17 days?!

Can't believe it's been that long! 

I've been SUPER busy moving and getting my apartment all set up, work has been crazy, kids have been wonderful, and the boyfriend, yea, I'll admit he's pretty awesome too! 

I've finished painting my dining/sewing room and as soon as all the boxes are out of it I'll post pics, it looks so awesome.  Next up is the kids room, so I'm going to hit up Lowe's and see if I can find a nice neutral color for their room.  I do have a bit of a paint review, Behr's all in one paint and primer SUCKS.  Waste of money truly.  Definitely doesn't cover as well as some other brands I've used.  My top two favorites being Valspar by Lowe's and Glidden.  I've never been a real fan of Behr so I'm not shocked I hate it. 

Work?  Oh, you mean the job I love that just sucks all my energy out of me?  Yea.  I'm FINALLY cleared on the ventilator so I get to run vent calls now which is awesome.  Bit more into the quilting budget.  I was also asked recently if I was interested in becoming a preceptor for my EMS system.  In our system you have to work with a preceptor for a minimum of 7 days to show your competency with skills and standing orders before you're given the OK to function with others already in the system.  I feel completely blown away by this!  I'll most likely accept because it's not often they come to you asking to become a preceptor.  And I've also been busy doing paramedic students practicals, evaluating them and basically making sure they know there stuff.  I have to say I kinda like the teaching aspect!  Never will you pull me off the streets to teach full time but I'm loving it as a side gig!

My kids are just awesome.  There isn't much more to say other than they're 2 of the best kids ever (I'm totally biased tho!).  They're so sweet and SO incredibly helpful.  They helped me unpack their toys and stuff without even arguing with me and were so eager to help.  I'm pretty sure they love the new apartment.  My daughter is in softball now and isn't liking it very much.  She says it's boring.  Such is being 7 I guess!  My son is a total chatter box!  All he does is talk, and he's getting so good at it too.  I love holding conversations with him, nothing like a 3 year old mind!  He loves trains, and trucks, and puzzles, and cars.  But he hates the potty!  I may just have to scream if this child isn't out of diapers soon.  And him being with his dad most of the time is an absolute disaster.  I had him *thisclose* to being potty trained when the judge gave him custody (all because I have a job). 

The boyfriend is great!  He has some good news on the job front so keep your fingers crossed for him.  He's been unemployed for almost 18 mos and he's starting to get down in the dumps so I'm hoping and praying that everything works out.  Right now he's about 6 hrs away playing Army boy, can't wait to see him when he gets back :)  We have season 3 of Army Wives to get crackin' on!

So that's my update, Sunday is going to be dedicated to sewing.  GOTTA get bee blocks done!  I'm slackin!

Hands 2 Help Charity Quilt

Didn't get around to updating on Easter weekend so here goes!  My partner and I decided to just pick out fabrics and make a quilt with them to save $$ on postage and she arranged for a wonderful woman to long arm quilt our quilts!  I'm so stoked!  All of this came from my stash and is such a random group of fabrics that work surprisingly well together. 

Check out Hands 2 Help!

This is what I picked out:

So partner what do you think???? 

Oh and don't mind my kitty, Petunia, she's recovering from getting spayed, she was rather ticked at me for a while but is now stuck at my side.  Love that girl!

wait, what's that I see there?!

 Yep!  I got my own digs!  Now, it's not spectacular, needs a bunch of paint, carpets are blue, but guess what, it's mine, all mine!  No more tip toeing around my mother not knowing if she'll blow up at me for breathing wrong, no more being stuck in my room, and I *finally* have a permanent spot for my sewing machine!  Oh I'm so stoked you have no idea!

This is the first apartment I've had on my own.  I've never lived alone, I moved straight in with my ex husband at 18 from my parents house.  It scares me to death but guess what, I have NO one to answer to, no one to consult about decorating issues, and no one to share with.  I also don't have to worry about my food being eaten.  I can't wait to get all my stuff in and show y'all pictures!

Oh and things I've learned so far:
-People are lazy morons to not take outlet covers and switch plates off when they paint.
-People are lazy morons who don't remove old caulk before putting down new stuff.
-People are cheap lazy morons who use flat paint in the kitchen.  Behind the stove.
-People are lazy slobs when they don't clean the carpets.
-People are lazy slobs when they don't vacuum said carpets.

I started painting the dining/sewing room today, it's a gorgeous color!  It's taking more than I expected but that's because the paint that was on the walls was flat and is sucking up the paint.  I cleaned the walls VERY well but that's whatcha get for putting eggshell over a flat I suppose. 

fabric shopping is wonderful!

It's a REAL good thing I'm not doing the stash report!

I tried getting all the Denyse Schmidt prints from Joann's but was only successful in getting 3 yards of the pink dots and a yard and a half of one of the blues so I bought a FQ bundle on Etsy:

It was only $55 for all 21 prints which works out to $2.62 per FQ, which was worth it for me, I didn't have to hunt down Joann's to go find it all, I checked 3 stores and only found 3 bolts of the stuff total.

Next, I got some cute fabric to make potholders and such from my LQS, I've been eying it for a while so I went ahead and 3 FQs and a 1/2 yard of the toasters:

Fabric is from Robert Kaufmann and is from the Metro Cafe line.  It's all super cute!  I plan on pairing it with some red and aqua solids from my stash.

This little gem came straight from the Basic Grey website itself.  I want to think it was mis-priced because it was only $6.80 and most of the honey buns on their site are around $16.

This is a Sultry honey bun and this line is no longer available.  Thinking of doing Mini Jelly Filled from Thimbleblossoms.  We shall see!


And I got a yard of Bliss tulips in the red colorway for my bee quilt.  My LQS still has some yardage available so I pounced before it's gone forever, it seems to be nowhere online.

This will be the binding.  I was going to go lighter on the binding but it seemed to need something strong to box it all in.

So if my math is right just over 13.5 yards in!  Stash busting time MUST begin yesterday!  The only thing I'm going to allow myself to buy is backing for my bee quilt.  I don't have large enough quantities to do the back for that.  

changes are good, right??

I've decided to change things up round these parts just a teensy smidge.  It's a little name change, not for the blog, but for patterns.  I realize I only have one created thus far so maybe I'm putting the cart before the horse but I have a bunch more in progress, part of the reason I'm not around much.  So, now I'm introducing:

It's just got a more professional feel than pickles & bacon and seems more timeless.  Why seventeen-ten?  It's the date of each of my kiddos births.  My daughter being born on the 17th of the month and my son the 10th.  Not sure if I'm going to do a separate website or blog just yet, I'm going to hold off on that until I get more out there.

Its hard...

To hate your job when this is the view from your 'office'. Just sayin!

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such a klutz!

Wish I could've been doing more sewing.  I REALLY need to get my March bee blocks out and haven't had much time to work on it.  Now I have April bee blocks to do too! 

Sadly, I won't get much sewing time in.  Why?  My dingleberry klutzy self managed to sprain my ankle closing a door.  I was standing at the back of my ambulance, just loaded the stretcher into the back went to step to the left to grab the door to close it, stepped wrong and twisted my ankle and felt a bunch of popping.  I hobbled back to the passenger seat (it was my partners turn to drive) and I could already feel my ankle swelling in my boot.  I had my partner grab me an ice pack and when I went to take off my boot it was just intense pain over the top of my ankle.  I hemmed and hawed over going to the ER, yanno, because us medical field types HATE being the patient, we really suck at it.  After about 15 mins my partner told me we were going so we called up our supervisor and went out of service.  Three hours in the ER later, no breaks just a sprain. 

My ankle didn't turn any pretty colors or swell too awful much later on and I think that has a lot to do with the fact I put ice on it right away, plus, I'm not an easy bruiser, it takes a LOT to get me to bruise.  Apparently the new treatment for sprains is to resume normal activity ASAP so I got sent back to work, didn't run any calls after it happened but I did yesterday and it was challenging, my ankle is still a little tender and even with the air cast they gave me.  I have two days off lets hope I can recuperate some more before having to go back!