Thimbleanna

Travel

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MeMum had a birthday this week (Happy Birthday MeMum!!!) and I was ridiculously excited about the birthday present I found for her.   Everytime I saw her this week I said “Tweet Tweet” and told her it was a hint about her birthday present.   So…

Once upon a time, MeMum and BigDaddy went to college at Utah State University in Logan, Utah.  (MyDadLovesMeBestSister and I were born in Logan when they were in school — Yay!)   On main street, in Logan, there’s an adorable little restaurant called the Bluebird and it’s been there since 1914.  (It’s true, we were born after 1914.  ;-)  )

The Bluebird

It’s an super cute little place with an old fashioned ice cream soda bar.

The Bluebird

And lots of candy and sweets.  It’s like an ice cream and candy store, but with a big restaurant in the back.

The Bluebird

Our family all loves to visit the Bluebird.  When I was at market in May, I went to Logan with my aunt and my cousins and we had dinner at the Bluebird.  Look at the cute logo on their dinnerware.

The Bluebird

And while we were eating there, it hit me.  MeMum would have a birthday soon and she loves dishes and she loves the Bluebird.  So, I asked if they would sell some of their dishes (new dishes, not used LOL) and they said yes.  WooHoo!  I babied those plates all the way home on the airplane.  Then when I got home, I spied a little bluebird ribbon that I had in the stash, so I trimmed a few towels to go with the dishes.

The Bluebird

(Sorry for the dark pictures — the plates really aren’t as creamy as these pictures make them appear.) And that’s the story of how MeMum got Bluebird dishes and dishtowels for her birthday.

The Bluebird

The End.

Have a good weekend!

XOXO,
Anna

P.S.  If you’d like a chance to win a few quarter yard pieces of Sarah Jane’s Children at Play fabric, don’t forget to enter the giveaway!

Rock Houses

I love, Love, LOVE the old pioneer rock houses that are out west, so when I was visiting relatives in central Utah in May, I drove around and took a few pictures of some rock houses.  Luckily, there are quite a few of these little beauties that are being restored and they’re gorgeous.

Rock House

While I’m showing you pictures of these rock houses I have a really fun story to tell you.  Remember this red door that I posted as part of my May Photo Scavenger Hunt?

Rock House

A few days ago I got a comment that said something like “imagine my surprise when I saw the red door on your post and realized that it’s the view I see when I look out the side of my house!”  (Hi Bonnie!)

Rock House

It turns out that Bonnie lives right across the street from this pretty little red door.  Ohmygosh!  What excitement.  To think that we could have met that morning when I was driving around taking pictures of rock houses in her little town.

Rock House

Several e-mails have ensued and I’ve been blogstalking poor Bonnie.   I can’t help it.  In my defense, she’s living my dream life in a rock house that they’ve beautifully restored.

Rock House

You’ll really be in for a treat if you go spend some time at her blog catching up.  Among all of her other talents, Bonnie is a wonderful cook and you wouldn’t believe the treasure trove of recipes.

Rock House

I’m intentionally not showing a picture of Bonnie’s rock house — you can see it in her blog header.  It’s adorable.  Isn’t this little blog world amazing?  It’s so fun to meet new people — it seems there’s an adventure around every corner.

Rock House

The house above is the one that started my conversation with Bonnie — the red door is on the side of the house, not visible in this picture.

Rock House

And the house below is my true-love rock house.  It causes a lump in my throat and a tear in my eye.  This is the house that BigDaddy grew up in and that MyDadLovesMeBestSister and I spent our childhood visiting grandparents.  My grandpa died when I was 17 and the house was sold.  It was a beautiful little house when I was growing up.  Grandpa was an amazing gardener.

Rock House

It fell into disrepair in the 80’s and 90’s and looked awful for a time, even sitting empty for awhile.  A new family owns it now and they’re at least trying to take care of it.  The picture above is from 2 years ago.  I must say, I’m not a fan of the cover-the-first-four-feet-of-rock-with-cement method, but at least it’s not crumbling like it used to be.

Rock House

Now they’ve added a front porch.  It looks so different.  Even the trees aren’t the same.  Oh well…time marches on, doesn’t it?

Gosh, this post took a sad turn.  That wasn’t intentional.  I really just wanted to show you some pretty pioneer rock houses and tell you that I found a fun new blog friend, so enjoy!

XOXO,
Anna

Pops

TheManoftheHouse and I had a quick trip this past week to Oklahoma to visit the in-laws.  It’s a long drive (about 15 hours) and we make it in one day.  In July, Dawn posted about Pops Soda Ranch, a fun place to visit just northeast of Oklahoma City along Route 66, and I took note.  I knew it would be the perfect reward after a long day of driving.

Pops

I love their bottle cap logo with the bubbles — too cute. Pops is a retro-looking service station with a diner and they claim to have over 500 different types of soda pop.  It sure felt like more than that.  Orange Soda anyone?  My favorite!

Pops

Everywhere you look, there are colorful, beautiful soda pop bottles.  The window display bottles are all glued to the glass shelves.

Pops

All the bottles for sale are in refrigerators and it’s really fun to look at the variety.

Pops

Pretty much any flavor you could dream up.  Dog barf or dog drool anyone?  Sodasgusting LOL.

Pops

We arrived just in time for dinner and as we were leaving, the sun was setting.

Pops

The big soda pop bottle wasn’t lit when we first got there, but luckily we were there long enough that they turned it on, and we were able to see all the pretty colors.

Pops

So, if you’re ever near Oklahoma City, keep Pops in mind.  It’s a fun stop to stretch your legs and have a break.

I managed to get some quilting done on my wall hanging and a binding done on a UFO while we were gone, so that’s a good thing.  Finally a finish, coming up in the next post.

XOXO,
Anna

A Post For Isabelle

Many of you know my good blog friend Isabelle is a college English teacher in Scotland and she’s always posting something clever, witty or funny.  A few days ago, Isabelle had a post for me and you must go read it.  Run over there … it’s a short post and you won’t understand this next part unless you do … I’ll wait.

Tap…

Tap…

Tap….

Funny, no?  Very Funny!  But, dear Isabelle, I’m afraid your vision of me doesn’t match reality.  This is more along the lines of my fantasy:

Man in Quilt

And look!  He’s wearing your quilt, standing in the road just down the hill from Edinburgh Castle.   You girls in Scotland see all the best Man Candy!!!

Funny that Isabelle’s student should prompt that post just now.  Exactly one year ago today, TheManoftheHouse and I were packing our bags to get on the plane the next day for our little adventure to Scotland to visit with Isabelle and Mr. Life.

Scotland Shot

To celebrate, I made Shepherd’s Pie for dinner tonight (so perfect for our cold rainy weather) and I’ve been looking through the pictures I took last year.

Scotland Shot

It’s hard to believe that it’s been a year already!  We had such a great time and saw so many beautiful things.

Scotland Shot

I love the thatched roof in the above picture.  If only we could have a roof like that on our house.  Those rocks crack me up but with the high winds we experienced just on our trip, I’m sure they’re a necessity.

Scotland Shot

We saw moss everywhere.  Beautiful, soft, plush, green moss.  I have a whole folder of moss pictures on my hard drive.

Scotland Shot

Looking back in my archives, I didn’t really blog very much about the trip, except for the visit with Mr. and Mrs. Life, meeting Ms. Locket, and our fun little highland encounter with Bin Laden.  And by then, I figured you were sick of hearing about the trip.

Scotland Shot

So, thank you for indulging me while I wistfully look back — hoping to return to Scotland soon.
Oh wait– here’s a picture just in time for Halloween.

Scotland Shot

Ok, one more parting shot — black kitties for Halloween.  They’re the Life kitties, Sirius and Cassie.  Very sweet — and I miss them.  I hope you’re giving them a steady diet of prawns and yarn, Isabelle!

Scotland Shot

And thanks for your funny post and reminding me of our wonderful trip.  As for the rest of you, I hope you have a great weekend!

XOXO,
Anna

Ms. Bitty Bit Wilson

A few months ago, Ms Bitty Bit posted that she used to write tole painting books back in the day.  The opening line in her post was “This is soooo funny…”.  Only she didn’t know just how funny it was, ’cause I actually have several of her books in my old collection and I NEVER would have made the connection between THAT Ms Bitty Bit and the blogging Ms Bitty Bit that we know and love today if she hadn’t posted about it.

So, given that bit of shared history, along with our blogging friendship, I knew I’d HAVE to meet Ms Bitty Bit on my recent trip to Utah.  OhMyGosh!  It was fabulous!!!  We had a wonderful time.  (I’ll back up for a minute here to tell you that my Aunt Annie and I were on a little two-day shop hop — we visited the shops in Bountiful/Brigham City/Logan on the first day and on the second day, we visited a few in the SLC/Provo area.)

Ms. Bitty Bit met us just as we were finishing up at Thimbles and Threads on the second day.  It was lunchtime and since Aunt Annie and I had never been to Pine Needles, Kim suggested we go over there and eat at the restaurant.  What a great suggestion — we loved Pine Needles and Gardner Village.  And our lunch was yummy.  I can’t wait until we can go back!  After lunch, it was on to Broadbent’s in Lehi where we got this shot for my Wilson collection!

Meeting Kim

We had a great time.  Kim is just as charming, kind and FUN as I knew she’d be.  And, can I just say, the woman is a celebrity?  The ladies at the quilt shops all knew her and her blog — too fun!  There was fabric purchased and I’d show you, but where fabric purchases are concerned, I’ve had to go into the witness protection program, if you know what I mean.  (Oh, come on, if you’d OD’d on all those fantastic quilt shops in one place, you’d sneak it into the house too!)

Anyhoo, after the purchasing of fabrics, I had our star autograph my tole painting books while I played the paparazzi photographer.  I was so sorry after this that we had to rush off — our day was WAY too short.  (We didn’t even have time to go to Material Girls — I’ve heard so much about it and I wanted to go.  And my favorite shop, Whimsy Cottage wasn’t open when we were there early that morning, so we missed that too.)

Meeting Kim

I was so touched that Kim would take a whole afternoon out of her busy schedule to spend with us.  AND, just look what she gave me!  My meager picture just doesn’t do her fabulous gift bag justice — that bag was chock full of goodies — CHOCOLATE and a delicious ear of carmel corn (which were both consumed on the long drive home (btw, Kim if you have any info on that carmel corn — I forgot to write the company name down before I threw the wrapper away in the middle of Kansas ;-) — I LOVED that stuff!)), this adorable bag made for her Moda Bakeshop Tutorial (how lucky is that?), the cute little teddy bear with the friendship embroidery, a stack of very pretty Moda snippets (they fell down into that bag), AND she thoughtfully made some very pretty handmade earrings for me, Aunt Annie AND SweetiePie!  (I love that little bag — it reminds me of a retro sundress.)

Meeting Kim

THANK YOU SO MUCH Ms. Bitty Bit!  I loved my gift bag, but even more, I so enjoyed finally meeting you.  Aunt Annie kept telling me what a nice friend I have — I feel so lucky!  Next time — and Yes there will be a next time — we’ll meet for longer — maybe with some sewing involved?  I can’t wait!

XOXO,
Anna

P.S.  Remember that darling little quilt Toni sent me?  Well, Ms. Red Boot is giving a quilt pattern away — run over there and sign up.  I was reading this post, and thought — Ooooh, that’s an adorable pattern I need to sign up.  Well, hahaha, then I remembered that she sent me that pattern when she sent my little quilt.  It’s a super pattern — I hope you win!