No high speed Internet for you!!

At least not anytime soon. :( My desires to connect and download at higher than snail speeds have been thwarted by Comcast's inability to find a live cable connection running under my house. They will have to send a maintenance technician out in about 2 weeks. We live in a new development with all the modern connnections supposedly right at the disposal of utility companies, but have had trouble with the satellite, the phone and now the cable. So much for modern conveniences... sigh.

After 7 days home either celebrating, in my sickbed or stuck inside by the snow and impassable icy roads, I'm climbing the walls to get back to work and some adult human contact. If I hear one more Xbox argument, I'll be certifiiable.....

I actually used to ENJOY this!

Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, found me:

1. Waking at 2 a.m. to nab a gift for my DD from Walmart.com

2. Getting back online at 3:30 a.m. because Walmart.com was down at 2 a.m.

3. Getting quite a bit of online shopping done prior to 5 a.m. (although the pivotal gift I've now learned may not be available after they already took and confirmed my order - damn you Walmart.com!)

4. Getting my kids and myself to the mall at 10:30 a.m. (traffic and crowds were NUTS - usually if I brave the mall I do it alone. I must have been insane to take 3 kids)

5. Home by 3:30 p.m. and in bed for a nap due to shopping exhaustion!

Saturday night found me coming down with a cold - my second already this season. Sunday it snowed a couple of inches here - the kids went out and played, made a snowman, then came in to eat lunch and it all melted away with the rain. I went out with my DD and ran a few errands, came home, napped because I was feeling so tired and achy, and woke up to another 4 inches of snow!

Today I called in sick - schools were closed because of the snow. The snow is mostly gone as of this afternoon and hopefully I can make it in to work tomorrow. NOT an ideal way to extend your long holiday weekend, for sure.

No quilting was accomplished either - so sad. :(

Step right up!

Here's my latest treasure - I've been on the lookout for something like this for years after seeing one displaying quilts in a magazine.  I just happened upon it in a home dec store on Saturday.  The gal in the store wasn't even sure it was for sale, and had to call the owner, who assured her it was.  So it came home with me.  This just charmed the pants off me and I love it even more in my home.   :)

I spent the weekend rearranging my sewing room to make space for my new sewing machine cabinet.  I cleaned out drawers and moved shelves around.  The furniture had not been moved in almost 4 years and there were many mutant dust bunnies lurking behind shelves.  But now everything is nicely opened up and looks really great!

I bought the inner border fabric for my orange quilt, but my fear of doing the mitered borders kept me from attempting that this weekend - oh, that and the mess from the rearranging furniture and all!

I did spend quite a bit of time cutting - cutting out 2 new pink and black quilts that I'm planning, and cutting up 2 collections of half yard pieces that I am sharing with my sis-in-law.  We are going there for Thanksgiving dinner, so I wanted to have them ready to give her on Thursday.  It certainly takes a huge amount of time to cut and refold 80 fat quarters!

You might want to get your sunglasses

Before looking at my latest WIP!  This is my ORANGE YA GLAD IT'S NOT RED quilt, made using the Zuzu's Petals pattern designed by Miss Rosie's Quilt Company.  The individual pattern for this seems to be out of print, but I believe it is still available in one of her quilt books.  Wow, it certainly is bright, but I love all the fun oranges I was able to find and use.

I also found the PERFECT fun border fabric, and pinned it up next to the quilt blocks on my design wall.  I'll save that picture for a future blog post once I get the blocks together and I need to shop this weekend for an inner border fabric to help separate the two elements.

I'd really like to attempt mitered corners for my borders - does anyone have a good source for instruction - book, video, website?  I've tried them before and have not been satisifed with the result, but I'd really like to give it a go again for this quilt, so if anyone has any suggestions, I'd really appreciate hearing them!

Going Supernova!

OK, the absolute BEST part of retreat - 2 years ago at another fall retreat, this woman Pam told us about a retro sewing machine she bought at a garage sale. She said it was green and looked like a rocket ship. Well let me tell you, I've been coveting that machine - sight unseen - for 2 years!  She talked about selling it, but she was also quite attached to it, although her husband wanted it out of the house. Well, the first day of retreat, she was again talking to my SIL about it.

They are in the middle of remodeling and the machine was now in the garage and her DH was really pushing to get it out of the house. So after I heard that, I went to Pam and asked her if she would consider selling it, and to think about how much she would want for it (I was thinking $300-$400). She said "Well I paid $50 for it" and I said "Well, I'd give you $100 and give it a very good home" so we made the deal.

I talked to her about it all weekend, and we decided to follow her home and pick it up on the way.  This machine was better than I could have expected - it's in its own cabinet, beautiful condition - pristine with all the original instruction manuals, cams for embroidery, all the original tools and it's just wonderful and cute as can be.  It's a Necchi Supernova from the 1950s - isn't she great?!

Pam said "I can't take your money - I know you will give it a good home" but in all good conscience, I couldn't let her do that (I don't know her THAT well" so I gave her the $50 that she paid. I'm sure I
got the better end of that deal!!!

I threaded it up last night and the top thread sews really well, but the bobbin thread is loopy, so it will need to be serviced, but I'm sure she will be purring like a kitten in no time.  Plus, I was able to get a lead on a great sewing machine repair person and was told if you call and make an appointment, he can do it in 24 hours!  I'm so excited to get this baby running and put her to work.  I need to try and figure out how to rearrange my sewing room to make room for her, though!

A little slice of heaven

I'm back from retreat and had a complete blast.  It was really great to go the extra day for the first time this year.  We were able to arrive on Wednesday instead of Thursday, which about half of the 90+ retreaters do.  It really allows you to get settled and productive before the chaos of everyone else arriving on Thursday.

My SIL and I ended up at a great work table - there are 6 to a table and two at
ours were published quilt authors and designers - what fun is that?  We had been to retreats with them before, but you really get a chance bond when you
work so closely together, and they were both so inspiring!

It was quite cold and rainy up the mountains, but there was only one day that we didn't get out for a long walk around the camp. Even our last day, we walked after breakfast. I felt like I was at least doing a little less damage with all the eating. Oh and the one day that it did rain too hard to walk, they had a free yoga class, so we took that and really enjoyed the stretching.

I got 2 massages, got my scissors sharpened, bought fabric for borders of one of the quilts I worked on), and sold some fabric from my sewing room that I knew I would never use.  I also found a source there to donate much more fabric too, so my sewing room is a lot more bare now that I'm home!

But the BEST part, is the cute little vintage sewing machine I bought from a fellow retreater.  I will save that for a separate post, though.

I didn't plan my projects very well this year.  Although I took 5 projects cut out and ready to sew, there wasn't one that I was truly inspired to start, so that was a real mistake.  Although when I got there, one of our guild members who owns a shop had a cute yellow, orange & pink surfboard fabric that I thought might look good for borders of my orange quilt, it inspired me to put together all those orange blocks just so I could see if I needed to buy that border fabric.  The blocks are all together, but need to be trimmed up and assembled, so I did come close to completing a quilt.

The rest of my time was spent sewing 720 half square triangles together.  Yes, I got a lot done, but nothing really to show for it except my stack of HSTs.  I will post a pic when I get the orange quilt together - soon!

Tomorrow! Tomorrow!

We're leaving tomorrow!

It's only a day away......

Alert Mr. Ripley!

Because, Believe It or Not, I've FINISHED the binding on the Red Monster!  I finished it in a week - yay me!  I never thought that was possible.  I guess the proper motivation makes all the difference!

Here's a shot of it temporarily lounging on my king size bed (excuse the mess) - this sucker is huge and heavy.  I can't remember the last time I made a quilt this big.  Whew - so glad it's done in plenty of time.  I can even take it to retreat with me and display it on my bed before it goes to its new owner!

We're leaving for retreat in 2 days - can't wait!!!!

Getting there!

Not a very exciting blog post, but I'm just over 1/2 way finished with the binding on my Red Monster quilt!  This is very exciting to me, since the baby quilt I just finished took me about 2 months to force myself to finish.  I'll try not to hurt my shoulder patting myself on the back!  lol

Two boys and a ghoul

Sorry, nothing quilty to post today, but I wanted to show pictures of my cuties before I took them out for trick or treating on Tuesday.  We had the Green Goblin, a zombie cheerleader and the Grim Reaper - scary!