QFK prepped and a quilt-in-the-making?

Last night at 10:00PM, I shut the burner off of the tomato sauce; I was no longer interested in waiting and waiting for it to finish reducing and THEN waiting another 40 minutes for it to hot-water-bathe.  The ideas shared were wonderful and you can BET I'll give those an attempt the next time I need to reduce anything.  Wow!  5 hours last night.....

and then another 3 hour this morning for it to finish reducing to a consistency I was happy with.  Eight total hours.  That's a long time!  So, YES, DEFINITELY I will give the suggestions shared a fair shake the next time.

In the end, 9 quarts are being added to our shelves of canned goods.  

While the sauce was simmering away, I spent some time preparing a backing for the Cars quilts-for-kids top.  

In addition to the Lightening McQueen scraps that Nancy sent, she also had about 1/2 yard of a coordinating Cars fabric in the box of scraps she sent me.  It worked PERFECTLY for the backing; simply made a bit wider with some red sidebars.

{{stir, stir, stir inbetween}}

One wonderful outcome of making these quilts -- I pieced together a few scraps of batting that had been collecting from my bigger quilt finishes.  

{{stir, stir}}

Since having my Juki98 short-arm and frame set up, I rarely quilt on my Bernina anymore.  But these are so small, and the suggested quilting is a simple cross-hatch, so that's my game plan.

I basted them up, and they now lay waiting on the ironing board.  

{{stir, stir}}

These extra spinning star blocks (from Carolina Christmas) have been catching my eye every time I walk past my orphans which are still scattered all over the floor.  A straight-set would work.. but I think I'm going to see what I can do with an on-point setting.  Coordinating colors are being tried out in my mind;  I AM a sucker for purples/oranges/greens lately.  Sashing is a possibility as well.

{{Stir, stir.....it was READY!!!!}}

My time downstairs ended, and the sauce was processed.  The rest of my day run-down:

Lunch was made;  school supplies were organized.  Cassie was dropped off to make the bus-time for her Cross Country meet tonight; Caitlyn, Candace and myself went shopping for some odds-n-ends.  I got home and searched some of my math websites to find some week-1 "fun" projects.... and now here I am.  

Paul nor myself will be trekking over to Cassie's meet tonight;  it's over an hour away; it's already begun, in fact, and Paul won't be home for another 45 minutes from work.  And me...?  Last Spring, I had signed up to work tonight's Volleyball match not even THINKING that Cassie would be old enough and want to go out for Cross Country.  In fact, I signed up for ALL the home Volleyball matches; and sadly almost all of Cassie's CC races conflict with the home VB games.  I am hoping to find someone to switch duties with, and if not... :{  At least I'll know better for next year.