Sleepless in the city...................

Can you tell me why it is that we can wake up at 1 AM which is way too early to get up even for me! But I'm wide awake at that moment thinking (with zeal) about what I'm going to do today. Then I finally fall asleep and wake up at the right time - totally exhausted? Drives me crazy when that happens. No worries - I'm up now and excited for the day ahead.

Today, I was hoping to post the pictures from our $25 classes this past year, but what I have to say is more important. I'll start posting those pictures tomorrow.

YES - the magazine quilt is on its way!  Yeah! I think I was at the UPS office at 4:00 PM. I wasn't all that happy with the results as I was quilting it, but when I hung it up on the wall for a photo? Oh yes - I like it and it's exactly what I had planned. That makes finish number 72 for the year. Doesn't look like I'm going to make 100 but I don't really think that's a problem. I do have some stuff lined up for more finishes so it won't be a 100, but close.

On top of all the customer quilts I did this year and the ones that I added to the "to be quilted" pile, I'm more than thrilled with the results of this past year. I'm looking forward to next year when I hope to be even more productive. As my space gets cleaned up, productivity gets better. Not having to search for things makes a huge difference and I feel that I did less searching this year. More focus, less searching.

I should mention one thing about shipping quilts. I've shipped a fair number and received a fair number back this past year. It costs a FORTUNE to ship overnight. My quilt was 50" square and weighed 7 LBS  (I don't believe that). The box size was 14" by 13" by 5". Overnight was going to cost $130. Three day was $100 or something like that and 5 day was $34 (with tax). I sent it 5-day. I couldn't bring myself to pay $130 to ship the box. I think back to how slap happy people are when prepping things for shipment and NO REGARD for the cost. Well, I'm guilty of that as well as I had NO IDEA how expensive it was. I think that any company that does a lot of shipping should educate all their employees on shipping costs. If companies were careful, they could hire at least one or two more people by what they save on the shipping bill. It's a whole lot different when the money comes out of your pocket versus the company you work for!!!

Once the magazine quilt was out of the way, I loaded a customer quilt and that got finished last night.

Customer quilt - DONE

This quilt will keep its owner nice and warm. Flannel on the top, fleece on the back (notice the excess Toronto Maple Leaf fleece on the left) and there's batting in there as well. Thankfully it's not too big otherwise it would be very heavy. But my kind of quilt!!!  And guess who gets the lovely task of sewing the binding on? Yep  - that would be me! One of my fun jobs of the day. Oh, the things I do for my customers - but I charge them of course!

I was hoping to have the next quilt loaded last night, but it didn't happen. Big deal. I had to piece the backing and it's now together, but needs to be ironed. That's a job for this morning.

But here's the MOST exciting news of yesterday. Last night, I decided to tidy that messy corner a wee bit so I wasn't jumping over stuff to turn the radio on and off.

The messy corner is a wee bit tidier

Hm - remember yesterday when I said that there were TWO boxes of stuff for the Misty Pines quilt? Well, I found the second box in a stack of project boxes and guess what was inside??

The missing box for Misty Pines

My two missing baggies of fabric!!!!   YEAH!!!  Christmas came early at my house. Speaking of Christmas, I ordered my Christmas present to myself yesterday. I'm so excited I can hardly contain myself. It won't come until December 27th, but it's going to be worth the wait and worth every penny.

The missing baggies of fabric

I also found all the paperwork for the kits. I bought bolts and bolts of this fabric from Northcott. It's from their Stonehenge Woodland collection which of course is now long gone. It's not even in the archive section of their website.

The paperwork

I think there were 20 people who bought kits. There was the option to buy the kit and take a class or just buy the kit. I know that some people finished their kits a long time ago, but I would bet that there are still a few out there who haven't even started! Well, I'm going to get mine completed and tidy up those boxes and if someone is missing fabric - too late!!!!  It's time to put this quilt to bed.

I'm working on my classes for 2019. Almost got everything finialized and I can start posting them. It's a lot of work to coordinate my schedule with the various stores. I'll also be hosting some classes at my house. So once I've got the pictures posted from last year's classes, I'll start posting the classes for next year. I still have to write descriptions for some of them and for a couple, figure out what specific pattern I'm going to teach.

On that note, I'm out of here. Off to press that giant backing and get it on the long arm before my guest comes today. It's a sewing day!!!!  And I get to work on finishing stuff. All the quilts that need binding are sitting on the "binding" table with the sewing machine set up for bindings. I wonder how many I can get done in a day?

Havea  super day!!!!!


Ciao!!!!!