Catching Up

Do you ever feel like you're so behind it's going to take you a week or more to catch up before you can even begin?  yup.  That's how I seem to have begun my 2014 year of sewing.  Starting something new or finishing something old has taken a back seat to basic repairs.  crazy.

"Mom!  Your door hanger lost a jingle bell!"

 Better stitch it back on so it's in one piece when I pull it out again next year.  The screen-printed "JOY" was made by my friend Kata decades ago.  It makes me smile every time I see it.  :)

Next on the list was to pull out some quilts for an Art Quilt Show in Porterville.  oh dear.  Their labels are way behind.  Apparently I haven't made show labels in 9 months.  If I'm going to offer some of these for sale, I'd better make some labels.

I made (and attached) five labels yesterday.  It felt like more.  I still have almost a dozen to do, but the quilts for Porterville were finished.  Or were they?

I took one off the wall, remembering that when it came home from the county fair in September, it had lost some beads.

 Two lines of fringe had been lost.  The hardest part of the repair was not actually doing it, the hardest part was remembering what my beading recipe had been, and where I'd stashed the beads!

 Once I'd finished, I realized that I'd forgotten some of the key bead ingredients, but because it was only two lines of fringe, it seems to have blended in okay.

Another of the quilts was missing a sleeve.  Now it's not.

 I have an old Christmas quilt, that I've been using under my tree for the past several years.  I'd given it to my mom back in the 90's, and when she passed, it came back to me.  I'd washed it, and the red bled like the dickens.  Most of the creamy background turned a shade of pink, from light to almost fuchsia.  Vicki Welsh posted an extremely informative post on dealing with bleeding on her blog, and I tried her suggestion.  ohmygoodness!!  That dingy pinky quilt suddenly sparkles!!  I'd used Biz, Oxyclean, Synthrapol and Retayne.  What was the magic ingredient that brought it back to life?  Kirkland Free & Clear, the product that I use on all my clothes!  Read all about her experimentation here.  And here.

I think I may have actually used All Free & Clear, rather than Kirkland brand, but look how the trees sparkle!  They haven't looked like this for more than a decade!  Those pieced backgrounds used to be as dark as the setting blocks!

Finally, finally I've gotten around to something new.  SAQA is seeking pieces for a 3 year traveling exhibit, and they only need to be 7" x 10".  Surely I can put together something before the end of the month?

Here's what I've put together so far:

It's a bit bigger than the finished 7 x 10, but boy it's a lot of fun!!  My car has been in the shop since early Monday, so I feel trapped at home.  (My son's car has not been washed since the walnut harvest, and I think the window may have been open a crack when they were shaking the trees.  It is beyond filthy, but it runs.  I'd rather stay home than clean it or drive it, so I'm only venturing out when absolutely necessary.)

So there you go.  I'm trying to catch up on the little things, so that I can concentrate on the big things.  Hope you all have time to quilt.  It's a good way to put a smile on one's face, don't you think?