Monday Meanderings 12 - 16 - 2024

It's been a week! I was going to write my blog on Monday instead of Sunday but I decided I'd write it Sunday night as usual.

First up is concert week info. Our concerts actually started on Tuesday when a group of Spotsylvanians went into DC and visited the White House. I'm sure you're wondering why we visited the White House. We were honored to be selected to sing to visitors as they toured the White House to see the amazing decorations. We were set up in the State Dining Room between two huge Christmas Trees.  

We sang a cappella for about an hour and three quarters.  Visitors to the House were walking behind the table in the bottom of our picture.  I was amazed at how many people were going through seeing all the wonderful decorations.  And, how many people stopped to listen and to video us as we sang. (Hum, I now have a little experience with the paparazzi!) (Note: I'm on the left in the back row just about under the sconce. Pat's center front with the red tie.) 

After singing we were delighted to find out that we could leave by taking the tour of the House. (They could have taken us out the back way and we'd never see all the wonderful decorations and these historic rooms.) 

At this point we've been checked in, given WH visitors passes, and gone through metal detectors. (Um, I was pulled over for a handheld wand over my front and back.  Who knew bra hooks would set off the detector?) 

The sparkling chandelier was augmented with a reflective canopy to give the feeling of a peaceful snowfall.  It was stunning.  Heck, the chandeliers alone were amazing.  There were 3 in the room but only the center one was augmented.

The official White House Christmas Tree was in the Blue Room. The carousel was a surprise.  The pink pennants in the circle at the top of the tree feature the names of every state, territory, and the District of Columbia. The chandelier is removed every year to accommodate the official tree. This year's tree is 18 1/2 feet tall. 

A friend snapped us leaving the White House through the front door better known as the North Portico. It was an amazing day. There was a lot of standing and walking. But we wouldn't have missed it for anything. ⬇️ I took one last picture as we were walking to the gate to leave the WH grounds.

Just in case you thought I found out all the information about the rooms listening to a tour guide or reading a plaque -- nope. Each family is given a full color booklet. This year's theme was A Season of Peace & Light. The booklet gives a lot of information about the rooms that were decorated as well as the decorations in the rooms. No doubt I'll be keeping this one for a long time. 

We left our house at 6:30 am to meet the bus we took to DC and returned about 2:30 pm. We were pooped out. And, did mostly nothing the rest of the day. 

I'm going to squeeze in my goals from last week here. Surprisingly it was a pretty successful week on the quilting front. 

12/9/24

✅Finish quilting sloth quilt and trim it — all done and returned to Jenny.

✅Finish sewing stash busting blocks into top — finished, measured and stored in the quilt closet.

✅Keep at cutting up scraps into usable squares and rectangles — quite a few scraps were “processed” this week. 

Concert week✅✅✅3 rehearsals and ✅✅✅3 performances — all done!

✅Shop for Christmas presents 🎁 — surprisingly we got a little shopping done. 

Here's Jenny's Sloth quilt. I used a light grey So Fine thread. The quilting design is called Just Leaves. I trimmed it for her and gave it back to her after the concert Sunday afternoon.  

Here's what I'll be working on this week in between all the holiday related events.

12/16/24

1 Concert

Make a table runner

Finish grands’ ornaments

Make a bunch of mini cupcakes for the Va Star Guild’s holiday party and attend the party

Wrap presents

I'm really hoping I can get more piecing and/or quilting done this week but it may not happen. 

15 Minutes of Stitching. Oops! I forgot to stitch on the day we went to the White House. Here are the statistics. My percentage dropped a little. Oh well -- it's still a terrific number! Do you realize there are less than 2 weeks left in 2024? 

W/ending 12/15 — 350 days in to 2024. 

• 15 minute days/week Nov = 6/7
• 15 minute days/2024 = 339/350 days
• Success rate = 96.85% 

I'll be linking up with my regular parties. Please take some time to check them out: Stitching Stuff at Life in Pieces, Oh Scrap at Quilting Is More Fun than Housework, Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts, and Monday Musing at Song Bird Designs.  Hopefully I'll be back with more quilty news next week.  With only 1 concert left to sing, life is calming back down. Oh, except Christmas prep. 

I leave you with my starring roll in Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer at the concerts this weekend. A friend from the neighborhood chorus gave me the nose and a bunch of us will be wearing them at that concert.  I snuck mine on at the Spotsy rehearsal and started singing Rudolph with the rest of them.  I was hamming it up. I checked with our director afterwards to make sure she was ok with it.  My first review -- it was great and I was very cool. Yes, do it for the shows. So of course I hammed it up a bit more for the two concerts. Another review came in -- "she was really having a good time with that song." Well of course I was! On the other hand none of the grand kids had much to say about it. One might have been in shock but she wasn't saying anything about it.  

PS -- I didn't think to take this picture while still dressed in concert black. So I decided it was fine if I took it in my bathrobe against my closet door! The things I'll do for a laugh! 

Happy Quilting All! Bonnie