Happy New Year

Unfortunately the Crumby Retreat is over - I dropped Bonnie off at the airport far too early this morning. I can hardly complain though because we had one heck of a great time.

I have a newfound respect for Bonnie. She just sits at that machine and sews and sews and sews. I can't physically do it. I can't mentally do it, but she sure can. So when you look at these blocks, realize that Bonnie made probably 80% of them. I pressed and trimmed to size and puttered. I made all the letters -- our initials for both of us and several words for Bonnie -- but got bored having to think about what I was making while she was just having fun. We both ended up making some stars tho - they add a little spark here and there.

When you look at these blocks, realize that we had a head start using Bonnie's scrap bags. She had all sorts of pre-cut triangles in there as well as pre-sewn rectangles that were leftover from someone else's project. Those really allowed us to make complicated blocks without having to do the itsy bitsy work ourselves.

We ended up with 168 3.5" blocks EACH by the end of the day on Dec 31st. On the morning of 1 January we both started sewing the blocks into 4-patches. I looked around and Bonnie had all of her 4-patches complete:

while I was still sewing them into groups of two:

Bonnie with her 4-patches. She did a bit of arranging, but not much. I love how her shirt echoes the bright greens in the blocks.

Here she has her sashing and posts laid out. In the top row you can see the "m" she made ages ago and threw out of a diferent project, but that I used for the word HOME. Our initial blocks are here in the lower right of the quilt top.

Bonnie has an unusual method of sewing her blocks together that she calls webbing. The blocks all end up hanging together by threads. She calls it webbing. Some of this has been seamed, but some hasn't - look at the gaps:

She got the whole quilt top together on the 1st. Well, except for whatever final border she decides to put on. I still haven't gotten my blocks together and that's even after she generously cut all my sashing and posts. I also chose red and purple, but my fabrics are more intense than hers. What with bulk, bias and a few blocks that were almost large enough, my 4-patches differ in size by more than a quarter of an inch. I'm sewing the sashes and posts on and slicing off any extra material from there, rather than from the blocks.

You'll have to wait for another day though to see the completed tops.

Amazingly enough, Bonnie made friends with screwy Howler. By yesterday all the cats were behaving normally - not off hiding under a bed. Not that Pokey ever hid - she won Bonnie over pretty quickly.

By the way, the Bernette and I did NOT get along. I don't know if it was the machine or how I was threading it, but the upper thread kept breaking over and over and over again. I was about in tears. So took it back and ended up getting the basic Bernina I really wanted anyway. Sewing on a good machine is such a dream - it just purrs. What a difference it made.

Now I have to get back to the real world and take care of appointments and overdue library books. Sigh. Hope to get the top finished today tho (the center part, not the border). I need to buy a shower curtain to mail to my husband, because he hates the French one he bought. There is a new quilt shop I haven't explored down there near the Target.... Hmmm, maybe I can be a bad girl and have some fun after all today.

I'm feeling well, just cranky that I'm not allowed any dairy on my low-iodine diet. I neeeeed that milk in my tea. It is forcing me to eat healthier since vegetables are the one thing there are no restrictions on.

My husband has spent a lot of time getting boxes unpacked and furniture arranged in the new apartment. He says I have a lot of quilts. That's so surprising, isn't it. I do feel sorry for him. Usually he gets to go off to work while I mess around with trying to find electrical adapters and things like that, but not this time.

Happy New Year everyone!