Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner

So last night, I had Dave select the winners – as in I said, “Hey Dave, pick three numbers between 1 and 19 for some elephants” and then later “Hey Dave, pick one number between 1 and 19 for my grand prize.” He is only dimly aware of my blog, so he had no idea whose comments matched what numbers.

I am pleased to announce the winners!

For the elephant pin cushions:

#5: Ana of Crafting Insights
#12: Michele aka SweetClementine
#18: Frauke of Quilthexle’s World

And for the super awesome package of journals made by jRcRown:

#1: Dimitra of Snarky Sister

Congrats to the winners – I’ll be getting in touch with you soon to get shipping addresses! And thanks to everyone for reading my blog – I appreciate it!

And now… a quick story….

Last night Dave and I went to the movies. We like to get there early to get seats pretty far in the back, but I blew a lot of our time talking on the phone in the lobby. I’m not usually one of those people, but my good friend, Kevin, who lives in Japan was calling and I was really excited to talk to him. Anyway, we were seeing Limitless and it was opening night, so by the time we got into the theater, the previews were playing and the theater was pretty packed. We sat down and the movie started.

About five minutes into the movie, I realized that Dave was eating popcorn and we definitely had not bought any popcorn. It turned out the older man next to him insisted that Dave take his popcorn and Dave felt it would be rude not to eat at least a few handfuls (I know what you’re thinking – Dave’s mom is a lovely woman who definitely taught her sons not to take food from strangers… and yes, I am quite disturbed that he ate it!). We’re not entirely sure why this man pushed his popcorn on Dave. The only reason we could think of was that he thought we were too poor to buy our own popcorn. True, we were dressed in jeans in an area where it’s not uncommon for women to wear fur and diamonds to the movies… and we did sneak in some cans of pop… because we don’t *want* to spend the money on concessions…. but we could have afforded popcorn if we had wanted it!

This is just the lasted in a string of strange movie occurrences.

That’s all I’ve got for now!

Blogiversary and a Giveaway!

A year ago, I said that I was going to try to actually write in this thing. I think my goal was to have more than four entries… guess how many I’ve had in the past year…. forty! Haha, I know – in the great scheme of blogging that’s still small potatoes, but it is ten times the goal I set out, so I’m pretty excited.

I’m also pretty excited that I have some readers… because you guys are out there, right? Right? (Bueller? Bueller? – you guys get that, right? I just asked Dave if I was too nerdy by referencing that movie and he had no idea what movie was I talking about – sometimes I wonder why we’re getting married).

Anyway, to thank you and to celebrate my one year blogiversary, I’m having a giveaway!

Here’s what I’m giving away:

Three people will each win an elephant pin cushion made by yours truly:

And one SUPER SUPER lucky person will win a package of journals provided by the amazingly talented jRcRown. I have purchased some of her journals as gifts for friends and a couple for myself – they’re the perfect size to slip in your pocket and jot notes on… but enough about how much I love them, more on what you could win! jRcRown has generously offered the following for one really lucky person:

One standard journal:

One set of cocktail journals:

One set of slim journals:

To enter the giveaway, please leave a comment on this post. For a second entry, follow my blog (and leave a comment saying that you do). Please be sure there is a link to your blog or an email address in your comment so that I have a way to contact you when you win!

The giveaway will be open until 6:00 pm on Friday, March 18th. Winners will be announced on Saturday.

Thanks for reading my blog! And here’s to hoping that I can last another year… who knows, maybe forty-one entries this year? A girl can dream 🙂

Gnomes and Mushrooms

This morning I came into work to find this delicious surprise:

Monday is my birthday, but I took tomorrow and Monday off from work (YAY long weekend!). So, today, my boss brought in an early birthday cake: bumpy cake with carmel frosting. Best breakfast ever.

You’re probably wondering about the title of this post. March is Jen’s month for the Bee in My Bonnet VQB. She sent us the cutest gnome and mushroom fabric, along with an assortment of ridiculously cute green and pink fabrics (and white for the background). Her only instructions were to feature the gnome fabric in one block and the mushroom fabric in another.

It was almost a case of too much freedom. I didn’t know what I wanted to do for the blocks, so I did what any reasonable person would do.. spent valuable work time researching gnomes online and bugged my coworkers with questions about gnomes (“What do they live in? What do they eat?” etc).

Thankfully, in times like these, there is always the internet with all of its useless, ridiculous information. I had nearly forgotten about that cartoon from the late ’80s called David the Gnome, but thank you, Wikipedia, for reminding me about him and his trusty fox, Swift. Speaking of which, I would just like to point out a few interesting facts (because let’s face it, everything on Wikipedia is presented as fact) I’ve learned about gnomes (quoted directly from the Wikipedia David the Gnome page):

1. “A gnome’s lifespan is exactly 400 years. However, there are a few cases of gnomes living past 400 years. One example is a couple in the Balkans living 550 years.”

2. “Gnomes work in various ways to repair the damage inevitably caused by humans. They also have the power of telepathy and mind control.”

3. (my personal favorite) “The series presents the gnomes as a kind species, of 15 centimeters (6 inches) of height, and between 250 and 300 grams (8 and 10 ounces) of weight depending on gnome body mass.” I think I love the phrase “gnome body mass.” Too bad it will never come in normal conversation.

Who knew that there was so much knowledge out there on gnomes? In fact, I bet when you started reading this you didn’t expect to become an expert on gnomes, too. You’re welcome.

Last night I made the two blocks:

Block 1:

Block 2:

Close up of the raw edge applique for Block 2:

I’m pretty happy with how they turned out. I’m thinking I might need to make a whole quilt out of raw edge applique blocks because they are so much fun to make.

Don’t forget to check back! I’m going to have a super fun giveaway on March 15th for my one year blogiversary! You’ll like it! I promise!