Where Does the Time Go?

I can't believe it's been so long since I've posted.  I've been sewing up a storm, and haven't had time to blog.  Well, that, and the entry deadline for Best of the Valley Quilt Show was yesterday.  Not only was I trying to finish my own entry, I'm in charge of logging in all of the entries for the show, as they arrive.  So, yeah.  I'm claiming busy life right now.

I've been working on the Charlie quilt, and he's coming right along.

 I even got so far as to be quilting Charlie's whiskers.  He really was a mess, before I buried the threads!

He is not due until March 1, so I put him aside, in the hopes of finishing another quilt for the show.  The quilt I had in mind was Harvest Barns, a quilt top that I thought I'd finished in November.  Unfortunately, when I basted it for quilting, I discovered that it was a full 1/2" wider at the top than at the bottom.  Since it's not a very big quilt, the mismeasurement was blatantly obvious.  Last weekend I spent 5 hours picking it apart, replacing pieces, and stitching it back together again.  It didn't take much longer than that to quilt it.

I quilted it a lot.  I quilted so much, and in so many different directions, that by the time I was done, it didn't know which way to lay.  And so, it lay in waves, instead of flat.  ugh.  I plunged it in a bath and soaked it, then pinned it flat before adding the binding.  While it was drying, I looked for the perfect brown with which to bind it.

 When it dried, I stitched the binding on, using the nifty leather thimble that a friend made for me.  Thank you, Ann!!

 When it was finished, I took pictures to enter the quilt show.  This is a close up of the quilting:

And here is the whole quilt.  I am quite pleased with the way it turned out.  It was totally worth the effort to take apart one of the borders, replace pieces, and sew it back together again.

 

Tomorrow we select the quilts to display in the Featured Artist's booth at the show.  On Monday, we jury the quilts.  The closer we get to April, the closer we get to crunch time.  I can't promise to post much, but when I finish Charlie, I'll try to make a point to check in.

Happy quilting!!