Silver Lining

I finished a quilt that had been basted since September.  It sat around waiting for, I don't know, inspiration? the right mood? a not-sore shoulder?  When I awoke in the wee hours on Thursday morning and couldn't get back to sleep, it suddenly seemed as good a time as any to get started on it.  I conceded that it wasn't going to have the "right" thread or the "perfect" predetermined quilting pattern; nope, in that moment, what was needed was somewhere to focus my attention, and that trumped everything else.

Thus, the cloud of insomnia had a silver lining:  One UFO down.

I quilted vertical lines down the whole thing, trying to vary them somewhat so they weren't completely straight yet not totally curved.  Wonky took a little practice.

I like the back almost as much as the front.  Isn't that the way it goes sometimes?

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Today was caramel corn making day.  Every year I make a big batch for my coworkers at the clinic and bring it in the week of Christmas.  But they started asking about it last week already, so I figured I better bump up the delivery date.

You can find the recipe in my post from three years ago here.

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I discovered this gem on my hard drive recently.  It's me and my siblings circa 1968. 

Paulette, Nita, Darrell, Russ c. 1968

Dad especially liked to line us up for photos around the holidays.  I so appreciate that we have such great documentation of our growing up years on film, goofy as some of those pictures are.

I'm on the left in the red sweater.  I love my sister's shirt with the Nehru collar, the bark cloth curtains, our antique Knabe grand piano with a bazillion little fingerprints on it, and most of all, my brothers' sweet faces!  Almost as if they can't wait for Santa and are trying to convince him they've been very good!

Linking to A Stitch in Time 2013 Finishes and Can I Get a Whoop-Whoop!