This 'n that

 I am working on a quilt which is mostly "redwork", a pattern I acquired over a year ago on a quilt shop hop and above a few of the squares which encircle the main embroidery which I will post later.
I made a trip to Colorado last week to be with friends and I purchased a new Janome embroidery and sewing machine.  I will have an adventure to learn all about it, but am so so excited to have it.

 Just another snap of the many ice huts at the annual fishing derby.  And of course another of the sun trying to wake up the valley.

What I really want to blog about is the "This" of this and that.  "This" past week, my dear friend and I went to Colorado and with my other close friend, we went to visit another old friend.  She was a room
mate of my cousin for nearly 50 years along with another woman who passed a few years ago.  We called them the "Golden Girls" and the 3 of us visited them many times over the past 30 plus years.  We  went to lunch and had lots of laughs.  I lost my cousin in July, and although she was 18 years my senior, we had become close.  There is much to tell, but I came away with "this", --an envelope containing her  life.  Her adopted parents death and birth certificates (her mother was my father's sister, 18 years his senior), her adoption file, retirement documents from the Air Force and awards, and a request to contact a half-sister who was to be notified in case of her death.  After her parents  were gone, she decided to find her birth parents.  Of course "this" was in 1991 when the records in Colorado were being opened and with the help of a mediator, she was successful.  What I discovered, must have been a shock to her.  I will continue with this story, but I was able to speak with a half-sister, her father's daughter, yesterday and I opted to send the information I had to her.  It was mailed yesterday and I felt that as a birth relative, and there are others, that she should have "this" information.  My cousin was born in 1925, and she was adopted as an infant into a home with a loving mother and father and as an only child, she lived a life of luxury for the day and never wanted for anything.  So I will continue this story in my next few blogs.

"To love, and to be loved, is the greatest happiness of existence. ~ Sydney Smith