Quilt top in a weekend

Here from the Pets on Quilt show? Scroll down to the bottom to see how my dog helps me quilt! She checks that all the blocks are nice and comfortable!

So yesterday I got an invitation to a baby shower for my SIL in the mail. EEK! I better get cracking on that quilt I bought fabric for awhile back. So I got to work- and voila! Quilt top in a weekend. It's 44" square (there abouts). It is actually made up of two base blocks- because I'm an idiot and sewed them wrong without realizing it. Having made 8 of one block and 4 of the other after my inital cutting, I wasn't ripping out and starting again. I just made the other 4 blocks the same as the mistake blocks.

This actually went really quickly, and I think pieced together pretty well for the most part. (There is one green square that is embarrasingly misaligned, but the rest are good enough for me. I am not a perfectionist, and sometimes I think that's good for baby quilts. A "perfect" one might be too perfect to be used. I know the last quilt I made for my SIL got used, and I hope this one will be used too.)

I think the technique I used is called strip piecing. I wanted to start with 6" squares, so I cut a long strip of pink, blue, and green that was 6" wide. Then I cut the green into 6" squares, but sewed the blue and blue together first- after pressing the seams, then I folded it back together and cut them 6" wide.

I did the same thing with the purple and yellow. I cut 3 1/4" strips, sewed them together and then cut the individual pieces. Then I flipped one of them, and sewed them together to form the block.

Once I pieced the small blocks, Kevin and I worked to find the perfect layout- since none of my original ideas would work: I didn't make the right blocks- remember. Then I started assembling the whole top. Elsa helped every step of the way!!! (Thankfully the recipient has dogs, so after washing this shouldn't matter.)

Here's a close up of the patterns: pink butterflys, blue stars, purple polka dots, a kind of floral pattern on the green and the yellow.

Could someone please come over here and do the backing for me? I hate the quilting part- I just fold it up and stuff it through my machine, but there is always the worry that once I'm done it will have a fold or wrinkle quilted in. (The baby quilt I made for my sister was a bit like that.) I'm going to cheat on the binding and just fold it over to the top.

Aww spring!

Look what is growing in our yard now!


Special thanks to the previous owners for planting all this stuff!


Living room pictures coming soon. We are still missing transitions strips, but it's pretty much a room again :)

And as an added bonus: Adorable Dog Pictures!

On a side note, the adorable dog's barking interrupted the blog posting!

Elsa...

I think my dog is the cutest thing in the world. It is rare that she doesn't look adorable. (She's not so adorable when she is super hyper jumping on company- that kind of bothers me. But once she calms down, so cute.)

Elsa likes to burrow under covers. She also likes to ignore me completely. We sometimes think she might be a cat. We live to serve her, she is not required to provide companionship in return.

So all summer long, it's as if we have no pet. We feed her, let her in and out, sometimes get to play rope, but she keeps to herself, generally looking adorable while doing it. But once it gets cold, I have a best friend.

Here she is cuddleing with me while I knit. At night, she sleeps under our covers (until she gets too warm, then she goes to the couch, until she gets cold, then she comes back in. Thankfully I go back to sleep easily, otherwise this would be not cool.)


She's curled up under the blanket, head on my lap, just barely peaking out.

Also- that's my "not snuggie" it is the greatest blanket in the world. It has zippers so it zips up likes a sleeping bag, except it zips in 2 parts and then the top and bottom snap together to give you arm holes, but unlike the stupidity of the "wearing a robe backwards"-ness that the snuggy has, this gives you a back. And it's microfiber on one side so it is so so so warm.

The Wanida socks (in picture) aren't done yet. I meant to knit more today but I ran tons of errands- got skates sharpened (YAY ~ YAY jumps for joy), stopped by to chat with Linda and get some fresh herbs before the winter took them away (yeah, it snowed today), and went to Hyvee to mail some packages and buy some bread for dinner (caprese salad)

Also- it is so cold in here: 61 degrees inside most of the day. But I refuse to turn the heater on before Oct 15, even if it is snowing. We'll see if I make it that far. It's really cold.

Dog sitting...

This seems to be the summer of dog sitting. Earlier in the summer Basie came and stayed with us, then I spent 2 weeks walking Merlin, and now Merlin is staying with us.

Elsa has never expressed any concern over Basie- he is so small we think she might not know that Basie is a dog. But other small male dogs she has met have never been any trouble, so we figured Merlin wouldn't be either. For the most part, we were right, however, I think Elsa feels threatened that we are replacing her. She is fine with him being around (they mostly avoid each other, but play in the yard) but she gets very upset if he plays rough (he can chew on, but not shake) her toys.

Bedtime last night was where the real fun was. Elsa had NO intention of letting Merlin up on the bed, and Merlin had no intention of sleeping on the floor. After holding Elsa down on the other side of the bed, and having Merlin come lay down as far away as possible, then petting and calming Elsa- it was all alright. On a normal summer night, Elsa stays for about 30 minutes, then leaves to sleep on the couch. Kevin guessed that she would stay all night. He was close to right.

At midnight the idiot who gives our neighbor a ride (to? from?) work pulled up into the driveway and honked 6 times. Then the wife of our neighbor went outside and yelled for a few minutes, and both of these things bugged the dogs (well, and me) they both sat up and listened. After a few moments, Merlin jumped off the bed to go investigate- completely out of character, Elsa did not. After Merlin did not return, then Elsa- apparently confident she had "won" the battle of the bed, jumped down, and went to the couch to lay down. Later in the night when Merlin came back to sleep on the bed, so did Elsa...

So how do I know all this- I barely slept at all last night, and it wasn't the dogs fault. I went to bed at 11:00 and laid there until 3:00. I slept a little bit but remember the clock saying 4:30 and then the dogs woke me up at 5:30. I went back to bed around 6, slept until 8 when I heard a giant dog fight, which was apparently in my dream, because the dogs weren't near each other. In fact, now, they seem to be doing just fine and have mastered the art of ignoring each other.

No progress

Today was a day where nothing got done. I'm still ridiculously exhausted from not sleeping all week. Last night we went to the Robert Earl Keen festival at the Iowa City Arts festival. That was worth staying up late for (although, we were home by 11:00!!) It was a fantastic concert, though I must say REK needs to learn to enunciate a bit, some things were tough to understand, and Kevin and I knew many of the lyrics. He sang all my favorites (except Merry Christmas from the Family- but that's to be expected) and kept it fairly family friendly for someone who sings mostly about beer drinking. And I managed to experience something I never thought possible in Iowa- listening to someone make fun of Lubbock. I had a really great time, but it made me very homesick.

So back to today- I left open my work screen and got done today 1/3 of what I had to do on last Wednesday and Thursday, but that should get me a bit of a jumpstart on the week. I have 140 items due Thursday, for comparision last week I had 120 items in those two days (plus about 1 hour on Tuesday that I was able to work when I got the assignment). This week should involve much less lost sleep, if only I can sit down and be productive. Fortunately, this week is also a subject I'm less familiar with (so it's taking longer) but if I had this subject area first- I don't think I would have made it through last week in time. Additionally, I have an assignment with yet another company that I HAVE to get done by Wednesday- and that is writing, not just aligning. Writing requires much more creativity, and I'm having a bit of writers block as I've had so much exposure to items I think of a good idea, and realize someone else had it first. I just finished a month of lesson writing, so sometimes I'm the person who had it first- but you can't write the same thing for two companies.

I called about the job applications at ACT (for the Specialist positions) and they have them now (they didn't get them the first time). My former AVP called over to the hiring managers for me, so I'm hoping I at least get an interview. This is a high enough job, that even though it is hourly and would be a step down on the ladder it should be challenging enough to be interesting.

In knitting news- I'm about 2 rows further into my "Ain't No Sunshine" socks. Brown just seems a strange color to pick for these, but I think it looks pretty nice.

We are still dog sitting and I don't know how much this teeny 9 lb dog should be eating. He is used to at will feeding, and Elsa thinks that's a marvelous way to take his food, so we can't leave it down. He'll eat if I hand feed him, but if Elsa is outside (he is scared of outside unless we go with him) and we set it down, he'll eat ONE piece, and then stop. That surely isn't enough.

I need to go back to the "comically small portion diet" my weight is back on the rise. I refuse to be overweight again!

Physical Therapy

I'm frustrated with PT. Last week, I went in with no pain and the PT decided that we would do one last session then be done. This week, I went in with considerable amount of pain, he did massage and ionto, no exercise, and I have another appointment next week. And today, well especially overnight, my arm hurts worse. It's supposed to be getting better! In fact, it had already got better.


You get another dog picture today because I haven't taken a picture of much else. This is not today though, this is two days ago. Today she is mopey. Today is a rainy, rainy day. The dog is very mad at me because everytime I open the door it's still rainy and she wants me to open the door to a nice day. Yesterday was a nice day. Absolutely gorgeous. Of course, even though I don't work in an office it's moot that it's a nice day because I'm holed up in the basement doing freelance work. Today I have printed items to edit, so I could have done that outside, but nope. The weather had other plans.

Still no knitting pictures. I am not knitting much at all lately. Between my arm (which based on how it felt in Phoenix I don't think is caused by knitting), work, and it being a boring stockinette sock it's going really slowly. If I was doing a cool design it would probably be finished by now. I realized I still have the Zombie Socks (raverly link, sorry for those not on there) on the needles. One is completely done, but the other is still in the cuff ribbing. Those will definetly be what I pick up next. Possibly before I do the match to the sock I'm knitting right now.

I also got Wendy's "Socks From the Toe Up". I've only ever done one toe up sock, and it wasn't great, but I'm bound to try again. The book has very simple designs; the opposite of the Cookie A book. But I'm bound to try some. The book was expensive- so I need to do at least 4 to have it equate to buying actual patterns. :)

Since I'm not working right now I'm trying to be more helpful around the house. So far I think I'm doing okay. Most of the house is cleaner than usual (quite the feat since I'm home all day) and last night I made dinner that was ready pretty much as Kevin got home. I resigned up for the FlyLady emails (those do NOT work when you work full time) but I refuse to put my shoes on while I'm home. If an absolute true, don't have a second to find shoes emergency came up, I have no problems being in public without them. I wish she wouldn't send so much crap, but I like the reminders to stop and clean a bit, and the ideas of what to clean.

Feeling lost...

Here's a cute dog picture. You are getting the dog picture due to lack of content and because I'm sad and cute dogs make it better.

I got bad news yesterday. The Girl Scout council decided to offer the job to another candidate. I really cannot believe this as I was perfect for the job and had fantastic interviews. Maybe it's a blessing in disguise, because the pay was low, the hours long, and the job was based in Cedar Rapids. But it was a job that I really wanted. I want to do non-profit work and make a difference. I don't have much chance of getting a teaching job for next year (A&M still hasn't sent me back my paperwork for the license!) but its looking more and more like I'll have an empty summer and will be substituting in the fall. I'm applying for a few more positions today but there are just so few full-time professional positions available. I'm not looking at part time work yet. I did put in my unemployment claim yesterday (*cries* that's something I never thought I'd do) but since I left with so much vacation, I don't think I'm eligible until July.

Yesterday I did get more knitting done that I thought I would. After having completed the outline of the freelance writing I'm doing (so 90% done- just have to type it in) I got an email to stop working because the client was revising specifications. We were supposed to get new specs by EOD yesterday, but the email never came. So I don't have that yet either. I am really really hopeful that I'll be able to use most of what I've already written!

I also got news of another freelance assignment, so I'm very excited about that. I haven't recieved the full information yet.

I went skating yesterday afternoon, but have decided that I will keep my skating posts at Skittles Skates

So today I need to:
- write at least one, hopefully two cover letters
- send those off
- 1 load of laundry
- clean the kitchen
- not be sad
- write if required, otherwise knit
- get out the fabric for mom's table runner and find matching fringe.