2008 October 21 | Suzanne Earley

I finished the machine applique on this bugger over the weekend. I bought this as a kit, I don’t remember how long it’s been. Awhile. Several years. I had trouble thanks to the fact that the kit did not have enough fabric, a fact I did not discover until it was too late to do anything about it. I found some replacement fabric, but then I think I made a cutting mistake (if it’s not one damn thing, it’s another). Finally, though, the appliques were on, and then it sat. And sat. It’s only 74 by 74, but that’s still kind of a pain to shove around underneath the arm of my Bernina to blanket stitch those flowers.

I cut some fabric for a backing, but I’m sure it’ll be awhile before I actually quilt the darned thing. I do have the binding cut and made, so at least that’s ready. I’m not sure what I’ll do with it when it’s done. Throw it in the closet with the rest of them, I suppose.

Now that it is in the To Be Quilted pile, I feel justifed in starting something new.

Like maybe with this awesome fabric that just came in the shop.

It’s called Knit Pirates. The crossbones are knitting needles. I also ordered a bunch of red and pink tone on tones and have been folding fat quarters this morning. The combo of the black and white print with all of the pink and red fabrics are making me swoon. At first I was thinking just the pinks, but some of the reds have red AND pink, and I’ve decided what they heck, I might as well throw caution to the wind (cripes, I’m thinking about using fabric with skulls on it…) and use RED and PINK together.

But what do I make? What do I make? I’ll come up with something…there’s an opening on my UFO list you know.

(the new fabric isn’t on the website yet, my darling sister is working on the scans for me…)

Mark’s been wearing winter jacket for years now. 1998 maybe? He bought it on sale at JCPenney’s — it’s got the Olympic rings on the back, and I think it must have been for the 98 Winter Olympics. Were there Winter Olympics in 1998? It’s not his only winter jacket, but it’s a favorite.

It’s green and black and purple denim, lined, very warm. And it’s in amazing shape, really. But then, he takes really good care of his stuff. He’s kinda scary that way.

Last spring, at the end of the heavy-jacket wearing season, he showed his jacket to me with a little bit of horror. There was a rip in the lining of one of the sleeves — he’d put his hand right into the rip.

I told him I’d be happy to patch it, and promptly stuck it on the back of my sewing chair, where it became part of the scenery. Every so often he’d say something about it, but since Jacket Wearing Weather was months away, I was in no hurry.

His comments and questions have gotten more frequent as the weather has gotten cooler, and, I finally decided that I’d better patch it before he started to think I didn’t care.

I have known right from the start how I was going to patch it, and all told it probably only took me 30 minutes to do. An hour at the outside. Why do I put jobs off? I was sure it would take ages to do.

From my post title you’ve probably already guessed what I did:

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