April quilts mash up

Another busy month.  36 quilts this month.  I think some of them snuck in twice to the collage and I can't figure out which ones did!

final quilt for the month of April

once I get the binding on I will take it outside for a better picture.  It's a retirement quilt for a fellow teacher who will soon get to spend lots of time fishing.  I look forward to that day myself, but it will still be a long time coming.  We only have 26 school days left this year.

I like this one better

I stopped at the thrift store on the way home from picking up the sewing machine today and picked up several sweaters and long sleeved shirts.  I want to make a few pet beds for my daughter's birthday.  She has two cats and a small dog.  Her favorite color is green so I started with this green turtleneck.  I picked out a women's small and I'm much happier with how this one turned out.  I used leftover batting pieces and small bits of fabric to stuff it.  The best part is I completely sewed it by machine.  No hand stitching.  I almost completely sewed it all before stuffing it so there wasn't much to sew up once it was stuffed.  That's the most important thing.  If you hate hand sewing, get most of the sewing done and then stuff it.  Then, there's just a little bit to sew shut and that's hard to do once it's stuffed.

I hope my daughter's pets like their new bed.  I'll be shipping them out in the next day or so since her birthday is Monday!  Yikes, how did it sneak up so quickly?

Having a plan

I got a phone call yesterday from a very sweet lady.  She wanted to know if I could use this beautiful sewing machine.  She had saved the newspaper article from several months ago about my Binky Patrol group and figured it was time to downsize before her kids had to do it for her.  She gave me this machine (I was hoping the machine was red too, but it's tan) and a bag full of goodies including several pair of scissors, rotary cutters, a mat and pressing board, pins, needles and lots of other sewing things.  It's nice to have a plan for all of our hobby items for when we can't use them anymore.  I plan on using mine for a very long time to come!  But when I'm gone, feel free to come on over and take what you want.  I don't think my kids want anything and I doubt my husband will know what to do with them.  Carla will be hosting my funeral and of course it will be a quilting party.  If you show up, plan to take things home that day :)

Another great machine for the teens to use when we have our quilting days.  It's great to be able to pull out so many machines and get the kids to work.

they just needed someone to show them

 Thanks to my little guy for showing the dogs how to use their new bed, they now love it and are both cuddled up in it all the time.  I'm really happy with how it turned out.  And the fact the dogs actually use it...Score :)

And another cute quilt for Margaret's Hope Chest.  Again, if you have any quilt tops you'd like me to quilt and send along for you, there is a button on the side bar with my address.  No need to send batting or backing unless you want to.  You can always send a roll of Kodel batting from JoAnn's when they have 50% OFF and free shipping.  That's what I always wait for.  You get 50 yards for about $50 and I haven't found batting for less anywhere else.  If you have a better deal on batting somewhere else, please let me know.  I've spent countless hours searching the internet and just can't find anyplace where batting is less expensive than that and that's the one thing I spend money on.  Not complaining, just saying.  I do go through batting quickly around here.

My dogs obviously have no taste

 So, I worked really hard on this first pet bed.  Don't tell my husband I stole one of his mock turtle neck shirts from the 90's that he hasn't worn since the 90's or he will go looking for it!  I can see some areas to improve on the design for the next one.  First, I'd want to get a smaller shirt because this bed is pretty big, especially if you are making it for a cat or small dog.  I think I will check out my son's sweatshirts and see what he has that is too small for him, then hit the thrift store tomorrow on the way home from work.  Like I need another excuse to stop there.
 After wrangling the dogs and forcing them onto the bed, I got the to hold still for exactly 2 seconds.  Don't judge the haircut.  I'm still learning and the won't sit still.  It usually takes me a couple weeks to get them looking decent.  Harper is the one in front, I think she's the mother to Lily and she is a little better at being patient so her hair is more even.

 That's why she got in two pictures.  I think she's about 7 now.  We've had these girls for about 5 years now.  My husband's friend found them one day in the summer when it was over 100 out.  He was out jogging and someone had left them at the park.  We searched for their owners, but nobody claimed them and so we just kept them.  They are good most of the time, but they obviously have no taste in good things.

They couldn't get out of the new bed fast enough and into the piles of clean laundry.  I guess it is time to put the folded things away so they have no choice but to use the new bed.  They like the pillows I make for them and those take about 10 minutes to make.  Just a square of fabric folder over and sewn around.  This thing took about 30 minutes to make and even some hand sewing thrown in there.  Just goes to show you that simple is best.

I'm hoping to make some of these fancy pet beds for the local animal shelter to use up the loads of scraps we create at the quilt days.  I thought they might appreciate the workmanship that went into them.  Maybe their animals are more discriminating :) and maybe they could sell them to raise some funds for caring for the stray animals.  Maybe...

DIY Cat Bed from a Sweater!

Like I need another project, but I plan to pull out some old sweatshirts and make some pet beds for the local animal shelter.  I have plenty of stuffing leftover from quilt day :) I'm asking the kids at school for donated sweatshirts and sweaters.

another for Margaret's Hope Chest

How cute is this heart quilt?  It's also an I spy quilt because the squares have a matching block somewhere in the heart.  This was sent to me to quilt and send along.  I feel honored to do this and would be happy to quilt something for you.  MHC will be happy to put the binding on and then gift the finished quilt to a child whose parent is in prison.  They especially need boy quilts.  How simple is this pattern.  Just a bunch of squares in any size sewn together to make a heart.  Do you have a couple of hours and a bunch of left over scraps sitting around?  You could really make a difference in the life of a child.

See the fabric to the right of this quilt?  I actually started cutting up the shirts I got at the Goodwill Outlet.  I feel so accomplished today.

My son should be home in about an hour.  Woo Hoo!  He will need laundry done and will probably want to take a nap.  Let the fun begin. :)

Margaret's Hope Chest day

 Today is my last day of vacation.  I really wanted to go to the Goodwill Outlet in Sacramento.  But, then I looked on my couch and saw the pile of treasures I got the last time I went to the Goodwill outlet in December when my daughters were home and thought, I really need to use up those treasures first.  Why am I collecting things like sheets and men's dress shirts and not using them up?  The fabrics are great and wonderful and fabulous, but if I'm not using them, they are just taking up space on my couch and are just as useless as if they were sitting at the Goodwill outlet taking up space.  So, today, I'm cutting them up and at least going to make quilt kits out of them while the machine stitches away on these cute quilts for Margaret's Hope Chest.

You see, I had the excuse of my son coming home from St. Louis and I could go to the Outlet and then pick him up from the airport.  I don't need to go, because Carla is picking up all the kids who are coming back from a Robotics event, but at least I had the excuse to go.  So, instead, I will use the time to cut up fabric and stitch quilts.  And try to get rid of this stupid migraine that's been annoying me all week.  Ever since I got my teeth worked on Tuesday.  Ugh, Stupid teeth.  Stupid migraine.  But, there are only 6 weeks of school left and hopefully when summer comes, I will have used up all of the fabric from the last Goodwill Outlet trip and will then be ready for another trip and can justify going back to save more fabric from the landfill and actually use it quicker this time around.  I promise the stuff I got was really great. :)

Flannel Rag Quilt

At our Quilt day on Wednesday, the teens cut a HUGE stack of flannel scraps into these 8 1/2 inch rag squares.  We used the new die that cuts the fringed edges.  When I used the die on the t shirts, the edged rolled on me and I had a hard time getting the pieces together without the edges rolling and catching in the foot of the machine.

One of the ladies started this project at the beginning of quilt day.  She worked for 5 hours on the project and so I thought she was having just as hard of a time working with the flannel squares as I was having with the t shirt pieces.  I was a bit disappointed that here we were cutting out all of these pieces and now it was going to take 473 hours to sew a quilt together.  The whole point in getting the die was so we could use up all the donated flannel quickly, not take hours and hours to get it all used up.

When I talked to Carla about it at the end of the day, she said, well, that's just how that lady works.  She's a perfectionist.  She would pin the blocks together and very carefully sew each one.  At the end of the 5 hours, she had two rows of blocks sewn.

I decided this morning to finish up the quilt she had started.

I'm a random kind of person and so just grabbed pieces and started sewing.  I wanted the quilt to be double sided so one row of fringe is on the front and the other is on the back.  Actually I messed up and then decided I liked it this way.  I didn't really want the three purple blocks together, but I'm ok with them being together, it all goes with the randomness of the quilt.

It took me about 45 minutes to put the rest of the quilt together.  I think you can make a whole quilt in under an hour, including cutting the blocks.  I'm very happy with how the flannel works with the fringe already cut.  There's no rolling or movement of the fringe when you sew, even close to the fringe.  The next quilt I will try to lay out the blocks before sewing.  There are lots of scraps, but some of the flannel goes together.  Maybe not enough for a whole quilt, but Carla gave me a whole bunch of solids, so I can cut that and work it in with the random pieces.

The quilt is warm and super soft.  It's in the washing machine now and will fluff up even more when it comes out of the dryer.  That's the worst part about these blankets...the lint that comes off the first washing!

When my daughter and I made one a long time ago, the cutting of the fringe by hand was so terrible.  It took a couple weeks and we both had really sore hands.  I love that the fringe is all cut out for you. I can tell we will have a lot of these quilts in the near future!

If you have an Accuquilt Go! or Studio fabric cutter, you need to add this die to your list of blocks to get.  It is really a great die to own.

crochet blanket

I've been working on this blanket for the last week or so.  Each square takes about 30 minutes to make and then crocheting it all together, adding the border and sewing in the ends took another 4 hours or so.  Mindless work when watching TV so no real added time to anything I wasn't already doing.  I hate just sitting and watching TV with nothing in my hands.  I'm trying to use up yarn I have around here and there's lots of that for sure.  The squares are 12 inches and just a plain granny square pattern.  It's big enough for a child and good colors for a boy.

Binky Patrol - what we do for kids and what happens to a binky

This awesome video explains what Binky Patrol is all about.

she got the 3rd year

 My daughter just found out tonight she got the Writer in Residence 3rd year position, which is the top position for next year.  I'm super excited for her.  She asked me not to post about it on Facebook just yet because she wants to be sensitive to her friends who didn't get it.  There were 4 of them competing for it.  I told her that everyone might wonder why I was celebrating and what all the noise was coming from my house and that I couldn't help it.  I'm super proud of her for all she's accomplished.  It's pretty awesome that she started writing when she was about 4 and had a goal in mind and has stuck with it for so long.  She got a lot of praise yesterday at her thesis reading.  She said one of the people there wanted to use her novel to teach in her class.  She said as soon as it is published, which hopefully will be soon.  So, I guess that means she will be spending at least another year in St. Louis.  Not sure what that means for the summer now.  But, for now, I'm happy dancing.

Raining is good for quilting

 It's raining today and that means I don't really want to go outside to work in the garden.  I missed my opportunity to shop for plants yesterday and didn't get the iceplants planted.  They are enjoying the rain today and will be ready to be planted tomorrow.  The ground will be soft.  I'm sure it will be drained by tomorrow or Sunday and there's no real harm in waiting that long anyways.

 It just gives me another excuse to procrastinate another day or two at least.  But what better excuse to stay inside and quilt.  I am being very productive this morning.  I finished these three yesterday plus the t shirt quilt top got cut out and sewn together.  I'm hoping to get the border on and quilted and maybe even bound today.  I do have a terrible tooth ache today from where the dentist filled the cavity.  I was hoping it would just go away so I wouldn't have to waste time going back to the dentist.  I was hoping he had just bothered the gum a bit and that it would heal on its own, but each day it has gotten worse.  I'm debating calling this morning to see if I can get in today.  And then, I'm not sure if it's just part of my migraine :(  I do hate that thing.

I think today I will count and see how many more of these quilt tops I have left.  Do you remember last summer when I got the silly idea that I was somewhere near the end of these?  And then I found another box and another?  Yeah, Well, I do believe the end is in sight.  I THINK I have all of them together now and when I get the chance, I try and pull out a few and quilt them up because they go so quick and because I have so many more to do.  They fit on the width of the fabric.  They just all happen to be girl quilts, so I do have to force myself to stop every so often and pull some boy quilt tops out and quilt those in between or when I get the call for quilts, I won't have any boy quilts ready.

The fabric came in the mail yesterday to make the fish themed quilt for the math teacher who is retiring and I really do need to make the baby quilt and the other retirement quilt and...I think I have about 20 quilts on the list of must do, but I'd rather soak my head in a bucket of ice water.

Oh, and there is a pile of papers to grade.  I did get two boxes of lab books graded yesterday.  It was a very productive day.  I also finished a crochet afghan I've been working on for about a week too while watching TV.  That always feels especially good because those take a while, I'd say about 10 hours on that one.  Picture later today on that.

My oldest presents her thesis

My oldest is a graduate student at Washington University in St. Louis.  Tonight she presented her thesis, which I guess means she graduated.  She applied for a third year, but that's just teaching.  She will find out Monday if she gets it.  Wow, where did the time go?  How did she grow up and become an adult when I wasn't looking?

I will always see her as my little girl, but she makes me so proud.  She has accomplished so much.  I'm busting right now.  I wish I could have been there to hear her read some of her works.  She's a creative writing major and will most likely have a novel published soon.  I'll be sure to let you know when you can buy it :)  My older son said it should be called "My Life as an American Woman"  He's funny.

That smiley guy is her boyfriend of about 5 years.  He works for a law firm in Austin, Texas.  They met in college.  He was the quarterback.  He's trying to decide if he wants to become a lawyer.  The firm told him if he works for them for another year, they will pay for him to go to law school.  He already took the LSAT's and got admitted to several law schools.  Oh, to be young and have your whole life ahead of you.  My youngest adores him and I think my oldest does too :)

being productive

 It's not even 11am and already this morning I've quilted a quilt, trimmed three quilts, graded a box of lab books, gotten dressed, had breakfast, ironed the interfacing onto the back of all of the t shirts for the quilt I really need to be working on and sorted a box of fabric.  I really wanted to go shopping this morning and get some more plants for the garden before it rains tomorrow, but decided that time would be better spent getting things done instead of making more work for myself.  I still have half a flat of ice plants to find places for and weeds that need tending to, but it's so much more fun to go out and get new things.  I'm wanting more geraniums and some lantana plants for the front yard, but it doesn't seem to be quite time for those just yet.  Maybe a couple more weeks and they will be in the stores.  Patience isn't my strong point.  I could start cuttings from the plants I have, but that would really require patience and I'm not sure I could wait that long, plus my plants are in full bloom right now and I'd have to disrupt the beautiful display in the back yard to make the front yard look nice.  I'm not sure I want to do that either.

 So, I will work on that t shirt quilt and today's goal is to cut out all the shirts and maybe even put the borders on them.  Once that is done, putting the blocks together will be quick.  I'd also like to pull fabrics for the baby quilt I need to have finished by Monday.  Vacation is more than half way over and now I'm feeling the rush of it.  But I'm also feeling the pull of Summer Vacation.  Only 6 weeks of school left and that will go by quickly!

The life of a teacher does have its benefits.

There is no resting

When I got home from quilt day, I had this message waiting for me on Facebook from my friend. Our church participates in Safe Families. If a parent is going through any difficult situation and needs help with children, the church steps up and takes the kids so they don't have to go into the foster care system. It can be for a day or for months. There is no charge to the family or to the state and members of the church pay for everything the child needs including food, clothing, school expenses and when the parent(s) are ready, the kids go back home, knowing they are loved and supported.

Hey Marilyn The father's house is hosting three children starting today and I was wondering if you had any quilts for older children? There are two girls and one 14 year old boy. The quilts I have are more for babies and toddlers just wondering if you had any laying around thanks

So, I had kept back about 6 of the biggest quilts and told my friend to come on over. I also have about a dozen big quilts that just need binding. There's always something around here for those emergency needs. No time to rest, there's always someone out there needing a hug.

I'm always striving to be more organized to better use my quilting time to accomplish more in the time I have available to make quilts and work with the fabric. Getting more done is always a goal, but isn't always something I accomplish. I often get sidetracked by new projects while in the middle of a project, but I think that happens to most quilters. Too many exciting projects. Maybe I need to make a set of blinders to help me stay focused. :)

Great quilt day and Project Pearls meet up

 Today was an awesome Quilt Day.  My little guy even sewed a seam on a quilt the last 5 minutes of the day.  Hey, it's a start.  He helped cut the strips for a jelly roll quilt from the leftover 2 1/2 inch pieces I've had laying around forever.  He got bored playing games on the ipad and finally, after eating almost all the strawberries in the bowl decided he could give this sewing thing a try.

I think he had fun and may give it a try again.

 There were lots of new ladies and we accomplished a lot.

 This gorgeous tumbler quilt top was put together with 9 1/2 inch blocks it goes together quickly.

 The teens who showed up cut flannel squares out of the new rag die which I love.  When those quilts are sewn together, they are finished.  What's not to love about that?

 And can you believe it?  Carla actually sat down to sew!  That's a rare sight.  That woman is so busy she rarely gets time to sit.

 Here's a picture of me and Melissa, the founder of Project Pearls.  She drove out from San Jose to pick up 30 quilts which she will take to the Philippines on April 29 to hand out to the kids.  I'm so happy to have found this great organization and to partner with them.  She is such a beautiful lady and yes, I am a giant!

 Look, Carla is still sitting down.  I had to take another picture.  It's such a rare sight, I wasn't sure I would see it again.

 And one more just to make sure I wasn't dreaming :)

 More kids cutting with the Accuquilt Studio cutter.  They did such a great job with that cutter today and worked through a huge stack of flannel.

We even had an adult using the strip dies to cut more pieces for more jelly roll quilts.  We are always working on the next project.  Of course, I still have to unload my car.  That's the worse part about quilt day.  Good thing I have 4 more days of vacation.  Oh, and I still have papers to grade.  Let's not talk about that just yet.

what's a Maker Faire?

Still winning tennis titles

So, out of the blue today my daughter gets this award in the mail.  She graduated from Oberlin 2 years ago.  The letter that came with this piece of paper says she was one of the top 16 best tennis players in the last decade.  That's pretty random.  Why 16?  Why not 10 or 20?

But, after the day I've had today, this made me smile.

I thought going to the dentist was supposed to make you feel better?  To anyone out there who chooses to be a dentist, I must ask, what were you thinking?  Why would you purposely choose a career where people hate you.  And not just dislike you, but actually hate you and get physically ill when they think about visiting you.

The last dentist visit I had in February, they found two cavities.  He said they were very small, but I should get them taken care of before they became a problem.  Well, today I went in to get them taken care of, even though they didn't cause me any pain.  I've only had one other cavity in my life and that was more than 20 years ago.

After the anesthesia wore off, my jaw hurts and my teeth hurt.  I don't think that is supposed to happen.  I have a horrible migraine.  My neck hurts and I've got to say the dentist is about my least favorite person in the whole world right now.

This vacation isn't very good.  I wonder how may other body parts I can make hurt before I have to go back to school!?!

I love these vintage quilts

I have no idea where these quilt tops came from, but I know they have been in my garage for a while, at least a year.  It feels good to finally quilt them up and get them out of here into the hands of kids who will cuddle with them.  40 years is way too long to wait for that!

I know sometimes I make a quilt top and then it sits around for a while, but 40 years is a bit overdoing it don't you think?  How do I know it's been that long?  Well, the polyester fabric is the first and best clue.  I'm really surprised that the fabric has held up so well.  This one was all hand sewn too.  The seams are really well constructed and most of the points are perfect.  I love the pattern on this one and I think I will make one just like it for my friend who is adopting her grand daughter.  It has just enough blue and pink to make her and me happy don't you think?  It doesn't scream BABY GIRL, but leaves you guessing too.  With 9 blocks, it will make up quickly.  I just love the border fabric my friend Stephanie gifted me with a while ago.  It's Hey Diddle Diddle and I had enough to border all three small quilts and it looks like it was made for this quilt.

Another breast cyst

I got to spend half my day at the doctor, getting another breast cyst drained.  Actually the procedure only took 5 minutes, but because one of the ultrasound machines broke this morning, they were backed up.  I got in right on time, but they asked me to wait 45 minutes to have the cyst drained.  Sure, no problem, I'm on vacation and really have no where I have to be.  1 1/2 hours later, they came and got me out of the little dressing room.  Too bad there wasn't a bed in there.  The wooden plank they called a bench wasn't so good for napping.  I kept thinking they were going to come back and find me on the floor asleep so I would sleep for 5 minutes at a time.

I asked the doctor why I keep getting these things and she said it is all genetics, like freckles and I will most likely keep getting them.  Lucky me.  There is no danger in them, they are just painful.  Too bad they hurt and they don't come in pairs.  They do add to the volume.

This one was in the right breast and the fluid was brown instead of yellow like the last two times.  The doctor wasn't impressed with the different color.  This time she put air into the cyst to try and kill it so it won't fill up again.

Tomorrow's fun includes a trip to the dentist to get a couple of cavities filled.  Will the fun never end?

more blocks for the Accuquilt Win the Dream contest

http://www.accuquilt.com/block-contest#!/about

This block is called Candy Land and reminds me of the game I spent hours playing as a kid and also with my own kids.  It uses the Rob Peter to Pay Paul block plus 2 1/2 inch squares all around.  Simple to make and a cute block once finished.

Every block I make I like better than the last.  I'm going to have a hard time deciding which block to vote on myself.  I really like this last block called Explosion!  It's such an explosion of movement and uses the Rob Peter to Pay Paul block, plus 2 1/2 inch half square triangles

What a great quilt story

http://www.news10.net/story/news/nation/2014/04/20/widowers-quilts-piece-together-family-stories/7913757/

Think I can convince my husband to learn to join me?  But then, he may take over my quilting area.  But then again, he may build me a new quilting room.  Hmmm.

aged to perfection

Cleaning out yesterday and I came across a box of vintage quilt tops.

This first one is very long and will be perfect for an extra long twin size bed.  I added the border.  The fabrics are from the 70's I'm guessing because they are a mix of cotton and polyester.  There was some stretching and many of the blocks were sewn on the bias.  The borders helped a bit, but there's some puckering and some tucks sewn in the quilting.  You really can 'quilt that out' sometimes, if you don't mind having a few puckers added in.  Of course, the thing will shrink differently when it is washed.  Some of the seams were coming apart as well and I did some mending as I quilted it.  I didn't notice the holes until I loaded and started quilting.  Some happened as I stretched it to quilt.  I think I had better wash this one first before giving it away for a couple of reasons.  First, it has sat for about 40 years in one garage or another and second to make sure I caught all of the seams that were coming apart.  I have a better chance of fixing those loose seams than the recipient and I don't want them thinking I gave them an old quilt.  Vintage is good, old not so much :)

I do love the pattern of this quilt and I think it has come back in popularity recently.  I don't remember what it's called, but I do remember seeing it on Pinterest recently.

I have several more vintage quilt tops that were in the box, but this was by far the biggest.  I'm adding borders to the rest and hoping to get them quilted up over the next couple of days.  I'm almost to the end of the giant backing piece I made and then I can get on to other things besides the big quilts.  That will be nice!

Happy Easter

 What a glorious day!

 When did they get so big?

 The morning started with church to celebrate our Risen Savior.

 The best part of bring the youngest is you get to color all the eggs yourself.  No competition.  The oldest is in grad school, another one is in college and the brother is at his girlfriends, so little guy got to color 18 eggs.

 Can you say happy dancing?

 This year I actually bought myself Easter lilies.  I just love the smell and I will plant it in the garden after it's done blooming.  It should come back again next year.  I used to have several at my old house and they would bloom year after year, but in June.

And these gorgeous Calla Lilies.  They were only $3 at WalMart.  I had a bunch of different colors at my old house too.  I don't know why it's taken me so long to purchase these again either.  I had so many pretty flowers at my old house that I didn't replace when I moved and have decided that it's time to buy them again.  I've begun working in the front garden and trying to make it look better by adding some plants that will block out the weeds.

Accuquilt's Block Design contest

 If you haven't heard about Accuquilt's Win the Dream block design contest, you must be hiding under a rock :)  Now that I'm on vacation, I'm having fun designing blocks and entering them.  You can enter as often as you want and why not?  There's nothing to lose!  There are the three block's I've entered so far.  I'm having fun and just love these blocks.  I can't decide my favorite yet.  With EQ7 it's easy to make a block, either drawing it.  I drew these blocks in the design a block option.  You could just as easily design a block using graph paper (probably easier because once I drew the block, I lost it because I had no idea where the program saved the dumb thing!).  I got good at drawing the block until I could figure out where the program was saving the block.

Then, I was able to use the block to make a mini quilt and called that a block too.  I just rotated the block and made four blocks into one big block.  I'm not getting as much sewing done because I'm designing digitized quilting designs too.  And, I'm sorting and cutting fabric.  My house looks like a bomb went off in it.  But, I am making quilt kits that I will be passing on to other people to sew, so that's how I'm justifying the lack of sewing that went on today.  Plus, I had a terrible migraine.  I've had a couple of ok days, followed by a couple of horrible days.  The verdict is still out on the botox.  It seems to be helping as I have more good days, but still not making things 100% better.  I guess I'll take a few better days over nothing.