Fabric Therapy

Let me start by saying that last week Thursday was awful. Nothing had gone right. My daughter didn't want to go to daycare. 15 minutes of screaming and clinging on to my leg as only a toddler can do later (and a pass off while she was still sobbing to her teacher), I was able to get out the door to make it to work on time. Barely. When I got there, only 1/5 of my students decided to get themselves out of bed to come to class. So much for staying up until 3 a.m. the night before to finish grading their exams. For any other teachers out there -- can we say instant re-evaluation and change of lesson plan for the day? In football (American) terms I threw a Hail Mary pass. (luckily we had a good discussion, but when only a handful of students get the benefit, you begin to wonder) Another student decided to post a message that insulted my subject, my teaching, the university, and the other students in class. As soon as I had conferred with my boss and decided on a plan of action about it, another student responded to her/him and told him/her off. Ok -- now I have to deal with this student as well. Oh, and all of this was before noon and I had run out of Diet Coke (my caffeine intake of choice) at 7:30 am. Can anyone say stress???

So, when the going gets tough what is a dedicated quilter to do? Retreat to the sewing room and play with fabric of course! I went home and ignored the pile of work I had to do and the phone and the nagging feeling I should be cleaning and went to work with my orphan blocks. This time I decided to invert the colors and make the white the points of the stars. I wasn't sure about them at first, but they have grown on me. So I had four blocks made out of orphans --

Hmmn...wait a minute here -- that looks kind of good, I like the way they go together, but the points aren't going to work -- sashing! That's it, sashing. Hmmnn...so now what to use? I still have a ton more scraps from all of the pink and white and green projects I've done in the past few years...I could dig, cobble something together...

So, after auditioning some of my scraps (although I must admit I wasn't too picky about it -- mostly I looked for things I had large enough scraps of to actually use. The unfinished blocks ended up being 11 1/2" by 11 3/4". Also -- note to self -- when measuring blocks, measure BOTH sides, just because it looks "kinda" squarish, doesn' t mean it IS -- re: look for more scraps to cut new sashing strips for lengthwise sashing). And, well, sashing isn't enough, I need cornerstones -- yes, that will work -- but if the sashing is going to be scrappy, the cornerstones should be the same color -- some continuity -- and, well --

There you have it. By the time I had to go pick up dd, I was refreshed, relaxed, and no longer ready to bang my head up against a wall (just to make it feel good when I stopped). Who needs a therapist? I've got fabric.

There's only one problem, these little blocks are no longer just orphans to "play" with, they are developing a life of their own. They are speaking to me. They are saying they want another border. They NEED another border. And, they even are telling me they want me to make crumble blocks. (please tell me I am not the only one who has fabric talking to them -- otherwise I may have to invest in that other kind of therapy) It's not like I can't accommodate them, I have the scraps, I have the know-how, I have a total disregard for most quilting "rules" that allows me to free-piece if I choose. What I don't have is time. So I've had to tell the quilt to shut up -- umm, rather to be patient -- I will get there, but for right now, I have finals coming up, projects due, more student papers to grade, research to do, and my mother coming for a visit next week. So, the little orphans have gone to marinate with summer sorbet until after finals.

And, so that I didn't feel totally guilty for taking an hour or so to veg out in front of the television, I have a UFO I finished! While not really "quilty" I have seen more punchneedle embroidery in quilt shops than anywhere else so I'm thinking it is fair game. I started this one a bit over a year ago as a take-along for a family vacation to Arkansas to introduce dd to one set of her great-grandparents. I thought it would be great -- easy, fast, can finish it in a week -- HA! It is handwork, no matter how easy or "fast" and it took me over a year. The nicely ironic thing is, knowing this, I still started the second one I purchased at the same time as soon as I finished this one! I must be a masochist.

I also spent part of today indulging in some fabric play -- I hope to have pictures of progress soon. I know I shouldn't have started this project, but ooooh those Heather Bailey fabrics are just tooo yummy!

Play time --

Since I've finished dd's new heart quilt, and work and school are about to become very busy I am at a point where I really don't want to start a new quilt. (ok, not quite true -- I WANT to start about three quilts, I have an idea for the Dick and Jane fabrics, there is my mil's Christmas present, and a few other "projects" I've had on the back burner for so long I need to revisit them. But TIME, TIME I won't have for another month.) So, what to do? More bags are an option -- I have tons of FQs left from dd's quilt and in addition to the drawstring bags I've shown here, I have a few other patterns that don't call for much more. Plus, really, how hard could it be to come up with my own little bag without a pattern?

But -- well, I really wanted a chance to play a bit. What to do? I had seen this post from Tracey at ozcountryquiltingmum about what she had done with some extra HST blocks. I had a stack of orphan HST's (thanks to Tonya for the name "Orphan" block -- I like it much more than either mistake or leftovers. Mistakes -- well, who wants to admit to or deal with them? Leftovers give me visions of the nasty containers that get shoved to the back of the refrigerator and eventually find their way into the garbage. But orphans -- orphans I feel for. They deserve to find a home.) from the quilt I made for my mother for Christmas this year (still looking for a picture of this one - I swear it's around here somewhere). I decide to play!

It was a lot of fun just cutting them up and mixing and matching to see how they could be arranged. The two blocks I ended up with (with a couple of squares of other scraps from Mom's quilt) I really like. I still have some more orphan HST's -- I'm thinking about reversing the colors and having the white be the points rather than the background.

Other than this bit of fun playing, the weekend was pretty laid back. A trip to pick up my mil at the airport ended up in a stop on the way home at a quilt shop I love but don't get to often because of distance. I found a few things -- but not as much as I could have. My mil bought some fun fabrics for me to turn into a purse for her and a fun little crafty project that makes fabric origami stars and bags. We got to play with these on Easter Sunday when the inlaws came over for dinner.

The Easter Bunny brought dd a bubble blowing dragon (the package says dinosaur -- but who ever heard about a bubble breathing dinosaur? Now a bubble breathing dragon I will buy) and it was sunny for long enough for us to take him outside for a test drive. She loved chasing after the bubbles! All in all, a great weekend -- a bit of the cleaning I mentioned before done, most not. But I think I spent my time much more productively playing with bubbles and fabric than with dust bunnies!