Weekend Update

It's done!

The pincushion for my swap is done, AND I'm slightly ahead of schedule. Deadline for mailing is July 17 :) To the left is just a sneaky peak of the pincushion and the small gift that I got my swap partner.

I actually finished one right after joining the swap, but I hated it. I'm so terribly critical of my work, especially when crafting for someone else. I'm always so worried that they'll hate it.

Now, if you've been keeping up with my blog, you know that I joined a mini-quilt swap.

I know myself. If I don't start now, and get working, I'll ignore it, right up until the deadline. Which is just not good, because my partner is international and if I ship right at the deadline, it will arrive late.

Unfortunately, I'm in a quilt-y rut. I can't think of a design. It's partially my hyper-critical tendancies. But it's also due to the fact that I haven't done a quilt smaller than 40 X 60 since my first quilt.

ARGHHH.

I need to find my EQ5 disks, and get the program reinstalled. It'll be so much easier to come up with something once I've got that. I just can't sit down and draw it out. My son will "get involved", which means that nothing will get done, and I'll have ruined sketches on my hands.

And for the geek-y, print-minded side of me - I really, really, really need to find those EQ5 disks... Once I have a design done, I can take the file into a PDF, and then take that sucker into work, and print it full-sized on a single sheet of paper. SQUEE! (I work in a print center, so I have a lot of nifty, nifty tools at my disposal. This is also why I no longer print at home - I am spoiled by having an arsenal of laser printers at my disposal.)

I have not started quilting the nine-patch top. I filled all of my bobbins with the blue thread that I ended up hating. I'm so not unwinding them and wasting that thread, because it's variegated and gorgeous -just not on this top.

I have white thread now, but I am awaiting the arrival of 24 brand spanking new bobbins, courtesy of eBay. I'm still debating quilting designs, so this time away is not necessarily a bad thing. I'm starting to lean toward outlining the sashing and attempting freehand flowers in the nine-patches themselves. We'll see.

I also have a copy of Beautiful Quilts: Art Deco: Making Classic Quilts & Modern Variations by Jenni Dobson arriving shortly. I would really like to get my hands on Material Obsession and Material Obsession 2 now. Reviews on these two books has been pretty phenomenal. I just get frustrated purchasing books, only to find that a huge chunk of the book is dedicated to a how-to section.

Hmm.. I think that's all of my ramblings for the day. It's time to fetch laundry from the dryer anyway. Yay, clean socks!!