It came!

Finally! It got delivered to my town at 4:30pm, but didn't make it's way to my mailbox until noon today.

I'm happy with everything! I already flipped through the Nine-Patch book (good job Judy!) and peeked at the Prairie Children and Their Quilts (I'll give it a deep read later).

More thread! I had to order their newest collection, "Garden Thread Set", along with 3 spools of silver for piecing, and 2 white spools for quilting. I'll have to remember to update my Excel list with the new threads. :)

Then there's the "yo-yo" makers. One makes flowers, the other makes circle yo-yo's. The circle one looks like it'll be a good portable quilting activity, like in the car or when I visit the in-laws.

Last of all, the fabric! 15 FQs (Fat Quarters) and a 1 yard dark green piece. The yellow/gold fabric is going to be the triangles in the Pineapple Blossom, and the other FQs will be for strips. The dark green piece will be for the binding. If I did my math correctly, I'll be able to get 30 blocks from the FQs. I'm *not* prewashing the fabric this time, I can't afford to let it shrink and I'd like to give myself a chance to quilt with unwashed fabrics. Of course I'll wash it afterwards. :)

And there you have it, my goodies. ;) I'm gonna eat lunch and then start to make the Pineapple Blossom quilt.

Leah

Disappointment

I'm a little disappointed today - my Connecting Threads order didn't come! I think it's because I so rarely order stuff online (half a dozen times a year?) that I count each second it's supposed to arrive. I check the tracking number about 200 times. It hasn't been updated since the 10th. And it said it'd be here on the 13th! Hmmph.

To console myself, I just made my purchase from Amazon.com. :D Hopefully it'll come some time next week and I'll bury my nose in the books while everybody else can enjoy Thanksgiving and the mad rush of Black Friday. Have fun! ;)

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I got this in the mail last week, all the way from England! A cute purple needle book.

Thanks Anne, I love the colors, and completely agree with the statement! I think I've only mended 2 things since I got married. One time was when a button popped off my husband's dress shirt. I took it to my machine right there, right then and sewed it back on before I could think about forming a complaint. The other item was a pair of exercise pants and the decorative side strip popped open a few inches.

No mending for me! I have a sister who loves to sew clothes and we made a deal - she'll sew whatever clothes I (or any future kids) need, and I'll make quilts for her and her someday kids. ;)

Leah

I'm 25!

Today's my 25th birthday!! I'm pretty happy about it, and things that have been happening. :)

The picture is the candle that my sister-in-law gave me yesterday, spiced cider. Mmm, mmm, mmm!! It'll be vying for attention for my nose along with Bath and Body Works "Sugar and Spice" lotion. Man, I just love that stuff. :D

Highlights of the past few days...

-We celebrated Thanksgiving yesterday. My MIL is going out of town on the actual Thanksgiving day, so she decided to do it 2 weeks early. That also leaves the day free for other family members to celebrated Thanksgiving on the actual day (like my sister-in-law's husband's family).

It didn't really feel like Thanksgiving - more like they were having a grand feast for my birthday. ;)

-On Saturday I got a birthday card from my only living grandparent, Pops. You all "met" him last Christmas. Inside of the card was a $50 gift card to JoAnn's. I'm *really* touched by this gift! Pops has never mastered the computer (yet! I still hope he will) and so finding a JoAnn's isn't a one-click away for him. And the gift card also says to me that he really appreciates his quilt and wants to fully support my hobby. :)

-This morning I got an email from Amazon.com... I nearly deleted it! It turned out to be an egiftcard from my parents, for a very generous amount! I am planning to buy the Foxfire Books, and the Dangerous Book for Boys.

I almost got the Daring Book for Girls, but I read a few reviews and somebody warned that there was palm reading, fortune telling and summoning spirits mentioned in the book. Just not the kind of thing I'm interested in promoting or reading about. Plus, a bunch of the Boys book review said it was great for girls too, so I'm gonna stick with that one. Hey, I was the one who wished I could be in boy scouts when I did a year in girl scouts. :)

I'm pretty excited about the Foxfire books though! I checked one out at the library and have been slowly reading it (a LOT of information to process) and would love to own all the books in the series. This is my chance! Thanks Mom and Dad. :)

-Since the beginning of October, I have lost almost 20 pounds. Whoo!!!!!!!!!!! This is my first time losing more than 10 pounds since 2001! Yeah, I have been struggling for years. One of the biggest changes I've done was to go off of birth control in the beginning of summer. I still gained over the summer, but since my visit to my parents house in October, I've been dropping. Feels so good. :)

While I was at my parents, I went to the thrift store and found this GREAT pair of dark green dress pants. Oh, I so loved the color, I just had to try it on, even though it was one size smaller than what I could comfortably wear. Sucked in my breath to get them to button and told my husband IHaveToHaveThesePants!

Yesterday I was able to get them on with ease, eat a Thanksgiving meal and touch my toes a few hours later! Yeah! :D

-I can drive a rental car now! In the past few years it's been a wee bit of an issue. On a couple of my family vacations we had to drag my dad around as the driver, cuz none of us kids could legally drive the rental cars. And my poor mom had to navigate Gettysburg to find a bike rental shop - for a quick second she forgot that I wasn't 25 yet and almost handed me the keys. :) (Of course, we kids teased her about not giving birth to me sooner so I could drive).

-Tomorrow my Connecting Threads order better come! I'm still pouting that my birthday has been declared a no-mail day, in honor of Veteran's Day. Sunday was a no mail day. I'm a mail-a-holic. Can you tell? :D

Off to update my profile, I'm no longer a 24 year old quilter!

Leah

Close to home

I'm sure many of you have heard about the Alum Rock earthquake in California. When I first heard about it, I was like "yikes! That's really close to my parents!" But felt better when I saw the magnitude was only 5.6. Ok! I know that might be a lot for some of you, but after the 1989 one, it's considered a more mild one, on my personal scale. :)

I've been looking at pictures online and trying to figure out how close to the epicenter my parents house is. From what I understand, it was just about 3-4 miles away. Too close for comfort.

The green arrow points to their house, the orange circle is where I believe the epicenter is. The epicenter is 7 miles from Milpitas (top left corner) and 5 miles from Alum Rock (bottom center).

My dad was sure thinking ahead when he built a steel-frame house (can "give" more than wood houses), but they gotta quit having so many adventures!

Leah

Gave me the giggles

In today's mail there was a notice from our (only) credit card company that they've raised our credit line up another $1,000.

Do you think they're getting nervous about the fact that our current cards expire on the 31st and we haven't activated the new ones yet? :D We're just lazy and haven't gotten around to activating it yet.

Maybe I better make that Connecting Threads order tomorrow, cuz I'm clean out of white thread now. Somehow I'm not motivated enough to consider activating the new card just for some thread, bit o' fabric and Judy L's new book. ;)

Leah

Another one to the list

Looks I have another antibiotic to add to the "allergic" list. :(

Not very itchy, but I'm flaming red, swollen and hot to touch. Hopefully this is the last time I'll get hives - it was about 15 years ago when I discovered that I'm allergic to penicillin. Now bactrim.

So I've been taking it easy and the only quilt-related thing I've done is curl up under them. :)

Leah

Drop out

I'm dropping out of my quilt guild's challenge. It's called "Someday Is Today" and you had to make the quilt that you've been wanting to do "someday". I knew *exactly* what I was gonna do. In July 2006 I cut a bunch of strips for making a Jewel Box quilt.

The sign up for the challenge was in February, but I got distracted by several other quilts to make and finish during that time. So I didn't start to tackle it until August. Then in August it was decided that my parents were gonna come and visit in September, and that my husband and I would visit them for a week in October. So that put me behind. It wouldn't have been a big deal, except I came home with a bad ear infection and took it easy.

So today I emailed the host of the challenge and let her know that I won't be joining. The quilt would need to be quilted, bound and labeled for me to admit it. I'm just cutting it too close and have been working harder at not adding quilting stress to my life! :)

I'm still happy - I finally got started on the quilt! Now just for some borders and I'm even thinking about trying to do feather quilting on it somewhere. But I'm going to enjoy finishing this quilt more at my leisure. Which means it'll likely get done faster... go figure! ;)

Leah

Mystery completed!

I finished Renee's mystery this afternoon. Woven Rings. Can you see the green and yellow circles?

The funny part is that somebody mentioned that it looked like those chairs/furniture with wood woven in small circles. I had to think hard (and back to the 1980s) about what she was referring to. But I had a nice laugh about the unintentional pattern. :)

I'm thinking I might add another "round" of blocks to the bottom and left side, so the green dominates. That will make it from 36" to 42".

Leah

A month of Saturdays

I'm about a month behind in blogging, aren't I? :P

Saturday September 15, my parents were here. Below is a picture of them touring the Tombstone Courthouse.

It was a nice visit, but time flew by way too fast! At least I could rest in the knowledge that I would be seeing them again in 3 weeks.

Saturday September 22, we went to the in-law's house and celebrated my brother-in-law's 24th birthday.

Saturday September 29th was the wedding. I had spend the week helping prepare for the wedding. I put together the favor boxes (and fought to death with the printer!) and help set up the tables and such.


That morning my husband and I had to pick up the cake from the bakery. I had to carry it on my lap for the ride home. Every bump and wiggle made me wince! I didn't want to be responsible for the cake toppling!


Here's a picture of my husband the night before the wedding. Longish hair, beard... all has to go.

I gave him a hair cut Saturday morning and he shaved. Doesn't he clean up nicely? ;)

On the left is the newlyweds, my husband and his parents on the right.

And of course, there was the whole wedding itself! :)

Saturday October 6, I was flying over to my parents house.

Then I spent the whole week either dyeing fabric or preparing the house for my brother's Eagle Scout Court of Honor.

Saturday October 13 my dad wakes me up at 7am and I spent the next 5 hours typing and preparing the program for the Court of Honor. Then there was the whole event itself. Top of it all, I had to pack everything I could that night, cuz we were leaving Sunday morning. Whew. :)

But this Saturday? Mine! All mine! :D Hubby is away on a conference, and there's a mystery quilt on one of my groups. I'll be making the baby sized quilt and so far I think there's snowball blocks in it. With my hand dyed fabrics from last week, of course. ;)

Leah

Fingers again and Ornaments

Oh pooh! I cut another finger this morning. I was trying to trim some fat off of a brisket we BBQ'ed on Friday and I couldn't get a firm grip because I already had one injured finger.

Well, it happened. The knife hit a tough spot, I applied more pressure and before you could blink, it whacked my middle finger. I have a great husband though - he groaned when he saw me crying and rinsing my finger off, but he brought over the bandages and ointment and fixed up my finger for the day. Thankfully the cut isn't as bad or as deep as the rotary one!

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My brother-in-law is getting married next Saturday, and the family pretty much started NOW to prepare for it. BIL has been distracted with moving to his fiancee's (who just bought a house) and fiancee's daughter just started school. So we had no clue about most things. They only decided last month on the date and about 2 weeks before the wedding they settled on the time of the day. Good thing it's gonna be a relatively small and simple wedding!

This afternoon my mother-in-law, two sisters-in-law and I went to Tucson to get some items for the wedding. They wanted me there because I have a Costco membership. ;)

We also swung by Michael's and got candles for the centerpieces and a kit for making favors. I saw these clear U-fill ornaments and picked up one package for myself.

In 2006 I started to save all the dog ears from my half-square triangles. For a couple thousand blocks... it sure doesn't add to that much!

I probably shouldn't have stuffed them so full. But I can't get them out so easily now! Maybe a crochet hook? I won't trouble myself with it now. :)

But that's one way to let the world know at Christmas time that you enjoy quilting. ;)

It'd probably help if we actually bought a tree though! :D

Leah

Does my fabric look fat?

Cuz I think my fabric is overweight! Below is a picture of the outside wall directly beneath my stash.

Yeah... is it just me, or does it look like it's buckling a little bit? I even took a little walk around the complex to see if ANY of the walls looked remotely like mine. 20+ sides of the surrounding buildings later, and none of them resemble what you see.

I'm hoping it's just a cosmetic thing, and not actually the wall/foundation sinking in. But if you must know, not only most of my fabric is against this wall, but also 360 pounds of weights and dumbbells reside directly above those cracks.

Keep in mind we're upstairs, and the pictures is near the ground. Perhaps it's the downstairs neighbors fault! Or it could have been there before we even moved in. I have no clue. I feel like strongly protesting that there's no way a "couple dumbbells" and "a few yards" of fabric could do that kind of damage!

But let's not forget about Bonnie and her dilemma. So yes, it is possible that fabric can weigh down a wall. Yes, hers was along more unsupported walls... but it still gets you wondering...

Is it my fabric, or is it something completely unrelated?

Leah

Finger Update

A little warning, the last picture has a direct shot of my finger and a little blood, not more than a drop's worth. I've made the pictures "small", so you have the *option* to click bigger. :)

Here's my fingers side by side. And if you look really closely, you'll see that my right finger doesn't have a nice round curve. It's lopped. :P


Finally, finally, finally it's stopped throbbing. That was the second worse part.

The worse was when it got stuck to the bandage, despite me using ointment and soaking the whole thing in water for over 30 minutes, trying to get the bandage free.

My husband kept insisting that for it to properly heal, I needed to get it unstuck. I just couldn't bear the thought of pulling at the wound again - the first time was when the paper towel got stuck to it.

So, I'm standing there with the bandage flapping and the thought of pulling it off was making me cry again. I told my husband to pull off the last bit. I squeezed below my finger as tight as I could, squeezed my eyes til I thought I was gonna pass out and waited, trembling for 30 seconds.

Open my eyes... and the bandage is still there.

"Why didn't you pull it?"

"Are you kidding me?!"

"That's exactly how I feel!!" And I'm laughing and crying at the same time. It's way worse than having a bandage pull some hair. :P

About a minute later I yanked it off, squealed and it's been easier since. Except the typing... that's kinda slow still. ;)

I don't think I sliced any nail though. It's slowly scabbing and I'm probably crazy enough to pick up the rotary cutter again today. :D




All said and done... I'm REALLY glad it wasn't my left hand!!!!!!!!!!!

Leah

Klutz Glove needed

I had an accident with the rotary cutter this afternoon.

As I was cutting a HST, my right index finger was just a little too close to the ruler's edge and I cleanly sliced off the tip of my finger.

Gasping, crying, bandages, tylenol, ointment cream and typos is how I'd describe the rest of my day.

By far, this is my worse cut. It still badly stings 9 hours and 4 tylenols later. I've been able to keep it from bleeding all over the place, but I'm so drained from the constant ache!

Hopefully tomorrow will be better... and maybe I can finish cutting my HSTs - one piece is still in mid-slice! :P

Leah

I can close my closet doors!

Whee! I got found my sewing machine. ;) Ok, so it wasn't missing... but certainly unusable among the mess!

Those big stacks of fabric from my last post? All into the closet now. Best of all, I can close my closet doors! ;)

I'm sure I've posted my sewing set up a few times, well, I turned one table 90 degrees and basically made a "triangle" arrangement, like it was recommended in Lois Hallock's Create Your Perfect Quilting Space.

And look! Floor! It's not even hidden with bins. :D Obviously I still have a bit of a mess to deal with, but trust me, it's a thousand times better!! You can come over now. ;)

One highly amusing point about my sewing room; I've managed to lose at least 2 needles, drop countless of pins and safety pins. I'm in that room almost all day, half of the times on my hands and knees and never get jabbed or find my missing needles. My husband stops by (meaning, he actually felt brave enough to step in the room) and in just 5 minutes he finds a pin that I never knew was there. :P

Time to clean the rest of the apartment! My parents come in 15 hours... and I have to sleep during some of them! :P

Leah

Wanna help me clean?

So, can you see my sewing machine? No? Me either...

This is all the fabric I picked up from the FLOOR. Never mind the fabric in the closet or bins!

Yup, I'm cleaning in anticipation of my parents arrival tomorrow. Tomorrow!! :D Eeps. I'm can feel myself getting excited. :)

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Just for kicks, here's something I posted on a forum about busting the stash/not buying so much. I really do feel like I have ENOUGH fabric! I mean, that picture alone is about 175 yards.

One of the things that really helped me feel "full" on fabric is to organize it. Sort it by color, type, theme... whatever YOU like for your fabric. "Re-handling" all your fabric again can really drive home how much you have.

For me, it was when I moved. Oh man, 3, 4, 5, 6, boxes of fabric (keep in mind each box held about 150-250 yards). And it just kinda blew me away with how many yards I have (yes, over a thousand, probably not 2000).

I think it's important to realize that we also need to USE our fabric! There was an estate sale in another state for a quilter - she had 15,000 yards. No kidding!!! They sold it off at $1/yard. While many of us would love to have been at that sale... it's kinda sad. That all that money and time she put into buying all that fabric did nothing for her or her family. It ended up being "pawned off" to strangers. It wasn't lovingly passed onto friends and family members who would treasure and appreciate her efforts. I don't want that to happen to my fabric. I want it to get used.

Another idea is to take 50 yards of fabric - be it 50 one-yard pieces or 10 five-yard pieces. Fold them up all the same way and stack them on top of each other. Wow. It's not looking like very much, is it? Yet 50 yards can make quite a few quilts!

From 50 yards you should get...
12 baby quilts
9 lap quilts
6 twin quilts
3 double/queen quilts
2 king quilts.

(And my figures are being generous... I bet you could take the scraps afterwards and whip up another quilt or two. Yes, I'm counting backings too).

I have been cleaning my apartment - and my quilting room - in anticipation of my parents coming over tomorrow. My room has been messy for a long time - I found stuff from last October! But as I've been cleaning, I've been folding and stacking up fabric. I have about 25 yards of hand dyed fabrics that are neatly stacked. Using that as my "guideline", I'm guessing I picked up 175 yards off of the floor. Yeah! That's either fabric I've bought in the past year, or likely used in quilt. A few pieces were being "auditioned" for possible quilts and I didn't put them back afterwards.

I've already started about 15 quilts this year, and I've completed 7. It's not like I buy fabric just to have more of it, but I'm actually using it up... but I'm not using it up as fast as I buy it!! All in all, I'd wildly guess that I've *used* 100 yards. That's not really a big dent in whole pile of fabric, especially because I'm still buying!

So, I have enough fabric. Time to start using it up. I have some family members who still don't have quilts. And by using it up, I remove the "guilt" over future purchases. And I get to feel good about myself using fabric and giving quilts.

Plus, when I die, I don't want somebody being overwhelmed with my stash! I want them to go through a stack or two and say "ohh! Look at that green piece, she used it in both of my boys quilts." "Mine too! And I think I spotted a bit of that blue in the couch quilt she made. She was very talented with the machine. I'm gonna miss her."

And not... "oh crud... what in the world are we gonna do with all that fabric?! Does the Goodwill take it?"

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Still, if you wanna come over and help me clean... you might get rewarded with some fabric. ;) (No, don't come over, I haven't had a shower in a few days, and I figured I'm gonna sweat some more, so I'll shower tonight!)

Leah