We are on the road again. We left this afternoon a little after noon, and we are spending the night at the Lakeside Casino RV park in Osceola, IA (south of Des Moines a bit). We are heading to the Kansas City Regional Quilt Festival, and this is not quite half way. Nice enough, and less noisy than I thought it would be due to a nice berm between the campground and the highway. There is also a nice little pond with a lot of frogs doing their best to mask the highway sounds. I actually remembered to take a picture of our site though it was a little late.
I did finish Callyn’s quilt. It turned out really cute. The flowers are each about 3 1/2” in diameter.
Basically a big piece of lovely fabric with a borderI stitched radiating flower centers with white then outlined each flower with the appropriate color.A big meander stitch in the border. Binding finished with a feather stitch.
Since we had only been at home a few days, it was easy to pack for this trip except for collecting the supply list for my quilting classes. Why do instructors ask for the impossible? One of my classes wanted 2” painter’s Tape. It turns out that such a thing doesn’t exist, according to the paint store I ended up at after searching all the big box stores. The biggest ones available are just under 2” and almost 3”. I bought the 1.88”. I also had to search for rubber cement. I am taking an intermediate free motion quilting class and a class on appliqué techniques. Ought to be interesting.
i have been in far northern Wisconsin, in Door County, and in southern Wisconsin, but I hadn’t ever been in central Wisconsin near where we are now. A few random thoughts.
1. This place is GREEN. Really, really green. Forests all over the place. Christmas tree farms in large numbers. Green.
2. There are lots and lots of vegetable farms here. Huge storage buildings for potatoes. Canning companies. Fields of green beans. Yup, vegetables all over. The soil is very sandy.
3. There are Amish in the area. We saw two men driving two horses each while cutting hay. We saw another man driving three horses while plowing. Another man was driving two horses down the road while pulling a baler. There are Amish quilt shops, produce stands (not open yet), and home bakeries advertising along the road. I took no pictures, respecting the Amish dislike for photographs,
4. There are lakes and wide spots in the rivers with shorelines covers with cabins and houses. Lots of water, lots of boats, lots of fishing paraphernalia. There is also a lot of good fishing for eating. I ate lunch at a diner in Hancock, and the six fillets of blue gills I had were huge and very good.
5. This place is at least as humid as Iowa, and maybe more so. Temperatures in the upper 70s felt much, much worse because of the humidity. I had thought about bringing the grandkids back here for a vacation, but I think I would melt in the middle of summer.
I finally got my daughter’s quilt (almost) finished. The problem is that I ran out of thread while doing the final 8” of the binding! I have nothing in the stash to even kind of match, so I mail ordered. I have also decided on the pattern for the baptism gown. Now to get the fabric, laces, and ribbons.
We are now in central Wisconsin, just south of Steven’s Point. We had some family things to take care of, so we took a short trip here. We are staying at Oasis Waterpark and Campground, right on I-39 at Hancock. So far it is a lovely place with some trees and roomy enough sites. I imagine the quiet will change tomorrow though. It would be a great place for kids with lots of planned activities and a great water play area in a small pond. I can’t yet go swimming because of the wound from my basal cell cancer removal, so a lot of it goes for naught for me.
I have however done a really complete spring cleaning of the motorhome – floors, cabinetry, even the shower and the corners that never get seen behind the slides. I am not quite so virtuous as to clean the inside of the cabinets though.
Today we visited the Experimental Aircraft Association museum in Oshkosh. What fun! I like airplanes, and I love history, so it is a winner for me. Some pictures might help.
An historically accurate reproduction of the Wright brother’s first powered aircraft, complete with mannequin pilotA partial reproduction of a 1918 Curtis showing the framework
A special D-Day exhibit opened today also. There were historical re-enactors from all services with lots of memorabilia.
One of the last D-Day transports
There was also a collection of vintage aircraft nose paintings, cut from the original aircraft and carefully conserved. There were some suitable for all ages:
And some were for more mature audiences (these are two of the tamer ones).
Sorry for the glare. They didn’t allow flash to even out the lighting.
We are staying here until Saturday sometimes, then heading home. We have to get ready for another family business trip, this time to Kansas and Oklahoma. We are starting with the Kansas City Quilt Expo though, and I have two classes scheduled. More on those later.
We ended up staying at Squaw Creek County Park in Marion for a week. On Sunday, 19 May, we moved to Pleasant Creek State Recreation Area. It is a lovely place, and we were lucky to score one of the six non-reservation sites that would fit us. We literally drove into the campground while the previous occupant was pulling out, so we quickly signed up for the site and out the lawn chairs out. Then we headed back to Squaw Creek to pack up the motorhome. I really do like how fast the Sani-Con dumps the black and gray tanks. Kevin likes how clean the process is, and he says it is one of the best plumbing updates he has done.
My daughter, her husband, her son, and the new baby girl came out quite a few times. DD says it is awfully nice to get out of the house but be in a safe environment. Seems like Callyn liked it too. She was up above her birth weight at one week old!
We did end up going back to the house some. We had trees planted (they look lovely), we had the deck stained, and we had some electrical work done. The electrical work included adding a big fan in the living room. Our living room faces pretty much straight west, and it gets hot in the summer afternoons. We did put a good sized tree there, but the room needed a fan.
A 60” blade was definitely not too big for the recessed ceiling
The other electrical work was to add a bunch of 4-plex outlets added at waist level in my craft room. I was tired of having to move shelving to reach the low level outlets that were there. We also added a new 20 amp line for some of the 4-plex outlets. Now I will have more flexibility with the heat press and irons I use! Used to be I had a single 15 amp circuit for the whole room. If I accidentally left the iron on and turned on the heat press, I tripped the breaker. This will be much nicer. Of course, to do the work every cabinet and shelving unit had to be moved to the middle of the room. It will be a pain to get everything back in its place, but worth it in the end. Most of the things I plug in are very low power – sewing machines, Silhouette cutter, PC, radio, etc.
I have two walls with these lovely outlets
Kevin also had the electrician install an outdoor outlet to plug in a camper that shows the front of the garage and the driveway. He added another camera in the utility room that shows the heater, the water heater, the water softener, and the sump pump. With us being gone so much, it is confidence-building to know the state of the systems, particularly the sump pump. We can also check the temperature in the house. I certainly like modern connected houses!
I am still working on my granddaughter’s quilt. I have done so much quilting on it, I am bored. I just have to plow through though since I really, really want to get it done next week. I have to get started on the baby’s baptism which is in late July. Still working on a pattern for that though.
I quit the previous post rather abruptly because we got some lovely news. Our daughter had a lovely baby girl, Callyn Rose!
Wearing the onesie I made for her
She came a bit early, 37 weeks per plan, and was a healthy 6 pounds 15 ounces. We are all pretty much in love as you can see.
Love that tongue!
Her big brother seems pretty pleased too. He wanted to be rolled up like she was.
Everybody is doing well. Callyn is nursing like a champ, and she is letting mom and dad have an entire 3 hours of sleep some times!
We are making food. Tonight was a bunch of taco meat plus all the fixings. I also made a lovely pot roast which will provide two big meals. We will get it vacuum packed and frozen so they don’t have any worries. We will probably stay here until Monday when I have a PT appointment back home.
We lived in Marion, IA for 20 plus years. We still have kids, grandkids, and some of our doctors here, so we come down every once in a while. Our favorite camping spot is Squaw Creek Park, and I finally remembered to take a picture.
Squaw Creek non-reservation area
We came down Thursday last week for The Hunchback of Norte Dame at Theater Cedar Rapids. We stayed in the reservation, full hookup area until Monday morning when we moved to the prettier site shown. Lots of space between sites, trees, birds, and wildlife more than make up for the lack of a sewer connection. Cost is right too – $23 a night instead of $28. We intend on staying here for a week or so.
The play was quite good. It is regional theater instead of Broadway touring, but I enjoyed myself tremendously. It didn’t hurt that I splurged on tickets, fourth row back, orchestra. Of course splurging on tickets in Cedar Rapids means $40 each or so compared to the nice (but not spurge) tickets in Salt Lake City, row H in the first balcony for $80 each or so!
Tuesday morning I got my second cataract removed, and it went as swimmingly as the first one did. I feel fully recovered, and it is a joy to be able to see clearly out of both eyes. The anesthesia knocked me out this time though! I got back to the motorhome and pretty much slept for 6 hours or more.
Oh, and I bought a new sewing machine for the motorhome and other travel needs! I got a Viking Opal 650, a good solid intermediate machine with the goodies I wanted. I had my class on Monday, and I am raring to go. However I am going to finish quilting the baby quilt for my daughter on the Bernina 440 first. It is well underway.
Last time I posted about medical stuff I was going to do. Now I can say I have done it. One cataract removed, and the next one scheduled in a week and a half. Dermatologist burned and cut a great big hole in my leg! Painful and slow healing because it is on my shin. I had a bad reaction to the tape too, so I ended up wrapping my leg in gauze then securing the gauze with Coban. However I did get to do some fun things.
I attended a Preemie Project sewing day to make G-tube pads for babies and children. The results will go to the University of Iowa hospital. We had 750 of them to do, and we got most of those completed. We were also working on tracheotomy pads, and we only got 75-100 of those done. It was still pretty fruitful, and I had a blast as usual.
Completed padsIn process pads
As you can see, these are made out of the cutest fabrics! Flannel, hemp, and bamboo make up the layers, bamboo on the skin side since it is supposed to have some germicidal action. I just realized the completed ones don’t have the plastic snaps on them. Those got added at the end.
I also made some more things for my daughter and her soon to arrive daughter.
Two burp clothsTwo gauze swaddles with a gorgeous fabric
I also made three crib sheets, but I didn’t get pictures.
We were lucky enough to score some free tickets for the University of Northern Iowa orchestra and combined choirs performing Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Kevin was not initially thrilled, but he did agree it was very good afterwards. It is a university orchestra, and there were a few issues with balance, but it was still quite good. The soloists were all faculty members (the tenor sings in my church choir). Even though the tickets were on the back row of the first floor, the sound was great.
We have a housekeeper once a month, and while she was here Friday, we decided to take off on a short road trip. We headed to McGregor, a small town on the Mississippi River. We stopped for lunch at River View on the north side of town. I had a wonderful mushroom burger and home made cottage friends (they were really potato wedges), and Kevin had very good fish and chips. I will be back there again! The restaurant is right on the river next to a marina, and they usually have boats tied up nearby. The water was so high! The proprietor said he didn’t expect anyone to be able to tie up until late June or into July. They have been in flood stage for over 40 days so far.
We crossed the river into Prairie du Chien and drove up the Great River Road. I don’t think I have ever seen the river this high. The last time it was this high was 1993, and I know we were on vacation. My pictures aren’t very good since they were taken on a dreary day with my phone, but it can give you a feel of the water.
The shore is generally much closer than this!
Lock and Dam #9 was completely openA close up of the open gates
I also finished up the embroidery classes at my local Bernina dealer. I get so frustrated with them! I know they make their money by selling things, but I think they really mislead naive people into believing that only (very expensive) items X, Y, and Z will work on their new machines, and it just isn’t right! Oh well. I learned how to use my machine, and I will not have to go back much.
I never seem to write as much when back in Iowa. I have spent a reasonable amount of time on medical stuff. I had a biopsy of a spot on my leg, and it came back with basal cell skin cancer, so I have to get a bigger excision done along with some cauterization. Sounds like fun, doesn’t it? I have always known I would get some type of skin cancer sooner or later, considering all the horrific sunburns I got while a kid. I also had to have a pre-surgery physical today. Oh, and I finally got a better date for the ENT/allergist. Crazy trying to get everything done in a short period of time.
Otherwise I have been doing a bit of sewing and learning about my new embroidery machine. I drove to Cedar Rapids to get the first class, and it was very helpful. I will be doing a couple of items done tomorrow. We are also going to prep the motorhome for the short trip for the surgery. We will get together with the kids who live in the Cedar Rapids area Sunday and Monday. Surgery Tuesday, follow up Wednesday morning, embroidery machine class on Wednesday afternoon, and choir practice on Wednesday night. Thursday midday I have the follow on leg surgery. Oh, and Thursday is also Maundy Thursday, and I really want to go to church! It will be complicated to get all the appointments done and get the motorhome back home.
Oh, and about that winter! Ridiculous weather Monday and Tuesday were in the 70s, and yesterday had a high in the 30s with ridiculous winds of 40 plus mph. The max wind gust was nearly 70 mph! Trucks blew over on the highway, and the whirligig in the garden was completely destroyed – it is now on the ground in pieces 😢. Sixty miles north of here they had lots of snow, but we only got rain along with our winds.
How’s that for an odd title? Fairly descriptive though. Wednesday was choir practice, the first one I attended since Christmas. It was wonderful. Life is always better after choir practice! My director is amazing. She plays the piece we will be singing on her piano while recording it. She then adds a synthesizer voice (instrument) to the piano track for each part (soprano, alto, etc.). Each person gets an email specific to the part we sing as a MP3 file along with a scan of the score. It lets me practice ahead of time and get comfortable with what the others have been doing in my absence. We are doing two gospel songs, one baroque piece, two “regular” choral pieces plus the Hallelujah Chorus. Pretty fun!
Thursday I went to the ophthalmologist for a consultation about cataract surgery. Yes, I need it, and yes, he can do it. My left eye is scheduled for 16 April and the right eye is scheduled for 14 May due to the doctor’s vacation in the middle. I am soooo ready for it. It will be back to no glasses for distance and readers for close work, but I am fine with that. The surgery center is in Cedar Rapids, 60+ miles away, so we are just going to stay in the motorhome for a few days at a campground not far away. They want you there at obscene times of the morning! More medical stuff too – dermatologist appointment to look at spots on my hand, and trying to schedule an allergist which is proving more complicated than it should be. The referral nurse at the clinic scheduled me with an ENT, not an allergist, so I am going to have to work it myself.
I have started the sewing for my new granddaughter. One crib sheet is finished, and I should have the second one done tomorrow. The delay is because today I bought a new embroidery machine, a Bernina 500. I was just wasting my big professional 12 needle machine, so I decided to buy a domestic single needle machine. It takes up hardly any space, and it is portable to take to workshops and such, something I was never able to do with my multi-needle. I am really excited about it. I am unpacking it tonight, and hopefully I can get a burp cloth embroidered.
We left Paducah on Tuesday morning. The KOA really needs to do some trimming on the trees in the campground. We did let them know, and they said they would. The poor owners are trying hard to get the place upgraded. We spent Tuesday night at Spindler Marina Campground in Peoria, IL. It was a nice quiet campground in late winter during the middle of the week, but I bet it would be crazy in the summer or on weekends. I was pleasantly surprised by the interstate in Illinois. It was much better than the last time I went through many years ago.
While we were really anxious to get home, we did stop at the World’s Biggest Truckstop on I-80. I was looking for a much better lumbar support for the motorhome’s driver seat, and they had a good collection. I ended up with a mesh one that feels wonderful! Between the tire alignment, the Safe-T-Plus, and the lumbar support, I am much less tired while driving. We ended up just taking the motorhome to the house to unload most of our stuff. Thank goodness most of the house construction is done on our street! Once we got the motorhome to the storage unit and us back home, we just kind of collapsed. It has been three months, and the mail pile was huge!
We still have some things to put up, but we are going to have all the kids and grandkids over on Sunday for dinner which wil be fun. I also spent some time with my vinyl cutter. I experimented with labels, and I got all my spice containers labeled nicely. I also decorated two little onesies for my new granddaughter, scheduled to arrive some time in May.
My daughter really wants girly things, so this was the pinkest pink I had! I think they are cute. It was a good thing I had her spell the baby’s name since I would have done it wrong! I also bought some other baby things, just since it is so much fun buying baby clothes.
We are gradually getting back in the groove. Tomorrow morning will be church, then I get to start cooking. Grilled pork chops, roasted carrots, smashed red potatoes, and flan for desert – yum! Kevin has already checked the grill works, and all it needed was a propane refill. We also made a nice big Amazon order to get a bunch of things we need before our next trip. We have also bought tickets for a show in Cedar Rapids, and I made reservations at a local campground for Mother’s Day weekend so we don’t have to drive back after the show. We have also made reservations for right after the FMCA rally this summer. We figured there would be 1000 rigs all trying to go somewhere, so it was best to make reservations. That will be the start of the next big trip to the Pacific Northwest. Oh, and Kevin is ordering a Sanicon system for the motorhome. It is similar to a macerator, but has a bigger hose. He will be installing that himself too. I figured there was no way he could last an entire summer without ordering and installing something <grin>.
