Today was not a quilting frenzy, but I did get a few things done. First I went through the pile of pieces I created in cutting super 9-patches last night and came up with a combination of center and larger border pieces. A fat quarter cut into 9-inch squares created the corner pieces, and another super-9-patch top is ready for quilting. That sent me into the flannel drawer looking for backings. I found some great possibilities, but once they were washed and dried, they were just a tad skimpy. I don't want to cut the tops down to fit, although that could certainly be done, so for now I put those away and I will look for alternate possibilities when I go to Monroe on Thursday. I need to remember to buy at least a yard and a quarter, if not a yard and a half in order to have the length I need.

While I was working on that top, I got an idea for using the rest of the fabric and some of my scraps as well. Since I already had some 9-inch squares, I went ahead and cut some more. Then I cut some batting a little bit larger, and created a top by sewing and flipping strips onto this foundation. Here is the result:

The process of sewing down the strips creates enough quilting through the back to hold things together. The blocks can then be joined together with sashing strips. The quilt I often nap under was made with this technique, and it has served me well for several years. Notice that I pieced the center strip to make it wide enough. The plan is for a quilt 4 blocks wide and 5 blocks long; that should be a good size for a child's quilt. I think for this one I'll make all the backs from different fabrics, but I may change my mind before I'm done.

So not exactly a frenzy, but forward momentum just the same. And since the scrap bin is overflowing at the moment, this idea comes at the right time.

The quilting frenzy of the past five days has finally blown itself out. Tomorrow I will do ordinary things like laundry and cooking and my job. But it sure has been good while it lasted.

Today I finished the Disappearing 4-Patch. It took about an hour to sew the chunks together, and another hour to add the borders, and it was done. I'll just say that some quilts are art, and I certainly consider some of the things that I have made to be art. Other quilts are just meant to do their job of providing warmth and comfort; this is definitely one of those quilts. But I like the technique, and I expect I will use it again in the near future; given the right mix of fabrics it could even be quite elegant.

I was quite proud of the fact that I managed to get the borders on with the orientation that I meant them to have. I wanted the text to read right side up toward the edge of the quilt, and that's what happened. I know it doesn't show that way in the picture, but it really worked for real.

Once that was done I pulled out the fabrics for the tessellated flowers and started cutting. Once I started sewing I realized I wasn't absolutely sure about my choice of size for the small triangle pieces. I had originally cut them 1-1/2 inches, half the size of the 3-inch block. But then they seemed a bit skimpy, and I wasn't sure. So it was time to make another set using 2-inch triangles. Here are the results of the two experiments: I'm still not sure. I've decided to set that aside and just look at them for a while, then chose. I've also decided that this is going to be like the tilted stars and be a "leader and ender" project - one where the blocks get sewn in and around other projects. Once in a while a simple project is good to have around, but after a while it can become mind-numbingly dull if that's all I work on. So I'll have pieces cut and ready on the work table. When I run out of fabric I'll sew it together and see what I've got.

Once I set that project aside, then there was the question of what to do next. I remembered the Super 9-Patch baby quilts (http://www.quiltmaker.com/patterns_downloads/quiltmaker/patt230.pdf) that I've made in the past and remembered that I had bought a set of fabrics to make some for Taigen, only I made her another quilt instead and these got set aside. It was easy enough to pull out the fabrics and cut. If I had paid attention to where the fold was on the first set, the sewing would be easy as well. As it is, I've pulled some other pieces out of the scrap drawers to make some substitutions, and we'll see what we eventually end up with. The one I was able to complete from pieces that ended up (mostly) cut to the right size is this one:

So at the end of 5 days I have 3 tops completed, 2 more that will just be a matter of figuring out what will fit together, cutting a few new pieces and sewing the 9-patches together, and the beginning of a lovely napping quilt for myself. The Tilted Stars and the Disappearing 4-Patch will go to the long-armer on Thursday for basting; the baby quilts will just get a flannel backing and I can handle those myself. I consider it a successful frenzy.

Got a lot of sewing done today for a Sunday. It helped that it was picnic Sunday and I only had one service and that one here. The disappearing 4-patch isn't quite done, but I've gotten as far as sewing the blocks together into chunks of 4. So only a few seams to do tomorrow, then add the borders and I'm done. I even found a piece of flannel I like for the back, so I'll get it into the wash tomorrow to preshrink it.

I did find in sewing the blocks together that I had to pay more attention to orientation than I had thought at first. I should have done the pin in the upper left corner before I took anything down from the design wall, but I muddled through the hard way.

The one thing I did differently with this quilt that seems to have made a difference in the end was that I pressed the seams open. I know it violates some sort of rule, but with all the turning of pieces, I wasn't sure how the seams would end up in adjoining blocks. I think in the end it saved some grief. We'll see how it looks in the finished quilt.

Now I've worked too late and I'm tired. I'll finish up tomorrow and see what else I can get done before I have to deal with reality on Tuesday.

Today was a good day in the studio. I got more than half way through a disappearing 4-patch quilt that will probably go to tornado relief. It's a simple quilt that can be done with scraps or with yardage. I wanted the cutting to go quickly, so I chose a cat print that I wanted to put to good use, then chose a couple of coordinates.

Here's the process, more or less. If you want to see more, there are several other tutorials out there on the web, such as: http://sewwonderful.blogspot.com/2010/02/disappearing-4-patch-or-4-to-9-patch.html. You start with a 4-patch. I started with 6-inch squares. The only rule about fabric selection is to avoid anything directional, unless you don't mind part of the design being upside down. I was amazed how many of the cat prints in my collection had all the cats pointing in the same direction. I'll have to look for some that are non-directional.

Once you have a 4-patch, you lay it on the cutting board and proceed to cut it into a 9-patch. I decided to measure out 2 inches on each side of the center seam, but the measurement is really arbitrary. After I had the block assembled, I thought maybe 1-1/2 inches might have been better, but I wasn't going to waste a finished block.

Once the 4-patch is cut into 9-pieces, take the middle piece on each side and rotate it 180 degrees. You end up with something that looks like this:

Then all you have to do is sew it together like any 9-patch, and you're done. Add a bunch of other blocks and you have something like this:

A couple of thoughts about the cutting of the 4-patch. This is definitely a time where "measure twice, cut once" comes into play; don't ask me how I know this. The other thing is that you really don't want to pick up the pieces part way through cutting the block. I have a small cutting board (it shows green on top of my big blue mat in the pictures) that I can rotate so I don't have to stand on my head to cut in the horizontal. It also helps that I can use a rotary cutter equally well in either hand, but that's not essential.

This quilt will end up with 24 blocks, plus a border if I can find something in stash that I like. I suspect this will be a place to use one of the stripes or directional prints I rejected as my main fabric. I'm hoping to have the whole thing put together by the end of the day tomorrow. I have another new project waiting in the queue that I'm itching to start on, so I want this one off the design wall as soon as possible.

The March retreat ended up being pretty much a bust. I got nothing of any significance done, and for no good reason except that I kept getting sidetracked with trivia and never really got in the groove.

But this weekend, while not a official retreat, seems to be making up for it. Both yesterday and today I've made good progress, and since the rest of the weekend seems to be relatively quiet, I should be able to continue on as I have begun.

The Tilted Stars is finally assembled. I am insanely proud of the fact that I did not screw up the sewing of the directional print on the borders, and did not have to undo something sewn on wrong side up. I won't swear that all the pieces ended up in the places I had planned, but so far I've only spotted one instance of neighboring blocks having the same fabric. Since I think the quilt will be fun as an "I Spy" for a kid, that can be one of the things to look for. I got the backing fabric earlier this week, so on Thursday, when I have to go that way anyway, I will take it to the long-armer and have it basted. With all the tornados lately I know there will be calls going out for charity quilts, and this one is big enough to cover a bed, so I hope somebody will love it and be comforted by it when it's finally bound and ready to go.

Now I have to decided what to work on next. The Yellow Brick Road is at least half quilted, and for the same reasons, I am feeling compelled to finish it. But I don't want to start on it until morning; I want to be fresh when I work on something that's a bit outside my comfort zone. I have a couple of ideas for scrap quilts, but I suspect I'll spend most of the night cutting and not get a lot of actual sewing done. I guess I'll just pull out some boxes and see what strikes my fancy. There should be something I can finish and maybe take to the longarmer with Tilted Stars.

And since that retreat I've hardly had time to pick up knitting needles, let alone focus on quilting. Of course, part of what made that time so productive was that I specifically designated it as quilting time, and gave that priority over all the other demands on my time.

So I'm doing it again. Thursday is the start of the NCAA basketball tournament, and it's the perfect time for a quilt retreat. I don't know that I'll get in quite as much time over 5 days as I did in February, but that doesn't matter. The point is to set a time and a goal, and work toward accomplishing it.

MJ will be here, and that can be both good news and bad news. I know she wants to put a few stitches into the DWR, so we can work on that for a while. And I really want to show her Kay's new shop in Vicksburg, so I may have to kidnap her for an afternoon and drive down there. I'm sure I can find something that I desperately need that will justify the time and the gas to go there.

So what about goals? Here's a good start:
1. Finish sewing the Tilted Stars together. Half of it is in blocks of 16 already, and the layout is fixed, so that should be doable.
2. Put in 5 hours on the DWR (1 per day). I think my fingers are up to this.
3. Finish the embellishment of the Spring Wall Hanging. Most of this is hand-sewing and fiddling until I get a layout I like.
4. 15 minutes per day of cleaning.
5. Finish quilting the Yellow Brick Road.
That should be more than enough to keep me busy for the weekend. Not that I might not pull out something else that looks interesting.

The retreat is officially ended. I knew this afternoon it would end when the last disc of the audiobook "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert ended; to try to listen to something else and continue sewing would be anticlimactic. And I was coming to the end of what I wanted to accomplish for the weekend as well. So it's over. And I'm pleased with the result.

The Christmas project is 2/3 done. I finished the last bit of that sewing this afternoon, and have now set it aside so I can work on other things for a while. It hasn't gone far; I haven't made a project box for it. It's good sewing for a day when I don't want to have to think too much. But it's time to look at something different.

I've started sewing the Tilted stars together. I posted a picture of this quilt when I first put it up on the wall on November 8th (wow! November!), and I didn't take a new picture today before I started sewing. I'm putting 16 blocks together, so the final assembly will be 3 units wide and 4 units long. It's easy sewing; nothing matches except at the corners. All I have to do is remember which way is up, and which side is left.

I did another hour, give or take on the DWR. My fingers are starting to toughen up, but today my back was hurting some, so I didn't try to push.

That left the spring wall hanging, and it didn't get as much attention this weekend as it probably deserved, but it didn't get totally ignored. For the record, this is the way it looked at the beginning of the day:

The problem is the block in the upper right with the flowers on it. This one:

It's got sweet yo-yo flowers and dimensional leaves, and I love the way it looks. But it's the only dimensional thing on the quilt, leaving the rest of it looking a bit - well - flat. The obvious solution is to add more dimensional embellishment, but that means getting creative, and that's when my anxiety level goes up and I start sewing tilted star blocks together instead.

But I had gotten so far as to assemble a basket of fabrics and doo-dads and stuff that I thought I might be able to use some day. At some point I had made this sweet origami flower:

I think with some leaves or something around it, it will fit quite nicely into the Ohio Star block. In fact, there's a piece of lime green ribbon in there that might take ruching quite nicely. So there's the beginning of one solution.

Then I got into the drawer of yo-yo makers and got out the one that makes flower shapes. I'm thinking that 3 of those, with a couple of leaves, will nicely fill the basket. So with just an hour of work, I was able to pin a couple things onto the quilt and begin to see possibilities.

So not a finished project, but one that might be ready for sandwiching and quilting in a fairly short time. I'm hoping to find some time to work on it this week; there's another snow forecast for Wednesday, and that might help.

I guess today was the payoff for the past two days, because today things began to come together. The work I had planned on the Christmas gift project is nearly done; I have about 2 more hours work on that and I will be where I want to be at the end of the retreat. In the course of the piecing today I got out the "leaders and enders" project I had worked on while I was piecing the DWR; I have a plan for those blocks when I have enough of them, so it made more sense to stick those blocks in the string instead of pieces of waste fabric. I kept having to stop and add more fabric to them, so it made sense that the "real" project was getting done too.

I also took advantage of a nice sunny afternoon and decent light to work on the Tilted Stars. I think it's at the stage where I'm ready to call the layout "done." I can see places where I might tweak it, but it's going to be hard to come up with a layout where two blocks of the same fabric aren't at least in the same neighborhood. And the overall effect looks balanced. So it's time to quit obsessing about getting it perfect and just start putting it together. It's a kid's charity quilt after all; perfection is not a requirement. I'll take it down from the wall in 4x4 sections, photograph the sections as I lay them out on the flannel board, and hope to get them put together the same way I have them laid out now. I make no guarantees, knowing me. But I can at least try.

I did another stint on the DWR, also taking advantage of good daylight. I'm nearly to the next corner, another marker of progress. I think the plan to quilt close to the edge, then bind the quilt and secure the edges is still a good one. Maybe with forward progress on a nearly daily basis I can get there by the end of February.

That leaves just the spring wall hanging untouched of the projects planned for this weekend. And in a moment of serendipity, there was a segment on ruching on "Sewing with Nancy" this morning, a technique I have thought about incorporating into the quilt. I suspect I will not get to this project until Monday, because there will not be a lot of sewing time tomorrow, and I will probably use it to move the Christmas project off the list. Ultimately I think it will be a process of auditioning things and making choices. That means trusting my creative instincts, always difficult for me. On the other hand, I'm getting tired of seeing this at the top of my UFO pile; I'd much rather see it finished and hanging on the wall.

I have no idea where the time went today, but I ended up with precious little time to quilt. Trini came to clean this afternoon, and of course I had to pick up around the house to be ready for her. I cooked pork chops this morning, and got the roux ready to make gumbo tomorrow. After Trini left I realized it was the 4th and if I didn't pay my water bill today it might get cut off, so that meant going out in the rain and slop. Then "Funny Girl" was coming on, and of all the movies on today, I wanted to watch that one. The next thing I knew it was 7:00 and I hadn't been in the studio yet.

I did manage about 15 minutes on the DWR. It was just before the movie came on, and so the last of daylight. The pictures are from yesterday. Taking a picture of my own hand seemed like the most logical way to prove that I had actually been quilting. But of course I couldn't stitch while I was trying to focus the camera, so it ended up being just as staged as if I had never taken a single stitch in the quilt. And then Bart came to help out gravity, and I tried taking a picture of him. But of course he's all black, and when he turns his face to the camera he ends up with "demon eyes."

When I did finally get to the studio I realized that my left shoulder had been aching all day. This is the one I injured in the accident years ago, and a cold damp day got to it. Even moving pieces from their stack to the sewing machine was causing me pain, and it was a kind of repetitive motion. So I worked through one side of a CD, then decided to just tidy up and get ready for tomorrow. Here's the table all set with cut pieces and partially assembled components, all ready to go. My glasses are even there waiting for me.

So I'm about to take some ibuprofin and head to bed. I have work to do tomorrow, but I plan to start the day in the studio. Saturday morning usually brings sewing and quilting programs to PBS, so I'll start with those, then get on with Sunday preparation. I really want to get into the studio in daylight and work on the placement of the Tilting Stars blocks, and tomorrow seems to be the day to do that.

Day One of the retreat has come to an end. I didn't have that many hours I could spend, by the time I went to Lake Providence, then went grocery shopping and had a nap, but it counts.

I first spent about 45 minutes on the DWR. It was already nearly dark when I started, so the light was not real good, and the podcast I chose was relatively short, so 45 minutes was enough. The kitties came in to keep me company, of course, so it was a pleasant time. I do wish sometimes Bart were not so completely black; it's next to impossible to get a picture of him. I'll try again another day.

Then I went down to the studio, where the primary goal for the evening was to get more pieces cut for the Christmas project. I did that, got sewing lines marked on a bunch of pieces, sewed a couple of strips together, and generally got things ready to make an assault on this project tomorrow. Because it was already after dark, I didn't try to work on the Tilted Stars; relocating colors is definitely a daylight job. Then before I left, I got out the spring wall hanging and pinned it up where I can look at it while I sew pieces together. I still can't say I have a plan, but I'm working on one.

So that's where we are, ready for tomorrow. In the morning I will have to do some cleaning to be ready for my help in the afternoon, and do some laundry. I also will do some cooking. But there will be sewing time in between tasks, and by afternoon all those things should be done. Tomorrow there may even be pictures.

It's now official; the quilt retreat is this weekend. I don't have any special meetings or anything going on, and there doesn't seem to be any reason to put it off. And with the Super Bowl on Sunday, there is a kind of holiday feel to the weekend already. So from tomorrow night until Monday night, I'm going to be in the studio except for the times I need to be working. I even went looking for crockpot recipes today so I would have good food to eat (gumbo and pork chops, in case you're wondering).

Here are the projects I plan to work on:
1. The Christmas gift project - I'm a little over 1/3 finished with the piecing, and I plan to be 1/3 finished by Monday night. This is not a stretch by any means. The fabrics are already on the table, although I'm nearly out of cut pieces. The piecing is pretty mindless. A good project to work on while I listen to an audiobook.
2. The Twisted Stars quilt - arrive at a "final" layout. I'm not far from there now; I just need to do some climbing to work on the upper rows. This works well in small increments. Whatever condition it's in on Monday night, I will photograph it and declare it ready for assembly.
3. The Double Wedding Ring - I still can't manage more than an hour a day of hand-quilting, but 5 days is 5 hours. Forward momentum.
4. A spring wall hanging that's been on my table for a while. It needs dimensional flowers to supplement the few that are already there. Last summer I bought a whole bunch of the new Clover yo-yo makers. It's time to get them out, along with the book on origami flowers, make some decisions, and move this project closer to done. It also satisfies the requirements of the Quilting for the Rest of Us challenge.
5. Finish quilting the Yellow Brick Road quilt that I started machine quilting a few years ago. This one is a maybe, depending on getting the other machine work done. It's about half quilted, and not very skillfully at that, so I'd like to just move it off the list. If there's anything that has a chance of being completely finished at the end of the weekend, this is it. That's the incentive to move other things along so I can set up the machine for it and work on it.

So that's the plan. Tomorrow I have Bible study in Lake Providence and I will make a Walmart run for groceries and pet supplies on the way home. Once I'm home, the retreat can begin. Today I got some work out of the way, and went into the studio long enough to clear away some of the clutter and finish up the one piece of the Christmas project that was nearly done. We won't talk about the condition of the floor or the clutter in the corners; I'll deal with that stuff when it bothers me.

Oh, and I will post pictures from time to time. Progress must be recorded and celebrated.

A second trip to the doctor and another round of prescriptions, and I'm actually starting to feel half human again. Yesterday I managed a hair appointment, grocery shopping and putting away the last of the Christmas things all in one day. A week ago I cancelled the hair appointment because I didn't have the energy to do it. Today I tidied up the books on the coffee table and loaded up a stack of books to take back to the office, which freed up shelf space to put some of the other work-related books that were cluttering up another surface. Forward momentum.

I also spent some time today quilting on the DWR. I had done a little bit last week, but today managed to put in a little over an hour on it. My goal is to have it finished by mid-May so it can be carried to Canada in the truck that will be taking a load of stuff northward. This is going to mean many days of stitching, but I think it can be done. I find this makes a nice mid-day break for me, so that has helped me figure out when I am going to fit this into my life. After lunch I can load up a podcast or an audio book, and that helps serve as a time marker, as well as entertainment. I don't want to work much more than an hour at a time until my callouses are back in working condition, as that just leads to sore fingers and unhappiness.

I reset my "yarn bank" to $0 at the beginning of the year, since I knew I had depleted the balance, and then some, in buying yarn for Christmas gifts. Since yesterday was the end of the month I added up my contributions for January, and was pleased to find that I've earned $17 in credits. At the same time I realized that I really don't need any yarn. I have plenty for a year of charity knitting, as well as some lovely yarns for gifts. So I'm not planning any yarn purchases in the near future. I'll just bank the credits and see how long I can go before I find something I just can't live without, or some clearance yarn that has to be "rescued."

Right now I'm working on a set of dishcloths for Theresa and Devan's new house. It's a little late to call them a housewarming present, but that was the original intent. They should be finished in plenty of time for MJ to take them back with her in March. I also have a baby sweater and a hat on the needles, working toward this year's charity projects.

I finally decided I'm going to make a kind of "knitting journal," using an artist's sketchbook I bought on sale last year and incorporating the ball bands I'm saving. I haven't decided what all I'm going to include in the journal yet, but I'm open to ideas.

I haven't done a lot in the quilt studio yet this year, mainly because of my health, but I did do a little stitching last week on what is now going to be a Christmas present for 2011. I'm not calling it a UFO because I never put it away and worked on something else; I just ran out of time to work on it. Since it was sitting there, it was pretty easy to just pick up and start sewing. I also have the Tilted Stars on the design wall, and I'm slowly working at getting the colors distributed more evenly and identical patterns separated from each other. That one does count as a UFO, so I have both a new project and an old one going.

My next goal is to schedule a quilting retreat for myself. I'll need to study the calendar and see when I can string together a couple of days to focus just on quilting. If I can go from Thursday evening to Saturday night, I should be able to get quite a lot accomplished, including some of the clean-up tasks I want to do.

For now I'm off to finish a dishcloth and work on a scarf. The weather is turning cold again tonight; working with wool sounds like a good idea.

Still trying to get my health back. I went to the doctor last Friday and got some meds to help, but it's still been a long slow road. I'm finally able to sleep for more than a few hours at a time, so I'm hoping in another week to be mostly back to normal, whatever that means.

Since I've been sick, I've had little energy for anything but the essentials, so quilting hasn't even been on the horizon. I'm hoping next week to get into the studio for a few hours at least and sort of "swab the decks." Over the holidays all kinds of things got dumped in there, and it's time to clear that out and get back to working order.

I have been able to do a bit of knitting when my cough lets up for a while. I finished a second brown mobius. When I bought the yarn I thought I would need 2 skeins for 1 mobius, but after knitting up the first skein, I thought it looked just fine, so I stopped. The second one I did a little differently from the first, so it has more of a mirror image from the center out look. I don't think it makes a huge difference in the end, but I like it, and that's what counts.

I also made myself a pair of fingerless mitts. It rarely gets cold enough here for gloves, but sometimes a little extra is helpful. They're red with a pretty cable design down the back. I made them on dpn's instead of 2 circs, and there's a bit of a ladder where the needle changed, but I'm not going to fuss about it; I might if they were a gift for someone else, but not for me.

A couple of other projects are coming along, including a baby hat, a scarf, and a pair of socks. Hats for AR Children's are getting done, along with the first baby sweater for CWS. I did a little bit on the pi shawl that is one of the hold-over UFO's. And the best news is that I now have $10 in my yarn bank. Not exactly a lordly sum, but enough to buy a couple of skeins on clearance. Now I just need to get well enough to have the energy to shop.

I got home from my Christmas trip on Friday with a whopping case of bronchitis. Today is the first day I've felt half-way human, and haven't been spending more time coughing than not. So I decided it was a good day to wrap up knitting for 2010 and start to work on 2011.

Actually, I did a little yesterday. I tried knitting on a complicated shawl, but that was beyond my capability, so I got out some acrylic and started a hat. I finished that hat this morning. So the first of the year's charity projects is done.

Finishing the hat made me think about getting my knitting diary up to date, and going through the project bags and all that sort of thing. I frogged a pair of mittens that I didn't particularly like, and put away leftover yarn from a couple of projects. Then I decided to get out last year's lists and see what progress I'd made. Unfortunately, most of the UFO's from last year's list are still on this year's. They are things that have no particular need for completion, so they seem to get pushed to the back burner. I need to make one of this year's goals getting those things done, so they're not on the list next year.

The Yarn Bank got reset to $0 on January 1st, so getting that built back up will be necessary if I am to have any new pretties this year. I also thought I would try something new - keeping all my ball bands for the year. I have 1 so far - from a mobius I finished on the trip home. Not sure what I'll do with them, but maybe I'll think of something clever.

Time for a sit-down. I'll pick out a UFO and work on it. Then maybe I'll choose a pattern for MJ's socks. Or find some other new thing to work on. At the very least there's a baby sweater to cast on. Tomorrow I need to get back to work, so I plan to take advantage of this day of convalescence.

I finally finished the last of the Christmas knitting on New Year's Day and gave away the last bits of it yesterday. It felt so good to sit down in the afternoon and cast on a new project with no deadline for completing other than it's a winter garment and I'd like to be able to use it this season. But since it's mostly garter stitch and I have a good bit of airplane travel coming up the end of the week, I don't see any reason why it shouldn''t be completed in the near future. I also brought a more complicated shawl project with me on this vacation, and if I feel up to it, I may get that one onto the needles this afternoon. I'm battling a cold today, so naps and medication take first priority. Tomorrow we are planning to go yarn shopping in the city, and I definitely want to be well enough for that.

The one kind of funky thing I've decided to do for this year is to keep the ball bands from all the yarns I use. I think it will be interesting to see how many new skeins I use this year, and what gets made from them. I have the ongoing hat and baby sweater charity knitting, but no specific goals beyond that, other than to try not to be finishing Christmas gifts on New Year's Day. I know I chose a lot of colorwork projects this year, and they naturally go slower than some other types of knitting. I'll try to remember to compensate for that next year.

When I get home there will be quilty things going on as well. I'll have to start by digging out the studio. Then we'll see what's next. Meanwhile I'm going to watch the sky get brighter for a while, then I'm going to hunt for a comfy sofa and a dog to keep me company.

A couple of years ago someone who knew that I did a lot of charity knitting asked if she could do an interview for a local magazine. She said blithely, "I'll be in touch after Thanksgiving to set up a date. Oh, and we'll want to take pictures of some of y."ur work." She was completely outdone when I answered, "That's not got going to work. It will all be gone by then." To date the interview has not been done.

This is the time of year when I distribute all the things I have been working on all year. Some churches have an "ingathering" in the fall to gather together all the projects various mission groups have been working on. I have an "outgoing."

Today I did the first drop-off of 44 hats for the Knitting for Noggins project at Arkansas Children's Hospital (http://www.archildrens.org/volunteer/Knitting_for_Noggins.asp). I take my hat to a very special yarn shop in Arkadelphia that serves as a gathering point for lots of charity projects and sells fair trade goods. Knit Unto Others ( http://www.knituntoothers.com/) has lots of great yarn, but more than that, is a place that invites you to have a seat at the table and just hang out and knit for a while.

Today I was smarter than usual, and determined that my visit to the shop was my only goal for the day. That meant I could spend all the time I wanted, without a need to rush off to some other place. Let's just say I went in with two bags of hats and came out with two bags of yarn. I'm on my way to well-stocked for Christmas knitting.

Tomorrow I'm off to Little Rock for the second drop-off. This one is a church-wide effort to create layette kits for newborns. The hard part of the kits, at least in the warm climate where we live, is the little sweater; they simply can't be bought around here for less than $20.00. So I promised the church that I would provide sweaters for the kits they create. This year they outdid themselves; I was prepared to knit 20 sweaters, and ended up needing 30. Amy helped by sending me 3 from her stash, so we were able in the end to complete 28 kits, with a few things left over for next year. In addition, 8 of our kits went out with handmade blankets in them. One of my parishioners loves to crochet baby blankets, and we love for her to do it.

I love watching the hats and sweaters pile up in my yarn through the room. A kitty litter pail full and labeled makes my heart feel good. But even better is the process of emptying them all at the end of the year. It means that all those stitches are on their way to the people that need them, which was the point in the first place. And of course, they go with my prayers. Whether for the child patients at Arkansas Children's or the tiny newborns that go home wrapped in one of Diane's blankets, lots of prayers go with the garments.

Maybe, when all is said and done, it's the prayers that are really the point.

Today was a good quilting day. I worked on the double wedding ring for about an hour while the cats took advantage of being allowed into otherwise forbidden territory.

Then after lunch I took out the slanted stars UFO and put the blocks up on the design wall. I did a little bit of rearranging, but didn't get too obsessive about it. I decided to tackle it by color group, so worked a bit on the lime greens, since they seem to pop out in this picture. Tomorrow I'll work on the turquoise blues, getting them more evenly spread out. Other than that, I'm just going to try not to get two blocks from the same fabric too close together, but otherwise try not to overthink it too much.

Because it was my Sabbath day, I didn't work at cleaning. The one thing I did do was put a finished top and its backing fabric back into the drawer of finished tops. I had taken it out and pressed it thinking I might give it as a gift this Christmas, but I've realized I'm not going to work on it anytime soon, so putting it away removed one bit of clutter from the back of a chair. Tomorrow I'll work at clearing the seat of the chair. One step at a time.

Then I spent several hours working on the current project, a Christmas gift in the making. I'm not going to show any pictures of anything resembling finished product, but here's a picture of the sewing table. If you can figure out what I'm making from this picture, please don't tell and spoil the surprise.

In the middle of all this Diane came by, so she got to see the studio for the first time. She remarked on the flamingos, which I guess I've gotten used to. She made me appreciate them all over again; I even got the lighted ones turned on for the first time in a long time.

There won't be much time for sewing tomorrow, as it's a pretty full work day. The Circle will be meeting here in the morning, so I have to put the DWR away, at least into the music room and tidy up the dining room. Cleaning up seems the best way to use a small bit of time, so that's what I'll focus on.

Today we changed the clocks back to Standard Time. It's not a traditional day for making resolutions, or charting a different course for the future. But it is a day that marks a transition from thinking about the world in summer terms to thinking in winter terms. So it seemed as good a day as any to think about quilting goals.

It's also a good time because I am nearly to the end of my charity knitting projects for the year. I have one baby sweater that needs buttons, and another that needs sleeves, and they will be the last of those for the year. Next week I will deliver the hats to the shop that collects them for the Knitting for Noggins project, and so however many I have done by then, that will be the end of those for the year. What knitting I do between now and the end of 2010 will be Christmas gifts and things that I myself need for the coming cold weather, but that's not the kind of production knitting I do the rest of the year.

So I'm thinking about quilts, and specifically, setting goals for what I want to accomplish between now and next spring's return to Daylight Savings Time. I have thought up six categories as a way to organize the work.

The first category is anything that relates to the studio remodel. This got stalled out in the early fall when I went to Canada and everything came to a screeching halt. There are still things sitting in the middle of the floor that need some other place to live. And the next "project" is to sort through the pattern books and get them more organized. I need to set aside a block of time regularly to work on this.

Category 2 is old quilts, or UFO's. I really do feel overwhelmed by these at times. I feel like I can't start anything new until I've finished some of the old projects, but then I don't really want to just work on old stuff either. I think if I designate some time to work on those but allow time for new work too, that will help.

Related to #2 is #3, which is stashbusting. In the process of sorting scrap bins I've actually added more to my unsorted scraps, and those bins are now overflowing. I need to work on cat quilts or something to just use up some of those pieces that are too small to save, but too big to throw away.

Category 4 is new quilts. This will include some Christmas things, but also the double wedding rings that are in production. And I won't eliminate the possibility of starting something brand new if the muse gives me the urge to get creative.

The last 2 categories are technique oriented rather than project oriented. The part of quiltmaking that I enjoy the most is hand-quilting. So category 5 is to keep making forward progress on some hand-quilting project. Right now it's James' and Crystal's DWR; if that gets finished before spring, there are plenty of tops in the drawer all basted and ready to go. Especially now that there's more light in the morning, the dining room is a pleasant place to work, so I will work hand-work time into the morning hours.

And finally, I want to spend the time to be more proficient with my sewing machine. Now that I've had the thing for 10 years, I realize I've never done the kind of systematic working out of the decorative stitches and features that I need to do to be really comfortable with anything but straight sewing. The only way it will get done will be if I block out time when that is the priority.

The hand-work category is one that I need to work on daily. Right now I don't have the callouses on my fingers to work at quilting for long stretches of time, so short stints work best. This week I've been listening to new podcasts as I stitch, and I find one podcast - about 45 minutes to an hour - is as much as I can do. So that's the goal - to quilt daily for at least that long.

Some of these are things that I don't want to do every day. Who wants to organize and clean every day? Nor do I want to do scrapbusting or machine practice for long periods of time. So these will get worked into the days when my work schedule is busiest. I'll do what I can accomplish in the time I have - 30 minutes at least - and consider it time well spent, then move on.

The days when I have more time to spend I'll work on the categories that result in quilts getting finished, the old and new quilt categories. Until Christmas, most of the new stuff will be gift related, so it will need to get the lion's share of the time. But just to be able to show some progress at the end of the week, I'll work on older stuff at least one day. I can think of one quilt that is ready to go up on the design wall, and right now the design wall is empty, so that's a good candidate for this week; it won't require putting other things away, other than making space on the sewing table, and that's not hard.

Okay - that's the plan. At least from now until March 13th, when we return to Daylight Savings time. Tomorrow is my Sabbath, which means I can spend most of the day sewing if I choose. I think I'll get those blocks out and start slapping them up on the design wall so I can play with their placement for a while. Then I'll work on the current gifty project. That and an hour or so of hand quilting should pretty well fill up the day.

Sandy, host of the podcast "Quilting for the Rest of Us," recently did a podcast on quilt documentation (http://quilter.podbean.com/2010/10/28/episode-27-in-which-we-document-our-quilts-10-28-2010/#comments). I am showing here the documentation portfolio I set up about 10 years ago. I will also confess that the most recent entries are from 2001. I think when I made the switch from film to digital photography, I quit making a paper record. And frankly, I went through a long spell where I finished nothing. Sandy has encouraged me to do better, and I'm going to spend some time thinking about how to update this system.

I started the portfolio around the time I was being encouraged to think of myself as an artist, not just someone who twiddles with fabric as a hobby. Having a portfolio is something artists do, so I chose that format rather than some sort of notebook.

The idea was to have a standard page of information about the quilt, at least one photograph,

and anything else that seemed important about the quilt. In one case I included a smaller version of the block that made up a table runner. In a couple of cases, I included a printout of the schematic I made in EQ software. The information included a completion date (but not a starting date :-) ), the name of the block or blocks used, the type of quilting used, and anything that was special about the quilt (made for a raffle, etc.). These pictures aren't the best because the vinyl cover on the pages wants to reflect light, so I had to take them without flash, but they give a general idea of what an entry for a given quilt might look like. Every entry was to be no more than the front and back of one page in the portfolio, but since they are oversized pages, that actually is quite a bit of room.

This is what the printed information page looks like. I had a template in the computer, that I could modify as needed.

The entry for this Christmas runner included 2 photographs and samples of the fabrics used, mounted together on a separate piece of paper.

This was the one where I made a small version of the block and included it in the entry.

This is an example of the EQ layout from another quilt.

When I pulled out the portfolio to take these pictures, I found a bonus in the back - several sets of Stack and Slash blocks in various stages of completion, neatly interleaved between blank pages. Evidently I did a workshop on this technique for my local guild, and these were the class samples. There are 24 blocks all together, so here is the beginning of another quilt (or yet another UFO, but I'm trying not to think about that right now). These fabrics are mostly leftovers from the quilt I made for my dad in the mid-80's, a quilt I sleep under now that the weather has turned cool enough for a quilt on the bed. Not sure where the finished quilt will end up going, but it looks like an easy finish, so it might get done next year.

As for what I am actually sewing on right now, it's a Christmas present for somebody, so I can't talk about it.

Favorite Things Friday

Since the UPS man just drove up with the fabric that I ordered from Equilter.com so I would have enough for Theresa's quilt, right now my favorite thing is a Big Brown Truck. When you live in Small Town America, you have to depend on the postal service and the other parcel carriers to bring you the things you want and need. The mail truck is always a welcome sight, even when all the carrier leaves is bills and catalogs; I'll put up with those for the days when the truck also brings me treasure.

Today the treasure is fabric. The kind folks at Equilter.com called to tell me they didn't have a 10 yard piece, but had one that was nearly, and two other small pieces, a total of about 15 yards. I bought it all. Now I know that there is no more to be had in the world, and one way or another I will have to make it work.

I still have a little sewing to do before I'm ready to take a picture of the center section. I'll try to get that posted tomorrow.