Rick better be careful how much he encourages me to get out because I do it pretty well. Yesterday Connie and I went to Minneapolis to have lunch with Lynette. Most of you know Lynette Jensen of Thimbleberries fame who wrote books, patterns and designed fabric for over 30 years during the same time we were in business. We have been friends for all those years and remain friends who touch base with lunch about once a year in Minneapolis near where Lynette lives.
She recently started designing fabric again for RJR and she brought us a gift! Yard cuts of Garden Collage!
It’s beautiful and I’m planning my quilt – I may add some shirt fabric – hard to say at this point, but I’ll keep you posted.
After lunch we shopped there at the Galleria in a dress shop that we liked and when it came time to pay, my credit card was declined! I have only one, a Target Master Card, and I pay the balance every month. I insisted she try the card again. Nope. Give me that card, I’ll call them. (They are a Mpls. based company.). I was told to give them a phone number so they could send me a text code which I did. She called me back. I answered a dozen questions such as -why are you not at home? Where are you? Why didn’t you let us know you were traveling? Where were your most recent credit card purchases? I nearly came unglued! How long will you be in Mpls? I am only 2 hours from home for the day having lunch and shopping! They were checking for fraud but isn’t that just too too much? Obviously I don’t get out much! I punished them the rest of the day by paying only with cash and not using that credit card. Ha! I showed them! (smile everybody)
Then we drove to Anoka, north of Mpls to Millie P’s Quilt Shop and I meant to take pictures but I was still too rattled by the credit card company and I simply forgot. It was such a nice clean, tidy shop and of course we both found things to buy. Like all of you, we needed NOTHING but still had a handful of fat quarters to buy.
Back on the road it was raining and rush hour so it was slow going to IKEA but we were rewarded when we got there because it was nearly deserted. We have never been there when it was so easy to shop and shop we did. Remember the Enie Joe Mauer fabric? They had it in stock and also had this EJM pillow.
We loaded up about 7 pm and we noted that the only thing we could add to the day would be a stop at the Mall of America which is just across the street….but I pleaded to just go home. I was exhausted. Home by 9:30 – a really great fun day!
As I turned out the lights to go to bed, the barn motion light came on. As I looked towards the barn I could see that because the weather was so nice, Emma was up and planning to sleep outside on the landing. Emma has an adventuresome spirit.
Oh, almost forgot — yesterday morning — 3 for 3. Another opossum in our trap, 3 days in a row!
Are you sure it’s not the same possum??!!
Wow, what a day, I am just tired reading about it! Mille P’s is one of my favorite shops–love the bright colors. Also love Lynette’s fabric, look forward to seeing your quilt!
Hi Mary!
We never do really retire!
I’m heading out in the morning to teach a weekend retreat!
We are blessed to love our work!
“Carry on”!!
Sharon
Don’t know if true or not..have heard that opossum are quite territorial and when you relocate them you need to take them at least 15 miles from home (where you trapped them)..good luck
I had a credit card declined while in London at Harrads. Very embarrassing. Luckily I had another
card. Since I have had my credit card hacked, just this month, I am more appreciative of security measures. It seems as though we are under constant attack by conartists. I get calls every day, it seems, to give them my access codes to computer, buy senior items I never indicated an interest in buying, and give them (supposedly the IRS money) over the phone. It has become increasingly easy to contact people to take advantage of them, both on the telephone and on computers and other devices. The result seems to make life more complicated with more passwords to remember, more loops to jump though to use the credit we have built up over the years. I don’t know if there is a solution when there are people out there that want an easy way to get our assets.
Annoying, but I am glad they questioned you. That’ll teach you to leave home!
Love the pic of Emma enjoying the great outdoors. Thanks so much, Mary, for keeping up the blog.
B
It looks like a fun day. A comment about the credit card…as someone who has been a victim of identity theft I can completely understand what happened to you. I just wish a lot of companies had contacted me firsthand and thousands of dollars would not have been lost!
Love your every day stories. Same thing happened to me on my credit card.Made me P—ed off and never used the card again. then one time went to Kohl’s and planned on using their credit card but my ex daughter-in-law had such bad credit that they would not let me use it that day. I could write a letter to Kohl’s if I liked but I told the manager I did not need these items and could get them somewhere else. I left the store with no items and cut up my credit card and have never been in the store again. Mind you there was a whole line of people and I was so embarrassed.
We are having summer like weather here in VA and I am enjoying it.
Carolyn
Love the fact you are getting out. The same thing happened to me last year when I was about two hours from home; they declined my credit card while I was trying to buy shoes! So aggravating and then it is hard to concentrate on your shopping! Thanks for the updates…I always look forward to reading them.
Such a nice picture of the three of you!
Omg I wish I had a fabric designing friend who gifted me with such a fab present! Very cool! You’ll have to have her sign your quilt label!
You live a beautiful life!
Wow, how lucky am I to kind of know 3 worldwide famous people!
Love your Emma the goat.
I love reading your blog and all the adventures you girls take. Your days if shopping are so exciting. To never need anything but come home with something you can’t live without is so fun. I love Lynette Jennings fabric and her patterns. Envy you that you have known her all those years. You girls are all my quilting idols.
I do have to wonder how you get your projects done so fast. I am so slow. To many other projects at home to keep me busy I guess.
Kate
Maybe u will have to spray paint the possum’s tail to make sure it’s not the same one you let loose?😊Lynda
I am also a never-again Kohl’s shopper. I wrote a check, and showed them my driver’s license. The clerk put my check in a slot in the register, and then mis-typed my driver’s license number (it has a lot of zeroes in a row, and I think she lost count). The register printed VOID on my check and that was it! She couldn’t re-enter the DL number. I really needed the item, and used every last bit of my cash to buy it. But I’ll never go back, if that’s the way their system works.
Glad you had a fun day out!
I laughed when I read three for three and wondered if you weren’t just trapping the same one over and over and over. If that is what is happening then that fella isn’t very smart. Or maybe he enjoys the security of that trap. I loved the picture of Emma in the spotlight. She’s such a sweetheart. Fabric! One can never have too much fabric.
Ah yes, credit card fraud. My card was recently declined at my local car wash when buying a package of car washes as they have it coded as a gas station. I’ve been going there for years and being declined was a shock and then I had to talk to fraud people too…cash is king I guess, lunch with both of you and Lynette Jensen. I still collect her early fabric…that would be awesome!
I wonder if Emma was keeping a watchful eye for more ugly Possums? So many years ago I came home from a date one evening with my now husband……. there was a Possum on the cement walk way up to the front porch. We shouted to scare it off… it hissed at us a few times before falling flat and ‘played Possum’. I hope your third Possum “is the charm” so to speak.
Lovely fabric from Lynette..GARDEN COLLAGE…I’ll watch for it.
Continued thanks for your posts. I am an avid fan of yours. 🌻
Hey great photos of you out of your zip code zone. Thanks for reminding me I need to get to Ikea to buy some of those black cat pillows for the daughter-in-law. And what a wonderful gift that Lynette gave you!
Wow!! It pays to have friends in the business, huh?? Nice gift!! Been to IKEA several times. . . Didn’t see any fabric!! S’pose everybody in the Twin Cities will be there lookin’ for those cats now!!
Love reading your posts. . . Thanks!
Wow…sounds like you gals all had a great day…n cash is always better the CC… Thanks for sharing…
What a great day! Spending it with friends. Next time you better let your CC company to decided to leave home. THey are watching YOU😄
Wow…sounds like you gals all had a great day…n cash is always better the CC… Thanks for sharing…n a great display of fabric from your friend….
You have such a fun life!
Great picture of the 2 of you with Lynette! She’s such a nice person! How lucky for you to get yard cuts of her new line! How generous of her!! Can’t wait to see what you make from it!
My daughter bought that same pillow at IKEA in IL in August! How funny! She loves it!!
Love that Lynette Jensen fabric. What a fun, fun day:) It is fun to get out!! We caught 14 chipmunks that were destroying our bulbs, flowers, etc. and ONE one eyed baby bunny that went back out to his mom. The chipmunks live in a new forest not far from us so I hope they don’t return. We left three so Squeak would have something to watch:)
I love the black kitty Ikea fabric. Thanks for sharing your day!!
We recently made a trip from Minnesota to New Jersey. Hubby’s credit card was accepted at motel in Ohio and then declined the rest of the trip. Called card company and they chastised him for not informing them of our travel plans. “Security” they claim. Said he would have to notify them if he used card in Iowa– less than 30 miles from home.
You are so lucky to have Connie as a traveling buddy. So much more fun when there is someone to share your adventures with. Liking the same things helps a lot.
So fun to hear your adventures up in my zip codes! I grew up near MOA (back then it was the Met Stadium). And my home was also really close to Galleria. Now I’m in the northwest suburbs and go to Millie P’s whenever I can! Sounds like you had a very full day!!!
I LOVE the picture of Emma backlit on the barn landing. It has great story to it!
We are two for two with possums!
Oh what a wonderful day for you!!! Lynette! I loved her books when I first saw them in the 80’s and still have them. I remember looking at her fabric and dreaming of some day learning to quilt. That someday came last year. So glad I still have her books and will look for her fabric. Reading your blog is a delight! My grandparents lived in Minneapolis for 60 years and we would go every summer and one year we stayed with them for 1/2 year during a job change for my father. I loved it there. I loved the weather and the houses and the trees! Lovely state and can’t wait to go back to visit relatives. Have to do it soon as we are all leaving earth one by one!
Karen-Stuck in NC
Mary, sounds like you had a fun day. Went to Canada this summer with a friend and she notified her credit card company…I only use a debit card had had no problems. I am sure I would have been upset if my card had been declined !
thanks for keeping up with your blog…it’s my first stop on the internet every morning. Lee
What a wonderful fun day !! Thanks for telling us about Lynette’s new fabric. I will watch for that.
So fun to hear about all your adventures.
Was going to ask what bait you use in the trap? But after seeing all these comments…. not sure you would get to the end……. I caught six possum in ten days…… and was trying to get cats…. and this is on a 1/5 acre subdivision lot.
Still trying to get the cats….. way too many…. seems like a cat congress out there and about as much use as our current congress.
We had our credit card refused while visiting our daughter in Illinois. We have a second, seldom used card, that was also refused. I called both companies to find out what was going on. Both said it was because of where we were trying to use them. We travel to Illinois at least once a year and never had a problem using them before. Now we have to call both companies to tell them our travel plans.
What a fun packed day you had!!
Love that Emma is your free spirit and sleeps, in comfort, high above her kingdom…hahaha.
That happened to us while we were traveling out west this Fall. Our credit card wasn’t accepted so my husband called and the same reason they told you, they were afraid it was being used fraudulently. We got it worked out and continued on our way. Charge! I guess with identity theft nowadays, they are being overly cautious, but if my credit card was stolen I would be glad they did this.
Sounds like a fun day to me. Where is the info on the cruise? Paula in KY
Paula – contact Stitchin’ Heaven in Texas for info on the cruise