Out of the House

I needed to get out of the house.  I have been doing a good job of staying home as much as I can.  If I do go out, I try to only take calculated risks….places where it’s easy to social distance.  There comes a time though that a sense of normalcy screams “I want to get out”….so we did a couple of things that were safe and thought out.

I’m not paranoid…but cautious.  I do have several things going on with me that put me in a high-risk category should I get Covid.  I figure better safe than sorry.

You might remember that last year our family went a couple of times to a local pizza farm.  I’ve so missed going this and finally this week Karl said, “Mom, it’s time.  Let’s go.”  Karl had gone without me a few weeks ago and reported back that he thought it was super safe.

You can only go by reservation.  They only allow enough reservations so you can easily social distance and it’s all outdoors.  When you’re not eating they ask that you wear masks.  I thought that sounded awesome…so Friday night we went.  It almost felt normal…it felt so good!!  Best of all, the food was awesome.  I love their pizza and the atmosphere too.

How fun is this??  Our little pizza farm, Luna Valley Farm, was featured in the New York Times.  You can read the article HERE.

The kids loved seeing the pigs at the farm….

It was dark by the time we saw them so the pictures is not the best but still you get an idea…

Saturday morning Kalissa and I decided to make a run to the Amish community south of us.  We had so much fun.  Our mission was groceries, the Amish bakery, and mums.

The grocery stores have products that are damaged in packaging….thus “bent and dent”.  Kalissa and I both bought a lot…  We went just as they were opening.  We were the only people in the store but the workers for the first bit we were there and by the time it was starting to get busy, we were at the checkout.  Again…we felt pretty safe.

From there we went to our favorite bakery.  We love the ladies there.  They are so sweet and remember us.  We visited with them a bit and, of course, bought too much….but it’s so-so good.  Here is Kalissa with her haul….Lucky Craig is getting a pie!!

Kalissa and I were reminiscing about when she was little and we’d hit the farmer’s market and she’d buy Whoopie Pies…she had to get whoopie pies when she was there.

Then she jokingly said, “Hey I need a picture of my mum with the mums”.  Oh, girl…you crack me up!!

From there, we ended up going to Oelwein and getting a coffee to go with our rolls.  It was McDonald’s coffee from the drive-thru.  (Thanks Lori for the gift card!!)

We ended up seeing a garage sale sign and turned to go but then we drove past and it didn’t look like our kind of sale.  I made the comment, “what do we need at a garage sale anyway?”  Well, then we went past another garage sale sign and said, “Kalissa…you didn’t stop!”   We ended up stopping and I’m SUPER glad I did.  It was one of those moments when I know I was in the right place at the right time.

Here’s the story.  The lady holding the garage sale had 12 sets of sheets that were new.  They were priced at $2 or $3 each…  I took them all!!  Sandra from the Cresco lady quilters said they are short backing fabric.  These are going to them!!  WOW…that is going to back a lot of quilts.

I typically don’t buy fitted sheets but these are in a set and the ladies do a lot of baby and lap-sized quilts so the new fitted sheets will work.  I’m hoping if they use a fitted sheet a flat sheet and then save their leftovers that they can use the pillow with it to make a third pieced together backing.  Imagine, 3 backings from each set!!  That’s my hope anyway.

The better news is that the lady might be able to get more.  She works with a program that provides free bedding to the needy….other things besides only bedding too.  Her group has a contact in the Twin Cities that gets overstock and items not sold from Walmart, Amazon, and other places for free.  The contact in the Cities takes what they get and works on distributing it to people in their area that are needy, but they end up overstocked too.  So the lady from the garage sale goes to the Cities and picks up some of that overstock.  In turn, she sometimes ends up overstocked.  In comes ME and the charity quilters.  I said we would take whatever we could get….She said she would keep that in mind and was thrilled with the work that our charity group does.  At this point, she was hoping to keep it all more local to our NE Iowa area.  I will keep working on finding out more about how we can get more of these new sheets.  I told her I would happily continue to pay the $2-$3 per sheet set.

I was totally doing a happy dance all the way to the car.  I’m really hoping this pans out to be something and we end up being able to get more sheets and I’m able to distribute them out to a wider area, but for now, even these are going to make a big difference to the charity quilters in my area.  YAHOO….now you can see why I said I was in the right place at the right moment.

While I was there the lady said being you’re a quilter, maybe you are interested in this….

I peeked in the bag and said, “YES PLEASE!”

Here is what was inside…

I’ve been wanting to try a Qsnap for cross stitching…there were three.  I think the big one is too big.  There was a wedge and a kaleidoscope ruler too along with a flannel board and embroidery hoops.  Definitely it was worth $2.

The lady was so sweet….Our bill came out to about $30 and she ended up giving us the goods for $25 being we’re doing charity work!!

So…it was a wonderful day out and exactly what I needed.   I was so happy to get out of the house in a fairly safe manner.

Aren’t you all excited about the potential for backing fabrics??  I sure am.  Now I need a lead on getting batting.  The ladies still need batting.  Does anyone have a lead they are willing to share?