Passing the Time

So I am now starting week 2 of 3 of my "forced" vacation. I stayed pretty busy last week with projects around the house; doctor and dentist appointments; hemmed curtains in Evvy's room; cleaned out back porch for donations to DAV; raked up some leaves; made a lot of phone calls.

This week I have been baking and making candies for Christmas gifts to friends and neighbors. It has been fun and I hopefully will give it all away so I don't snack on it.

I also started handquilting a pinwheel quilt that I made the top for a couple of months ago from scraps. It is a simple but pretty quilt. The quilting is very simple also. I am just quilting a quarter inch inside each triangle. It is really just a project to keep my hands busy. My girl is going to learn to love quilting! My friend Peggy and I can't wait to teach our girls how to quilt. Erica will have a couple of years headstart on Evvy but that is OK. Erica is so cute. Peggy has been hand quilting a beautiful quilt for Evvy and when Peggy sits down to work on it now, Erica says, "Mom, you quilting?" "Mom, you done quilting?" I think Erica is ready for Evvy's quilt to be done as much as Peggy is. She finished all of the blocks this past week and now just has the border to finish. It is a truly beautiful quilt. Peggy has such tiny stitches. I think she measured last week and she quilts 10-11 stitches per inch. I on the other hand stitch about 6 stitches per inch. She wonders why it takes her so long to quilt! Click over to Peggy's blog (see sidebar for link) to see a picture of the quilt. I don't think she has a recent one with all the squares done yet.

I can't believe that Christmas is just a week away. This will be only my second Christmas that I haven't spent with at least a part of my family. The other Christmas was when I was in training preparing to serve my mission to Guatemala. My life has just been totally put on hold waiting for Evvy to come home. I haven't made any plans. I am also just trying to save all of my money to pay for the adoption and to pay for living during my time off when she comes home. I am surprisingly not too down about Christmas. I feel bad that mom & dad won't have any of us kids with them this year. Last year Allan's family and I were out there for the holidays. They just have one month left of their mission service in Salt Lake. They will be back in Texas the end of January. Hopefully, we will be taking a trip to Guatemala shortly after they get home. We can then all celebrate our birthdays in Guatemala. Mom's is the 4th; dad's the 16th and mine is the 21st. I can't think of a better birthday present for any of us!

I am feeling a little more upbeat now that I have received an update out of PGN. Not the best of news but at least it was easily remedied and they haven't found anything else wrong with the paperwork. And I would think after 13 weeks they should have found any and all problems with the paperwork!

7 more days to Christmas! I am going to try to call and talk to Evvy's foster family on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.

Susan