Mum Time and a Giveaway!

This post will be short, words-wise, and (I hope) sweet, while my darling mama is visiting me from way out West in Alberta.  When we lived here in southwestern Ontario in the 80s, Mum always would come around this "end of April beginning of May Spring is busting out all over" glorious time of pink trees.

Pink magnolia tree

She is here for my daughter Dayna's graduation tomorrow from Wayne State University in Detroit.

Fun pic of us and a magnolia tree branch

Geography lesson! Yes, we live in Kingsville, on Lake Erie, my daughter Dayna lives in Windsor, Ontario, a half hour northwest of us, and she goes, make that used to go, to school for the past 4 years in Detroit, which is north, yes, you read that right, and I typed that right, of Windsor.  The only place in Canada where you go north to the US.  We are in the 100-mile peninsula of southwest Ontario. Windsor is Canada's southernmost city and Kingsville Canada's southernmost town. Both are south of Detroit.  We like to say that the line in the Journey song, "Don't Stop Believin'", that goes "just a city boy, born and raised in south Detroit", clearly that boy was from Windsor, lol.  Any-who...you can take the girl away from teaching, but you can't take...ya I know.

My mum is very English.  Very.  Even though she came over in 1958, she still has retained her accent, and her British pride. Rule Britannia! Today I took her to Annabelle's, an English Tea House in an 1859 historic home here in Kingsville. No we didn't have the English Tea Service, but we both enjoyed a delicious quiche and salad with a pot of tea:

And now for the giveaway!  This is my first time taking part in Sew Mama Sew's Giveaway Day.  And for the very first time I have a sponsor for a giveaway!  Cheryl of Meadow Mist Designs has kindly offered to donate three of her beautiful patterns.  Here is one of them. I just love the name of it, not to mention the colours and fabrics:

Peanut Butter Quilt

Before I show you the other two patterns, here is a bit more about me and some of my quilts. I hope you might snoop around the blog a bit too, maybe come back, maybe even decide to follow me.  There are some interesting things coming up in the not-too-distant future in my little, but oh-so-pleasant world.

My sewing director-in-chief is my Himalayan cat, Bella.

My lover of all other doggies in the world, cats too (even though they do not reciprocate his feelings), and of course, me, is my pittie puppy, my pibble, Rocco:

Naala sometimes makes appearances, but she mainly is glued to my husband, and one of her stuffies.

A few recent quilts I've made:

Scraps of Calm a Scrap-a-Palooza quilt

Shamrock - original design, sewn in our Florida home

Pocketful of Sunshine - original design

Makeup pouch I designed

Placemats made in Angela Walters' class

Seashell runner

One of my favourite quilts to date, Seaside Rose, completed in November 2013

The first quilt I did on my Avanté:

Perky Purses

One of the biggest highlights of my quilting life was taking a class in person with Angela Walters as well as seeing her trunk show just 2 1/2 weeks ago. 

I'm working on a few secret projects at the moment...

These two and another I can't show you!

I'm also very honoured to be pattern testing for Cheryl of Meadow Mist Designs. Stay tuned for updates on this project.

If you are still with me, here is another of Cheryl's beautiful quilt patterns that will go to one winner:

Charming

It really is charming, in many ways!
And finally, the third pattern in the giveaway is Pike's Peak.  If I had to pick just one, this would probably my favourite of the three patterns:

Pike's Peak

All three are terrific designs, no?  And she has several more available in her Etsy store.  I am excited to test her new patterns (she has two), so check back for sneak peaks. They should be available for purchase towards the end of June.  Check out her post today for her giveaway and to see the block she designed that got into Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks magazine!  Awesome!

Speaking of peaks, if you come back Friday, you will get to take a peek (get it?) into my sewing space.  I've been tagged by the lovely Lara, of Buzzin' Bumble, who showed us her lovely sewing space last week.

So how do you win one of the lovely Meadow Mist Designs patterns?  Simply leave me a comment telling me your favourite thing you like to do with your mum/mom.  For a second chance, leave me a second comment that tells me how you follow me.  I will pick three winners by Sunday May 10 at 5 pm PST, which is 8 pm EST for me.  Winners will be posted on this post as an update.  International entries welcome as the patterns will be emailed! Be sure to leave me your email in your comment if you are a no-reply blogger.  If you don't have a blog, you can still enter.  Email me if you have any troubles.

My favourite thing to do with my mum is to have tea, either at her house or in a great teahouse such as the one we visited today, and talk and talk!


Update: It's 8:45 EDT so at 114 comments (OMG, and I cannot reply to you all, sorry) I am closing the comments for the draw.  I will draw Tuesday evening, since time with my mum is über-important up until she leaves which is late that afternoon. Thank you for visiting me everyone and Happy Mother's Day! My new favourite thing? Which is really an old one now I think about it, is go to a symphony with my mum, which I did, this afternoon, in Windsor...and it was her favourite composer and one of my top 2 or 3, Mozart.  As in Wolfgang Amadeus.  Ahh it was a great programme and a great way to spend Mother's Day.  :-)