Second day at quilt store

A quick recap from Thursday I only was at the quilt store for 2 1/2 hours. So today I was to run the shop all by myself for 4 hours. Talk about scary. Luckily, the other gal (Sue) who has had to cut back on hours showed me how to open up and various other things before she left, she got back in the nick of time to help me with probably the most unusual day I'll ever have.

I am sure the nicer weather brought out everybody, or my morning would have been extremely boring. Which would have made my second day easier, but not as much fun.

Skipping forward an hour or so. Sue decided that I had things under control so she left, because she and I were splitting the day. I am still waiting on costumers, when the boss (Cheryl) calls Sue at home needing fabric cut. Back to work Sue comes.

So far I have not messed anything up yet. Ok Sue leaves but will be back in a little over an hour and 20 minutes I'll be fine. No problem. I had another customer, still doing great; folding fabric that I had cut and realized I messed up. I had forgotten to charge two panels on the last ticket. I'm going to surely get fired now. Sue shows up I tell her my fear. Luckily, we knew the gal, and her phone number was on the check. But I still thought Cheryl was going to fire me on the spot when she found out. Sue simply said it will be fine just wait till shop hop then you'll be forgetting more than that.

So my four hours at work was luckily not all by myself because there were way to many unusual things that I would have bothered Sue at home so it worked out she was there in person to explain how do handle it. The costumers were extremely understand, one of them used to be the shop owner. Talk about weird her and I swapped sides of the counter. It was really a good day except I thought Cheryl should fire me.

Now hours later I've talked with Cheryl; I still have my job YEAH!!!! But was warned (jokingly) if it happens 20 times or more in a row there may be problems. It is great working with these gals; it is even better that they were friends before I started working there. But still you hate to let friends down especially when you are trying to help them out. I was informed though that I have about 2 months till shop hop starts to learn the ropes, so I am ready for all the fun.

Quick note: As of this post I have official hit my 100th post. Stop by tomorrow evening to see what I have cooked up for this special occasion. Thanks for stopping.

Update 2/3/08: Spent today sick so things are on stand still. Until I feel better.

Is it Spring yet?

I don't know about the rest of everyone but I am ready for warmer weather. So when I saw this Bunny Hill Designs pattern by Anne Sutton at the LQS I stopped at on my lunch break. It just spoke warmer days and sunshine. I just loved the different bunnies and that chocolate bunny looks scrumptious. Tomorrow I'll have several hours at work to maybe come up with the perfect fabrics to make a couple of these pillows. I know first I should check the stash, but it doesn't hurt to look.

First day at quilt store.

I went to my new job today. Oh what fun. I just loved being in the shop and starting to learn the basics. I even saw a great new pattern for my bags/purses. But want to see how things go before I spend my earnings on something that won't sell.

That job is great. Now for the not so nice parts of the day. I am trying hard to not use curse words but my day had tons of bad parts. I pull into the town I work in 18 miles from home and hear from the engine compartment KNOCK, KNOCK. I speed up the noise gets louder I slow down the noise gets quiter. NOT good at all. I ask my new boss if I can make a personal phone call with in minutes of getting to work. Of course my husband is in class and I had to leave a voice message, oops forgot to see if it is ok to take personal phone calls on the job. Great I'm going to get fired before I ever start. Skipping ahead. Hubby shows up at 12:30 listens to the car, does something and then comes back into the store and says he's going to try to drive it home. My boss asks if this is a good idea,then she says I can leave so I can follow him home. So it was 30 minutes early I left work. As it turns out the car made it five blocks, we parked it. Went home and got the truck to tow it the 18 miles home, in attempts to save what is left of the motor.

Some where in all this confusion I did manage to learn how to run the cash register, the credit card machine and minor other things in the 2 1/2 hours I was at work. Then was asked if I could work Saturday by myself for 5 hours. Yeah I did not get fired, but I still haven't cut any fabric, or learned whats what really. Cheryl is so easy going that is the main reason I decided to help her out when she gets into tight jams. I help her and get to play with all the new fabrics and see the patterns. So I am not sure who is getting the better deal. I get paid to enjoy my passion.

Now the car is sitting in the shop and hubby is really wishing our weather would warm up so that he can see what is wrong with it. I just hope and pray it is an easy fix and that maybe by April/May I can drive my car again. I just cannot at this moment really afford to replace the whole engine, and maybe it just needs some internal parts replaced. But the sounds it was making led me to believe it is done for.

If this was not bad enough, today was parent-teacher day. Of course the 3rd grader is not doing to bad, still needs to work on learning her spelling words. But the teen son is not doing good at all. I had one teacher tell me that she was really upset with him because he lied to her today. Of course we were not shocked at all. So we came up with a game plan to get his grades up. On to the next teacher; where I had to tell her that my son lied to her on Tuesday and that he was there early, and then about the other lie he told her. Boy this kid is just not learning. The sad thing was having to A.) be told he was lying, B.) tell someone he was lying C.) then try to figure out how to get his grades above failing. Then we had to come home and talk with him and see what we can agree to not agree on. We have been working on the lying issues for years and it seems we are fighting a losing battle. And since he found out that his bio-dad wants to never-ever see him again it has been almost unbearable to live with him, deal with homework, and such.

So needless to say this has been a day of ups, downs and all arounds. I have run the emotional guantlet and now I have to try to concentrate on homework. I usually try to keep my blog upbeat, sorry if I bummed everyone out.

What I've been up too

I have taken everybody's advice and have made two charm bags, not for myself but to sale. I do have one already listed on Ebay. I am so scared that it will not sale. I hope to have the second bag finished yet tonight to get it posted quickly.

I finally got the new ironing board cover made. I am so happy to have a new cover that is not scorched, ripped and burnt. I will miss my kitties but do like the flowers on the new cover.


Now for the really big news. I just was hired at the local quilt store called the Picket Fence to work part-part-time. The owner is very understanding that my first job has set days I work and that I am only available to work the other days at the store. She just needs some one to help out because one workers husband is seriously sick, and shop hop starts soon. So she figures if I am trained to help out at least there is someone to call.

Update: If my bags sell then my next bags will be more of a springtime nature, followed of course by RED White and Bold which of course is Sandy Gervais fabric lines. I just love having a bag/purse for the different holidays/seasons. These bags easily hold the current book I am reading along with the rest of my essentials. At this moment though it is looking like my current adventure has hit a dead end. Who knows though I did land a job in a quilt store, maybe she will let me sell the bags there.

Lakeside

Oh I am in pattern Heaven and fabric Heaven. I just picked up my first qurater of Lynette Jensens Lakeside. I hope to get to cut the fabric yet tonight. I just love the pattern and the fabric is just cool great. The biggest problem I had was which way Lakeside or Lodge if that wasn't enough then the big quilt, little small quilts, or both. Wow, such choices and I had to decided, this decision has taken me over a month to figure out. Well I decided to do the big quilt, this way I will have another full size quilt

Sent a quilt out

Well I have broken down and sent another quilt out to be quilted. This quilt is a Thimbelberries pattern created by Lynette Jensen called "Campfire." I decided to also use flannel on the back too. I'm not scarred of quilting flannel, but this throw is just a little more than I want to tackle right now. So I just decided to let someone else have the pleasure of quilting it; and this way it will get quilted and I can finally use it, instead of just hanging on a wall. You can see a glimpse of the quilt behind the cats in this post. Or from this site.

Death in the family

Today was a very sad day. I had to remove Yellow Head from the pond. I'm not exactly sure of the COD (Cause of Death). I do how ever have two strong suspicions. First off we got to -12 degrees last night and there was 4 inches of ice on top of the pond. And somehow the water pump spit gallons of water out onto the ground leaving only about 3 inches of water at the bottom of the pond. There was a very big gap of air between the layer of ice and water which is really good.

So some how Yellow Head was up on a plant shelf out of water. If he was not already a fishcicle than the fact that the floating de-icer short circuited and barbecued him finished the job off. There was so much smoke billowing out of the pond and the smell of burning plastic oh my. But the de-icer got hung up on the plant shelf in the air part between the ice and water or it could have been worse like boiling water worse.

OK. the true horrors of the matter are in the bottom of the pond should have been 7 fish and so far I have only found Yellow Head. So I am literally breaking the ice off the top of the pond with my garden hoe so I can check on the other fish. Because truth be told if they were pondbefore the day got above zero. I think at this point there are six still alive so I lugged 8 gallons of water to tied everything over for a few hours.

Now the fun begins the de-icer manged to melt a hole in the pond liner so I could not completely fill it with water until that is patched and we are going to have another cold night. Luckily honey is home now and can deal with everything patching the liner, trying somehow removing the now permanently melted de-icer from its new home attached to the liner, and buying a new de-icer. I am just glad that my Koi did not die with Yellow Head. Yes, I saw their tails moving when I poked at them with the hoe.