Crazy Quilting Sampler...

In early 2016 I signed up for a free course on Crazy Quilting (CQ).  Free is always attention getting for me.  My "crafting" budget is rather small and I need to stretch it all year long. Kathy Shaw offered this course on her blog Shawkl.com and you can merely click the link I have for you to read.  Bless Kathy and her amazing patience with me.  When I convinced myself to sign up I had every intention on doing the lessons in a timely manner.  However life took over and by August I was woefully behind and out of state without my project to work on. In the top photo you can see that I managed to get the ribbon embroidery completed recently per Kathy's instructions.  Thank you Kathy dear for extending my course timeline.  You have been an inspiration and excellent teacher.

I was committed to finishing what I had begun.  Here is a close up of my wandering ribbon vine and roses.  And because "Murphy" is always lurking, I ran out of the green ribbon on the vine leaves.  Of course I ordered what I had ordered before and wouldn't you know the die lot was not the same exact shade of green.  Since this is my learning sampler I decided to put perfection (which isn't reality) aside and use the green I received.  I am happy with the results and if you are astute and you look very closely you will see the two different shades of green. 

Ahhh...my completed Crazy Quilting sampler.  I have added some buttons and a dragonfly charm and a few lace motifs and several shuttle tatted pieces.  The buttons and charm I already owned.  The lace motifs I had purchased along with my silk ribbons.  The shuttle tatted pieces are from my friend Diane of LaceLovinLibrarian blog. Thank you Diane dear for sharing your tatting with me and I am honored to place them on my sampler.  I am pretty happy with how this has turned out.  I purposefully left some errors as learning bits.  I will try CQ in the future as I have so many wonderful charms and bits and treasures to incorporate into this type of handwork.  The biggest shock was when I showed it to Mr. C and he actually liked it and complimented my work.  Rare indeed.  Mr. C says I need to get it framed and I am certainly going to pursue that idea. Thank you honey!
Well I know you all have seen us on the news/weather.  Nevada City is getting torrential rains and water levels not seen in many years.  Thankfully we live uphill and the water runs downhill.  Our pond is draining just as Mr. C designed and built it to do.  The water level is up to the surrounding border and swamping the bogs.  Our house gutters are all working the way they should after Mr. C worked long and hard redesigning and putting up larger new gutters where needed and repairing holes in current gutters.  He keeps them cleaned out all year long.  Our local Nevada City Deer Creek is flowing high and rapid.  The restaurant "Lefty's" which overlooks Deer Creek is flooded and closed for at least a week.  It was shared on World News.  Also the Yuba River has been shown and it is very full and has level 5 rapids.  It is continuing to rain in furious quantity.  We have received over 16 inches in just a few days...along with over 8 inches of snow.  After five years of extreme drought we welcome this rain and the snow further up.  Now it is a matter of safety for everyone.  Stay home and out of creeks, rivers etcetera.  Highway 80 over Donner Summit has been closed on and off as long as 24 hours to clear traffic accidents and an avalanche of mud and debris.  People please be safe and do not travel if you do not absolutely have to.   I feel very fortunate that I am able to stay home and be safe and dry. 
On another note...we will keep our home listed (click for link) for sale through Winter.  Our broker, Mimi" understands that Winter is an excellent time for staying home and surfing the internet for that dream location and home...ours could be it!  After all Mr. C and I did find this unfinished home on the internet way back in 1998 when the internet was very new and offered little.  And here we are nineteen years later.  Waiting patiently for the right buyer so we can move along on our journey.  St. George Utah continues to call out to us.  After all Discover is what 2017 holds for us.
Continued Happy New Year to each of you and may you be doing exactly what makes you happiest...