Full Disclosure...

At the risk of shocking some of you, I've decided to post how many projects I have floating around the house in an attempt to motivate myself into finishing some of them (i.e. shaming myself into finishing them).

You see, I had been having the urge to work on something cross-stitch for a couple of weeks now, and thought about starting a new design. I have plenty of fabric (a post for another time) and plenty of floss (you've seen the pictures here), so I could start something with very little outlay of money. I even went so far as to go through the filing cabinet where I store all my cross-stitch patterns and pulled out the three that seemed like the best option. You see, I couldn't decide which one was the best option, so I pulled out three to peruse for the next few days to decide which was the best.

As I sat there perusing, I realized I have this large box where all my WIPs live (Works In Progress). It's a copy paper box - it holds 10 reams of paper...it's not a small box. And no, I don't have a picture to show you of that - someday. Anyway, I remembered this box that I had relegated to the back corner under my working table and decided to pull it out. Let's see what projects I have already started that I might have forgotten about, maybe one of these would be the best option right now....

Yeah. I have a total of 27 bags of projects in this box!! One bag per project. And 24 of them have stitching on the fabric!!!!! This is ridiculous. 24 started cross-stitch projects?? And I'm thinking of starting another?? Yeah....nix that idea. So I pulled out every project I had that was close to being finished. That was, um.....4. Yeah....24 cross-stitch projects started and only 4 can be considered close to being finished. This is ridiculous. Oh wait, I've said that already.

I did find a 5th project that I no longer wanted to stitch, and was very near the beginning stages of stitching, so I'm currently frogging all those stitches. It's going pretty quickly and then I can say I only have 23 started cross-stitch projects!! Yay!!!

Then I remembered I don't only cross-stitch, I quilt and knit, too. Argh. Ok, so how many knitting projects do I have started? That's easy, 3. Three knitting projects? I'm not even an avid knitter, why do I need to have 3 going? But at least it's better than the cross-stitch projects.

Ok, on to the quilting projects. Hang on, I haven't actually counted these yet (I'm kind of scared to...). Let me do that while you wait...

Counting...

Counting...

Fainting...

Ok, I've woken up again....I currently have 22 quilting pojects started. That means it is somewhere between the stages of having either cut fabrics or begun stitching something, and it doesn't have a binding on it. Four of these projects are piecing, 8 are applique, 2 are English Paper Piecing and 8 are in the hand-quilting stage. Whoa....

So, I've decided that I need to get each category (cross-stitch, knitting and quilting) of WIPs into the single digits, under 10. I have no idea if I'll be able to accomplish this or how long it will take, but I'm hoping that by posting about it here, I'll be more accountable about it.

I thought I'd add this picture of Felix. This is how he looked after he got done helping me clip coupons this weekend. I think he's on coupon overload :)

Pineapple Quilt Progess

Just in case you thought I'd fallen off the earth, nope, I'm still here. I've been spending some time at my sewing machine this week (very unusual of me, I know). You see, I've gotten very bored with the hand-quilting of Mom's tablerunner (which is supposed to be finished by July 14)...so I've been bouncing between projects right now, trying to do a little bit of something and then going back to the hand-quilting. It's not exactly working...

Here are my working stacks of fabric next to my sewing machine...I know, the creams are washed out by the light, I'm a horrible photographer...

I tried to take a shot of me sewing on one of the blocks - how do you ladies get these kinds of pictures in focus??? You can tell from this photo that these blocks aren't large - only 5 1/2" finished.

Here is the beginning of a block...boring to start..

But look what 9 finished blocks looks like!! I haven't sewn these together yet, they're just pinned to the design wall right now. I'm liking them more and more :) I've finally gotten it down to about 1 hour to sew a block, from the 1 1/2 hours it was taking me....I think this is going to be a quilt where you either love the process or you don't make the quilt...

One last shot of Felix. He likes to sit between our legs if we have our footrests up. He doesn't bother my sewing - too much. If I happen to dangle a thread within his line of sight, he'll attack it, oh yeah. Doesn't he look like he's just waiting for that to happen? LOL

Some pictures today..

I finally got around to taking some pictures of my activities these last couple of weeks.

Yesterday was taken up by painting our living room, as I mentioned in yesterday's post. Here is an action shot of DH putting on the second coat of paint. As you can see, he's quite focused on his work - and he does a great job, too :)

Today I found this lovely in the mailbox. Notice where it came from? Hint - Australia! But wait - I'm not expecting anything from Australia....Hmm...well, I did just send a package to this person back in March, but I wasn't expecting anything in return...

So this pile of loveliness was completely unexpected!!! 9 skeins of Silk 'N Colors flossies!!!!!! And do you see the cute card she included? How sweet :)

The main project taking up my time these last few weeks has been Mom's tablerunner. Here is a full shot of it as it dangles off the side of the table. I've gotten the entire center blue section quilted, as well as the top left portion of cream. I am working my way back to the center on the top section. The blue triangles at each end will ultimately be chopping off.

Here is a close-up of the feathers I quilted into the center section. You can't see them very well, but they are a 3-pronged feathery frond kind of thing. Each pattern filled half of the space, so I flipped it for the other side.

Here you can see the design I am quilting into the cream sections of the tablerunner. I'm quilting in the ditch around this design. I love how the wool batting is making the designs puff up nicely, even before it's been washed.

Here is a shot of my Candied Hexagon quilt - in process. You can see the piles of fabrics in the upper right of the picture. The bowl of glassine envelopes are the quilt blocks waiting to be pieced. Each quilt block gets it's own glassine envelope. I learned that trick in a hand piecing class I took with Linda Franz. Once you get all the pieces to a block cut out, they all stay together in their own envelope and don't get mixed up. Very tidy.

The bottom of the picture shows my styrofoam working space. Another idea Linda Franz offered was to have a flat working space that can support your work, and can be pinned into. I found a spare piece of styrofoam in DH's shop and cut out a 7" square - perfect!! And still room for a kitty to sit in my lap while I'm working :)

Below is the design wall holding all the completed Candied Hexagon blocks. I was wrong, I only have 2 rows finished so far, not 3.

Below are 3 bowls I've made this week. The dark purple one is the largest one I've made so far. The blue one is my attempt at a square bowl. It's also a little shorter than I had wanted. The light purple one has become my go-to size/shape of bowl.

Here is a shot so you can see the heights a little better. Sorry the camera decided to focus on the jar of threads rather than the bowls I spent so much time on.....stupid camera....

Ok, that's enough from me for today. I won't have much to post about for a while, but at least you are now all up to date.

Am I still here???

My life has gone on hyperdrive since my birthday last month. I've now become the official back-up babysitter for my sister's 2 boys. Which is taking up a fairly good amount of time. And Kendrick has hit the stage where he is testing to see how far he can get away with things..and he doesn't seem to like his little brother, so there is a LOT of hitting going on. Good thing Grayson is so laid back about it. Anyway, life is very full with this new responsibility - and I've only watched them 5 days out of the last 3 weeks - wow, it seems like it's been a lot more than that! LOL

I've also discovered the fabric/clothesline bowls craze that was going around a year ago or so. Man these things are addictive!! I made a couple for my mom and sis for Mother's Day and am now trying to build up a small stash of them to offer for sale at the yard sale we're planning to have this weekend. I currently have 3 made - hopefully at least 2 more will join the party.

I also spent today painting the living room with DH. Talk about hard work!! I was in charge of trimming the ceiling and baseboards so DH could follow with the roller....which meant I was up and down the ladder alllllll day. And did I mention we have 10 foot ceilings in our house? That's a long way up!!! The first time I went up the ladder this morning I thought I was going to have a panic attack (I have issues with heights) and DH would have to to the ceiling bits. But I finally conquered my fears and didn't look back. We now have a lovely green living room and we even got 2 coats on in one day!! All the neighbors were impressed (yes, we had to show it off to someone!).

Let's see....oh yes, I'm also working on a surprise gift for Mom for her birthday in July. I had some blue and cream log cabin blocks floating around my sewing room for years. I had originally bought the fabric to make a log cabin quilt for my little brother and his first wife. He's now on to his second wife and I never managed to finish the quilt. In fact, I only had 6 blocks made. So I got this bright idea to round out the number of blocks to 8, and sew them in 2 rows of 4 blocks to make a tablerunner. I'm going to cut the corners off to make the ends pointy and am in the process of hand quilting it now. I'm about 2/3 of the way finished with that and am still on schedule to get it to her by her birthday. And I repurposed the blue and cream fabrics to make my pineapple quilt.

I've also been working on my pink and brown Candied Hexagons quilt blocks. I've got 3 rows of blocks completed and on my design wall. I'm waiting until I get all the blocks pieced before I decide on an actual layout. In the meantime, I'm placing them in position the same way the quilt I'm following for the pattern has the blocks placed. I'll rearrange to make the colors flow right once they're all made.

I was able to get my grandmother's sewing machine fixed recently, too. Apparently the ceramic plate in the foot pedal had cracked, which made the entire machine not usable. The local quilt shop's father (a retired electrician) replaced the foot pedal for me for only the cost of the pedal. How awesome was that!

I've had another interview since my birthday rejection. And they didn't want me this time, either. My mom and sis think I need to dye my hair. I went gray really early - first one found in high school, major additions in college. I'm really starting to think they might be right...sigh...

Now that I have access to my blogger account again (I was locked out for a week or so) I hope I'll keep up with somewhat regular posts....but we'll see.

I realize I haven't been posting very much lately. Things in the personal world have been a little crazy for me lately, and I seem to be going for days without working on any of my projects. Thankfully, the personal world has settled down a bit and I've been able to focus on the Christmas season.

DH and I have become friendly with a couple of new neighbors that moved into our neighborhood this past fall. One is a stay at home mom with 2 little ones and a husband that works away from home all week. The other is a young couple that are seriously into horses.

We've had the young couple over for dinner a couple of times, as well as gone out to their parent's farm to watch them train their horses. I'm really considering taking riding lessons. I've loved horses since I was a teenager (what teenage girl doesn't love horses?) but have never had the opportunity to be near them. There is even the possibility of my being able to work on the farm to pay for the lessons. How awesome - considering I don't have a job yet! I've been putting it off a little bit, as I'm learning that I'm very nervous around the huge beasts. I'm used to Pips and our 4 kitties....if they step on you or kick you, it's not a big deal! The plan is for me to continue to go out there with our new friends and get comfortable with the horses, then start working sometime in the spring or summer. And then the riding lessons start :) Yay!!

Ok, I should make this stitching related in some way...I've told you that I've been trying to teach myself how to knit while I'm on this work 'vacation'....I think I'm doing pretty well :) I found a pattern for a circular afghan in a book in the library - One skein Wonders, I think - and thought it would make a lovely tree skirt. Only problem was, I had never used dpn's. I didn't even own any. So, I haunted Etsy for a couple of days, coerced DH into letting me buy a set and waited for them to show up in the mail. When they finally did, I took off. And ripped it out. And started again. And ripped it out. And started again. This is how far I've gotten on the third attempt.

I'm a little further along in the pattern than this picture shows now - and things are going along much smoother than they did in the beginning. This has actually become my go-to project when I'm watching something on TV that DH likes and I don't....I don't think it'll be finished before this year's season is over, but I'm pretty sure I'll have it done before winter is over. My only concern now is if the circular needles are long enough. I'm starting to cram stitches around it and I'm only at the half-way point...eek!

Another thing I made recently is a new pincushion. I like these little cushions for use when I'm stitching in front of the TV. They work great when I'm working on my english paper piecing projects. I gave away my last one to a young girl that wanted to learn how to sew at our quilt bee last month, so I spent a couple of evenings getting a new one made up for me. This one is about twice as big as my last one, but I like that size - you can't lose it down the side of the chair when it's bigger!

The front...

The back...

The last thing I wanted to show you is this little working wall I put together a couple of months ago. I've got a large design wall that takes up an entire wall in my sewing room, but I wanted a small one near my sewing machine, somehow I thought that would be more convenient.

DH had some odd insulation bits in the garage, so I absconded with one about the size I wanted and took it upstairs. I wrapped it in a piece of fabric I had and pinned the edges down. Then I took a few pieces of heavy duty double-sided tape and stuck it to the wall. It's working out pretty well!

And here you can see it in my sewing corner. It's pretty convenient.

Again, I'm sorry I've been so absent lately. I'm hoping things will settle down with the new year and get more normal. We'll see...