A big thank you to Jane for the beautiful gift I received in the mail while I was away in Colorado. As a winner of her Pay It Forward Award, she sent me a beautiful Temari Ball. She has made many of them and each one is different. On her blog she has just recently posted directions for making the core of the Temari Balls. It is very interesting. Stop in and take a look at World Embroideries to see how it is done. Thank you so MUCH Jane for the lovely gift. I am still working on the gifts for the two who won my Pay It Forward.
Thank you too for all of you who sent well wishes and prayers for my son. He is recovering slowly and making excellent progress. In another three to five months or so he will be back to normal. I was so fortunate to have been able to spend this week or so with him and see for myself how he is doing. This trip to Colorado was a very special time for us.
Here is one of their lovely sunsets.
On our return trip we did a little detour and did some middle-of-the-winter touristy things. We stopped in Custer State Park to see the free roaming buffalo and other animals. 
The buffalo amaze us.
Then the beauty of the Pronghorn antelope is so refined.
We did a quick visit to Mount Rushmore in the Black Hills and saw a wooly mountain goat grazing.
On the way home, I did manage to find the quilt shop that Jill from Cottonwood Quilts in Niwot, Colorado told me about. It was not hard to find and it certainly was well worth the trip. The owner, Debbie, has done a fantastic job of having a LARGE variety of fabrics, patterns, threads, etc. for her customers. It is a delightful shop and it seems to be busy with lots of things going on all the time. They do quite a bit of internet business as well. So stop in to see them at The Quilted Moose in Gretna, Nebraska. It is a lovely town just west of Omaha, Nebraska. It was difficult to walk out of the store without spending a fortune. I could have bought one of this and one of those and some of these….etc. etc. Since my sewing room is shamedly stuffed already with things I haven’t finished…I refrained and just picked up some small pieces of fabric I had been seaching for.
One special find of this trip to Colorado came from The Stitcher’s Garden in Longmont, Colorado. Nancy showed me a delightful tool called a “Fiber Hider.” It is super for all kinds of thread or yarn. One can just slip the looped end under your threads and pull the tail through with the other hooked end. It is a bit pricey ($30…would make a delicious gift), but once I had it…well I can’t imagine not having one now!! And I love the little silver turtles. In the past week, I have used it over and over again! Don’t know what I did without it.
Hello everyone…I’m still in Colorado, but wanted to give an update. My son is doing exceptionally well, albeit he must be very careful and do nothing but walk, lay down and take it easy for at least another month. The surgery appears to have been a great success. He always told me the weather in Colorado here was mild compared to Chicago and I used to tell him he was telling falsehoods. However, it’s the middle of winter and it is to be in the 50s tomorrow!! with beautiful sunshine. Eat your hearts out those of you back in Chicago! I love driving into Boulder, Colorado and being able to see the Rockies and the city below.
Later that same day we made the side trip to Winterset, Iowa. Here one can find the home of 
I told my daughter-in-law to go skiing with her friends in the moutains for a few days, for a break away from the caregiving. So after spending some time with my son, helping out with the daily things like, walks around the block, laundry, shopping, cleaning, cooking, etc., I managed to sneek out with the use of our trusty GPS, and found this SUPER needlework shop, 
Averyclaire 