Roundabout

Again I've found the scrap pile on my cutting table more compelling than what I should be doing.

What I should be doing is finishing the second chevron baby quilt.  I am working on it, or rather I was working on it, but I took a break.

For like a week.  In the sewing room, nothing but crickets.

Know how after you've been away from a task, you sort of have to ease yourself back into it?  No?  Okay, maybe you are a jumper-inner. That's cool. 

I had a boss at one time, a senior lawyer with a big case load who needed multiple legal assistants to do his work jump when he said frog support him.  In the days leading up to a big important trial, when you would think he would be nose to the grindstone in final preparations, what would he do?

He'd empty garbage cans.  Just go around collecting the office garbage from beneath everyone's desks.  

I used to think it was weird.  Okay, I still do.  But I kind of get it.

When I worked at another place and started to feel overwhelmed by deadlines and stuff to be done, sometimes I'd just stop everything, move all the file piles onto the floor, and clean my desk.  I'm talking Windex and paper towels, chasing dust bunnies  from behind the monitor, wiping schmutz off the telephone receiver, and swabbing the screen.  Somehow it helped.  A feeling of accomplishment, however small, can bolster you for the larger task at hand.

So I intended to tidy up my cutting table to ease back into the flow of things in the sewing room, but that (the tidying part) didn't happen.  I started fondling fabric bits piled next to the overflowing trimmings receptacle and pretty soon I was flat out playing in the trash.

And then I had a mini made.

And another in the works.

And soon enough, the machine was humming with pieces of the chevron baby quilt moving through it once again.

Does this sound familiar?  Do you ever do a loopy roundabout to get going where you need to go?

Slow Mojo

How is it I can ignore two whole boxes of paperwork "to be filed" for years on end, and then all of a sudden decide that it needs to be addressed this very week?  

Hm, could it be that I am procrastinating on something else?  I think we can all guess the answer to that one.

This month marks my four-year blog anniversary, and that's about exactly how long it's been since I did any serious filing or otherwise dealing with paperwork.  The good thing about waiting so long is that 80 percent of it can be tossed.  Well, not tossed, exactly, as a lot of it is personal and financial type things.  I'll probably have a little party around the burn barrel soon.  Hear that, Dad?  I'm coming over to your place to set my stuff on fire. 

A friend and former coworker, who was a young lawyer at the time and now is a financial advisor, told me he threw away all his bills right after he paid them.  Like, immediately.  On hearing this, I remember being shocked for a few seconds.  This was before the days of going paperless and online access.  I was taught one needed to save such things, although I was never really sure for how long.  His response was, "What for?" and he went on to justify the rationale for his personal statute of limitations.  I've become better at adopting this attitude in the years since, but apparently I'm not quite there yet. 

I did find my mortgage paperwork in one of the boxes, along with an original car title and my sister-in-law's Health Care Power of Attorney.  You know, things one might need to put one's hands on quickly without first having to sift through a few hundred pages of financial statements, receipts, and a couple colonoscopy reports (with color photos!).

Not much has been happening in the sewing room this week except for one sample block.  I bought a Quick Curve Ruler so I could make the Mod Olives block following the tutorial at Sew Kind of Wonderful.

But I am apparently a big fumble-futz when it comes to curved rulers.  I made a mess of the first few cuts and finally gave up on the rotary cutter altogether and used a marking pen with the ruler and then scissor-cut the pieces.  I'm not sure what my problem was there.  I'll take another whack at it (probably literally) another time.

Finally, I am taking baby steps to try to sneak around my procrastination problem. So even though it's been slow, the flow (my word for 2014) hasn't stopped completely.

A few days ago, I doodled a quilting idea for the Hubcap Diamond Star Halo quilt, and today I finally got it basted.

What are you working on this weekend?

I love everything about this song, a song about flow of another kind, as in a river (and life, in general).  Darrell Scott can sure tell a story in his songwriting, and he is a master on the guitar.

Random 8-14-13

I basted the black and white quilt over the weekend, but have been taking my time (read: procrastinating) on getting around to actually starting on the quilting.  It's the way I roll, folks.  I know this and deal. 

That means I do any number of other things instead, like become engrossed in a new-to-me TV series now available on Netflix—Ripper Street.  Matthew Macfadyen, anyone?  Yes, please!

I seriously heart this show.  Wish our cable lineup included BBC America so I don't have to wait a whole year for the second season to get to Netflix.

Last night, I pin-crastinated on Pinterest, beefing up my Hot in Here board rather nicely, I think.

Douglas Booth

I cannot wait until Romeo and Juliet hits theaters in October.  This fellow is worth the ticket price in eye candy.  And Hailee Steinfeld?  Well, I loved her in True Grit.


I should reread Romeo and Juliet before the movie, though, because when it comes to Shakespeare, I always wish there were subtitles.  I like to spend a little time with the language, you know?  Although it's not like I don't remember how the story ends.

Speaking of which, I turn on the subtitles to watch Ripper Street because I don't want to miss any of the dialog.  The writing for that show is topnotch.

So I finally started quilting the black and white quilt today, doing some ditch quilting around the black frames.  Straight-line ditch quilting in black thread on black fabric means there is really nothing to show at this point.  I have an idea to quilt the centers of the frames in spirals, which is different than the original plan, but I think it will be cool, if I can get the hang of it.  I did one on a practice pad, but when I went to quilt the first one on the quilt, it was a spectacular disappointment.  That has been unpicked and I've stepped away from the quilt to allow my frustration to dissipate.  I'll be back for another go at it tomorrow.

Finally, the gardens are producing and I've been blessed this week with tomatoes, kohlrabi, cucumbers, green peppers, and zucchini.   I did the healthy, responsible eating thing with most of the big yellow zucchini I was given, but what I really craved was my old favorite, chocolate chip zucchini cake.  Went Googling for a gluten-free version and found this recipe, which I made immediately, adding one egg and decreasing the sugar by half (it was still plenty sweet).

(Source: mygluten-freekitchen.com)

In a word:  Awesome!! 

Digging this new song by Amos Lee.

He Won the Toss

It seems like forever since I've posted, but there hasn't been much of anything sewing related to talk about.  I started the week with some kind of horrendous flu bug, which thankfully passed in a day or two.  Then when work wasn't being busy, I was sidetracking myself on other bunny trails, with a bit of dithering and procrastinating in between.

Thank you all for chiming in on the binding for the kaleidoscope quilt.  I appreciate your taking the time to visualize and comment.  Fairly early in the week, I had pretty much decided to cut the yellow binding and intended to go and do that as soon as I pressed "Send" on an email and got up from the computer.  But the getting up part didn't happen (see "sidetracked," above).

Someone needs to invent the computer chair ejector seat, and a portable model for laptop or iPad users (the iEjector?).  Preferably with a 3-2-1 countdown sequence, warning vibrations, and rocket exploding noises.
(Or maybe someone already has, but that model comes delivered in a plain brown wrapper...but this is a family friendly site so we won't go any further with that!)

Another day dawned, and I made an impromptu run to JoAnn's to explore other possible binding options, and came home with three (!).  I really favored one, but when I asked my husband his opinion later that evening, he favored a different one of the three.

So there they sat the rest of the week, the hunks of fabric on the floor on top of my quilt, while I sat working and dithering and dithering and working and procrastinating.
  
Tonight I announced, "We have to make a very important decision," as I pulled a quarter out of my purse.  I tossed, Norm called.  He won.
"Aw, two out of three?" since I am a good loser like that.  

"Sure."  He won again on the second toss.

"You'll love it.  I can see it in my mind already, and it's going to look great," he reassured.  He's probably right.

I've got a busy weekend ahead, what with Twilight: Breaking Dawn to be seen in the theater, pretty people to be drooled over, special contacts to be worn, lines to be stood in, medium-rare steak to be eaten afterward, a binding to be sewn, and more work-work to be done.  Sunday Sundry will be MIA this weekend, but look for the bound and completed kaleidoscope quilt reveal early next week.
 
There are also plans in the works for the next project.  

I'll be using these two groups of FQs from separate giveaway winnings, but I think they'll work well together in this quilt.  That's Central Park by Kate Spain for Moda on the right and a variety on the left, including a Sharon Holland design and Amy Butler, I believe.

There is a whole story about how I finally decided upon the two main frame colors (Ash and Mink from Connecting Threads, shown underneath the stacks), and guess what?  It involves a generous amount of dithering and procrastination, along with plenty of sidetracking.  I'll show you the stack of rejects another time, but today let's focus on the positive.

Have a great weekend!  Ciao for now!

One Thing Leads to Another

(That could well be the theme of my life, right there.)

It was all going so well.  I was attaching the final border to my black and white quilt (after having set it aside a couple months ago), and it wasn't until I did the final backstitch at the end of the long seam that I realized I had run out of bobbin thread.  And not just recently either, but way back about 45 inches ago, just a short ways into the seam.

Don't you hate when that happens?

So I got up and walked away.  Went upstairs to use the you-know-what and grab my water bottle, intending to take a break from sewing and go walk on the treadmill.  Until I saw my camera and had another idea.

Can you just develop ADD in mid-life?  Because I swear...

I talked myself out of a blog post last week where I was going to, in a very organized fashion, tell you about the status of my unfinished projects, lest you think I can never finish a ding-dong thing (and I am beginning to wonder myself).  But since blogging would chew up a chunk of time—time probably better spent trying to complete one of said projects—I scrapped the idea.  Until now.

But this is far from a linear post, if you hadn't noticed already.  Which, by the way, according to the test linked on Elizabeth's post today, I am mostly left-brained but a good bit right-brained as well, and my dominant characteristics are the left-brained "Linear" and, by contrast, right-brained "Random."  

If you've been reading this blog for more than two weeks, you probably figured that out already.

The point is, with my camera in hand, I went back downstairs and started pointing it around my sewing space to perhaps show you, in pictures, the status of some of the projects in the works.  I actually tidied up my room, believe it or not, a couple days ago, so this is about as good as it gets.  Organized chaos, you might say.

Here's the table to the right of my sewing machines, stacked with some of the fabric stash.  There used to be a color order to this scheme, but as you can see, that system did not take, long-term.  My system seems to be, "I know it's here, give me a minute and I'll find it."

There's the cute jelly roll (in the ziplock) of Sherbet Pips from Sarah's giveaway.  I DO have a plan for it—this pattern, Basket Case, from Cluck Cluck Sew.  Bought and downloaded and waiting in the wings for my next whim to start a new project while in the middle of 10 other ones.

Do you see that Alexander Henry "Heath" fabric there on the table?  Here's a closeup.

This was supposed to be the backing for the black and white quilt, but the online fabric store goofed.  I ordered 3 yards and they sent 1.  I emailed them about the error and they said the fabric was completely out of stock, they didn't know when it would come back in (if ever), and I could keep the yard they sent me for free.  Um, okay.  Since then I've tried to find it elsewhere but have been told it may be July before it comes in.  So I've ordered Plan B fabric, a black and white paisley, and it should be here any day.

Not that I'm going to rush right into finishing it or anything.

On the "design wall" above the table is this really old block I found in my mom's things.  It's kind of wonky and falling apart, but it must have had some meaning for her to keep it so long.  I needed someplace to put it after I pressed it, and since I don't really use the that space for anything other than a flannel-covered pinboard, there it went.

A little south of the table is a rolling cart full of thrifted plaid shirts, cut and folded, for a dozen or so scrappy projects living in my brain that may or may not ever see the light of day.  On top of the cart is part of a pile of scraps Jenny sent me (the rest of them are on the futon and in the laundry room).  They are destined for a string project of some sort.  Just don't hold your breath.  Oh, and underneath the scraps is everything for a cute Christmas table runner that I didn't get around to last Christmas, but mark my words, it will be done well before December 2011. 

Continuing to turn counter-clockwise from the sewing machines, is this veggie wall hanging (and PhD project) that I should have had done in March.  Ready for basting and quilting (I even have the batting there), and I can NOT bring myself to do it just now.  I've even practiced the quilting pattern.  One day I'll get mad at myself for all my procrastination and knock the thing out.

Speaking of knocking something out — HULK HANDS!!!  

These glorified boxing gloves make growl-y Hulk noises when you hit something like, "HULK MAD!"  and "DON'T MAKE ME ANGRY...YOU WON'T LIKE ME WHEN I'M ANGRY!"  And yes, I bought them for myself from the toy department.  I took them over to show my friend one day, and every time I drove over a bump, they growled and threatened me.  Who was over her Hulk Hands by the time she got home?  Annoying, is what it was.

More fabric (and scraps) piled up that I am playing with.  I have a general plan, but have determined it will require the purchase of some pastel solids to make it all work.  I am deliberately not buying them now.  Too many other undone things already.

The H2H quilt top, another thing to be quilted.

Here is my futon.  I hate the thing, but it serves as another place to hold my junk, and Norm won't let me get rid of it.  There's my Sudoku quilt top on the left, to be finished.  Next to it are three electric menorahs and some other random stuff in the white bag to be sold on eBay come fall.  Oops, make that four menorahs. I forgot the one I took out of the box.  

Next to that is a pair of my daughter's scrub pants I'm supposed to be taking apart and using as a pattern for making her a new pair, the fabric for which is the dark blob on the far right sideof the futon.  There is a vintage muslin sheet for a backing and some vintage turquoise gingham for who-knows-what.  More scraps, and in the other white bag are the two quilt kits I found at Goodwill a few weeks ago.

On the wall above the futon is Dolly the dummy's working wardrobe of aprons.  Too bad she lacks arms (and a brain) so she could do something to help, instead of just looking cute.  

The lighted chili peppers serve a purpose.  They are plugged into the same surge strip as my iron, so if I turn out all the lights as I'm leaving the room and still see the chilis lit up, it means I probably haven't shut off the iron.

Check this out.  I bought this handbag at Goodwill, no real clue who Kate Spade was at the time.  Found out she's kinda famous for her bags, but after seeing her website, I am 99 percent sure this is a knockoff.  I don't think she ever did kitschy pinups.  Anyway, I still like the bag a whole lot for the ten bucks I spent on it.  Will I take it out in public?  Probably not.  It makes me smile though.

And that wooden wavy looking thing there next to the purse is a cypress knee made into a lamp.  I was with my mom when she brought it out of a swamp in Louisiana a long time ago.  We took it home and she boiled it to soften the bark, stripped it, varnished it, and made a lamp.  I love it.  I would love to find one of those 1950s drum shades for it, instead of the one that's on it.

Okay, I've rambled on too long.  I will get that quilt top done tomorrow!