Foto Finish: Feet

I nearly forgot about Cat Patches Foto Finish, yesterday's theme was feet.  So after going back to my old pictures, I found this one that I'm certain I've never shared. These were my daughter's shoes before before the days that she could walk.  My momma always told me that if children can't walk there is no sense trying to keep shoes on their feet so don't even bother buying them.  She always felt it was better to invest in quality baby socks that stayed on instead of being worried over loosing shoes and I saw the logic in that. So I didn't buy any of these shoes. Instead they came to me as hand me downs from friends and family.  As you can see most of them have never been worn and many still had stickers on them.  When DD outgrew the possibility of wearing them I happily donated them all to Hospice and sent them all paired together off for frugal Grandma's to pick through and gush over.

Finally Finished

I finished adding the binding to the final baby clothes quilt.  This ended up being the 3rd of 3 that I kept for DD.  The others are a twin, a double, and this one a very generous full/queen.  I made so many others with her baby clothes many of them completely reversible such as this one is.  This feels like an end.  I'm actually glad to see it too.  Knits are such a picky fabric to use in quilts.  While it might be an end to the endless baby clothes quilts it's the beginning of the next chapter and I can finally close the book on everything I started three years ago.  I refused to part with any of DD's baby clothes and stored them away like a squirrel jealously guarding a winter's hoard.

Then my Dear Friend Heather told me about the conception of her son; we didn't know yet that she was having a boy.  That was a great day and I was so happy for her.  I still didn't want to share any of DD's old clothes but I thought, maybe if she was having a boy, which is ironic since some of DD's clothes came from her!  Lucky enough for my heartstrings she was indeed having a boy (who is now in Pre-K!) and that's when I first started allowing myself to pick things out of storage.  In fact Heather got every last stitch of neutral to boy I had.  Oh I did hold one back, you can see it in the heart in the bottom left corner of the above picture.  See the blue with darker blue stripes?  That was a footed sleeper, I bought it because my DH told me he was sure we were having a boy and I believed him.  We have a picture of me with that sleeper draped over my belly laughing.

And all of this got me to thinking.  My mother had quilted, my grandmother had sewn, why couldn't I make a quilt of these clothes?  So I did.  I took what the storage containers claimed to be dear goodness 52 gallons of clothes.  I spent at least two months first cutting out the seams and then stabilizing the knits.  Oh yes that's what I said.  I started with interfacing but that was a real ironing nightmare with all those clothes so I switched to the stabilizer and spray adhesive and then after piecing ripped it out of each quilt before quilting.  It was a real mess.  Yet that's where I started.  By that point I didn't know I'd found a passion that would allow me to explore every pent up bit of myself I'd ever boxed away.

My blog changed as I did.  Instead of just the odd mother who talked about her daughter and only sometimes mentioned any physical limitations.  I found this entirely new quilting world online.  Which is good because I've long since worn out the ear of any loved one that doesn't live with me.  Lucky for me DH and DD are still happy to listen most of the time.  Aren't you glad I still talk about my cats too?

Since I knew how hard it was to part with those darling baby clothes both of my larger baby clothes quilts bear a label proudly honoring the three moms who shared their beloved baby's clothes with me.  The quilting is feathers moving through sashing of the front between every block.  Mostly because I knew I had DD's quilts already tucked safely away, I knew I couldn't ruin anything and I thought it would make good practice.  Then the blocks are quilted with mostly double hearts, though there are some singles and a few triples to represent our family and the three wonderful women who shared more than just clothes.

Do you See What I see?

Today I worked on the final baby clothes quilt.  This is a near twin of one I made the first year I was quilting.  I accidently made nearly twice as many blocks as I needed so I called it serendipity and made another top.  This one is bigger than the original and measures 90" square.  It has a pieced back as well, which I will show you after I get the binding attached.  For now I've finished the quilting.  Praised be!  And delt with all the threads and trust me there were a lot.

This was my first BIG quilt to quilt on the mid arm frame.  I will say there is theory which I picked up as much as I could reading everything I could get my hands on.  This is real tangible data, but it has no true meaning until reality combines and the key clicks.

Keys to making the key click:

1. There are such a thing as defective needles.  It might look great but if you've changed the thread, adjusted the tension, checked your needle plate for burrs, called in some else who knows more than you, clearly rethreaded the machine a zillion times, and checked the manual...  Guess what?  It might just be that brand new needle.  This one in particular I felt the burr as soon as I removed it from the sewing machine.  Wish I'd thought of that before loosing hours and hours.

2.  When quilting on a quilt frame needle size should be two sizes bigger.  So if you've always done freemotion quilting with a side 90/14  you need an 18.  Don't try to bull you're way past that needle size.  My home machine doesn't care, but the Janome 1600P, goes so fast it cares and will shred your thread.

3.  Thread does matter.  I read somewhere that Janome 1600's likes overlock thread, you know the two strand serger thread?  I'm still trying to figure out if that's true.  But currently I have everything set perfectly for the quilt I just quilted using So Fine Thread.

4.  In a the span of half of a 12" block you should not have any thread breakages.  Certainly not the 3-5+ I was experiencing for the past month.

When everything comes together it's like the best homemade gravy you've ever had smothering the best pot roast you've ever tastes.  I'm sure there are more keys to unlock and mid arm frame tricks to learn.  But I can't tell you how happy I am that after 5 amazing passes last night I stopped at half way and went to bed.  Today I finished the quilt!  Okay I still have the binding - let me know when you find a quilting frame that will sew that on too, I'm sure everyone will want one.

Do you know what that means?  Another quilt from the quilt list will be gracing my living room.  I wonder which one it will be?  Actually I already know, but you'll find that out soon enough.

Christmas Quilt-a-long Year 2 August Day End

After lunch I decided to do a bit of quilting on the quilt frame.  I have the second baby clothes quilt, the first of which I called Blessings from Heaven, all loaded and ready to go on the quilt frame.

This quilt is bigger than the other one.  It's measuring 90"x91" and that's bigger than I remembered.  I did a nontraditional scallop as the binding treatment on the first quilt which made the full size quilt more useful on a twin sized bed.  And as it was only my second quilt I stitched the entire thing stitch in the ditch. But this one is another matter.  Because I knew I wouldn't be putting scallops on this one I did a different border treatment all together.

So it starts with a small 2" outermost border which I have been quilting like this unununun (minus the serifs) The next is a border of 3" blocks those I spend a while thinking of how to quilt and came up with hearts that chain loop from one into the other at the bottom.  Once I got the hang of those they turned out nicely.  Finally is the final border that finishes off all of the sashing.  Each intersection has a hand embroidered heart so I have been quilting feathers between the hearts and a doubling back to make an inner and outer heart through the embroidery.  So far I'm pretty happy with it.  There are some mild puckers and so forth on the top as the knits aren't properly interfaced - hey I told you this was a duplicate of my second quilt and made at the same time so why else do you think I've put off quilting it for two years?  To deal with the puckers that I knew would happen to some degree the batty is a lofty 3/4" so hopefully when washed it will be nice and cuddly and at that point I'll just have to just say who cares, right?

Currently I'm in a holding pattern because it's time to start quilting the blocks.  The quilt is so big that the sheer number of wraps around the rails wont allow me access to quilt any single entire block at one time.  I had planned big loops within the heart blocks but as I only have access to about half the bottom of block I'm not sure how to proceed.  If I work with it ignoring what I can't quilt yet I'll end up with way to many starts and stops.  Which leads me to my other thought of simply picking an all over pattern and quilting that within each block.  Does anyone have any other ideas?  Feel free to throw them out, because this is only the second quilt I've done on my mid arm so I'm a bit bamboozled.

Tiny was so excited when I got up to post to you that I just had to share this picture of her.  She must have wanted me to come in the sewing room because now she's sleeping behind the sewing machine.

Hopefully everyone had a great Christmas Quilt-a-long Day.  I know I did.

Something Leftover

Sure enough yesterday I cut fabric.  With the templates my DH cut for me the whole process went rather quickly.  As I have 60 x 45 inches leftover of the Patisserie fabric (how did that happen!?!?) as well as plenty of other leftovers I believe I will have plenty to make the back after the top is done, we'll see how it goes of course.

Denim Patchwork and Yes that's a Carebear.

I noticed I haven't showed you this yet.  When I came up with the plans for the back of the Gift from Heaven Quilt I planned 3 borders worth of 4 patches, but with a mix-up + a change up of the middle the quilt grew to quickly and I wasn't able to add the 2 set of borders.  Hence the birth of this denim patchwork; the fabrics are made from dd's baby clothes denim, knits, fleece, and so on, so it is wonderfully soft.  I'm not certain what should become of this one yet.  I know I will use a real batting on it and perhaps a blender flannel on the back.  My eyes keep seeing it as a puffy quilt.  What do you think?  While I know sort of how to make one of those I don't have any idea how much Polyfil something like that would take.  Any thoughts?  As for the flannel backing I think it should be something super soft.  Every time my brain says make it blue I argue back "but it has such pretty girlie white patches!"  It's a never ending battle of course.

I don't recall the exact measurements I think it's 42" x 48", but I was noticing yesterday while waiting for the bus, that it is big enough to be a lap quilt.  What do people use puffy quilts for anyway?  Do they always live on a bed?  As I look at the pictures even now it's easy to see what it would look like puffy, but to what purpose?  Maybe I'll figure it out today.

As always you can view my pictures in more detail by simply clicking on them.

Gift from Heaven Quilt Details

Yesterday I was thinking that perhaps instead of making a big fuss about having a fat quarter printed of DD as a baby perhaps I should save that for a different project in the future and instead work on finishing up both the back and the front of this quilt.

Very Different Border Detail on this quilt.

So off I went to go get it.  This WIP was the first project I set aside, so instead of being in the WIP box (which is nearly empty!) it was stashed in the bottom of my closet.  Don't worry the only other quilts stashed in my closet are finished ones.  So I pulled it out and a couple of things stuck me right away.  This second quilt is actually quite different than the first, with different colors and different memories.  All that time ago when I was adding the borders I ran short of the broadcloth but had plenty of 3.5" squares so the border ended up with the pieced border seen abouve where as the first was a straight broadcloth with a scalloped binding.

My favorite blue and terry block that I forgot I made!

I did hand embroidery through all three layers of the first quilt.  By working carefully the red hearts that are carefully placed on the front appear sprinkled on the back.  As this second quilt already has a planned pieced back I didn't think I should embellish all the way through.  So instead the hand detailed hearts have been drawn in the same places as the first quilt, but I'm only working with the top layer this time and wont make the quilt sandwich until later.

Hand embellished details.

So far I have stitched 10 or 11 of these little hearts, and I have 34 total, so I'm about a 1/3rd of the way done.  DD has already been asking whom this one is for. 

The Original Blessings from Heaven Quilt for Comparision.

Gift from Heaven Quilt Back 2

A week or three ago I saw on Gwen's blog a quilt back that made me stop and think.  It was indeed scrappy and inspired me to consider doing the same, you can see the back I'm talking about by clicking here.  She tells me those are 12" blocks, but yet it reminded me of my box of squares.   The ones I cut out for Jessica's baby clothes quilt. 

Most of you wont know this but I spent three months cutting up Jessica's baby clothes and making them into 3.5" squares.  Yes three months.  I had FOUR 13-gallon kitchen trash bags full of her baby clothes stashed away, or was it five?  That's how I was able to not only make one quilt, but an entire second top to boot. 

Now that top has been waiting for me to get off my duff and figure out some sort of back so I can get started on the quilting.  After all quilts like these long to be FINISHED!

So today I got out that banished box of squares and started counting.  I have 760 of the afore mentioned squares, and to think I've made at least 3 baby blankets using those fabrics since I worked on the Blessings from Heaven Quilts! (Talk about overkill!)

To piece the entire full size quilt back I would need...  Are you ready for this?  900 squares to make the entire back pieced from the leftover squares, I knew there had to be another answer and here's what I came up with.

This layout uses a mere 512 of those 3.5" squares.  For the center I have selected a newborn picture of Jessica, which I will have custom printed after I jazz around with it a bit in Illustrator.  I think I will adjust two different pictures and have them both printed so that I can select the one I like best.  Does it make you want to go sew or simply wish me luck?

Lady Bird and her Gentleman-bird stopped by for dinner, so I snapped a couple of photos. Not the one of Lady Bird with her crest up like I wanted, but maybe next time.

Feathered Star

For the past two days I've been working on this Feathered Star Quilt.  It started with the desire to do something with the leftover fabrics from Jessica's baby clothes quilts.  I'm going to add another single row of those baby clothes squares around the outside and then when the time comes binding it in gray.

This is the one and I believe only Feathered Star that I'll be making.  You can find the pattern at Quilter's Cache under 20"+ blocks.  I didn't have quite enough of the hand dyed fabric to make the block 2 colors and added in the gray, which I think works nicely throughout.

When I look at this photograph I'm surprised.  The squares are all shades of purple.  Sort of makes you say "hu" over the things a photograph can do.

A Pocket For Corduroy and School Stuff?!?!?!

Jessica is four now and that means things like school supply lists (I received my first one as a parent two days ago, more on that in a jiff). Backpacks, clothes for her first day, as well as Friday Spirit Day Clothes. It's really feels like a lot to do before the month is up. After I made my first pair of boxers, for my husband, I learned tags are there for a reason, so I always put in at least a scrap of fabric so the wearer gets it on the proper way.
So what do I do? I go on a tangent looking at little girl jumpers. My all time favorite line in the Harry Potter movies -to date- is Ginny saying "Mummy, have you seen my jumper?" I adore the way she accents that! My mom offers up her pattern from when my sisters where little, which I promptly alter to make pjs. Not bad for an deviation from the pattern, if I do say so myself. Everyone knows it's very important for children getting ready to start school to have new "jam-jams!" LOL, right! Yes, that's a Purple Punch Vera Bradley Backpack, Jessica's auntie loves her very much!
As for that school supply list, it says EVERYTHING must have the child's initials on it. Want to take a guess at my daughters initials? JR! Right, like I'm going to cover her things with that. So JCR it must be. I had a fight with the embroidery machine about it. The embroidery machine won, but I got my way by turning the flywheel by hand 1198 times - one turn per stitch, now there is a workout for you. DH started calling around about the sensor the machine needs (of course we don't have a part number!) and the only quote he was able to get today was $90 to start and any parts needed would be on top of that. I know, Eeegads! Of course my sister tells me after I did all that that she could have had the kind people at Vera Bradley do embroider it for me.

I'm a first time mom, I can't help myself. Since I am also armed with the knowledge that I'm a last time mom, it's really important for me to do everything right, can't you tell? Jessica's school supply list says "12 pack of crayons". As a child of the 80's I know there are two kinds of crayons. The good kind made by crayola, and the bad kinds made by everyone else. Even today I find this to be true in every pack of crayons I come across. Like a good little mommy I go online and type in "12 pack crayola crayons" I can have 12 boxes of fill in the blank number of crayons made by crayola. I can have 12 crayons all the same color... Or I can buy something else. Melissa and Doug are making plastic ones now... That seems wrong, like somehow you'd have to press harder or something I dunno. Then I found another place P'kolino. Their own website doesn't show the crayons as being available (only the colored pencils), which makes me uncomfortable.

So here's what I've learned. Most 12 pack crayons (including the lumber crayons believe it or not) are not round. In theory preventing them from rolling, and allowing for a better grip. Another thing about crayons that my super artistic daughter taught me is that washable is the best. Crayon isn't fun to try and get out of anything... So I'll be hoping for a box of triangle washable Crayola's! I will have accept the yoke of "one of those parents who can't follow directions". Because if I order something online and it's wrong... Grrr...

"A Pocket For Corduroy", while not the first book of the dearly beloved little bear named Corduroy, the pocket one is the one we own (you try having oodles of voucher money at a paperback bookstore that is going out of business and see what you buy!) After reading that book the other day Jessica insisted on him having his own pocket (I selected purple fabric to sew on, just like in the story). No photo of him as he's tucked into bed with my little one this evening.

Today is my 6 year wedding anniversary. I had it all planned out. I was going to give DH a Bobby Flay Reversible Double Cast Iron Griddle, and then we could enjoy bacon and pancakes for breakfast. Well Kohl's was out of them, so we'll have to save that for another day. So since I have vested interest I hope all of you had a great day. Because that's all that mattered anyway.

Spring Quilt Festival 2009

A bit of blogging this morning had me finding out about http://parkcitygirl.blogspot.com/2009/04/quilt-festival-spring-2009.html It looked like so much fun I just had to join in. You're more than welcome as well! Check out the link above for the details. My favorite quilt, is my very first one. I drew up the pattern I would use before I even knew a thing about quilt blocks or seam allowances. I made it from my daughter's baby clothes. The cut off points don't matter, for me it's about all the memories, both of the past and of the future. In this quilt I found a part of myself that I had been missing for my entire life, and yet never knew. Sitting at the sewing machine allows me to reach through the generations to touch the people who having lovingly made quilts before me. Touching all of those fabrics, some outfits had been hand-me-downs and some not allowed me remember all of the joy of my daughter's babyhood and to peak into the lives of the wonderful women who had shared their children's things with me. I am blessed to have made this quilt. Working with bias square triangles and knits at the same time showed me how limitless quilting can be. When I started I was certain I would send it to a longarmer yet, when the time came, circumstances prevented it. Taking a deep breath I started machine quilting in my little Elna which has only a 6" throat, and you know what? It wasn't so bad! To this day that machine is still my favorite for quilting! Jessica playing peak-a-boo with her quilt.

A Quilt for Baby

The Dino Quilt is done. Hooray. I'm so glad. The woman hours I've put into it blows my mind. It doesn't seem like much but shoot! Other bloggers have been keeping track of "stash" fabrics used versus "new" fabrics purchased. Here's one that will blow your mind: I haven't bought ANY fabric since before Christmas. I know tell me about it, withdrawal anyone?

As for an actual accounting of the fabrics. The entire dino side is scrap bag fabrics. The back is made from DD's baby clothes, cut up and used this time last year for the baby clothes quilts (current count ~ 4 double sided pillows, 1 wall hanging, 2 double size quilts, one twin size quilt, and two baby blankets, and a prairie point binding on a king size quilt all from those aforementioned precut baby clothes). The only "added in" fabric is the red white and blue border all gained from my stash. Both the blue and the red were purchased with a plan in mind and I used what was "leftover" from those projects for the border. The white was purchased last summer simply because it was polka dots (on sale for $2 a yard!) and dd loves polka dots.

I always save the batting that you cut off to "true up" the quilt after it's quilted. Sometimes I have a bunch leftover sometimes not so much. All of the batting from this quilt was from my "salvaged batting" pile. For anyone wondering: if you'd like to use your own salvaged batting simply zigzag stitch the pieces together sewing either just on top of the two edges or abutting them. I've done it both ways and you can't tell any difference. While I wouldn't use salvaged batting for a wedding quilt it's just fine for a little quilt like this.

So my total out of pocket for my good deed was merely time.

In the second photo you can see Jessica. She is doing this new rather annoying thing. She will smile big and bright and then right when she knows you're taking the photo she will turn it into a "closed" smile. It must be something she picked up from her father...

Momma-made and Jessica Helped

This is the back of a baby blanket I started for my neighbor's great niece. She is expecting a little boy in July. Perhaps it's the July due date that has me taking the time to make something. I don't know it just feels right. Like I just said this is to be the back of the quilt. On the front I'll be using the dinos you see at the top together with some cartoon style dino embroidery. I hope it will be really nice. When Jessica was little her pediatrician would always compliment me on Jessica's blankets so hopefully that bit of sweetness will be passed on as well. Yes these are charms leftover from Jessica's baby clothes quilts. This makes quilt number five made from her baby clothes. Who knew I had cut so much? My "boyish" fabrics are running thin so hopefully I'll have a slew of baby girls to make quilts for. hahaha This is the Angel food cake that nearly wasn't. I always make homemade Angel Food Cake. The yolks are saved for homemade ice cream, and the whites go to the cake. This is the only cake my daughter will eat, so I suppose it's nice that she chows through it. Excuse me I seem to be doing a bit of bird walking today.

Why this cake almost wasn't. After separating more than 8 of the required dozen eggs I broke a yolk into my whites! Eeegads. Luckily DH fished it out for me...
Then I mixed ALL of the sugar into the flour, instead of holding some back to mix in the whites (I dealt with that by beating the whites into hard shiny peaks instead of soft peaks)
Just as I was measuring out the cream of tartar I discovered I only had 1/2 tsp. but my recipe calls for 1 1/2 tsp! (I handled that one with a bit of help from the Internet - it seems you can substitute lemon juice for the cream of tartar!) So I used what I had and used lemon juice for the rest (use three times the amount of lemon juice in place what your recipe called for)
At this point I'm certain my cake will fall. I don't know what that looks like I've never had a cake fall before but I dread it.
Lastly I discover that the tube pan has been put up and away for so long that it's dusty and now I have to quick wash and dry it before the eggs are whipped. I'm drying it as the preheated signal on the oven goes off. Thrilled I'm done and it's up to fate now I rush to put the cake in the oven. Except my oven racks are all wrong and I have to move them while they are hot. I hate that. I'm always afraid I will burn myself. We have strict rules about no children within a crazy huge radius when the oven is open but still...

As you can see it did not fall. Lucky me. I'm beginning to wonder if it's not really me... Maybe I just have a great recipe?

Just Keep Sewin'

Good Morning! At least it's morning here. Hopefully your day is as pretty outside as mine is.
I've been working on my first rag rug. It will be a present for my husband for his side of the bed. I'm planning it to be a nice little runner size. Already our cat Kitty thinks it's wonderful, she tried to sleep on it last night and when she found it full of pins she slept on the unpinned ropes instead.
Since the Red Star Quilt wont be ready for this weekend, I went ahead and made a little matching pillow. It was leftover baby clothing from Jessica's Gift from the Heart Quilt, so all I had to do was sew it together. No cutting to make my rib yelp. :) The inspiration for the entire red star quilt and pillow is shown there next to the pillow. This is the one and only time they will be together. These were my first machine sewed buttons and button holes. I really like the contrast. The backing material is the same mini roses white on white of the big quilt and I think they will look great on a bed together.

The Red quilt is currently rolled up into a tub waiting to be basted, so I can't show you them together right now. The good news is as long as I don't have to lie down I'm not feeling awful.

So the sewing project for today is to make a bit more progress on the rag rug and tomorrow I'm off to see about finding a Color Wonder Paint Brush Set for Jessica for Christmas. Hey of all the commercials she might see and want something from I'm not up for denying her a paint set. Currently they are buy one get one free at Toys R Us, but they couldn't seem to find any on the shelves when I called about it yesterday. Time will tell.

Croke!

Today I am a frog. I was one last night, and this afternoon too. Where the handsome prince to break the crokie-ness of my voice? My DH? He's not a prince so the kiss didn't work. Mean little sniffle-ing bug. Everyone in my house has it now. It's even settled in Rob's lungs, so please spare him any happy thoughts you might have. He's prone the pneumonia, so it's a constant fear when something like this happens. Since I don't have to talk to blog I can feel free to share my day with all of you.

First things first. The reveal. I made all 12 rosebud blocks, only to discover I really needed 15 or 16, so I'll have to get on that tomorrow. Here is the layout plan. The embroidery at the bottom is white on white and will go all around the quilt. I'm thinking about a blue border between the white of the basket and the natural muslin of the rosebud blocks and then a second between the rosebuds and the embroidery. DH thinks perhaps the center white background should be cut down a bit smaller and that I should add more butterflies. What does everyone else think? I'm personally inclined to agree with him, hopefully now that I've found some more freebie butterflies that wont be a problem. As always you can click on the image to see it better. I encourage this because you can even see the details of the white on white fabric in this photo.

Tonight I'm showing off my daughter as she headed for bed. She is sporting the pj shorts I made for her, aren't they darling? I'm afraid they wont fit her much longer. Why is it she seems to out grow the things I make so quickly? Is it just that I love them more? Oh no her teeth aren't really like that, she just enjoys being silly for the camera. If you click on her you can see those big baby brown eyes! Whoever would have dreamed that my hazel eyed husband and my blued eyed self would have a child, the namesake of a Green eyed woman grow up to have brown eyes?!?! Oh well there's no more denying it now, hazel maybe, blue never, and certainly not green.

Jessica's Gift of the Heart Baby Clothes Quilt is DONE!

Today was a good day. It doesn't matter than things completely didn't go my way, or that I had my butt chewed until my foot hurt and then some. It was a good day.

Why? Today shortly before lunch I FINISHED Jessica's heart baby clothes quilt. Binding and everything. I even did a spin on a scalloped edge. Just wait till tomorrow when you'll get to see it. The things I did to it since I last showed you a picture really have pulled it all together.

I also finished cutting all the red fabric for my red Christmas quilt. I still have the white roses left to cut, but the cut list for that is as long as my arm and I don't want to be to sleepy and miss cut by a 1/4" or something stupid and then have to buy more yardage.

One of the pieces I had to cut forty squares of the same fabric. I'm telling you when I set it down after cutting it, the fabric went "thunk".

Have I mentioned I'm waiting to be able to afford batting? Here's how it breaks down. The kind I want to use for the two Christmas quilts, and the second heart baby clothes quilt runs $10 a yard. Now the red quilt is a large queen nearly a king, which means I need 3 yards. The other two are full/queens which means I need 2.5 yards for each one. That's 8 yards, now easy math $80 +tax = $85.60 for batting alone. Now that's the white stuff in the MIDDLE of the quilt. Not even pretty stuff. So since I bought the batting for Jessica's quilt on sale 50% off (and the twin size one I used cheap poly batting I didn't like). Now I'm spoiled and I want to wait for it to be half off again. I have a 40% off coupon which would make the out the door total $51.36 and inspite that being the batting for THREE quilts, that is a hugh number at my house. So I'm wishing and hoping that it will be half off again by the time I'm done piecing the red quilt.

Gee that was long winded, why don't I wrap it up, and tomorrow you can see pictures.