Happy Anniversary, Overall Quilter!

Its been a good day, inspite of having a flat tire and getting rained on...but I get ahead of myself. Today is the two year anniversary for a LQS nearby, called Overall Quilter. Its a great shop and I went to the celebration this afternoon with three of my quilting buddies - Cheryl, Carol and Diane. I did not buy any fabric, but I did pick up some goodies I have been wanting. One is a Kaleidoscope template needed for my KScope quilt - I have been looking for one of those for weeks now. This morning I was watching a video about hand quilting and the instructor was telling about how wonderful these mechanical pencils are that are made for quilters - gotta have it, and now I do, along with some extra yellow and red leads. Then I found the perfect miter binder marker - woohoooo, now I will have perfect mitered binders. (I wish it were that simple!)

So we head back home, and I notice the car is starting to ride a little rough, and I ask Carol - are we getting a flat tire? She kinda thinks we are...but not sure...we are on I77 going pretty fast, heavy traffic, no place to pull over...and then all doubt is removed. Flat tire, grey smoke, and I am pulling over on a very narrow shoulder on an interstate overpass. So after placing a call to dear hubby to come and HELP, I think to call the insurance company as we have roadside service on our policy. Trying to convince them that I need a tow truck rather than just someone to fix the tire is interesting. Now I ask you, would you want to change a tire, standing on a interstate with heavy traffic and 4 panicy women watching? So they agree to send a tow, hubby arrives and takes my friends off to their cars, and I wait on the tow. There is this very high median in the road that separates the interstate road from the on ramp, - about 3 feet high and 4 feet wide...so I decide I am probably safer sitting on that instead of in a car that could be rammed by a big rig at any moment...so I climb up on the median and enjoy a nice breeze that was blowing , watching traffic speed by. Speaking of that breeze - its actually a severe storm blowing in. The tow truck gets there, this rather interesting looking fellow gets out and tells me he is going to fix the flat right there on the interstate. Now I am thinking...you see the traffic going 80 mph, a storm blowing up, and you want to change it here...but what do I know? Hubby back now...I sit in his truck and it is starting to rain...uh, more like a downpour. Tow truck guy (TTG) having trouble getting tire off...you see you have to unlock the lug bolts or something like that...hubby gets out in the rain to get the tool to do that with, but too late, TTG has already ruined the rim of our tire. We now have two police cars parked around us with blue lights flashing...pouring down rain...tire rim destroyed, and you might know where this is going....TTG gets the spare out and it is flat! We have had this car for 6 years, never needed the spare. How was I to know it would be flat. TTG should have checked that BEFORE he started changing the tire. So he has to tow it after all. I just have him take it to the repair shop and leave it there. Hubby takes me home and all is well...for now. Sorry no pictures, guess I need to learn to carry a camera with me at all times.

I did manage to do a little sewing tonight, finising up my third braid on my French Braid quilt. This is just a glimpse of it. These braids are very long so hard to get it all in one picture. Yesterday was my Stitchin Friends club meeting and they started their braid quilts. Some very beautiful fabric combinations - I will have to show pictures next month when they bring their braids back and we assemble the quilt tops.

Darlene brought me a birthday present she had on order back in May. I just love it. Have you heard of The Gypsy Gripper? Here's a picture...and boy does it grip. Thank you Darlene!