Warriors of Gold!

September is CHILDHOOD CANCER AWARENESS Month.

Many of you know that our Anthony is a leukemia survivor!

Anthony endured a brutal 3 1/2 years of chemotherapy and other treatments, to prevent future relapse.

Our family was blessed by SO many organizations!

One way I pay it forward to current and future families affected by childhood cancer is to make a quilt each year.  

Then, friends and family (maybe even you?!) donate to the charity of their choice, from my list.  Every $5 donated means one entry into a drawing for the quilt at the beginning of October.

Just donate and send me a screenshot of your receipt (please don't include account numbers!), and we'll enter you in the drawing! goldnplum@gmail.com

St. Jude Children's Research Hospital

Strong Against Cancer

Ronald McDonald House Charities of Western Washington & Alaska

The Brave Warrior Project

Soulumination

#septemberisforkids #childhoodcancerawareness #kidsgetcancertoo #morethan4 #childhoodillness #mykidisawarrior #wenatchee

Maggie's Quilt

So...I made Maggie's quilt just before Christmas...1 1/2 years ago.

I was finally able to finish it on her birthday yesterday.  lol

The link for the site that I found the template on is in this post.

I made Lilly a similar quilt, but with a different color scheme.

This one was so fun, with "older" style colors and fabrics.  

It has a vintage feel.  

I used warm & natural type batting.  2 layers, so it would be fluffier.

It machine quilted (stitch in the ditch) like a dream!

Springtime Before and After

For Mother's Day, I just wanted my plants planted.  

I miss being able to get on the ground to garden, but if I try, my hips get so mad that I can't walk for days.

Maggie, Andy, and Anthony helped me plant a bunch of flowers and a few veggie plants.

We put the white fencing things around the box so Brandi (puppy) wouldn't go in the garden.

Didn't work.

Those small sunflower starts are all a couple feet high now.

Lilly with Dexter.

Dexter and Brandi chase each other for hours, in a figure 8 around the dining room and front room.

We signed up to make dinner for the missionaries one day, and I noticed the day before that one of the missionaries had a birthday on the dinner day.

So, we put up some streamers and made some angel food cake.

I was quilting and don't remember if I got a hangnail or a small cut.

But, some of the batting I had trimmed off the quilt was perfect for protecting my finger.

More comfortable than a bandage too.

Since our HUGE backyard tree was cut down this spring, the patio is hot and dry.

I wanted to have a lot of greenery around the patio to soften it up.

We are still having to be careful with money, even after paying off our debts, and especially after paying all cash for the tree cutting service.

So, I asked on FaceBook for any planters people didn't want anymore, and didn't come up with much.

Thrift stores didn't have much either.

Then, there was a FB Marketplace listing for a yard sale and the woman had 4 large planters for cheap.

I went right over to get them.

She gave me a can of spray paint to match the green and said I could touch them up.

Maggie and Kelly said the green was too ugly, so I ran to the store to get black paint before the store closed.

I'm so glad the paint dried pretty quickly because there was a lot of rain that night.

The paint was fine!!

Maggie had an accident with our station wagon.

It had to be towed away to be fixed.

KITTEN!!!

Josh is serving a mission for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Salt Lake City East Mission.

His mission is obviously comprised of SLC, but also has a big chunk of Wyoming in it too.

Missionaries can email their families once a week, but can only talk on the phone or Skype on Christmas and Mother's Day.

Here are a couple Skype pictures from when we talked to him!

It was so good to see and hear from Josh.  

I get texts every few days, from people that Josh and his companion have served or taught.

They are doing good work and service.

Maggie braiding Kelly's hair

Our puppy, Brandi, LOVES to attack sprays of water.  In this picture, she is jumping up to chomp on the spray of water.  It is hilarious to watch.

Kelly's hands were so swollen when she had her allergic reaction to has nausea med.

I recently started subbing at our local library.

One day I was checking in books and found this.

I sent the picture to Kelly.

Her boyfriend is Kevin.  

We got a kitten a week ago!

She's tiny and cute, and is so adored.

I think she's a calico and she has fur on her head and face that reminds me of Samoan cookies by the Girl Scouts.

I thought we should name her Sam for Samoan or Coco for coconut.

Anthony called her Kitty, but it sounded like Kiki.

So, she's Kiki.  :)

The Brave Warrior Project was the recipient of the Run For The Border fundraiser.

Anthony is a Brave Warrior, and so he got to go see some of the bikes and meet most of the people.

He LOVED it!

We will be getting a collar soon!