I think...

I quilt too much. I quilt like I shop. Impulsively, and with little thought regarding what I will do with them one I have them.

So I've finished over 40 quilts now. Taking out of that count the four at Helen's, two at Kelsey's, one of Maddy's, four on my bed, one on my wall and one in my swag, and one that's been sold to the lady from Flannies that she still hasn't picked up yet, and thats still 26 quilts that have no home or designated use. And I've started another one. Because clearly, I need another one. It's blue and green solids with a few spotty fabrics in there too. A boy quilt, for if should I find myself "needing" one.

Unfortunately, although there was allegedly some sunshine this morning, I slept through it so no pretty on-the-grass photos from me. I have some flat out on the kitchen floor photos though.

The last one had a solid back - the advantage of a quilt less than 110cm wide. I really love the backs done with the big random squares though. The blue one especially. It's fun piecing stuff randomly and hoping for the best, and it's even better when it works out.

My big problem now is that lately I have been getting around to the fabrics I had assigned to projects for myself. It's fine when it's only a technical experiment or a casual urge to work with some certain fabrics but Autumn Nutmeg was for me, the Mingle Star quilt, once the bindings get here, is for me, and I'm starting to worry that eventually I will end up as a terrible inverted version of princess and the pea, except instead of sleeping on a dozen mattresses I will be crushed under the weight of hundreds of quilts. And then you'll all have to hack my blogger account, and I haven't even written up a will regarding my stash yet.

I should have a think about doing that. And updating my completed quilts list. And cleaning my room, charging my camera(s - I bought a hot pink 10MP Fujifilm one today for $60), mending some clothes and backing up my computer.

There, all thought about. Not done, obviously, but I've thought about doing them, and decided to go to bed instead. I'm good at making decisions like that.

Apologies for the cheese induced delirium.

Do you ever wonder what happened to those people who dropped out of the blogosphere? The ones that used to post all the time, that you followed the lives of, who one day just... vanished? I always hope they're doing fine, living their lives without sharing them with the world but sometimes I worry. I worry that something happened to them, that there's a reason they're not online anymore.

There was a thing on facebook a while ago that said "After I die, I give you permission to hack my account and change my status to is chillin with jesus" - I'm not at all religious and nor do I believe in an afterlife, but the point stands. Should something happen to me, I expect someone to hack my account* and let everyone know. And for someone to finish up my half done quilts.

Speaking of half done quilts, I now have four less. That still leaves one unfinished top, five quilts than need a back and basting, two that need quilting, and two that need binding. But that's ten of a total fifty, or an 80% completion rate. I'm happy with that.

I've also realised that if you must bind, bind lots. Binding feels like it takes forever, and forever takes just as long if you do it four times as if you'd done it once. Admittedly tonight I only did the second (and third, because I bind in my own special way) lots of sewing - I'd sewn them on and done the join and ironed them around and pinned them down last night. It would seem that what I've actually decided is that if you must suffer through multiple eternities, make them all different.

Or, possibly, what's really happened is that I've eaten too much cheese and become a bit delirious.

Anyway, back to the point. Four more quilts are now all bound and ready to wash and crinklify*

45, 39, 36 and 18

Two are in the machine now, and I'll put the others in when they're done, and hopefully we'll get 5 minutes of sunshine tomorrow for me to do the photos on the grass thing.

The other thing I've gotten done is the top for quilt # 50.

I love the fabrics and the colours, but I have to admit, they're not right for this pattern. The Falling Leaves fabric having both pink and green in it means that depending on how you're looking at it, the background either merges into the rings or pops to the foreground. I can't help but think of it as my Escher quilt, even though that's really not what I was going for. I'm gunna have a do over - I've had some fabrics in my stash for at least a year now, a pink, blue and green with flowers that should work - it's been in an envelope in a box and I can't remember how big the flowers actually are, but if they're fairly small (I recall them being a bit under an inch across. I could be wrong) then it should be fine.

Parent's should be home tomorrow night, so that should cheer up my dog, prevent my house from making any more threats upon my life, and curb my until-4am sewing seshes. Still, it'll be nice to see them again, as much as it has been nice doing our own thang for the last fortnight.



*if shouldn't be hard - firefox knows all my passwords.
** my submission to the quilting lexicon for 2011.

I was feeling good about all this...

Is it weird that I'm simultaneously reading the new issue of Fat Quarterly and the Balls in the Bush forums? On the one hand, pretty pictures and precuts, on the other, drunken debauchery and rootin' in the back of the ute...

I suspect it would be weird for anyone else, but that's okay. I like being the only one with a hand made quilt in my swag.

Tonight, after getting the gunnas out of my system with a couple of hours of vintage boot browsing on eBay, I pieced two points of each star block into pairs, and then, when I couldn't be bothered going out to press the seams, I quilted one sixth of the the straight line quilting on the blue, green and purple there never was a nine-patch quilt.

I like to call them that, well, I think of them as that, but in all of my notes to myself I refer to them as no9 patch quilts because that's easier to type. But at no point while doing any of them (there has been four: Kelsey's, The quilt with no name, Helen's and The blue, green and purple one) did I ever actually make a nine-patch block before chopping it up. I made three-patch chains and chopped them, and then made what were technically six-patch blocks which I chopped up, but never a nine patch.

My ruler was too short at the time to cut it. Sad but true.

What else is sad but true is that 1/6th is only 16.5ish%

My achievements don't seem as satisfying anymore. I was gunna do more, but then I got and email duhdonk, and after that I remembered that I'd got the new issue sent to me, and then something or the other reminded me to check the Balls in the Bush website, and now it's been an hour and I suppose I won't be getting any more sewing done tonight.


Still, it's better than nothing.

Sweet...

I am loving loving loving how these backs are turning out.

Finished back to the Blue, Green and Purple Disappearing Nine Patch

Don't get me wrong - it's still feeling like a slog. I think it's the lack of "sew, press, proceed" routine that's getting to me. There isn't really much more of a plan to it than "42cm long, 10, 15 or 20cm wide. Sew into squares to liking"

Back in progress for Autumn Nutmeg Quilt. Edge triangles have been sewn together, but whole square blocks are just lying there. I realised just now that I don't have a photo of the top either, so I'll have to do that tomorrow.

Still, this will be my third back done in a week. That's good progress. Granted, it's not progress on what I should be making progress on (Quilt for Helen for her birthday, 8 days) buuuut... Remember when I said I was gunna get half my unfinished projects done before #50? I'm gunna get there. I've got quilts at every stage; cut but with no piecing done, blocks pieced but not assembled, tops with no backs, basted quilts, quilts with binding half attached, and freshly finished quilts.

I have one to fully bind and one to finish binding on, three, nearly four (with my half done one above) to quilt, and one more (Helen's) to make a back for. And with the two mini zigzag quilts, and the Newsprint Mingle Quilt, that's over half my unfinished quilts all finished!

Well, it will be, when I'm done.

Crafternoon II - Keepin' on Crafting

So today was the epic sequel that everyone's been waiting for. I had planned to go to Lincraft before I picked up Kelsey at 1, but then I didn't get out of bed till 12, so that didn't happen. Lucky me she needed buttons too so I still go to go to Lincraft.

Even though I was only gunna get one bundle, I ended up getting 3. These are the two I brought home - the third I bought because I was suffering from Getitforestheritis, a horrible affliction caused by the knowledge that Helen's making a retro tickertape quilt for Esther, and an uncontrollable desire to unnecessarily help. I have no idea what I'll do with these though, since I don't really have a design on the top of my head of a 16 fabric spectral retro quilt.

Since I've no plans yet for that, I figured I'd get started on one of the other ones. The purple, green and blue bundle I assembled ages ago seemed to be preferred to the pink, white and brown bundle, so I went with that. I only got as far as cutting my big squares before the girls went home, but I got stuck in while they had tea, and it all came together around 8pm.

Ah, the joys of photoshop. This is cobbled together from a couple of photos because I took the photo at Helen's right after I'd finished, and I didn't have a stool to take it from. Here's a real life photo.

I got home about 10.30 but unfortunately, the speedway was still on. Tonight was the start of the season and because we live so close, it's annoyingly loud. I haven't gotten anything done since I got home (not including the consumption of yet more mini pavs with whipped cream) and I'm not planning on it, and tomorrow will probably be a washout too since I'm back at work.

More money = more fabric though, so I suppose I don't mind. And it's my last shift for 2010.