Quilting in the snow

Well, it is finally acting like winter. We had a small dusting of snow on Thursday, and it has been snowing lightly for a few hours this morning. Town is very quiet, and it is peaceful. I do hope that the guy who is supposed to be shovelling shows up soon though. I have been in poor shape all week and I don't want to do it myself. This is exactly the kind of weather that makes me want to make hot chocolate or cider and hand quilt all day. Perhaps after I finish the work I have to do I can work on the Quilted Mediation piece. I finished the outlines earlier this morning while I was having coffee and I am liking the design. It is quilted with a brown thread, on a light lavender color fabric. I will now begin adding other colors, with dense fillers by hand in selected areas. Combining the idea of thread painting and the sculpting effects of hand quilting on a semi puffy batting. I really want to work on this now, instead of the other things I should be doing.

Guild last night

Pushed myself to go to guild last night. Happily I was not the driver. About half way through the lecture - which was really good, the dayquill gave out. I am in poor shape today. I have been doing boring paper work most of the day, and have hit the wall. I probably should be working on the quilt I basted yesterday, but I want to use a decorative stitch that is only on the machine I have at home, so that will have to wait. My head is not clear enough to work on too much right now, so I will ramble on here for a few more minutes and hope that my most recent shot of caffeine kicks in.

I have been thinking about my work, not the class samples, but the Artwork. I do have a few things that I can say consistently, I like wonky or free form style piecing, I love the texture provided by hand stitching, and I like the dimension created by quilting with a puffy batting. Thematically, nature serves as my inspiration, specifically, the little things, bugs, plants, critters, and the more unusual the better. It does feel like things are starting to have a more consistent feel. However, the usual trouble is getting time to make more. My resolve to spend time every day in the studio has been shot to H**l this week as I just barely make it through the work day. I have been mostly able to hand quilt a bit each day though. Even if it is only during commercial breaks in the show on the TV, it is still something.

Hand Quilting to the Rescue

I was feeling awful this weekend. The "bit of a cold" I had when I posted last turned into a full blown mess over the weekend. I overdosed on liquids, including home made chicken soup, tea with honey and lemon, and grapefruit juice. Between the caffeine in the tea and the amount of liquids, I slept poorly. I couldn't trust myself to do the cutting on the next quilt I am working on, but I could work on the hand quilting sample for the Quilted Mediation project that will be put on the shoppe schedule in February. As I worked to cleanse myself of the blasted germs, I twice fell asleep on that piece. But with hand quilting, as long as you don't poke yourself with the needle it is rarely a problem.

At any rate, I am feeling much better. I care not if it was the tea, or if it was the Quilting, but I did get alot done, and I like the after effects of the quilting much more than the tea.