merry christmas to me

I do love my house, but when we bought it there were a few things that we didn't like. 1. no real closet for the master bedroom. Which we took care of last year. 2. the acrylic sink that came with the house was scratched and stained. It was also a double bowl which I have never liked. For Christmas I asked for a new silgranit sink with a single bowl. I really wanted a farm house sink, but would have had to cut the marble and modify the cabinets to get it to fit so I thought this was the next best thing. Well DH does NOT do Internet shopping. So after I picked this out I got a note for Christmas saying this is what I was getting. Well since we were in no particular hurry I waited until the web store had a sale. This arrived last Friday and DH spent last evening putting it in and doing the plumbing. 3. Is remodeling the upstairs bathroom which is going to have to wait for quite a while, but for now I love my new sink. :cD

light at the end of the tunnel

No time for sewing, but I think I am starting to see a light at the end of our tunnel. Now that the horrible tenants are finally out we have been spending any available time trying to put the apartment back into rent-able condition. We went into this particular rental a little naive I think. They were our 3rd tenants in this apartment and the family we had before them were wonderful. These people wanted to move in even before we had a chance to clean. They said they would clean it themselves and wanted to move in immediately. We were just happy to have it rented so soon. There was some older wallpaper and they asked if they could change it. DH said simply "sure" not thinking that they would do something outrageous. I mean, it isn't their property. They allowed their teenage daughter to paint her bedroom HOT pink (notice the overpaint on the outlet) with primary red accents around the windows and doors (notice the overpaint on the switch by the door). Those colors don't even go together. I thought I had taken a picture, but evidently even my camera must have been offended. Not only were the colors horrible, but they did an ATROCIOUS job with the work. The woodwork was stained, but we had to paint it because they slopped so much paint it couldn't be cleaned off. Then, for the coup de gras, there were 4 bright colored rectangles in a grid, probably 12" by 18" each, in bright purple, yellow, orange and green with the playboy bunny symbol painted in the center of each of them. It took 2 coats of primer, 2 coats of paint and another coat of paint ragged over that and I can still see the outline of those tacky bunnies. This is what it looks like now, after 3 solid days of both DH and I painting. Big improvement. Big exhaustion.

um....

I did do some stash busting this week. The only problem is I did more stash acquisition than I did reduction. We had to go do work on our rental apartment to repair some of the damage our tenants {grrr} did to it. I wasn't going to stop at Marden's, but DH wanted to stop because they have good prices on paint brushes, rollers, etc that we need to do the work. I don't know if you remember this post from Christmas, but look what I found for $2.99 a yard. I just couldn't resist. I will be able to make a much bigger quilt with the addition of these to my fat quarters. Right? You would have done the same wouldn't you? Did anyone notice I do fine as long as I stay away from Marden's?

OK, final tally:

Stash used 2 1/2 yards

Stash acquired 23 yards

the fruits of my weekend

I got 25 blocks completed and the half square triangles sewn for about 10 more. If my back didn't hurt from being bent over my sewing machine I would put them together too. I'm going to take them to work with me tomorrow and show them to Wendy and see if she is happy or wants me to change a color or something before I get it all put together.
Stashbusting accomplished this week: I cut up 4 1/2 yards of fabric and didn't purchase any.

quiltathon day 2

1. Make chicken pot pie ready for dinner. CHECK
2. 2 turkey pies in the freezer. CHECK
3. Pasta sauce in the crock pot. CHECK
4. 2 loads of laundry washed 1 to go. (DH taking over) CHECK
5. I'll have to wait on the dough. I ran out of whole wheat flour. Oops.

Lunch eaten, the last strips of half square triangles cut and I'm ready to head out and start assembling blocks. :cD

end of the day

I thought it would look like more. :c\
After spending almost an entire day cutting, sewing and cutting again it should look more like a quilt. It will go faster now that the cutting is almost complete. I only have 6 strips left to cut into half square triangles.
I can have about half the day tomorrow to see how much more I can accomplish. Other things are going to intrude:
1. Make chicken and turkey pies.
2. Put pasta sauce in the crock pot.
3. Laundry. :P (hopefully DH will help out here)
4. Make pizza dough.
Oh, and our realtor called. They are showing our house tomorrow. We really need to sell it. Everyone, please send positive thoughts our way for a good offer. I think since we listed some people have sold, bought and sold another one. Time for ours to sell. It really is a beautiful house.

progress

After a couple of hours of cutting I had a little mishap. I started to drop my rotary cutter and instinctively tried to catch it. Stupid move, but I just did it without thinking. I didn't even feel it, but it started to bleed pretty badly so I felt it needed a bandaid. Wouldn't want to get blood on my fabric would I?

After that, I worked until I was so hungry I couldn't concentrate on Harry Potter anymore. I have most of the large pieces cut and have to make the secondary cuts. Here's what I have accomplished so far. I'm going to sew some blocks before I finish cutting. I get bored cutting, but will get back to it after I get some sewing accomplished.

start me up

Harry Potter Half Blood Prince loaded onto my iPod and all my fabric straightened. After my cutting table was cleared I was ready to go. I am starting a Queen sized duvet cover for a friend of mine at work. I'm going to be spending the morning cutting. Hopefully, I will be able to start the sewing this afternoon.