"He Loves Me" Quilt

This quilt is named "He Loves Me" because Wayne still loves me after 29 years, and that makes me happy everyday!

I made it in 2008, and it is 48" x 48". 

Valentine's Day- The Happy Couple

WAYNE PLUS AMY = TRUE LOVE. HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY, WAYNE.

Today is the 29th anniversary of our first kiss!

Age Progression- Amy

My mother loved to have portraits made of her children. I have many, many childhood portraits of myself. Here I am about one year old.


This is my first grade picture. I went to Ranch Heights Elementary School, in Bartlesville, Oklahoma.


Twelve years old, the day I got my braces on (my mom liked to take a photo of our teeth just before we went to the orthodontist for the first time.) This is in Cleveland, Oklahoma. Thats our Vista Cruiser (or Grand Safari?) station wagon in the background.


Freshman at BYU, 1978.

Frazzled Fancies #1

A few years ago I started a series of quilts I called "Frazzled Fancies". I take tiny little squares of fancy dressmakers fabrics (silk, velvet, lace, metallic, suiting, linen, etc.) and pile them up and make little decorative squares, about 2"-3" across. After I make a bunch of these squares, I apply them to a background and embellish them with machine and hand embroidery. Here are some of the wallhangings I have made using this technique: (Click on photos to make them bigger, then you can see the stitching)


Decadence 16" x 16". 2004.


Home Fires 31" x 27". 2006.


Splendor 25" x 23". 2007.

My brother Jamey's birthday

My baby brother Jamey was born 41 years ago. I must not have been a very observant child, or no one remembered to tell me, because at 9 years old I was left completely in the dark. I remember wandering around the house asking people "Where is Mother?" until someone laughed at me and said "Didn't anyone tell you? She's at the hospital, we have a new brother!" (This is not the only time I was forgotten. I have many more stories like that. Its because I am the middle child, I am certain.)




He turned out to be a great dad, and a righteous, good man, and I wish him a very happy birthday today.

Sisterly prerogative #1

Tara and Zac were waiting for me after church one day a few months ago. I caught this series of interactions on my camera. That's what sisters do.

Mrs. Wixom's Frontier Lady Chocolate Box

These are Wayne's maternal grandparents, Earl Partridge Wixom and Olive Nunn Wixom. (Click on photos to make them bigger.) We bought a little house right across the street from them in Layton, Utah in 1982 and lived there for 5 years. They were the sweetest, kindest grandparents to us, and helped us out all the time with our three little boys.


Wayne's grandmother had a chocolate business for many years, but had closed the business by the time I met her. Her chocolates were quite famous in Utah. One day Wayne's boss in Salt Lake City surprised Wayne with a special gift. He told Wayne that he had been cleaning out a closet, and found some things stored inside a "Mrs. Wixom's Frontier Lady Chocolates" box, and knowing it was Wayne's grandma, presented the box to Wayne. It is one of his most cherished keepsakes.

If I was in Charge

No man would have ear hair.

No women would have long chin whiskers.

Men wouldn't spit.

Children wouldn't pick nose.

People would know not to wear new suits with the back vent tacked closed, or pockets basted shut.

Disposable diapers, kotex, and tampons would have been invented at the time of Adam and Eve.

Teeth would have been designed better.

Human childbirth would be similar to kangaroos: the baby would come out tiny, then grow bigger outside.

Department of Motor Vehicles would have nice people, there would be no lines when I go there.

No big car speakers blasting out the bass notes.

No cigarettes thrown on ground. No littering of any kind.

No car alarms.

There would be no crowds or long lines where I want to go.

No dogs licking me.

Stoplights would all be smart, they would know how many cars to let through.

Panty hose waistbands would be very loose. Or better yet, I would never have to wear pantyhose.

Goodlooking Wayne

These are two of my very favorite photos of Wayne, taken after his mission. (Click on photos to see his big muscles.)

Bronchitis, "Too Many Daves"

I have a bad case of bronchitis. I haven't taught seminary since Tuesday. Wednesday I went to the doctor and got Advair inhaler stuff. She said I wasn't contagious, she said I had lung inflammation which causes symptoms of asthma.

(Thursday) Today I have laryngitis. I babysat Elizabeth and Thomas for 2 hours. I pointed to my throat and whispered to Elizabeth that "my throat is broken, I can't talk." So for the whole two hours she kept asking me, "Your neck broken?".


Enough about my sickness. I want to put my very favorite Dr. Suess poem "Too Many Daves" on here. I think it is in the book "The Sneeches and Other Stories" by Dr. Suess. I've tried to memorize it, but never did completely. Maybe if it is on my blog, I can review it more often. I think Seth tried to memorize it too.

TOO MANY DAVES
By Dr. Suess

Did I ever tell you that Mrs. McCave
Had twenty-three sons and she named them all Dave?
Well, she did. And that wasn’t a smart thing to do.
You see, when she wants one and calls out, “Yoo-Hoo!
Come into the house, Dave!” she doesn’t get one
All twenty-three Daves of hers come on the run!

This makes things quite difficult at the McCave’s
As you can imagine, with so many Daves.
And often she wishes that, when they were born,
She had named one of them Bodkin Van Horn
And one of them Hoos-Foos. And one of them Snimm.
And one of them Hot-Shot. And one Sunny Jim.

And one of them Shadrack. And one of them Blinkey.
And one of them Stuffy. And one of them Stinkey.
Another one Putt-Putt. Another one Moon Face.
Another one Marvin O’Gravel Balloon Face.

And one of them Ziggy. And one Soggy Muff.
One Buffalo Bill. And one Biffalo Buff.
And one of them Sneepy. And one Weepy Weed.
And one Paris Garters. And one Harris Tweed.

And one of them Sir Michael Carmichael Zutt
And one of them Oliver Boliver Butt
And one of them Zanzibar Buck-Buck McFate…
But she didn’t do it. And now it’s too late.

(Ooooh! I see a theme developing between this post and yesterday's. Did this poem influence Seth to want to name his kids Bucket and Toast, or does Seth like this poem BECAUSE he wanted to name his kids unusual names? Something to think about!)

Zac Grinder

(Click on photo to make it bigger.) Zac and Adam went "urban exploring" in an old brick factory. Adam is a genius at digitally "enhancing" photos.

(No teenagers were harmed in the making of this photo.)

Starting a Food Storage Plan for the Year

I have to tell everyone that Carolyn Nicolaysen on her Totally Ready blog has just restarted her one-year food storage program. (It is her Feb.2, 2009 entry, entitled "Our General Store").

Today is the day it begins, and if you read her blog every day and do what she says, you would have a great food supply built up by next year.

I love her blog, and have learned great things about emergency preparedness from her.

If you don't want to wait a year to get the whole program, you can go back and read her posts from the past couple of years, she has already been through the whole thing before. She also has a book you can pay $6.95 to download.

Book Review: Tipping Point

In The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell, he tells the following story about college students studying for the ministry:

"A group of seminarians were given assignments to prepare a short talk about biblical themes, then walk over to a nearby building to present the talk. Some were asked to speak about relevance of the professional clergy to the religious vocation. Others were given the parable of the Good Samaritan. Some were told, "You're late, they were expecting you a few minutes ago." Others were told, "It will be a few minutes before they're ready for you, but you might as well head over now."

Along the way, each student would see a man slumped in an alley, head down, eyes closed, coughing and groaning. Who would stop and help?

The only thing that mattered was whether the student was in a rush. Indeed, on several occasions, the seminary student going to give his lecture on the parable of the Good SAmaritan literally stepped over the victim as he hurried on his way.

Of the group that was in a rush, 10 percent stopped to help. Of the group who knew they had a few minutes to spare, 63 percent stopped.

What this study is suggesting is that the convictions of your heart and the actual contents of your thoughts are less important, in the end, in guiding your actions than the immediate context of your behavior."

If you read yesterday's post, Muffy Mead-Ferro tells about her opposition to being "busy, busy, busy". I agree. If I was as busy as that, I would probably be one of the ones who wouldn't stop to help a person in need. And I don't want to be too busy to help people.

Book Review: Confessions of a Slacker Wife

Muffy Mead-Ferro wrote the book Confessions of a Slacker Wife, which I enjoyed. Here is my favorite paragraph from the book:

p. 108 "Maybe this is as good a time as any to notify my friends and family that one word I'd rather not be used to describe me in my obituary is the word "busy". I don't want to be remembered as someone who hustled and bustled through life. I wouldn't mind the term "hard worker". If someone wanted to say "multitalented" that would be fine. But those traits are different from being busy-busy-busy.

In fact, I wouldn't be upset, or come back to haunt you in any way, if my obituary actually said, "She seemed to have an inordinate amount of free time."

For the women I know, ...maybe even for the men, free time needs to be a higher priority. Free time is something we should have in abundance in our wealthy country, but we don't because we're too busy. We're so appalled at the idea of wasting our time that we've actually become adept at simply looking busy, even when we have nothing to do."

You Tube: Be Prepared for Tribulations to Come

Click here to watch a YouTube video with conference addresses by LDS apostles and prophets about the tribulations to come.

More house quilts #2

"This is the Life #1", 24"w x 22"h. I've made a whole series of "This is the Life" quilts, just using different colors. I teach a workshop where people learn to make the house and the borders using a curved piecing technique.


"Over the Hill", 15"w x 12"h. I made this highly embellished piece in a workshop taught by Susan Shie. I've always enjoyed her quilts.


"Good Neighbors #2", 16" x 24". This is a class sample for one of my quilting workshops. The pattern for these three houses was taken from the border of my quilt "Make an Appointment". In this workshop I teach the students to draw their own whimsical cartoony houses, and make them in fusible applique. People think they can't draw, but when given permission to draw in a childlike way, they really have fun.

Tara's 17th Birthday

Our beautiful daughter Tara is 17 today. Here is her photo when she was six. (Click on photos to make them bigger.)



This is her first formal, which she wore to the Rose Prom in 2006.



Here is a cute photo of her in August 2008.
We are so proud of her, and are so thankful we had one rose amongst all our thorns.

Cheaper than cheap

I just read "Places That Are Your Friend in a Recession" by Jeffrey Strain, and I had to say "DUH!" I was already doing everything he suggested. Here are the "places" where he said to go to save money.

Have a Garden: I've never done one before, but after reading about the current severe drought in California, it will be really wise to grow our own salad ingredients this year. I bought vermiculite and cow manure mulch Tuesday, and will be making a Square Foot Garden soon. Stay tuned for my progress on this.

Stay in your kitchen instead of going out to eat: I heard that someone on the Oprah show challenged the audience to only eat out once a month, and the whole audience groaned. I really never eat out, so this is not a change for me.

I am starting to try all different meals made exclusively from my food storage. Tuesday I made northern beans with TVP ham in it. I cooked it in the crockpot, Wayne didn't like the taste of the ham TVP but I liked it ok. I also made cornbread using powdered eggs and powdered milk, and it was great.

Local Library: I have read thousands of books over the years from the library. It is one of my favorite places. Why pay for books when you can get them for free?

I used to check out huge piles of books for my kids every week. In 2001 when the Cary library card system was changed, I asked them if there was a record of all the books I had checked out. From 1995-2001 I had checked out 4428 books. After that, they changed the system and didn't have it on record anymore.

Used-goods sellers: I love yard sales, I love Goodwill, I love to shop second-hand stores and thrift stores. It is like a treasure hunt.

The Internet: I am one of the reasons newspapers and magazines are going broke. I get all my news from the Internet.

Hobbies: Just let me sew all day and I won't have to pay for any other entertainment.

If I have been this cheap for years, and now I'm supposed to live cheaper, I don't even know where to start! I guess everyone else can save money switching to these things, but I'm already there.

A Near Tragedy in the Lake

Wayne and I went on a walk a week ago, after we got 6 inches of snow. We have a lake in our neighborhood, and there is a parkbench on a tall bank by the lake. I went over to it and brushed the snow off the bench, and suddenly I slipped on the steep snowcovered bank and started sliding down toward the water. (Above: You can see in the snow the place where I slid down.)

Miraculously I grabbed the park bench and stopped sliding. I was so shocked, I realized I almost fell into the icy cold water. I kept thinking of it the rest of the day, what would have happened? I guess it was shallow enough for me to have gotten right out, but I would have been so cold and wet and it was about a half mile to our house. Moral of the story- stay far away from the edge of the cliff. You never know when you will slip and fall.

Below: I took that photo from the other side of the lake. You can see the bench at the top of the bank. (click on photos to make them bigger.)

(P.S. Lyric had read my Chuck It List, and commented that I should be careful what I say I will never do, because it might happen. "Never go swimming again" is on the list. She was right, I almost went swimming.)

More house quilts #1

Anytime I can't think of what to put on a quilt, it is natural for me to put houses. Its about my favorite subject, I don't know why. Above: "Little Neighborhood", 17" w x 21"h. Below: "Frazzled", 17"w x 18"h.
Bottom photo: "Ragtag Houses", 17"w x 50"h.

"Make an Appointment" quilt

I have made many quilts over the years with houses on them. This is one of my most famous quilts. It is 81" high x 66" wide. I made it in 2001, and it has been published several times and won many awards. I made the houses using fusible applique with satin stitching around them.

It says, "If you want to see me, come over anytime. If you want to see my house, MAKE AN APPOINTMENT".

The Shape of a House

For some reason, the shape of a house (square with pointy triangle roof) is my very favorite shape of all. My friend Lyric puts a lot of circles on her art quilts, I tend to put houses on mine.
I collect little houses, and other things shaped like houses, like these printers trays(below) or these salt and pepper shakers (right).





I really like this "Old Woman in a Shoe" piggy bank, it was one of my first "house" purchases, I got it at an antique store.

You Tube "How Joseph Smith Wrote Book of Mormon"

Great video on YouTube "How Joseph Smith Wrote the Book of Mormon".