Thank you Dad

Today, I had to sit and wait for daughter #2 to finish up her art project after school. This was going to be my early day. I could come home right after school and rest, but she was absent last week and this was the final day to finish making the clay vase so the teacher could fire it and so she had to stay after. She said she would only be maybe 45 minutes so I ran after the boys, picked them up, dropping the older one at home and bringing the younger one to pick up my daughter. He wanted to come with me. After waiting an hour in the car for her (it took her about 2 hours to finish the project) he really didn't want to come pick her up anymore, I thought about all of the times my dad sat in the car waiting for me when I was a kid. There were probably 100 or more band practices and at least 50 hula lessons (yeah, I'm that good) and ballet lessons -- don't ask me to dance please--and after school projects and candy striper at the hospital and...the list goes on and on.

I'm sure I said thanks before, but I doubt I really meant it like I do this time. So, Dad, thanks for sitting there in the car, waiting for me all of those times. Thanks for not complaining when I took just a little bit longer, or had to go back in to find my jacket or clarinet or whatever I left behind. Thanks for giving me all of those opportunities as a kid.

I can never pay you back for those times, but I am paying them forward to my own kids and hope that I am half as patient as you were.

exhausted

I haven't posted this week and here it is Friday again. With my three jobs at work, life is getting to be hectic. I have not worked this hard in a long time. I am a full time teacher of high school science, which is fun, but takes a lot of prep time. There are labs to set up and since I am always in the front of the rest of the teachers (each time I try to get behind everyone, they all slow down) I am the one to set everything up. I am slowly learning that if I don't set up for everyone, they will take my lab set ups because I don't get there before everyone else does in the morning and so I have to set it up again. I might as well just set up enough for everyone the first time around so I have what I need when I walk in every day. It just takes time. Complaining about it has done no good so far. People just look at me and say, well, we thought you set it up for us, or we needed it and it was there, so we took it. Getting frustrated and telling the principal does no good because everything things we should work together, which means everyone thinks I should do all the work anyways and not complain about it. Once you accept your role in life, you are much happier. But it has taken me a long time to get to this point. I still complain a lot and still forget a lot. Just this week, I set up a lab for myself and then came in and it was taken from me. I don't know why I was surprised, but I was and that threw my day off. So, the next lab, I set up for everyone else too.

Then, there is the BTSA, beginning teacher support program (what's the A for?--assistance?). We had a meeting this week that went until 6:30 and was 30 minutes from home. We could have easily met at our school so we didn't have to drive so far because all we did was talk about what we need to get done, but no, we had to all get together far away. At least they fed us good food. That's always nice.

And then there is the peer tutoring program. That is taking the most out of me. It is every day after school. It is like teaching another class and only getting 3% extra money for it instead of 20%. There is a lot of coordination between the tutors and students needing help. I can't make it today, I need extra help, Why isn't my tutor here? Then, if someone doesn't show up, I have to help the kid with subjects I haven't taken in years! I mean, who paid attention to History in high school? Sorry history teachers, but that stuff was boring to me! Then of course, there are the parents, who care more about this than the students do. The kid shows up for 10 minutes and says they are done and then the parent asks why the kid's grade isn't going up. I'm not sure I want to do this again next year. Things are going much more smoothly than they were at the beginning of the year and there are some really great kids in the program, so I'm sure I'm just ready for vacation, but I sure could use a day off. Oh wait, that is tomorrow :)

finished

I finished the quilt for the cross country coach today. It needed one more piece of border fabric since it is so tall and skinny and then had to be quilted and bound. I was going to leave the binding until tomorrow but decided I had no idea what tomorrow had in store for me and I wanted this done by Monday so I had better get it done tonight.

Here is the first of the Santa faces. It still needs eyes and a nose and moustache, but it is quilted (not like in this picture) so that should't take too much time. My friend took the pattern and simplified it so there are only a few pieces and now it should go together much faster. If only I hadn't cut out so many to begin with!

Here is the design wall I set up in my oldest daughter's bedroom. That was the only wall in the house I could find that was big enough and empty enough. I had to move a couple of pictures, but put up 2 yards of 72 inch felt I got at JoAnn's on sale last weekend. It isn't sticky enough to hold the squares, but with pins it works just fine. I am thinking of running a hair brush over the felt to make it fuzzier and think that might make it work better so I don't have to use pins, but for now, it is good. Right now, it is holding my daughter's t shirt quilt. The funny thing is, the pattern is called twist and shout, but all of the blocks are twisted the same way, so maybe I should change the name to just twisted! I didn't realize I was making the blocks wrong until I put the whole thing up on the design wall. I'm going to like having this so I can lay things out and step back to look at them while I put a quilt together. Before I just had to lay things on the floor and shoo the dogs and cat off of them. Of course, I had to clean the floor before starting any of this and that was always a pain!

And finally, this is the quilt that the foot broke while I was making. I tried to quilt it with a flames pattern. Some of the lines look like flames, some not so much. But it was something different and I'm sure some little boy will love it.

implementing the plan

Today I decided that why wait until Jan 1 to start my plan to work through my stash. There has been a box of fabric sitting in the way for at least a month now and I grabbed it and started sorting it. There was a whole bunch of really nice fabrics in there and I knew I wanted to keep all of them. Most of them were whites and off whites, creams and such and I don't want to make a whole quilt with those colors, but they will come in handy when piecing other things. So, I emptied a drawer in my dresser that holds my nicest fabrics and put those fabrics in the now empty box.

Then, I took those fabrics and started sorting. I picked out fabrics for several of the quilt tops that were needing backing. Some were in large enough pieces that they are ready to quilt. Some will need sewing together to be ready to go. I think I got at least 5 backing pieces out of that box. Then, there were two very large pieces from the original box that matched other quilt tops. If only I could have found some extra time in that box as well so I could get all of these quilt tops finished up, that would have been nice too :)

So, I am left with a box about half full of fabric scraps. There are about 6 that would go nicely together to make a black/white/pink quilt and I think that would be pretty neat. It is out of my normal range of colors and now I have to decide on a pattern for it. I would not cry if I can't use the rest of the fabrics before the end of the month and need to gift them to someone else. Nothing in that box is a favotite, but they are all nice fabrics that someone could use to make nice quilts.

I will have to see what I can get done by the end of this month and how well this idea works.

Having a plan

I like to have plans, whether things come out the way I had planned or not, it is nice having an idea where you are going sometimes...

My plans for getting the fabric stash more under control for next year is to pick a box out of the garage or shed each month. Some months will be carefully chosen, like when I need to work through Christmas fabric (this time in July--not December!) and other months, I will just pick a random box and I plan to work through the fabric in that box during the month. At the end of the month, whatever is not used will be donated on Freecycle. I have found several other charity crafters and quilters through my local Freecycle group who are very grateful for my leftover scraps. That way I'm not storing what I'm not going to be using and someone else will get the benefit of some wonderful fabric pieces.

Just last week I went through some projects that had been donated to me this summer. My mom and I went through them once and she picked out a couple that had some promise and actually finished them up. I finished up a whole bunch of them and these were the leftovers that I decided I would never get done. I offered them up on Freecycle and a lady came to get them for her daughter's 4th grade class to teach them geometry.

Win-win. The fabrics got out of my house and found a home where they will be used and appreciated.

I can't do it all and by giving things away to others, I will be able to use up all of this stash eventually. My great fear is that one day I will run out of fabric and not have enough. I have no idea why I get afraid like this because as soon as I give some fabric away, I get a phone call that someone has more fabric for me. I just need to learn to be more trusting.

I also have a plan to work through all of the quilting books I have purchased over the couple of years I have been quilting. I have probably 100 or more books on the shelf. In 2009 I will pick a book a month and make one quilt from that book. If there is no quilt that I can make or want to make from that book, out of the house the book will go. Not sure where the book will go, but it won't get to live on my shelf anymore. This will also force me to try new things instead of the same safe quilts I have been making this last year.

So, off of this computer and to work on those Christmas projects. I worked on a Santa wallhanging yesterday. All it needs is button eyes and a moustache and nose and it is done! Turned out cute, although the binding is a little wavy. Oh, well, can't be perfect, now can it...

big hug

Today I finally took in the blankets from the last Binky Patrol meeting waaaaay back in October. I have been loading and unloading them from my car for almost 2 months. Next Sunday is the next meeting and I knew I had to get them over to the hospital before then. When the kids and I walked in today, the ladies looked at me like they had seen a ghost! They said they had just been talking about me and here I showed up. One of the ladies was wondering if they should give me a call because they have a Holiday party coming up and wanted to give blankets to the mothers and babies and they were out of blankets. Here I show up, just in the nick of time. Now, how did I hear them from 20 miles away? I knew I would get those blankets over there just when they needed them the most.

I hope to collect another 20 or more at the next meeting. The December meeting is usually the least productive, but watch out for February. That one is the most productive. Everyone who missed the December meeting shows up in February with extra blankets. But it always works out perfectly.

As we were leaving, one of the ladies told me to wait. The new director wanted to thank me. She came out and gave me a great big hug! I've never met her before and she wanted to just say thanks for all of the quilts and baby afghans that we have donated over the almost 5 years our Binky Patrol chapter has been going. There are days when I wonder if I will have the energy to keep doing this and then there are days like today, when a big hug sends me home to work on more blankets!

Oh, and yesterday the 2nd foot that I ordered came in the mail and this one actually fits the machine. I'm back in the quilting business. I finished up the quilt that has been patiently waiting and now this weekend I have plans to finish up the quilt for my daughter's cross country coach and get some more quilts on that machine and test out the new foot. If it is going to break, I want it to break quickly so I can get my money back.

Yo-Yo bell ornament

http://www.coatsandclark.com/Crafts/Sewing/Projects/Seasonal/CS0052+YoYo+bell+ornaments.htm
Here is a really cute Yo Yo Christmas bell ornament. My Christmas list is getting longer and longer and my time is getting shorter and shorter. I am hoping to be over this cold by the weekend so I will have some energy to work on projects.

new foot

Well, the new foot came yesterday and it didn't fit. It fit the machine, but the hold where the needle is supposed to go through the foot doesn't line up with the needle. So, when you turn the wheel and the needle comes down, it comes down right in the middle of the plastic part of the foot. Do you have any idea how frustrating that is? I'm so glad I ordered two different feet from two different places. I am going to be calling the first place sewingmachinesplus today and letting them know that the part they say will fit my machine will NOT fit my machine. They did this with the needles they sold me too. They were really good about just letting me keep the wrong ones since I had a machine that would fit those wrong needles, so now I have 100 free needles. But I don't have a machine that will fit this wrong foot, so they will be getting that back. I was just so excited that the foot came so quickly and then of course when it didn't fit right, was so disappointed.

I am hoping the second foot comes today and that it actually does work. Of course, this foot also came with the cover place and cost over $40. But, again, the original cover plate didn't fit the machine either, so...

Another Christmas project

http://www.fatcatpatterns.com/HumbleNativity.pdf
Here is a Nativity wall hanging that I'm going to try as well.

Yesterday I cut out a whole bunch of the Santa pieces and hope to get some time tonight to start stitching. I have no idea why I cut out more than one of a project before trying it out, but when I get some fabric out and start cutting I just can't seem to stop. I start thinking of all the people I want to make them for and just keep going until it gets to be bedtime and then run out of time for working on the actual project.

The Nativity set requires some applique, which I've never done before, so I think I will start with just a couple of them (my youngest son's teachers would love this one I think) and I will change the border because that is a lot of friendship stars which will require a lot of little triangles which I also am not good at sewing. I'm thinking one star in the corner would be nice and then a blue border around to show night time. Dark blue. Yesterday when I went digging for the Santa fabrics, I had a hard time finding any blue or red fabric in my stash. I have a ton of greens, but have used up most of my blues and reds for the Quilts of Valor quilts I'm working on. I guess I know what I need to be on the lookout for when I hit the sales :)

Christmas projects

http://www.quilterscache.com/S/SantaFaceBlock.html
I've decided to start some projects for Christmas. Maybe some will be gifts, maybe some will be for myself. Maybe some will be for next year! This first one is a 12 inch block of a Santa face.

Looks easy enough to cut and piece. I think I might even start on it tonight. In fact, I think I might make more than one and have one for a gift. The kids have so many teachers that it is hard to buy presents for all of them. I'll keep looking for more easy and cute looking Christmas projects to share with you all.