Ready or Not Here We Go!

This calendar for the past couple weeks.

Lists, Lists, Lists!!! But now I can throw them all away. The camper is loaded, the house is ready to be without us and Dan has about one more hour to work. I am so very ready for no more lists. I just put 6 in the recycle bin. Plumbing issue came up when I was draining the hot water tank. The helpful man at George Morlan says it is not related but when I turned the hot water off to begin draining tank my kitchen faucet started dripping cold water. The only position where it didn't run was in the "on" setting on the "hot" side! I turned the valve off down below the sink and we will deal that in December. Fixing a faucet can be Dan's first "Honey Do" of retirement.

Here is our home for the next several weeks. Dan thinks we could make it permanent. I will let you know what we (I) think about that come mid December. The first couple nights of our trip are arranged around our daughter. She is at nursing school in Ashland, Oregon and has a friend she wants to visit this coming weekend, who lives in Truckee, CA. So the latest plan is for us to drive tonight to Valley of the Rogue State Park between Grants Pass & Medford. I have a little champagne to celebrate Dan's retirement. (shhh it is a surprise). If the weather is good we will bicycle and relax in the morning. We will load a cooler for dinner on the road. Martha has class until 2 tomorrow then we will leave her car at the Medford airport for her return and head out from there about 2:30... second night destination: a Walmart in Sacramento. It can only get better from that, right? We will leave Martha with her friend in Sacramento, then sleep a few hours and head for parts unknown.

Games, games, games

Here is a recipe I came up with today:
When I was emptying the refrigerator the only perishable item I did not have room in camper for was some buttermilk. Plus I had an orange that the border patrol at California might have taken away. So I made muffins. They have a light orange flavor and are quite tasty in my opinion.

Orange Cranberry Muffin

• 1 3/4 cup flour
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp each cinnamon & nutmeg
• juice from one orange
• 1/2 cup craisins
• 1/2 tsp dried orange peel
• 1/3 cup oil
• 3/4 cup buttermilk
•  1 egg, slightly beaten

Combine dry ingredients and make a well in center. Warm OJ, cranberries and orange peel in microwave for a minute on low setting. Stir OJ & cranberries, oil, buttermilk, and egg together; pour into dry ingredients and stir until just moist. Fill muffin cups and sprinkle with sugar ( I used raw sugar)

Bake at 425 degrees for 20 minutes.

Yield 12 regular muffins.

I am still having trouble with formatting, lots to learn, lots of time.... ;o)

Best wishes to any who read this! jean

My Title My Life

Millie on my "Cris Cross Applesauce" squares.

Wheely Thready Daze Ahead

Preface: I have plenty to learn... I would like to add several photos the one I have here is of Millie on my Criss Cross Applesauce quilt squares (thanks Bonnie Hunter for the pattern). Now I have a design wall so Millie doesn't get to test my quilts quite so early in the process. Anyway, I am sure I can move the picture to another spot but at this point I do not know how. Now on to my explanation of my blog title:

I am going to try to blog a bit as my sweet husband and I head into a whole new phase of life. Our "nest" is empty and we are blessed enough that after a 30 year career, Dan is retiring. We are preparing to head off on a major road trip in our pick-up and camper. We like to stay fit, so besides the camper wheels we will ride on our two wheel mountain bikes as much as possible. So that is "Wheely" which of course, is also a play on the word "really" and I am really excited about life just now!

"Thready"... on the simple level refers to my passion for quilting. I have always done most of my work on my reliable old Viking sewing machine, but since it doesn't get to go on the road. I am trying to stack up some projects for "on-the-go". So far I have begun a hexigon quilt, I have my first attempt at hand quilting a lap quilt going, plus I am going to attempt "fussy cutting" triangles to become another hexigon/kaleidescope quilt. I want to give credit to an inspiring blogger and quilter: Bonnie Hunter, her website is Quiltville.com and her blog is Quiltville's Quips and Snips. Even though we have never met I can say from following her blog she is an amazing woman, quilter and writer. On the next level including "Thready" in my title refers to all of the wonderful "threads of my life". The threads of the internet can be as much fun as those on my needles. Isn't it fun to find bike trails, campgrounds, recipes and how-to videos, etc etc. I love the connectedness of this life.

"Daze" well sometimes as I look ahead I am in a "daze" about the days to come.

They say the more you write the better you get, I hope there is some truth to that. I always feel so impatient with myself when I write a sentence my mind begins to wander to another thought instead of really completing any thought I was on before. I think I have attention deficit disorder at the keyboard! Following my train of thought is like untangling a ball of yarn when the kitty takes her nap. For now I am going to let the rambling go and hope things improve. (That is what the delete button is for, right?)

The other member of our adventure party will be our old dog, Millie. She is 14, deaf and somewhat vision impaired. Millie was a pound puppy, who came to our family when she was about 6 months old. She is some sort of border collie/spaniel/???. Now a days she spends most of the time sleeping, so long rides in the back seat of the crew cab should be fine. We have covered a board with carpet to set on the back seat of the truck to be a platform for Millie to ride on. She will have her bed in a third or half of the seat and we will use the other half of the seat for storage.

We have cleaned out the camper and "rethunk" what we want to have along. Plus we have added a couple drawers on a space that was designed for a TV. It was always wasted space now we each have a drawer for the small clothing items. We added a shelf in the cupboard under those new drawers. It is the space where we put the extra towels but the top half of it has always been empty. Now it will hold miscellaneous household "stuff".

I will put more pictures in my next post if I figure out how to disperse them in the posting. I want to get this first effort up & live.

Jean