Uh-Oh!

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I started a new scarf out of the pink fuzzy yarn I bought, but I’m still not done with the blue one yet. Oh wait… I’m not done with those, plus the new Wedding quilt, the Apple Core quilt, there’s that antique quilt I’m working on, I’ve got one that I started when I made Wedding Spectacularrrr that’s the same pattern, only in bold colors, I still haven’t finished the one that I’m making for my Granny, and yeah… there’s a Trip Around The World quilt that I’m doing by machine that I started in 2000. Just what I need to be doing–starting new projects, that probably won’t get finished.
Hopefully I’ll have some extra time after the stress of the last three days at Fox are through. Here’s me having some fun at the teleprompter during a commercial break tonight. Let me tell you how glad I’ll be to never, ever, ever run a teleprompter again after Sunday night.

Don't these headphones make my head look awful?

I’ve got to stop starting new projects.

Somewhat Redunant…

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I know it’s been mentioned time and time again, but I love the Quilt Index. It’s a slow night here at work, so I’ve been scanning through it. It’s such a great place to go to get inspired for color or pattern ideas.
I’ve been thinking about pieces of the antique Grandmother’s Fan quilt that my Granny gave me. Right now, I’m using yellow quarter circles, but I found this verson of a similar quilt, and I’m thinking about possibly using the red instead. It’s so much more vibrant than the yellow.
I’ve also been thinking recently about how important it is for me to be a good, consistant quilter. I had been working on the quilt for Laura and Steve at work the other weekend, and someone mentioned to me that it’s unbelieveable that I’d want to do all that small work by hand. I think it’s hard for people outside of this art to understand that quilting is, in fact, an art. No one would ever go up to a painter and ask why they put small details into to their paintings. I think it’s why I was so worried that my Wedding Spectacularrrr quilt would be appreciated, after countless hours of hand piecing and quilting were put into it. But it makes me want to work harder as a quilter; to become exceptional in my work.
Oh, and by the way, I got a job. It’s temporary for the time being, but it’s a start. My last day at Fox is this Sunday, and Monday morning, I’m an aid for a special education boy in a first grade classroom–at least for a little while. It’s quite a career change, but I’m feeling good about it. Yay, for somewhat steady work!

SPAM, SPAM, SPAM

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The technical support crew here at H.T.P.S. Headquarters has added MT-Blacklist to hold back the rising tide of SPAM and advertisement comments. If anyone has trouble posting legitimate comments with the new filters, just e-mail me and I’ll make appropriate changes to let your comments through. Happy blogging.

Weekend Project

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I love it anytime I can finish a project in just a couple of days. My quilts always take so long to do, that it’s almost like a race for me to finish a small project as fast as I can. I bought the materials to make a messenger bag on Friday, and I finished it up late last night. It’s gray corduroy, with wool felt flowers tacked on with buttons. For making it in just over a day, it’s not too bad, and it’s cheaper than any of the other bags that I had been looking at. I only spent about $15 for the materials, instead of $60 for the bag in the store that I liked the best.

Look Mom! I made a bag!

And here’s the details of the flowers:
Button flowers

Now I can take my quilting with me in a semi-stylish bag!

You Can’t Sew If You Leave Your Thread At Home

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I’m stuck here at work, with no work to do (okay, I’m actually waiting for a soundbite from the Howell Melon Fest to come back to the newsroom before I finish my last story tonight) and I can’t sew since I left my thread on a table in my living room. My philosphy is that even if they don’t have work for me to be doing here, I might as well at least be working in some sort. So I guess I’ll blog instead.
(Oooh…people are jumping on big trampolines on the Olympics right now. At least the Olympics are recording on my TiVo right now.)
I did want to mention that I really think it’s cool how people have started to notice this little website of mine. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve gotten mentions or permanent links on Material Girl, All Too Quilty, Quilt Reflections, In A Minute Ago and Albedo Designs. I’m really excited that I’m not the only quilt blogger out there, and that people are actually reading about my work. I think there’s a lot more really great quilt work that’s being documented online than I know about, and everytime someone leaves a url with a comment, I’m excited to check out what they’ve done, or like to do.
Awww….swimming is on. I’ll be so glad when I don’t have to work evenings or weekends again.

The Knit & Garden Update

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Time for a quick post before I head off to work for this evening (only 11 more days left at Fox, yay). I’m about halfway done with the blue scarf, and despite several finger sized holes where I’ve dropped and picked up stiches here and there, it’s not looking too bad. (I’ll post another picture of it when I finish it up.) I really like the soft boucle yarn I’m using, since it doesn’t seem to show my mistakes as much. I also picked up another ball of rosy colored yarn at JoAnn’s this week. It think it looks like a pink angora bunny all balled up right now.
I took a few shots of the parties going on out in my yard right now too. My sunflowers are huge, and doing really well. Aside from the wilted looking one in the front, they look great for planting them from seed earlier this year. I’m going to have to put them up again here next year too.

Sunflower Party

My Black-Eyed Susans are cool too. I spilt this plant this spring and gave half of it away, and it’s already grown back to as big as it was this spring.
They Won't Stop Growing!

Okay, I’m off to work. But my quilting is going with me too!

Another Quilter Takes Up Knitting

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I didn’t want knitting to be fun, I really didn’t. So to prove to myself how much I’d hate knitting, I bought a ball of yarn, and had my mom show me the knitting basics. Turns out, I don’t hate it. In fact, it’s really pretty cool. I’m thinking that by the end of the winter season, I’m going to have a scarf to go with every outfit I own. This one with the blue yarn is going slow, but I suppose you can’t expect much from your first attempt at knitting.

My First Knitting Project

But that’s not to say that I’m giving up my quilting anytime soon. I’m almost done cutting the pieces to the new wedding quilt, and I’m working on piecing what’s already cut up. I just have three more prints to cut, and I’ll have the whole top of the quilt ready to sew up. I’m getting excited, since I think it’s really going to turn out well, at least color-wise. It’s one of those things that once I see the fabrics next to each other, it just makes me so happy that I don’t stink at combining fabrics.
See! I’m still quilting!
Still Cutting Fabric

Let The Sewing Begin

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So I’m still cutting pieces for the latest round of wedding quilting (when will you people stop getting married?!?) but I couldn’t help myself and I started sewing. After a while I just had to do something else but cut. I know I ought to use my rotary cutters to help out, but I feel like I have more control over the fabric when I use scissors. It’s probably the same reason why I don’t like machine quilting either–I get a feeling of controling what I’m doing when I sew by hand. It’s also the old lady in me creeping out. You know I’m actually a 56-year-old in the body of a 23-year-old. It’s weird.
But when I’ve been stuck here at work (only 21 more days left until the Channel 10 takeover) in the evenings I’ve been on the search for new good quilting websites. Is it just me, or is there really no good quilting websites? Everything that I’ve found has just been pretty useless. Although, in the past couple of months I have found that All Too Quilty, and more recently Quilting Reflections, are another two quilting blogs that are good sites, that are written by people who are actually good quilters. But overall, I’m really blown away by the fact that quilting is hardly represented on the web. They’re all knitters! Where did all the knitters come from?!? Knitters make me jealous because I wish I could do it. It’s just another thing to add to my book of things to do after I finish the projects I’m already on.
Good news for me! My nearest and dearest friend Kate, is visiting from North Carolina this week. I see a shopping road trip in the very near future for us!

It’s Too Hot To Sew!

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I’ve been cutting pieces for the next wedding quilt I’m making for several days now, and I was in the mood to take a break from that. Unfortunatly, it feels like it’s 90 degrees in the house today, and keeping a quilt on my lap to work on just doesn’t excite me too much. But I did pull out the Apple Core quilt that I’m making for my parents. I’m hoping it’ll be much cooler by the time I get home tonight from work to do some sewing. But I was pleasantly suprised by it. I hadn’t worked on in in some time, since I wanted to get Wedding Spectacularrr ready to go. Turns out, I’m on row 20 of 30. So with that said, I’d like to try to have the top completly pieced and ready to quilt by the end of October. I think that’s pretty reasonable.

Apple Core Quilt

But while my sewing isn’t loving the heat, my flowers sure are. I moved a lily that was in a weird spot next to the shrubs in the front of the house to along the side of our fence this year, and it just finally opened up. I was afraid I had hurt it when I moved it, but apparently it was okay. It’s now one of my most favorite flowers in the yard.
Pretty Pink Lily