I Quit

Today I finally said , "Enough! I quit!!"

I was trying to finish up a quilt I have been working on for over a year. It's a beautiful quilt, but I just haven't been able to muster the energy to finish the borders or the corners (all which require lots of piecing!). This quilt has always been a big pain to me, but I guilt myself into working on it when I can.

I spent several hours last week cutting the fabric pieces out and all I lacked was the sewing.

Usually when I sew on a project I will spend all day in my studio jamming to Pandora and sipping on a sweet beverage. Today I tried.

I spent a couple of hours at my machine. I tried to love the process. I attempted to be crazy in love with this quilt.

                                                   ***Halfway finished quilt***

I tried.

I really did. I did not enjoy a single minute spent on this quilt today.

The problem is that I have 24 hours in my day. 24 hours to really work on things I love. 24 hours to be with people I love. 24 hours to truly feel passionate.

This quilt, this project just fails me. Finally I quit.

Oh, I have enough to make a nice size quilt as a throw or a table cover. So I ironed the quilt smooth, neatly folded it and placed it in a bag with backing fabric. In a couple of weeks I will give it to my favorite long arm quilter to finish.

It felt great.

What did I do with the rest of my 24 hours?

I concocted a new cheddar cheese, one with 5 peppers to spice it up!

I played with puppies and with my little boys, who also played with puppies.

Finally, I made a promise to myself to not pursue activities and projects that do ignite any sense of love or passion or spark.
Life's too short ya'll. Go make the most of these next 24 hours!

Happy Saturday Ya'll!

The Fabric Stash

Inspired by my cramped storage space lovely assortment of fabrics stashed away in my closet, I decided to organize it all!
That is the one problem with being a quilter......quilters are actually fabric addicts. We buy fabric just because we like it and because we "plan" to make something eventually with that fabric. It can spend years stored away in a "fabric stash."
I have spent the last couple of weekends using up my larger pieces of fabric to make bags and totes and such, but what to do with all of the small pieces can be overwhelming.
Most of the time I throw it all on a couple of shelves or in a box and wait for the inspiration to sew with it all.
Truth is, it can be too difficult a task when you are not even really sure what pieces of fabric are in the bottom of that stash box.

I started by cranking some Fleetwood Mac up on Pandora and sorting all the stash fabrics by color. I have blues, pinks, greens, purples, oranges, and brown and blacks.

Being that I am feeling frugal and I did not want to put appropriate store shopping clothes on this weekend, I found what boxes I had and stacked the fabrics in said boxes. I plan to hit a store some time this week and buy plastic boxes with lids that will stack neatly on the shelves.

Something that is important (I think) when you store and organize your fabric stash and scraps is to fold the pieces as neatly as possible. It will save you time down the road when you do not have to spend so much time ironing out a billion wrinkles. Also, I had a stash of Christmas fabrics and decided to make a separate box just for those. Sometimes it is difficult to decide which color category a piece falls within so it's perfectly fine to have a "pattern" category or whatever fits your groove.

Now that I can see what I have, I can create something with all of these strips, scraps, and tid bits of fabrics!
The time I spent this weekend will pay off down the road when I decide to sew something with some scraps.

In fact, I found a stash of coordinating fabric and made a special little game for the kids.

Tic Tac To, anyone? This was very simple to put together and the kids have played and played all afternoon.

There was no need to sew anything fancy, just some squares with a little sashing between.

You could use more subtle colors too, but I prefer the bright, playful ones.
Wouldn't this make a great gift for a child? It would also be a nice game to take along in the car.

Now that this fun project is finished, I have another set of fabrics that I am cutting to make a quilt.

It will be a bright one! It is amazing what I found crammed on my shelves this weekend!
So these are my new projects for the next few weeks.

What projects do you have going?

Have a fabulous, productive week!

Lather, Rinse, Repeat

I feel like today was "Ground Hog Day." Not the cool day in February when we all wish warmer weather was lurking around the corner, but the movie with Bill Murray. Everything has been done twice around here.

*Leia, the farm goat*

The day started as a day to be productive. I mopped, washed all the towels in the house that were dirty (that equals a bunch o' towels in this house) and decided it would be a great day to catch up on things like make up pancake and muffin mixes for the week. The kids dutifully finished school but then I got distracted.

*Willow being silly*

You see I had this fabulous layer cake that was begging to be pieced into a quilt so I pulled out my sewing machine and got busy sewing.

Here's where it all started. I finished sewing all of the squares together and the border when Zeb needed some milk to drink. Just as I was pouring the milk I spied the baby crawling into the pantry. No biggie, I would grab him in a few seconds. Then after those few seconds the door closed and I heard a noise from inside that pantry. "Oh no! I smell something familiar coming from the pantry!"

 * a mess from my past*

Well, behind my door was a gallon jug of peach melomel (wine). I made it over a year ago and was waiting to buy wine bottles to bottle it so it could ripen another 6 months. There sat my baby in a hug puddle of wine as he continued to pour it out on my floor. One gallon of homemade labor gone.

I yelled for the girls to get "all hands on deck" so we could grab the freshly washed towels to sop up the wine. Indiana changed the baby while the rest of us cleaned the floor.

I washed the towels.....lather, rinse, repeat.

I mopped the floor...lather, rinse, repeat.

I decided I would make more wine next summer when the peaches ripen...lather, rinse, repeat.

I continued to sew. This was when I realized that quilters are crazy people. You see, I sewed 36 blocks together and added a border around those blocks. The next step was to cut it all up into blocks again and sew those back together...lather, rinse, repeat.

* Cutting the first piecing*

Who in their right mind does that????? I do. A. Lot.

Think about that next you see a quilt or your granny gives you one as a gift. That quilter, your granny....is crazy.

*The start of the second piecing*

Speaking of CRAZY! I somehow was placed on a vote for Top 25 Family Blogs on Circle of Moms. What crazy cat put me on there? Well, I just discovered this and really do not want to finish last. I am close to the being in that 25 group. Will you vote for me HERE? My picture isn't even on there, but I have no clue how to fix that since I have no clue how I got there....BUT I frequently read A Baker's Dozen and love her. She is currently #2. I actually voted for her several times before discovering I was there too. You can vote once a day. So vote tonight and then tomorrow you can....lather, rinse and repeat!

The positive side of all this mess was that the house smelled deliciously like wine.

You can't find that scent in a Yankee Candle!

Have a groovy night, ya'll!