McCraw family holiday at Myrtle Beach

We had a very nice time at Myrtle Beach this year with the McCraw clan. As usual, there was a puzzle.

The place Carolyn picked out was roomy (8 bedrooms!!!) and just perfect.  About 100 yards from the beach.  Not that we could see the beach thru all the fog....

The photos loaded up in an odd order, but I'm not going to bother putting them in chronological order.  You'll figure it out....

Granny had sewn together the star pieces for this quilt several years ago....put she put it aside and gave it to Sharon.  Sharon pieced it all together an added all the trim - then did a fabulous job with the actual quilting.  The other children gave them the bits and pieces to freshen up their bedroom with all new linens.

Puzzle work.

We posed for some "formal shots" for Granny.  Somehow, everyone was in a silly mood!

Finally finished the puzzle.....that sky and ocean was really tough!!

Some of us went over to the Boardwalk on Broadway to play putt-putt....and imagine our surprise when we parked next to a vehicle with our "hometown" realty tag.  Small world!

Ahhh, the memories!!  It's been about 10 years since we played putt-putt with our kiddos!!

Haha - pretty Miranda on a silly-stool!!!

And the sun finally came out on the last day!!!

Art!

Richard and Miranda gave me this neat Chinese watercolor art instruction set for Christmas.

Some of my attempts at the first lesson....it's harder than it looks to get all the wonderful shading that the book instructs.  It's all about how you "load" the brush and the pressure you put on the paper.  Lot's more practice is in order!

Cold!!

OK, it's cold.....I know, about half of you saw much colder temps....brrr.  I hate the cold!

And because it's cold, I'm having HOT lentil soup and HOT tea for lunch!!

Replacing our trusty gas cooktop

After almost 20 years of fairly constant use.....my gas cooktop was on it's last legs.  It was a really good one - we've replaced a few parts over the years, but now several of the gas tubes have corroded thru and two of the igniters don't work anymore.  The replacement parts would cost more than a new cooktop.  So, we did what all good Americans do!   Called Lowe's and ordered a new one!  Note the jumble of pots/pans in the cabinet below.  My trusty mechanic (AKA Duane) fixed that for me too!

All done now.  Most of the day was spent on the retrofit.  It appeared to be a "drop-in replacement", but it proved to be larger than my old one.  So, we had to carefully measure and cut the counter top out to fit.  While the cabinet was opened up, Duane built a nice sturdy shelf for my pots/pans also.  Very nice!

Casserole Cover!

I'm finally getting around to posting about this....I had to wait until after the book club party!!

First, I have to give credit to Christina at "2littlehooligans" for the wonderful  tutorial

Our book club does a "Bad Santa" gift exchange every year in mid-December.  We're not supposed to spend much on the gift, just something fun that might be "stolen".

I got this idea to make a casserole cover as my gift.  Surely someone in the group would need one!

First, I had to find the correct cloth.  The local stores didn't have what I was looking for, so I turned to
 Etsy.com and found just the right pattern.....Books!!

Here's the "short version of the assembly"......at the end, I'll put the "longer version" if you're interested in the actual construction.

Basically, you just sew rectangles together filled with batting to insulate the casserole dish and make the handles.

Almost done....

I can't believe I didn't snap a "finished photo" with the dish actually in this one.  Read to the end to see a finished product...

So fast forward to Carolyn Boyd's house for the book club Christmas party.  The eleven ladies' presents were all lined up for the Bad Santa exchange.  Mine is in the bulldog bag.

And it was a hit!!  It got "stolen" two times - and Diane ended up with it!  (we have a two-time-stealing rule - after a gift is stolen two times, the third gal gets to keep it!)

So - here is a longer version - certainly go to the 2littlehooligans blog link above if you want to make one - her directions are wonderful!  I did a few short-cuts, just 'cause that's the way I roll, haha.

I cut out the patterns using old aviation charts.  Cut the cloth and the batting.  Note, this is not the "book" one, but another one I made out of different cloth for my sis!

Ready, set, sew a bunch of straight lines!!

Nothing has to be too precise - you're going to trim off the edges anyway.

See - all trimmed and ready to be turned right-side-out!

Second piece almost finished.

Turned right-side-out and top-stitched.

Lining everything up to sew the pieces together.

All the pieces ready to attach.

Kindof a tedious process to get them all in the right places!

Basically top-stitch the handles onto one of the rectangles.  Add velcro strips at the edges of the rectangles to hold the cover closed.

Add a little velcro'd tab to hold  a serving utensil.

And there you have it!

All ready for a casserole and church social!

Tah - dah!!!