What I've been working on

I guess technically this is my Motivational Monday post, but guess what - it's Thursday! a tad behind. Lots of stuff going on!

First I have to tell you my story about the UPS store. Yes - I'm going to name the company because I'm MAD. But I must also mention that this isn't UPS per se, but the individual store that I deal with.

I finished one more quilt yesterday for a magazine - that makes SIX finishes for the year. All documented and some form of a photo taken. It needed to be at its Canadian destination TODAY because of the photo shoot timing. OK - that's my fault for it being so late so I'm going to have to pay for overnight shipping. Just suck it up!  I take the box to the store and fill out the paperwork. The person running the store weighs the box and measures it. He also tells me the price - $210!!!!   I knew it was going to be high, but that's the price of overnighting something to the US and I was a tad surprised that it would be the same for Canada. Oh well - let's just get this over with.

When I went to sign the paperwork, I happened to notice how many pounds the box was. THIRTY-NINE pounds. Seriously???  It's a quilt. I said to him that the box did NOT weigh 39 pounds. He argued with me and said that is what the scale said. I told him to check again. OH - it weighs 3.9 pounds. DUH!!!  No apology. That changes the price significantly. It ended up costing $95 with the tax to ship overnight. MUCH better. I can live with that. Thank god I noticed the weight or I would have paid a whole lot of money for nothing!

I learned two valuable lessons - one - you CANNOT be late with these packages because they cost a lot more money to ship (it was double from sending 4 business days). Second - find a DIFFERENT store to ship things from. Never again will I go to that store. DH has had similar issues with the staff.

But it feels good to get that quilt finished. It was one that both the magazine and I forgot about and it was made in a panic. Thankfully, it was a simple design, but I wanted to custom quilt it. Why? Well because it looks better and I'm really happy with the finished quilt! That leaves a few more panic projects in the works - OK - there are still four that I'm working on. One is on the longarm and I'm trying to convince myself that it's OK to put a panto on it. I'd like it in a box by Friday. I think panto will have to do as I have a Sit n Sew again today and a meeting tonight. Yep - but I was reading that book - The Alienist last night!

I was very productive on Monday. I'm going to get those blocks for the 150 Canadian Women quilt done if it kills me! I thought I had made 6 blocks on Monday, but when I laid them out when I got home, I realized I had made 8! Yahoo!!! I had to finish one of them when I got home because I didn't read the instructions properly and miscut the squares!

8 blocks for 150 Canadian Women Quilt

 That takes me to 36 blocks completed and I've been putting them inside page protectors. I think I'm going to need a bigger book! Or, I just put them in a bag!

Binding with 36 blocks from 150 Canadian Women quilt

 I had cut out a bunch of blocks last year and those are all sewn up now. I have a number of blocks where the red is cut out, but no white. I think I'm going to cut some more blocks today during the Sit n Sew. Then I'll be prepped for more sewing on Monday.

I like sewing a few blocks each week - imagine sewing only on that project? Boring! But doing 6 blocks a week? I think I can handle that as long as I can keep up with the cutting.

If there are 114 blocks left and I do 6 a week, that will take 19 weeks to get that done! That's more than 4 months! Yikes!  But I don't see why I can't do that!  Just got to keep those blocks prepped.

Then I went to something basic. I made 8 of these giant nine patch blocks.

Eight giant nine-patch blocks

 They are for a kit that I bought this past summer. I'll show you when I'm done! I came home on Monday and finished cutting the rest of the kit so it won't take long to get it together. It's simple.

I also finished prepping another project that I'm working on at Monday sewing. And I'll share that when I get to the sewing part. It's for me and it's super cute!

Scrap basket is FULL!

Oh - I worked on something else on Monday, and I hope to share that with you tomorrow. I couldn't quite finish it on Monday because part of it was paper pieced and I didn't have anything with me to do that. It's all prepped and ready to work on today.

Gosh - I LOVE these dedicated sewing days. If you are prepped, you can accomplish a whole lot. It's great fun to sit around and chat with everyone. I sew a lot at home and while I don't mind it, it's a whole lot more fun with others.

I also forgot to take an ender and leader project for Monday, but that is now packed in the Monday bag. This is my ender and leader project for home.

Ender and leader project for home

 I made one block the other day and then decided it's way faster to just attach the little red square to all the 2 1/2" rectangles. Then I'll make the blocks!

Ender/leader block project

You'll be happy to know that I did get my phone connected to the car via Bluetooth! And in case you think I'm working too hard, I went to see a  movie yesterday!  I know - deadlines looming and I'm off to the movies and sewing days!  If you haven't seen Jumanji, you should go. It's absolutely hysterical. I don't think I've laughed so hard at a movie in a long time! Thanks, Lynn! Good choice!

That's it for me. I've got to finish getting ready for today. Didn't take long to tidy up the studio. We're a small group today as a couple of people had to back out for various reasons - sickness and we don't want them getting us sick! Thanks for staying home!

OH - I have a note on my calendar to watch Jeopardy tonight. Someone and I can't remember who (one of my contacts in the US) is on the show. She's a quilter and apparently, her and Alex chat about quilting!

Have a great day!!!

Ciao!