Ugh. Mornings. Not a fan. Too many disturbances last night. It’s fine for puppy. He just naps all day. Me? Not so much. I bully through it, sometimes more or less irritated than others. Really, I know the kids will be asking when I’m going to grade everything, and here’s what’s up with that. I didn’t grade shit this weekend. I quilted like a madwoman. I did 14 hours of art stuff instead of grading. Yup. And I’m not done, but I’m where I wanted to be, perhaps a bit further. So that’s good. But I still have grading to do. And I’m not sure how I’ll tell them that.
I started by pinbasting Friday night and then quilting. I quilted Saturday afternoon as well, although when I started, I found this living thing curled up inside the quilt ball I’d put on the sewing machine…
Um cat. Move.
I did outlining for hours…hoping to finish it on Saturday, but I had somewhere to be at a specific time, so I had to stop short of that mark…
I really didn’t have much left…half a face, I think. Part of the sun. Her hair.
So I’m watching the clock and thinking, “I’ll just finish this up.” Yeah. No. Sometimes you just have to stop and get where you’re going.
Sunday, I got all the errands and have-to’s done, and then finished up the sun etc. pretty quickly. On Saturday, I’d been smart and bought the background thread. Then Sunday, before I even started this, I went and bought the binding fabric, so I’d be ready. I knew I had a 2-hour staff meeting today and wouldn’t make it to the store before it closed. They used to have one late day a week, but no longer.
Quilting the background didn’t take as long as I thought it would…I think I stopped sometime just after this to make dinner…
And came back to Kitten trying to sit all over the quilt again.
She’s not very patient with me. Total quilt time was just over 10 hours.
Not bad. But I managed to fold the backing up into the quilting. I did not cut all that out. I trimmed the quilt and then was lucky that it fit under the binding. Don’t do more work if you don’t have to.
I laid it out again for trimming (fast-moving dog)…
Then sewed on binding and sleeves, top and bottom.
Then pinned it all back. Then it was after midnight. Kitten doesn’t want to sit on it when it has pins in it, strangely.
But that’s further than I thought I would get. All of a sudden, it’s going to be a piece of cake to get it to the photographer Friday. Only two weeks later than I thought it should be done.
Interesting that I got more done on it while teaching than I did with a week off school…although there was other stuff messing with me that week. I guess it’s easier to be efficient when I don’t have any time. Now I need to start drawing the next one.
This came up over the weekend…back to the world of nonexistent penises. There’s the quilt that started that whole mess. Actually, it wasn’t the quilt that started it…it was one person and then one organization that claims it supports art and creativity. My ass. This article is in Textile Fibre Forum, their latest issue.
Thanks to Tanya for writing me up again. I should stay out of trouble for a while so she has time to make a quilt or two.
OK, so tonight I’m grading stuff AND sewing down a binding. Maybe I’ll finish…maybe not. There’s a lot of binding on this one. It’s a relief to almost be done, though, that’s for sure.
Kathy Nida 