Life at The Funny Farm

First of all, I have been in a grand funk for over a week. It all started when I had to go to see a rheumatologist. The bloodtests that were taken during my yearly physical in July showed markers for this stuff. The R doc informed me that I probably have the beginnings of lupus, not too common, but possibly hereditary. Figures, my father had it. Of course there are things that go along with it like dry eyes that itch and burn, and fatigue. Well, that I have definitely had for a while and my thumbs are driving me crazy because they hurt all of the time. I told him there was no way I was taking any more medicine than I was already taking and he said that was fine, drew some blood and said...see you in 6 months. Don't have the blood test results yet.

So, I promptly came home and went to bed and have basically done nothing to speak of but sleep for most of the past week. I did manage to take a short quilting class Friday, but that is all. Made a cute wall hanging which I will show a picture of soon.

Saturday I watched football games all day, played games on the computer, and finally decided to start reading The Story of Edgar Sawtelle. I finished it up tonight. This book was one of Oprah's choices, which means doodley to me, but I did read some of the reviews on it, and thought I would try it. I have a Kindle and it is such a joy to decide you want to read a book, go find it on Amazon, download it and voila, instant gratification. If you don't know about Kindles, just type in Amazon.com and go read about them. Great "inventions"!!! Oprah likes them so much she gave all of one of her studio audiences one and there is a $50 coupon on her site for them. It will be there for a few more days, but not long.

Aud informed me on Monday we needed to return her Ugg boots; they didn't fit right. Ok, fine, we can drop the Buick off to have the a/c fixed.....especially since it is only 58 degrees outside and we might need the a/c....and then we will return the boots. So off we go. She drives the Buick to Smicklaus Chevrolet and then we go to Dilliards. We return the boots, she buys another pair of shoes, we both try on lots of shoes which don't fit, get some cosmetics and then go to a restaurant in the mall that we both like to have "lunch". Of course it is 4 because we didn't get up until noon.

Had a great lunch. Chicken alfredo sandwiches with an olive relish of some sort and a green salad and wonderful raspberry tea. Then I go get the car and drive up close to the door so Aud doesn't have to walk too far. She has packages in her hand, and when she sits her cane down to open the door it falls down. A very nice man stops and picks it up and she thanks them, gets her packages in the car, and off we go.

I want to stop at Staples, I need some glue for a project and Aud wants some colored paper clips. We get to Staples, I walk in and ask the clerk at the register, who isn't busy, where the glue is. I don't know, it's down one of these isles and he starts walking along the front of them.....ok...which one.....I don't know. He looks back toward his register and a woman has approached it so he turns around and heads back. Wait, where are you going, I don't know where it is, ask that woman, and he points toward another clerk who is helping someone on one of the aisles. She is busy, you look it up, you are supposed to know where things are.

He is frantically looking around, I am glaring at him, the woman at the register is looking at us both like we are crazy, and he hollers at another clerk who has shown up down the way and asks him where the glue is. It is on isle 5. Ok, fine, of course it is in the back of the store, but I trudge down there, and they must have 50 kinds of glue, but not the one I am looking for. I wander around and find another clerk coming out of the storeroom and he helps me look and he can't find any either, so I thank him very much and head toward the front. I have decided I am not going to buy the paper clips there, they are too expensive and I am really irritated now!!!

I stop and ask the clerk that knows where the glue was if he is the manager. No, but can I help you? Yes, I don't appreciate the idiot at the front not knowing where the glue is. I thought the purpose of people who work in stores was to know their merchandise and to help people. He did neither, and I think someone needs to get him trained properly. Yes ma'am, and I get another one of "those" looks. As I walk toward the exit, the idiot says, are you ready to check out now, and I give him one of my best "steely" look and tell him I didn't find anything I wanted, and left.

I walk out the door and there is Aud, white as a sheet, standing outside of the car. What's wrong, I have lost my purse. What? You haven't been anywhere, where did you lose it. Now that is a dumb question of course, but one that you always say when something like this happens. I don't know, I must have left it on the curb when I dropped my cane and put my packages in the car. Well it won't be there now, but we'll go back and look. So we head back to the mall. Of course it isn't on the sidewalk, so I drop her off at the entrance and tell her to see if she left it in the restaurant. I get the car turned around and head back so I can pick her up and a few minutes later she comes out with purse in hand.

When she walked in the restaurant the couple that was sitting there said your waiter put it in the back, so Aud retrieves her purse from someone else, our waiter was busy, and comes out to get in the car. Did you give him a tip Aud? No, didn't think about it, well I think he should get one, ok, here, take him this. So, I leave the car running, go in the restaurant, find the waiter, give him a tip, which really pleased him, and we leave.

By now Aud is so stressed she is beside herself and I feel so sorry for her. We did have a laugh, more of relief than anything else. I told her we didn't need to have another adventure so close to the last one, lol. I am so glad she found it; she had all of her credit cards in there and quite a bit of cash. So we go home and crash.

We have been out every day this week and something silly has happened every day. As Aud says this evening when we were coming home from having dinner with my daughter and one of the grandsons, this has been the longest week, and it is only half over. Do you think we will make it through without any more "things" happening? Don't know Aud, tomorrow is hair day, who knows. And I need to buy groceries, oh, I will go with you, ....ok....well, that will probably be the next adventure, it always is when we go buy groceries together, lol.

Hope you are all having a great week. For those of you who read my blog and don't have an email for replies to commments, thank you for stopping by, I always enjoy reading them.

Summer's Last Hurrah

The weather has been so gorgeous this week, and the flowers in the front yard are looking so good I had to share them with you. These are the azaleas blooming above the impatiens, aren't they just gorgeous? They will bloom until the first freeze gets them. Last year it was December before they went away.

As you can tell from this bed the impatiens are taking over.

Here are the periwinkles and caladiums. I had a young man come help me clean up the yard and get it mulched and ready for winter a couple of weeks ago, and it has looked so good since then.

Star BOM Block 5 and 6

Judy at Patchwork Times is doing a Star BOM that I am involved in. Thank you Judy! I am enjoying doing these blocks!

This is Block 6.

This is Block 5

Another Day at the Funny Farm

A little background here. Remember the story about the Buick Reviera? Well I had to take it in after I got back from Kansas because of the leak that was over the right front tire.


"Just a small leak, it is probably nothing. Probably just some oil that dripped down when they worked on it before". right......well, it is going to get checked out.

One day later, a new water pump, sparks plugs etc, and something else I don't remember what now, and a goodly amount of money "it's fixed"!!! I get the van to come get me so I can pick it up and I pay for it, get in the car, start to drive off and the a/c isn't blowing cold air. I back it back into the shop, and they take it off and, as usual, I have not bought any of my "kill time" toys with me, so there I sit twiddling my thumbs. About 30 minutes later it is bought back and a hose had come loose and that was all. Ok, thanks, and off I go.

I get about 20 minutes away and I see a light come on that I assume is the "check engine" light, say a few bad words, and go on home. That will just have to wait. The car hasn't been driven since until Thursday afternoon.

Every Thursday afternoon, most of the time at 3 pm, Aud gets her hair done. Since she has stopped driving supposedly I take her. She has informed me the night before she needs some shoes and some bluejeans so we are going to have to go shopping.

I hate, hate, hate, to go shopping unless I am going to a quilt store. I buy everything I can online. But my sweet mother loves to shop. She doesn't always have the stamina for it anymore so she buys a lot of stuff online too. But about twice a year we venture out on a shopping trip.

Ok, so here we are, we have been to the beauty salon, her hair looks wonderful as usual, and we head off to her favorite shoe store to buy shoes. I have called to make sure they have time to see her. This is one of those very small stores that sells shoes fit to your foot. I tell them we will be there in 10 minutes. I no sooner hang up the phone than lo and behold the Check Engine Soon light comes on. I am at an exit on the turnpike so I head off..."it is nothing", yes it is, I am not going to drive around town with this light on, "well, it won't hurt", I am not doing this, we are going to the auto repair shop. By now, I have called and cancelled our appt at the shoe store.

We get to our favorite place, drive in, Mario, who knows us well by now, comes up and asks what is wrong. Well, Mario, the Check Engine Soon and the A/C needs service lights are on. You two go set down in the waiting room and let me see what I can find out.

We go in the waiting room, sit down in front of this huge Sony TV that is blaring, but we can't see it because the only place you can see it from is 1 seat and it is occupied, and not by us. A man in a suit, his name is Jay, comes up and asks if we need anything.

Yes, if you are going to have a TV blaring the least thing you can do is provide seats where you can see it and have blinds on the window to cut the glare. Well, we can move your chairs over here in front of it. No, then the man that is sitting there who can see it (and looks like he has swallowed a prune) won't be able to. I don't care for tvs anyway, but you could at least have some decent magazines. He laughs, and says there's nothing out there I don't know about, just ask me what do you want to know.

So we are having this off the wall conversation and I don't remember exactly what was said, but he tells us he is 49 years old and has just had a quadruple bypass and a 3 hernia operations. Of course I have to laugh. How can you have 1 hernia, let alone 3, without knowing about it? lol.....he was a delightful soul and Aud and I thoroughly enjoyed chatting with him.

Here comes Mario to tell us that the a/c needs freon in it, and that is why the light has come on. They cannot figure out why the check engine light has come on, so when that happens again drive straight to the shop and don't turn the car off. Now the bad part of this is they no longer make the freon that goes in this car. You have to have a kit to convert the air conditioner to be able to use the new freon. Of course! So what are we looking at? Oh, about 180, but I would wait until next spring, you don't need the a/c now. Well, maybe he doesn't, but he isn't old and harmonal, lol. I will take it in next week.

One of the stops we intended to make was at a Mexican restaurant that we dearly love, and we are starving because we have not eaten since breakfast at 11 am. So we do that, and as usual it was delicious.

Next stop, Dilliard's. I park at the door that is closest to what I hope is the women's clothing. I can always find a parking place at this door. We go in, and go by the shoes, "just in case". Oh my goodness, Aud finds 2 pair of Cole Hahns, and a pair of Ugg boots that she can wear!!! Wonderful!! Please hold these for us and we will come back to get them later.

Upstairs on the escalator, which is always an adventure, since Aud is unsteady and has her cane. We find a wonderful salesclerk called Pural that helps us. 1 pair of bluejeans, and 3 new outfits later, we are through! Ooops, where is the nearest restroom? Oh, across on the other side of the store of course. So we traipse across the store, and sit down in the chairs in the "little girl's room" ro recuperate from our walk.

Well, lets take the elevator down, so we ask where it is, and it is on the side we came from, and I am not walking that far. So I ask one of the salesclerks to help get Aud on the escalator without falling down, and she does, thank heavens. We pick up the shoes, and by now it is dark, so I ask the shoe salesman to watch us walk to our car, because I don't want to go to jail if someone tries to rob us and I accidently kill him, lol. So we all traipse out. I know I have parked in a "crip space" and I know where I have parked the car...but it is not there.

Someone must have taken it. You are just like your Daddy! He use to call me from the Fat Stock Show and tell me someone had stolen the car! And I would ask him where he had parked it and he would tell me, and I would have to go get him and take him to the car. Of course by then he was watching the horses, so it took forever to get back home.

Oh, here comes the lot patrol. I wave him down and ask him if he will see if he can spot it. Sure, so he takes off and starts going up and down the isles and I have decided it has been stolen because I know where I parked it, and that spot is empty!! The lot patrol starts passes us about this time to go down the next isle and it dawns on me we have come out of the wrong door! So I go running down the isle hollering for him to stop and telling him we have come out the wrong door! Mother is standing at the entrance with her cane and part of the packages in her arms, and I have my arms full of clothes, and both of us are exhausted. I ask Keith, by now I feel I have known him forever, lol, if he will take us to our car, as the right entrance is on the other side of the building, lol.

Of course, so we pick up Aud, pile in and he drives us around to our car. I don't think we would have made it if he hadn't, lol. And sure enough, the car is right where it was parked, in the exact parking place I thought it was, just at a different entrance, lol.

SO, Aud and I get out of the patrol car, load our packages into the trunk, thank Keith profusely, climbe in the car, look at each other and just laugh. I cannot believe all of this has happened. I never forget where I park the car, or I should say, never until now. What next I wonder?

Stay tuned, who knows what where out next adventure will be, lol.

Hope everyone has had a great week!

Goodbye Kansas - Hope to see you Next Year!

Well, this adventure is over and it sure was a good one.

These are the batiks I gathered from all of the stores I was in. Mostly I buy third yards, but a couple of these are 1 yard.


These are the backing fabrics that I bought in Yoder for 5.00 a yard. Love it!!! I bought some patterns and some yardage but didn't take any pictures of them and they have been put away. Sorry about that, maybe you will see them made into something one of these days, lol.

To back up a little, when I drove to Kansas, I had a small map that basically told me where Kathy's house was. I am good with maps (hah) and I figured out the most efficient way to get to her house. I turned down this road and figured after about a mile that the street crossing it wasn't in existence so I thought, what the heck, eventually there will be another road going back to the west.

This was my present for persevering down that road. This cemetary is so unique. See how the trees are all bending over? The prevailing winds up there are from the south I think, and these trees all bend to the north.

Very clean and very inviting, if a cemetary can be called that. Kathy assures me there are some very old graves out there, and next time I go to Kansas I intend to investigate.

I got up Monday morning, drank a cup of coffee, and headed out to Oklahoma. I figured I had enough gas to stop at the turnpike restaurant to get gas and eat a donut or something and get some orange juice. I had forgotten to ask where the closet McDonald's was that we had gone through on Saturday morning.

I stopped and got my gas and my stale donut and some oj and headed on down the road. Just after I crossed the OK/Kansas line, which I intended to take a picture of, but I never saw anything that told me that I was in OK until it was too late to take a picture.

Anyway, Sharon ,I have a town named after me too! It is to the east of I-35 not too far from the Kansas border. This town is actually named for an ancestor of mine several generations back. One of these days maybe I will investigate and get all of the particulars.

I made good time and stopped at Starbucks in OKC and went home, unloaded the car, gave Aud a kiss, and took a nap, lol. I am sure Kathy was totally exhausted, poor thing, she had to go to work on Monday. However, it took me about 3 days before I really knew where I was again.

I am hoping to go again next year if I can get some of this stuff I bought made up. Don't place your bets though, I haven't gotten much done since I got home.

Hope you enjoyed this trip if you have been following it. Wish you could have been with us, we had lots of laughs.

Kansas Shop Hop - Part 11

I have this post and the one below it out of order, lol.

On Sunday morning we got up around 9 and had a wonderful breakfast of bacon, eggs, biscuits and gravy and great coffee, thanks to Kim. He is such a dear.

Then we headed out to Derby, which is south and a little east of Wichita on 15. The quilt store is called Sunflower Quilts

Here is Annette, a very sweet lady who answered lots of our questions and cut our fabric for us. When we got there around 11 it wasn't busy as yet and we got lots of attention, lol.


Some discussion of a pattern I believe.

This is pattern that they are going to order for me. It has y seams in it which I do not care for, but the pattern intriqued me very much. Some of it is hidden behind the table.

Check out this sample. Cool, huh? It is a Karen Combs Studio pattern.

I don't remember what this is, but I know it is one of the newer Moda lines.

This is a block of the month I think. I know I have seen it on Vicky's blog. Really pretty quilt.

This sample looks like it was done with batiks, but is really done in cottons. I intend to do it with batiks, and Annette told me I could download the pattern from Hoffman California. Look under their quilt patterns. It is called Savannah Streets and is 67 x 83.

There was a whole room devoted to Kansas Troubles and their patterns. This one is called Wildflower Star Duet. They have it kitted and all of the samples are just beautiful.

A Christmas sample maybe? It is called Block Party and may be a BOM. I have this out of order, it should be before the Kansas Troubles.

Here is another Kansas Troubles pattern. It is called Flower Basket trio. They do have a kit available on this one also. Now that I look at it again, I wish I had bought this one too.

And then we come to this one. I fiddled around and mumbled to myself about buying the kit because I have the majority of this fabric, just not the large runs of the middle pieces. I had to laugh, one of the women in that room that was stamping passports and I were talking about the samples and how wonderful they were, and, as she said, there are some cold winter nights coming up, lol. Okay, fine, so this kit found it's way home with me. It is 90 x 100. It just smacks of home to me.

We paid our way out of this store and headed down the road to Severy. I told Annette and crew I would be back. Great store! I am sure if any of these samples call to you, you can call Annette and get her to mail to you.

Kansas Shop Hop - Part 12

After we left Derby we headed out on Highway 400 going east. It seemed like it took us forever to get to the Needle in a Haystack . I think both of us had about decided it wasn't worth it when all of a sudden, over the "hill" and in the middle of nowhere there appeared this tall "Needle in a Haystack".

We walked in and were kind of standing there when I spotted Nelda sitting there very quietly in a chair and watching all that was going on. She looked lonesome so I sat down and talked to her for a bit. She was with her daughter. They had been to their separate churches that morning and had a bite to eat and then she came to the quilt store with her daughter. She is 83 years young, had lost her husband 2 years ago (I think), lived in Rose Hill (a small town not too far away we had driven through on our way to Severy} and had worked for the Kansas Post Office for 25 years. Such a gentle soul. We talked a little about nothing and then I told her I had to get busy, lol.

This lady was stamping passports and this was the signup table for doorprizes. We didn't win any, drat it.

Lots of samples, some high, some low. This picture is a close up of one in another picture further down.

As you can tell, there were lots of things to choose from, and we found some hand products that we had to have. There were also some "antiques" and craft items in various nooks and crannies. Actually this quilt store looked like I expected all of the quilt stores in Kansas to look like. Kind of jumbled and lots of older fabric as well as newer. Great store for bargains!

Ok, we have now completed the requisite stops at all of the stores involved in the Central Kansas Quilt Shop Hop.

However, being ever curious I had picked up The Country Register at the store in Derby, and it mentioned another store in Severy. Since we were almost there, we thougt why not, and heading east again.

About a mile down the road we came to the "address" listed, but there was nothing there but a filling station and an auto salvage, storage, whatever behind it. So, we pulled in there and tried to decide what to do. Meanwhile a couple of cars had turned south at this intersection in the middle of nowhere and after a block had turned back east. Very strange. Ok, let's see where it goes, lol.. We followed the leader and about a mile later came upon this quilt store in the middle of nowhere called Itchin to Stitch. It doesn't have a website. The building was new and when you walked in the door it was very clean and bright and nicely laid out. No one was there except the owner and one employee. Kathy found some polka dots she had been looking for, but I resisted everything, yea for me!!!

I think this picture must be turned on its side. I did inquire about this and was told that they were sold out of the pattern. No offer to get it for me, so I have no idea of what or who.

This was the only other picture I took in there. I didn't get warm and fuzzy feelings here so I didn't take lots of pictures.

We did ask how far Severy was from there and were told there really isn't a town, it is just a collection of buildings, lol.

So we headed back to Wichita and I took this picture of a wind farm. If you inlarge the picture you can see all of the turbines in the back. Fascinating.

We called our resident chef and decided to meet him at P K Chang's for a late lunch. He called us back about the time we got there and told us he had changed his mind, it was too much trouble. I can relate to that, lol.

We had a drink and a wonderful meal and just set there in shock for a little while before we headed back to Kathy's. We had "run the marathon", and finished. Great great trip.

I have some loose pictures to show and will wrap this up in the next and last post.

Kansas Shop Hop - Part 10

Salina was the farthest store we went to, and when we started back to Wichita we went through Newton to go to Charlotte's Sew Natural.

There were some cute samples in this store and several of the patterns are ones that Charlotte, who is the owner, has crafted. This is a cute table runner that is one of her patterns.
Not sure whose head I cut off here....lol...

Another table runner pattern from Charlotte.

Interesting quilt. You can order her patterns from her web site. As usual everyone was very friendly and I found some batiks in there that I liked, plus some patterns.

It was almost dark when we were leaving and we noticed 3 different colored fire plugs on the streets. Some of them were silver and red, some were silver and black, and some were silver and blue. Have no idea why they were different colors. Didn't appear to be any rhyme or reason.

All day long Kathy had been fretting about the car pulling to the right and talking about it needing to be aligned. I had laughingly ask her if she had checked the tire pressure and of course she hadn't. Well, when we walked out of the Newton store I just happened to look at the tire. It was way low....

Kathy, we have to stop and get some air....as we pass a filling station. Oh there is another one down the road, we will stop there, so we keep on driving and reach the edge of town.

By now Kathy has called Kim to tell him we will be home shortly (I didn't realize she meant less that 30 mintures) and he wanted us to stop and get some green onions.

We do not pass another gas station and I insist that she turn around and find some air. We stop at a local stop and go and air is 75 cents!!! I am flabbergasted, I didn't know you had to pay for air, and 75 cents? Unreal. Of course we don't have any change so she goes into the store and gets change, and finds out the air pump is out of order, lol. Now Kathy, being one of those people who drives a car and never has to tend to it because she has someone to do it for her, says Kim will take care of it when we get home. I, of course, can see us stuck on the darn freeway after dark with a flat. So, I insist we find some air, which we do eventually, and sure enough, it takes quit a bit. Kathy fills the tire, gets in the car and says, hmmm, that's what that light meant. I could have shaken her by then, but all I could do was laugh.

We did not find any store until we got to Wichita, which was about 20 minutes away, and here we are at Dillon's for the green onions. That is Kathy going into the store for the onions, lol.

We got home ok, and the onions were for the cajun talapia that Kim had fixed, along with some dirty rice. Oooh, it was so good!!! How wonderful to be gone all day and have dinner ready when you get home! So we fiddled around and then had the jalepeno dip that I had bought, and went to bed fairly early because we were both just beat. We had been to a total of 6 stores.

That was Saturday. We only had 2 stores left for Sunday, and as it turned out, we found one more open. That will be the next post.

Hope your week is going well!

Kansas Shop Hop - Part 9

Continuing on to Salina and The Quilting Bee. This was a quilt in the front window. I really really like it, and when I asked about it inside, I was told they needed some pink quilts to decorate their window and had used this one in the window because the town was having a "pink" contest for. It is an older quilt and if anyone knows anything about this pattern please let me know.


The ladies here were also terrific and helped me find a pattern suitable for the fabric below.

I was not prepared to find fabric like this in the middle of Kansas. This is from Westex and is printed in Japan. They had 8 pieces, one of which didn't go, but the other pieces I bought enough of to make this pattern hopefully. I know this picture doesn't do this justice, but it sure looks good to me.

Some samples of other quilts. I know I took more pictures in this store, but I must have had a empty battery because I don't find them.

We drove through the neighborhood close to the downtown area where the quilt store was located. Look at these gorgeous homes.

This is what all of the streets looked like in this neighborhood. Loved all the trees.

This one was on a corner...just gorgeous!

And that was all of Salina. Next up, heading back to Wichita with a stop at Newton.

Kansas Shop Hop - Part 8

We walked out of The Button Hole in McPherson which was fronted by the construction going on pictured here. By now my knees were killing me. I had worn my MBTs, forgetting that they stretch my hamstrings, and I could hardly walk. Lucky for me, there was a shoe store across the street. She the sign that says shoes?

We drove over there, lol, and lucky for me they had some orange crocs. I just happened to have on an orange T-shirt and gray pants so that was a perfect fit. Of course one of the people in the store said, laughingly, when I walked out of the store with them on, you won't have to worry about people knowing you are coming, lol. True, but I forgot to take a picture of that, so here is one I took just so you could see how bright orange they are.

With my feet and knees not screaming I could now draw my attention to eating. Kathy and I hadn't had much to eat, and there was a great little deli a couple of doors down from the quilt store, which we drove to, lol. And this young lady waited on us. We had broccoli and cheddar soup and I had a salad and Kathy had a sandwich. See the Gallileo sign on the counter, that was our order number. Great food! Of course I can't find where I wrote her name down either.

Now that our tummies were full, we head out the door, only to see the Chile Cookoff going on. We ask these fine people to pose, and they did so gladly. They didn't ask us if we wanted any, and I only saw one other group of people doing anything that looked like cooking chile, so I was kind of glad they didn't. Not sure what chile would taste like in the middle of Kansas. Especially if you were bought up in Texas where chile is an art supposedly, :>) Aren't they wonderful? Right in character; the man on the left was even playing a guitar.

After this fun time we got in the car and started out to Salina. We could see this church from the road and it looked so majestic sitting out in the middle of the wheat or whatever it was, field, that we decided to investigate. We turned off on a side road that looked like it might lead us to it.

Here is is from the parking lot that was on the side of the church. There was a very nice cemetary behind it, well kept up. There wasn't any town close to it, just this wonderful church out in the middle of what looked like nowhere.

The rest of our drive into Salina was uneventful. That will be the next installment.