A Work in Progress

*Cranky Old Woman (a la Nancy ) I placed an order for a single item with a well-known on-line needlework shop earlier this summer. The item was back-ordered which was OK with me. A package from the store showed up about four weeks later, but when I opened it, the contents were not my order and the sale slip had someone else's name on it. I called the store and told them about the error. The response was "How did that happen?" and then I was asked to return the package to them. A few days later, I got a call from the store and was asked for my address. I did return the package the next day, at my own expense during an extra trip to the post office. About two weeks later, I finally received the item I wanted after yet another phone call to the store to check on whether the package was on its way (it had gone out in that day's mail). In the meantime, my credit card had been charged. Why am I cranky? Because the shop made no effort to thank me for returning th...

No, I'm not channeling my inner Paul Simon , but I am celebrating the return of my middle child. He was last seen snaking his way through the security line at the Philadelphia airport early on the morning of June 9 on his way to a summer research project in the Colorado Rockies. He was in a rather remote location with an elevation of 9500 feet and cell towers are few and far between out there. He communicated by e-mail sporadically as the internet was not terribly reliable and he called about every two weeks when he went to the nearest town. Let me tell you that ten weeks is a loooong time to go without regular contact. Even at 1:30 this morning, he was a welcome sight! (Not so much the large duffel and backpack full of dirty clothes). Now it's time to get him to the dentist and the barber (the beard has got to go!) before he heads back to college for his senior year on Monday. In the meantime, my older son will come home and the whole family will be together for the first ti...

That's the saying on the sign that my daughter hung when my husband turned 60 (60!) a few weeks ago. The sign stayed up for my birthday last Saturday. I don't know about the "perfection" part, but I certainly as getting more aged by the minute. In years past, I've started a new project on my birthday. But you've all seen the list of my WIPs, so you know I can't justify a new start. I saw Robin working on this Lizzie Kate chart, The ABCs of Aging Artfully, during our guild meeting on Saturday. Since I already had it in progress, I pulled it out and put some more stitches in it. The plan is to do a letter per day--that's the plan anyway. I'm thinking that it will be made into a pillow to put on my rocking chair.

I've been whiling away the summer and suddenly it's crunch time! My sampler guild is having an ornament finishing class on Saturday and I need to have a finished ornament. Here's my progress so far on Joy by Angel Stitching. It was in the JCS ornament issue in 2006. This one will go to my niece, but do you think I'll actually get three more done for my own children without a deadline hanging over me? One of the long-arm quilters I've used is having a sale that ends this weekend. The deal is that when I bring in at least three pillowcases to be donated to ConKerr Cancer, I will get 20% off on quilting. No limit on the number of quilts. I have six tops done so far (two of these were done last summer when this same quilter had a 3-for-2 special--didn't get the third one done and the other two never got quilted). If I can get this block pieced together with 34 of its friends, and add three borders by Friday morning, I'll be able to take a seventh quilt. This...

It's been a few weeks since I've posted and there is absolutely no reason for that except that I am having the laziest summer on record. As you know, I was thrown for a loop with my change in job assignment in the past year. My husband and I took full advantage of being empty nesters and filled our weekends with activities and short trips. It was a busy year. So I've been happy to stay close to home this summer and recover. I've been reading a lot, doing some heavy cleaning and ruthless decluttering along with some stitching and lots of quilting. I've taken the time to do some experimenting with a ruler to make flying geese (Deb Tucker's Wing Clipper--no affiliation, just the ruler I chose to buy at a quilt show). These geese finished at 1x1.5" and were made from scraps from a project that is nearly pieced. I'll be taking a class in the fall that has flying geese in the pattern so I wanted to be sure I remembered how to use the ruler. These small square...

Last week, the friend who got me started on quilting suggested that we get together. Usually, we meet for breakfast or go on a shopping expedition. This time she came over to my house and we spent the day sewing. I worked on blocks for my Shoo Fly quilt and have them all completed. Just have to work on the layout and sew them together. My friend and I set up our machines at my kitchen table, but I didn't want to move my ironing board up from my laundry room/sewing area. A glance at the sewing area was enough to make me do a clean-up! While I was at it, I decided to finish off two quilt tops. This one was made from an All About Color jelly roll. As I mentioned in another post, I'm trying to learn something from each quilt. From this one, I learned to read the directions and then read them again. A local quilt shop had made this quilt and I was so excited to get their last jelly roll so I could make it also. I sewed combinations of three strips and then started cutting. Except...

Here are some of the fabrics I won in a giveaway from Nancy at Patchwork Penguin . Since I rarely win anything, it was a very pleasant surprise to find this box on my doorstep yesterday. I'll be using the fabrics to make some charity quilts and including some of them in scrappy projects. Thanks, Nancy, for being so generous!