Well that's a surprise!!!!

As you read this - well, it depends on when you read it, but I'm off on an adventure today. So I wrote this post last night.

Well, that's confusing. I guess that's why people don't really mention specific dates or days of the week in their blog posts.

It was a very productive day again today. Many steps as I went for another walk, this time to the library and to the bank. I think that's about 5,000 steps - something like that. It's not really that far. But now I'm at almost 14,000 for the day - third day in a row.

I have a small tote bag that I carry stuff in. Is it a tote bag that I made? Of course not! It's some bag we've had around the house. I like it because it's light and I can put a lot of stuff in there on my shopping trips. I could use my pretty Canada bag, but I can't seem to break down and use it for my shopping trips. I use it to carry stuff in, but not for shopping.

My shopping tote

When I was doing some unpacking, I came across this piece. It's an old table topper that my grandmother made. I think that's the story. It's done with punch needle. Who knew that someone in my family did punch needle way back when. I've taught punch needle dozens of times at the CreativFestival. Believe it or not, but I think punch needle is coming back. The piece is very well done.

An old piece of punch needle

I got this quilt done yesterday - well earlier this week. I had a chuckle when I opened it up to load it on the machine. You see, sometimes, I don't see the quilts until I'm ready to quilt them. This customer had dropped off some quilts when I wasn't home. I had grabbed them and put them on the rack, but didn't open them up. I like surprises. Well, I got a huge surprise when I opened this up.

Customer quilt - DONE

Why?  I had bought this pattern last year (May) when I was in the US. I loved it. It was a kit, but I was either too cheap at the time to buy the kit or they were sold out. But they had the pattern so I bought it.

Over & Down Under pattern

Then in March, Ronda and I were at Country Concessions on our way home from a retreat and guess what? She came over to me with a kit in hand - it was this kit. I had never mentioned this pattern to her. She bought the kit and I managed to buy the jelly row of flannel strips required to make the quilt.

Jelly roll and the pattern

A month or so later, I managed to find some black (dark brown) flannel) that I could use as that outer edge. I found that at the Hobby Horse.

Jelly roll, pattern, and border fabric

What's even funnier is this. Look at the last project that Maria worked on at the retreat.

Maria's version of the quilt

I believe she had purchased her kit from Keepsake Quilting. None of us knew that the other had bought the patterns/kits. Maria still has to put the last border on her quilt. I'm sure it's done now.

OK - I guess I had better get my quilt done or I'll be the last person to make one!

I'm way behind on letting you know what's happening in the magazine world. I seem to have a good streak going and many quilts have been published lately. It's pretty exciting. Here's a link to one of the patterns. It's from the Fall 2018 issue of easy quilts. Matter of fact, there are TWO of my quilts in that same publication. If you look at the headline at the top of the magazine - SLOTHs - that's the theme for the second quilt. I'll share what's been happening next week.

Now I've got to get to bed. Tomorrow or is that today? is going to be an exciting day.

Have a great day!!!!

Ciao!