Start 'em young

Earlier this week, my 7 year old granddaughter and I spent 3 days at a local state park in our motorhome. She has been 'on and on' about learning how to sew, so this seemed liked a good, quiet time we could concentrate on that. And so, I brought my smaller Pfaff machine and we had a table that could be low enough that she could easily reach the foot pedal. What fun we had. It happened that I had some sheeting that I had used for another project, so it provided very clear lines for her to follow. And she managed to follow them pretty well. You can notice some of the earlier efforts, as well as the later ones. She also wanted to do some hand sewing. That was much more difficult - particularly because I am right handed and she is left handed. But it was really such fun and she came to appreciate more, what it is her Nana does when she is "sewing".

She also thought she wanted to try her hand at "designing" a quilt. I had made quilt segments (actually for her) earlier and so on a piece of flannel I had brought along, we laid the pieces out. Actually we laid them out over and over and over. She really had quite a time deciding what she liked. She finally said, "Nana, how do you know which way it's supposed to go?". Cute, heh? She kept thinking that there were "rules" for all of this [don't some of the rest of us do that too?]. But I just kept telling her that "no" there are no rules, really. Just whatever pleased her.

It was a great 3 days, just the two of us. For our Dutch readers, I forgot to mention that I spoke with the people in the camper truck nextdoor and asked them where they were from - they were in a vehicle with a British Columbia (Canada) license plates. Turns out they were from Edam. I got to practice a bit of my halting Dutch.

This was a terrific conclusion to my birthday "week". We had started to celebrate a week ago with a salmon BBQ at friends, then cards throughout the week. On Sunday the grandbabies and their mama came over to celebrate with cupcakes and more cards. In the midst of that event the doorbell rang and it was my son, who lives in the 'other' Washington. He managed to arrange a conference he needed to attend in Portland, OR, so also could surprise this mama on her birthday. Aren't I just the luckiest one ever?

Last week I completed the piecing of a small wall hanging made of 5" charms. I kept seeing them in the LQS and thinking they would be fun to play with, but wasn't sure how to proceed. So, when I get the borders in place, I'll send along a photo of that work in progress. Can you believe it, July is almost over?