The quilting pentathlon!

OK --- so it's NEVER a good thing when you hear multiple helicopters flying overhead. When I took Murphy out for a walk, they were relatively close to the house. Why does everything happen when I walk her? 

So you can't see the helicopters in this photo, but I managed to snap the geese flying overhead! 

Geese in the sky

It turns out that a pedestrian was struck and killed on a MAJOR street. Now this person -- a 40-year-old man was NOT crossing at the lights -- just bounding across the road, and it was DARK at 6:15 AM. No one deserves to die, but seriously??? I bet he was wearing dark clothing, and no one could see him. I would not have wanted to be the driver. 

Another pedestrian was killed just a few days ago -- again, a 40-year-old man -- hmm, does that tell you something? There were no details, so not sure what happened. But people --- if you are a pedestrian --- WALK to the lights, be ALERT (no phones), and wear the proper clothing for the time of day. If you don't want to look like an idiot, you can buy a reflective vest made with reflective tape, so it's very light and easy to remove once you arrive at your destination! 

It's unfortunate, but we all must be more careful -- drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians. I think the biggest thing is to BE PREDICTABLE and do what other people expect you to do (like follow the traffic laws); that will save many lives. 

Remember, as kids, we always colored our tree trunks brown. Well, how about 50 shades of brown? This is a rotted tree trunk, but look how cool the colors are.

A rotted tree trunk

We have started to shut the backdoor since it's getting a bit cool, and there's sweet Lexi -- on her mat outside the door. That dog LOVES to sleep on a mat! It wasn't so cold that she needed to curl into her "winter ball."

Lexi lounging on her mat

Before I hit the long arm, I had a couple of phone calls that needed to be made. One of them was about the internet in our house. What could we do as we do not get reliable internet upstairs, particularly in Studio U, and I've struggled in Studio B for the last while? So I called our service provider. Hmm -- do we have boosters. Yes, we do, and they belong to the service provider. Well, it seems they can check those things from their end, and the one in Studio B had a BAD connection (red zone) and needed to be rebooted. So that is done --- let's see how it goes on Zoom tonight at the Virtual Retreat.

One of our internet boosters

Then he asked me where the other one was. Hmm -- where is that other booster? I couldn't find it upstairs, so my goal was to find it and then call them back. They could not ping the second booster. After I got off the all, I remembered giving it to DH, who was having trouble with the internet in his office. Oh yes --- that's where it is. I did not get a chance to call them back, but I hope to do so in the next couple of days and try to get better internet upstairs. 

So what happened in Studio B? It was another insanely long day, but if you read the title of today's post, that's a hint! 

I had to finish preparing the quilt backs and search in the closet for batting pieces for the last couple of small quilts.

That involved multiple pressing. Instead of removing one layer of material waiting to be sewn, I pressed right over it! 

Multi-layer pressing

And this is the bottom of my garbage with a massive nest of thread and an empty thread cone. That is kind of cool!! The thread just shapes itself into the contours of the bin. 

The thread nest in the garbage bin

As those quilted got ready to quilt, the batting, backing, and quilt top were strewn around Studio B.

Quilts waiting to be quilted

And here it is --- a pentathlon of quilts! 

Community project quilt number one - DONE

Community project quilt number two - DONE

Community project quilt number three - DONE

Community project quilt number four - DONE

Community project quilt number five - DONE

The largest was 43" by 51", and the smallest was 32" by 37", but it still took time to load and unload, set up the software, advance the quilt, and change the thread. I didn't finish until after dinner. 

All the quilts are trimmed, and almost all the bits are sorted and dealt with. I think I'll be making pet mats today. 

And here is the heap of quilts that require binding. 

Quilts that need to have the binding attached

And this pile has binding on the back but is not stitched to the front of the quilt. 

The binding needs to be stitched to the front of these quilts

Oh --- I did get some work done on the sweatshirt but forgot to take pictures. I hope to finish it off today, and I'll show you. 

I had to zip to the library and the mall, so that was my afternoon walk. I went to Bulk Barn to buy supplies for my oatmeal topping. I don't mind buying those at Bulk Barn because I can't imagine any kid walking down the aisle and tasting the ground flax seed! I spotted my favorite bars on sale. Only this one flavor was on sale -- I'm OK with that, and when I dug through the box, I found some that were 75% off while the remainder of the box was 25%. Now was that a mistake? I don't know, but I bought all the 75% off ones. 

Bars on sale!

I was very good at the library. I went to pick up a book for DH, and while I spotted a couple of good books, I left them because I'm trying to read books from my own shelf, and I don't need a stack of library books distracting me. How focused I am these days!!!!

And they are going gangbusters with the new movie theatre. I can't wait until it opens so I can walk to the movies. Not that I go often, but I might go more often knowing I can walk there! 

The new movie theatre

OH -- back to those quilts. That is the last of the small quilts. There is a box of young adult quilts (about 50" by 60"), and there are many larger quilts for Quilts of Valour, but all the smallish ones are done! At least for the moment, as there will be more in the future. So how many quilts did I do? By my count, there were 41 smaller quilts, and I completed them in 17 days! That's not too shabby in my downtime! 

Now, I'm onto some Quilts of Valour quilts, so the clock is reset, and I'll see where I go with those. I do not even have a quilt on the frame this morning, although it's ready to be pressed at 9 AM. I just ran out of steam last night! And I don't have much time left to mess around before I need to get back to serious work! The fall classes start next month, and there is a lot of homework to prep!

Don't forget that tonight is Virtual Retreat. It starts at 6 PM. I can't wait!!! I love company when I sew, but I do not miss packing up the car to get there, especially for just a few hours! The links are in a separate blog post, so watch for those! 

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!!!