Annual Pig-Picking

Today is our annual fall pig-picking for some of Charlie's business clients.  We used to have this at our house, which meant having the yard and house perfect.  By the time the guests arrived, I was usually pooped!  It was even worse for Charlie, who had to rise at dawn and start cooking the pig.  One year, my daughter-in-law Emily and her friend Aimee helped me hang quilts on the back deck.  The main purpose was to hide the lawn mower and other equipment under the deck, but the guests enjoyed the outdoor quilt show.  Move over, Sisters, Oregon!

A couple of years ago we got smarter and started having the event at North Ridge Country Club in Raleigh.  The first time, Charlie still cooked the pig, but the chef helped him and learned how to do it.  The next time, we only had to bring our pig cooker.  This time, we told them to rent a pig cooker!  So all  we had to do was make the sauce.  Last night we had a sauce-making party, so even that was fun.

Later today my brother John, my sister Katy, and my dad are joining us for the party.  There is a rumor that Katy's husband Kenny may even join us.  He is the inventor of The Secret Sauce recipe.  He does not like to travel except to go to the mountains, so we'll see. There will be some professional blue-grass musicians on hand to entertain this year, so it should be lots of fun.

My only task is to make some floral centerpieces.  I usually  just buy some mums or pansies and wrap them with a colorful paper napkin and some raffia.  Better get busy!  It is sunny and cool and should be a perfect fall day.

Another Successful Pig-Picking

Yesterday was our eighth annual client pig-picking given by my husband Charlie and his partners. The last four have been at my house, but this year it was held at the North Ridge Country Club. Not only a nice change for me, but this year the sky looked like this just before the party... see all the golf carts heading for cover?Up until then it had been a very nice day. But as soon as the guests arrived, it started raining buckets, and I was very glad not to have eighty guests eating dinner in my garage and downstairs. We had a patio dining room at the club with a large overhang, so the pig cooker was under the roof. Well, not until Charlie went out and moved it, getting soaked in the process.

Our son Dave got wet too, as he was helping with cutting up the roasted pork. It was wonderful to have Dave and Emily there with us. Even though they live in Raleigh, we had not gotten together in awhile.

It was a lovely location. The trees are getting beautiful here in the Raleigh area. This nice maple was just outside the patio area where we set up.

At the last minute, I decided to work up some table decorations. Here is an easy idea that worked very well. I bought pansies in fall colors in individual four-inch pots. I wrapped each plant with colored tissue and a decorative napkin, and then tied it with raffia.

Emily and our friend Pauline helped finish this project just as the first guests arrived. We had enough for all the dining tables and to put out with the buffet. After the party, many of the guests were given a plant to take home with them.

Another last-minute arrangement that s added to the pleasure of the event was a musical performance by my husband' partner Alex, his sister Debbie, and Alex's friend Dennis. In the past, Alex and Dennis and also our son Dave have played guitars at "the party after the party." But with us mostly stuck inside this year, Debbie and Dennis set up their amps and provided entertainment for all. Debbie is a professional musician from Asheville, NC, and Dennis is great on lead guitar. Debbie and Dennis had never played together before, but they were wonderful!And the crowd was appreciative!

I was disappointed that my father was not feeling up to the trip down from Boone, so he missed the party this year. But he felt better today and is here now. I am so grateful that he is still well enough to drive at age 86. He is hoping to visit some friends and relatives during his visit with us.

Sigh of Relief

The wood floor installation was finished at 8:30 on Monday night.

We moved a lot of stuff back in, and cleared enough off the beds to permit sleeping, and redecorated in time for company on Friday night. There's still a lot of stuff hidden upstairs.

I was touching up the paint in the dining room where I had spackled nail holes, and the paint no longer matched. So that room got LOTS of quilts and pictures on the walls.

I got granddaughter Lily into her hard-to-put-on Patsy Aiken romper. (Her hair is not really that close to the candle as it appears in this picture.) She and Avery enjoyed the new granite island.

The yard was looking pretty good in time for the party, too.

These purple berries grow along the branches of the beauty bush. I saw one growing in the middle of our woods the first year we moved here. Must have been deposited by a helpful bird. Then I finally found one in a nursery nearby. Daughter-in-law Emily helped me get things ready for the pig-picking. We hung up some quilts on the deck rail and made a lady scarecrow . Behind her is an old quilt that I purchased on E-Bay.

I tried to take Lily's picture with Aunt Emily in front of the mums, but she decided not to say "cheese" this time.
Avery was not too into the party at first, but he made friends with two other little boys who arrived later.


My father drove from Boone to attend the pig-picking. That is him down by the pig cooker, talking to two ladies

The party went just fine. We had a beautiful day, absolutely perfect! Sunny and mild.

The next day Bryson was packed and ready to take the kids back to South Carolina. Since Avery's pre-school was closed Monday and Tuesday, we talked him into letting us keep the kids here a few more days. I will meet their mom halfway on Wednesday morning.

So, you know I love 'em when I have just finished remodeling, and allow Thing 1 and Thing 2 the run of the house. So far the floors are winning. They have both slipped on the wooden floors several times.And I'm glad we got the tile in the kitchen instead of wood. That bowl of Fruit Loops wiped up very easily!

Although the weather was perfect on Saturday, Monday and Tuesday have been rainy. We played with Play-Doh and decorated pumpkins on a plastic cloth on the garage floor. This worked better in the summer when they wore shorts and went barefoot. Both came in with Play-Doh stuck to their jeans and the treads of their shoes.

It was Lily's idea to use Play-doh to make pumpkin faces, but she pulled it all off before I came back out with the camera.

I am hoping to inspire a new generation of quilters. Lily loved this little trapunto quilt with all the crystals and beads.

She was trying to claim this one. It is PINK and has a heart and sparklies. Just what she likes! I have promised this one to SAFE Child for their Valentine's Day auction.

And I was tickled that she called this one the "Cupcake quilt."

Well, it has taken me three days and about twelve sessions to post this blog. Tomorrow I will be missing the little messers an awful lot!

Good Old Mountain Music

What a great time we had last weekend! A real family get-together to celebrate my nephew's wedding two weeks ago. The picture above shows me on the bottom row with my brother Chris, John, and John's son Ryan. The standing row is my brother Tim, sister Katy, brother Pat, and my Dad. Really fun to have all of the siblings there except one, who lives in Southern Florida.
I mentioned that I was busily working on several projects last week. One was ordering these two posters with pictures of the wedding. You can actually just upload your digital shots to Walgreens.com and order the poster. You can add as many photos that you like to the collage poster. They were a big hit, especially for those who were not at the actual wedding. The wreath above the posters is adorned with flame azalea that I picked on the mountain that morning.
In addition to picking the pig, there was another kind of picking going on...the pickin' and grinnin' type. My brothers always provide guitar/banjo music when they get together...but the younger generation took over at the party, with various ones taking turns on guitar or mandolin. Above are my son Dave on guitar, and friend Big Mike (6'9") handling the mandolin.

The other project I made last week was a DVD of all the wedding pictures, set to three different songs by the country group Alabama. If you have a computer with Windows XP, it probably has Windows Movie Maker. It is a rather simple procedure to import your pictures and drag them to the storyboard. Then you can adjust them to go along with the lyrics of your songs. I have very successfully used this for rehearsal dinners and other picture shows.

Finally, here is a parting shot of one of the hillsides on the mountain in the late afternoon sun. The trees have leafed out and are in many shades of greens and pastels. We often see deer playing on this hilly meadow.

Ah, the power of blogging! I wrote about this topic once before, when I posted about being invited to speak at the Piedmont Quilt Guild after one of their officers read my blog. This time, apparently my blog posting about my mother was powerful enough to move several people to tears, and create a flurry of e-mail among my relatives. As I mentioned, I have a large family, but our e-mail exchanges have been pretty quiet since Christmas. Since Sunday, I have heard from most of my siblings, my father, my Uncle Jerry, two aunts and several cousins. Thanks to everyone who has responded to that post in my comments or e-mailed me.

This week is very busy, as I am still working full time and trying to get ready for a mountain trip this weekend. This Saturday will be the big party to celebrate my nephew Jason's wedding. Nothing like a good ole' Southern pig-picking! I've been working on a few surprise little wedding gifts, got a birthday present for my sister, and will have to decide what to cook as side dishes at the party. My son Dave will be riding up with us, and several of my siblings who have not been to our mountain place will also be joining us. Great fun!

Here is a cute little story from school. My third graders were reading a selection about growing a vegetable garden. There was a photo of an eggplant on one page. I asked if anyone could identify that plant, and one little girl raised her hand wildly. She blurted out: "Eggnog!"

Sorry about no "quilty" news again. I am trying to plan a quilt "show-and-tell" at school before the year is over. It sure will tie into our curriculum in math as far as measurement, patterns, and geometry! Our annual end-of-grade testing program is next week, and after that it will be fun to do something a little different. Maybe inspire some future quilters!

Garden Party

Well, we did it! Got through our big outdoor party on Saturday afternoon. Although it has only rained about four times this year, it rained all day Friday and on Saturday morning. It stopped by the afternoon, but not in time for me to hang out the quilts. I only had the little pumpkin quilt hanging off the back deck rails. Charlie's assistant and her husband brought me the most beautiful orange and yellow roses. I love them!
Here is a little garden flag I made. A few years ago I won a drawing for some leaf blocks and never could quite make them into a quilt, so I used two of them to make the front and back of this little quilt. I just quilted it free motion on my Bernina, and added some Swarovski crystals. The oak leaf was made by my friend Holly Sweet.
Here is the other side of the flag. I'm not sure, but I think Margaret Slade made this unusual leaf. Editor's note: It was made by fellow Cyberbee member Tama Brooks! Thanks, Tama! It has a few red crystals that catch the sun perfectly. Don't you love the hand-dyed orange and yellow fabric? I had some in my stash that matched the leaf almost perfectly.

Getting ready for the weekend

From one big weekend event to another...this time at my home in Wake Forest, NC. My husband and his partners at Wachovia Securities have hosted a Client Pig-Picking in the fall for the past five years or so. What is a pig-picking, blog readers not from the South may be asking? It is a very popular outdoor food fest, the highlight being a whole pig that is cooked slowly on a big outdoor grill. The traditional method calls for a hickory log fire, but we use charcoal. Husband Charlie is the chief cook, which usually involves rising at dawn to put Porky on the grill. Many Southerners in rural areas raise a hog or two in the backyard just for this purpose. We purchase ours from a local abattoir who dresses it out, ready to roast. However, for the last two years, a nearby neighbor's pig has escaped a few days before our event and run wild through our yard, rooting up grass and seemingly volunteering to be the guest of honor! Here is one whopper who is seen in front of my next-door neighbor's play yard. I think he is as large as the pool or the trampoline!Let's hope he or his successor does not show up this year! Anyway, the pig for the meal is basted constantly and served with my brother-in-law Kenny's secret sauce of the vinegar and tomato variety. There is controversy over the best barbecue- Western NC style, Texas style...but this is Eastern North Carolina style and we don't get any complaints.

Last year, I decided to hang quilts from the rails of our back deck for the party. The idea behind this was to hide the junk stored beneath the deck. However, it was quite a crowd- pleaser, and Charlie has asked me to do the same this year. This is how my quilts looked last year- my own little Sisters Oregon Quilt Show!

Anyway, this will be my last post until at least Sunday or Monday. Lots to do to get ready! Fortunately, the rest of the food is catered and the tables and chairs will be delivered and set up. I only have to bake some cookie bars as an additional dessert for those who are not keen on the traditional banana pudding. Oh yeah, and clean the house, finish the yard work, get guestrooms ready for company...

I have been decorating the yard for the party! Wish me luck having 100 people over for dinner this Saturday!