Cowgirl Swap - My partner

Hope you are all enjoying your summer so far! I am keeping busy w/kids & swaps. Above is a picture of what I recently received from my partner Lisa Mallette, we were to make something vintage/cowgirl. She made me a cool/vintage wall hanging out of an altered cookbook! I love the vintage picture and the "wood" like painting technique on the cover. Great job Lisa. Below is another photo of what she sent me....a handmade/bound journal.

Once again, she did a great job. I really like the fabric cover w/the photo and nice touches inside the cover and paper she used in the book. Not only did receive some nice artwork but met another friendly blogger!! You can find her at: www.studiorose.wordpress.com. Say "hello" and see what she is making.

Here is a little "thank-you" mini collage for the hostess...that I have to mail w/some other things to the many hosts in the past. It is hard keeping up w/swap projects alone..and then to send out thank-you's, I am just behind and should take a few hours to wrap that stuff up & send it all out at once. (before next year!!) I am some kind of "perfectionist" wanna be...that is my stuff has to be just right before I send it out, even if it takes soooo long & I need to stay up into the weee hours of the night. I say "wanna be" since I am so far from having it together I just dream of it. What would it be like if I did things in a timely manner instead of in the rush of the moment? Freeing I tell you. I keep trying to tell my mind that but my spirit and my mind are not connection of how things should be so for now I must continue to function on my "mindless" time zone of "Hurry-Hurry". I will post what I made for my gal later, as well as quick photos of what I got from the "birds/bonnets" swap that I am needing to post. I have been busy as well enjoying our pool....it is like having a resort in our back yard, or did I say that before??
Stay cool!!! Carol

Under Construction

Here are some photos of our pool under construction. As you can see, it is never too soon to enjoy the new pool! No need for life saving devices in a couple inches of water....

Please read the saga of our pool in the post below!

Pool Progress

This is the story of our pool. An abbreviated version somewhat. And why I have been away from my computer for a bit of time once again.
We purchased our pool about 4 years ago at the end of the season on a special clearance. It was in a few boxes. We had good intentions figuring on set up the next year. The next year came and we found out through research that we needed tons more work on our yard to support our new above ground oval pool and through a few quotes found out the cost for that alone would be at least $2000. Our hopes were deflated and time went on another year passed and even one more after that. We just could not work things out for a long, long time financially. Another season came and with that some hope as we found someone to do the work on our yard, to flatten our slope and prepare it, for 1/4 the price. We had the work done and still even then it was not quite right. DH did a lot of work w/laser levels and scraping more dirt, etc....then mapping it all out and laying down all the track and some major pieces, only to find we were missing 2 major steel diagonal support pieces. Through many phone calls found the pool store closed and no luck w/any of the pool manufacturers either... By that time another end of season was upon us and we would wait one final year.
Enter 2008. With this new year, once again we hoped of a pool but did not want to get our hopes too high as anything can happen. We purchased the filter system, and located a steel company that could cut 2 pieces just so DH could fabricate them as needed to do the job, purchased sand and set a date to begin set up. W/ many wheel barrows of sand and lots of hard work we prepared the site some more. Actual set up would begin the weekend of June 6th. Just so happens the friends from church would not be available since that was our big Church Picnic and to top it all off, we began our first heat wave of the summer. We worked for many days in scorching temperatures, one way or another the pool was going up. Had a little help Sunday w/the liner but for the most part it was just the 2 of us. (no not the the "flippers" below..LOL)

The pool did get up as you can see. We filled slowly, it took 4 days as the first night of filling we woke up to find 4 walls buckling a bit at the top...DH figured out a fix and spent another hour or 2 straightening it all out. Then the next night was one of our biggest storms w/65 or so MPH winds and our pool survived. We ran into so many problems (& fears!!) but it is finally up and running. We will need to add a deck and ladder soon, when we recover and find time) The filter system just attached yesterday and filled to the top. I claimed a float, as all mommas need to do. We still cannot believe that there is this lovely pool waiting for us every day. It is like a little piece of heaven for our whole family and such a blessing as our family loves to be home, we are simple people. And the look on our youngest seems to say it all: We cannot believe we have our own pool now!!!!!

Saying a "good night and God Bless" to you all,
Carol

Some of my little cowgirls too

Here are some pics of my little babes when we went to a craft festival and they had pony rides w/hats to top it all off. That was last fall. I am dreaming of fall already. I am trying to type at the bottom of this post but now I have the lovely problem of the computer underlining things for some reason....so I will finish up here. What in the world makes it underline all of a sudden?

O.K. I just got past the underlining ghost...all clear at the moment. Have a wonderful night. Will posts pics of the beautiful lovelies I received from the "birds & bonnets" swap next.
Carol

Cowgirls

It seems I had found another swap to join and another friend to make! This is the "Cowgirl Swap" from Tina Wright I really enjoy challenging myself w/different themes. Here are some photos to go w/the theme of "Cowgirl". A Cowgirl Rooster. (lovely door stop don't ya think)

Some Pink Cowgirl boots and last of all part of my Swap that I am working on and need to finish up over the weekend. Posting some more "country pics" too. I am uploading pictures from "picasa" and found that I could do 3 pictures at once but having trouble manipulating them and don't know how to add more to this from there. Does anyone else know how to post more than one picture at a time any other way? This is such a different world and so not me.
Carol