slow and steady.....

I had a really good weekend quilt wise. I worked on my hour a day quilt for a few hours trying to catch up. I was hoping to do the November one as well, but I think with my trip to Denver and my weekend visitors I just won't have time. I really don't need another UFO and want to get this one finished before starting a new one. I have all of the alternate blocks finished and 19 of the leaves. I'm getting closer. .. :c) I'm really happy with this quilt. I have made it completely from my stash. I haven't bought even a new spool of thread.
I also finally found the fabric I needed to finish my mystery quilt. I had originally purchased the yard for another collection that I have been building then this project came up. It was perfect with the other fabrics I wanted to use for this, but with the mistake in the cutting instructions I ended up a 1/4 of a yard short. So when I found it I had to replace the yard for the original collection plus the 1/4 yard. I ended up with 3 yards. When I run out of something I always seem to overbuy. :o$ Funny how that happens....

the good, the bad and the ugly

the good........
I'm back from Denver and had a wonderful weekend. When planning for our move I had invited my quilting group in the town I moved from to come and see our new house when we got settled. Before I left it turned into a plan for a weekend mystery ride and retreat. A couple of the girls and I were the planning committee and I think we did a good job if I do say so myself.
DH decided to decamp for the weekend (can't imagine why) and stayed at the old house to do winterizing chores along with DS. He drove me to my friend's and we got everything together for the weekend. We met everyone else, 9 total including me, at 7 the next morning. We split up into 3 cars and started off on our adventure. First stop was a bakery to get breakfast and pick up the dessert for that evening. Next stop a small rural quilt shop. We had called ahead and had her open early for us. It is a very small shop and it's a good thing there weren't other customers since we pretty much took over the space. She did do quite well though, since I think we spent over 1000 dollars between the 9 of us. We had a little trouble getting everyone out on time, but half an hour late we continued on our way.
Next stop was lunch (notice how prominently food plays into all plans). I had found a small burrito place with good reviews in a shopping center that had other choices in case someone was opposed to burritos. Turns out everyone was amenable to that so we all ate together. It was very good and as it is close to my house I think DH and I will probably start going there when neither of us feels like cooking. We thought we were running behind, but as it turned out the burritos were so fast we arrived at our next stop a little early. We had arranged a class at the quilt shop closest to my house and we all made the tops for felted wool pin cushions. It was great fun and we ended the "out" portion of our day with more shopping.
When we arrived at my house my friend had premade chili and I had made some bread in my bread machine. We put her chili on to heat while we had "show and tell". Everyone showed all their purchases and we had a prize for the person who had been the most frugal. We figured that the people who had spent the most didn't need a fat quarter bundle. :oD After eating we played a couple of games of LCR with fat quarters and Pictionary with quilt block names as the clues. It was great fun and we laughed so hard at some of the "unique" drawings. Can you figure out what quilt block this represents???
Everyone sat around and worked on their individual projects until bed.

the bad.......
One of the girls revealed that she had found my blog online a while ago and had been reading it and looking at pictures of my round robin rounds. INCLUDING her own. You know who you are. Bad, bad girl. You are ruining your own surprise. :oP

the ugly......
After we woke up on Sunday morning and we were starting our day all of a sudden we had no water. No bathroom, no coffee, and no washing dishes. It sort of put a damper on our morning. We did have enough bottled water to finish making coffee and tea, but people had to go to a nearby gas station to use the bathroom. The party broke up about noon and DH came home to see what he could do to help the situation. It turned out to be the motor on the pump had died. We tried replacing that, but it was old and on so hard that DH had damaged the pump getting it off. We ended up having to replace the entire pump. Let me tell you, you don't realize how many different things you use water for in a day until you go to use it and it isn't there. I never noticed how many times a day I washed my hands until I couldn't.

puppy sitting

Puppy sitting isn't very conducive to quilting. He is very active and needs a lot of attention. That is my leg in the plaid jammie pants. Most of the time he is either in my lap, right beside my leg with his head or paw on my laptop or dropping a toy on me to throw. I have to try and keep his kong filled so he is occupied for periods of time and I can get my job work done. I have managed to do some of my stems. About 11 I think, but he has narrowly missed being stabbed with a needle multiple times because he would rather be in my lap than let my sewing be there. Just like a baby though he does nap periodically which is how I have managed the 11 that I have completed. He's lucky he's so cute.
DD did a beautiful job in Giselle. I saw 2 performances. She had a soloist role and a number of corps roles. Samantha, you were right the Ellie is a beautiful theater. Too bad DH couldn't come. He would have loved the captioning in the seats. He always complains that he doesn't know what was going on during a ballet. I wish I was going to be around for the next weekend to see Dracula, but I'm not sure I would like all the blood anyway.
I'm hoping I have more room on the flight back on Wednesday so hopefully I can get the stems finished. :o/

fall progress

I've been working furiously to get as much of my leaf quilt done since I won't be able to devote my hour a day from Denver. I had DH set up my design wall before I left and I took this on my new wall to show that I have actually been working on my quilt. I have over half of the alternate blocks totally put together and the parts are all made for the rest. All my parts for leaves are put together, but I decided that I wanted to do my stems differently. I thought it made them look more windblown. I did bring the stem squares to do handwork while I am here. Hopefully, when I get home I will be ready to put my blocks together.

denver anyone?

Anyone out there from Denver? I'm going next week and wondered if anyone had any quilt shops to recommend. DD has a solo part in Giselle and I have more vacation than DH so I'm off to see her first show in Denver. I'm also going to help out with my new grandpuppy. He is having a little trouble with the long rehearsal hours that come before a show. He will be happy to have someone to hang out with while she is working. Here is a picture of DD with her new "baby". I get new pictures of him almost daily and am being told I need to put at least 2 so here is another. :o)
I'm going to have to take a break from my hour a day leaf quilt for a week or so, but like Judy says "it's for fun". I got a pretty good start on it tonight. I worked 2 hours to start to get more done since I know I'm going to be gone. I didn't get to start sewing because I hadn't done any cutting yet. I think I have pretty much all my leaves cut and I just have to cut background and alternate block pieces then I'm off sewing. I can't wait to see what it comes out like. I'm not totally sure about my background, but we'll see.