 90 minutes of mounting panic. I got helpers to drive around looking for her (after I had already driven to the likely spots). I called the hospitals, the library, Target, th police… I really thought that she might have been abducted.

Lorna suggested calling the bank to see if her card had been used. I did and then three things happened almost at the same time: I finally got the bank to tell me when she had last used her debit card (20 minutes before), Mom drove into the garage, and a nice policeman showed up at Mom's front door. Mom was surprised to hear that she had been missing (and she was thrilled to see the policeman).

We did go to lunch with her friends and she had an excellent visit. I had a glass of wine with lunch and felt much better. 

What did we learn from this experience? Mom says she won't forget her cell phone any more. I will wait longer to panic. And we are both hopeful that that this doesn't happen again. 

My kids and grandkids loved the stacking cups toy by Fisher Price. Surely you've seen them – they were a simple shape and came in a stack of rainbow colors. The cups coule be stacked little to big or nested big to little? They had a pattern on the bottom that could be stamped into Play-Do. Well, those cups are gone and I have to say that the new cups are pretty wonderful.

I ran across the new Fisher Price stacking cups and had to buy one for a baby. (Remember Theo, the beautiful baby? He got a set.) I also bought myself a set because I just love these things!

They are pretty! The cups are numbered which is educational and graphically nice. You can make balls which are fun to roll. Just ask Jack who has already given my set a test run. The little yellow ball makes noise when it moves. 

The cups can be stacked and the little ball sits nicely on top.

The balls can be nested which makes this an easy toy to store – you end up with the one biggest ball and everything else inside. I have my ball out in the studio ready for those times when I just want to stack some cups or see the pretty colors :-).