Friday, August 31, 2012

Have you sensed the transition?

Hm :\
One post is three days..... instead of three posts in one day !  HA.

Yes, yes.... the past two days, I have been at school for teacher-inservice.  The days were wonderful as wonderful can be; and the excitement of a new school year; the classroom coming together;  the technology bugs getting worked out;  all the coworkers faces; summer stories; new changes/challenges introduced for the upcoming year.

Many of the teachers are heading back in today to do final preparations;  and after 14 years of "Day 1 schedules," I've learned to go-with-the-flow; smile and high-five students; and the day will be a success.  This is the first year that I DO NOT have copies of my syllabus ready; this is the first year that I don't have any "real" lesson planned for the first two days of school..... the "wings" will sprout and I will be "going with the flow."

Just this morning, a friend posted this on Facebook, and I had a good ol' laugh!  I try to play-it-straight with the students if they ever ask me the classic, "When are we ever going to use this?"  I usually try to brush it off with "You probably won't,"  and then I walk away to avoid what they realllly want:  a distracted teacher.  HA!  Is that bad??    But why does math get the bad rap?  When will you ever need to know that Lincoln was the 16th president of the United States?  Or, .... maybe English, Science and Social Studies teachers also hear that infamous question???  Am I being biased to think it's only Math teachers who hear it?

To try to keep humor in the workplace, I forwarded this one to our Driver Education instructor; a REALLLLLLY cool dude!  And, I shouldn't have been surprised at this response (cuz he's kinda a mathy/sciency/safety nerd too)....  "Actually, Amy, it should be the squ.root of 625, which results in 25 MPH- the officialy school-zone maximum speed.  The speed limit shown in more that 26 MPH. That's simply too fast for the safety of our students."

LOL

I sure do appreciate the amazing staff I get to work with :)  In fact......


YAY!  I forgot I took this picture last week!!!!  The driver instructor is in the hat (he's also our "shop" guy), and the other two pictured here are my Matheliciously-nerdy counterparts.  They are part of the "cribbage crew" in the staff lounge during the high-school lunch period.  Therefore, I RARELY get to chill with them and a game of cribbage (I eat in the Junior High lunch period), so....last week, when we all were putting in some 'flex' hours, they let me know that "the game was on!"  {{Linda--shhhh!  I promised the guys 'no Facebook,' but I didn't say anything about my blog.  Tee-hee}}

Boy--working with great people sure makes a job nicer, huh? 

Alright;  cinnamon rolls are done (Cassie is getting to be a GREAT 'cook' around here).  Today:  Final school shopping detail.

Happy Friday Everyone.


Tuesday, August 28, 2012

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.

Tiny Tuesday: #27 Orange Peel

With a combination of applique and patchwork piecing, this block came together without too much difficulty.  The yellow background squares were cut out and the two blue fabrics were prepped and cut for applique.

Nothing too crazy here.....pretty straight forward {{just lots of pieces}} :)


Monday, August 27, 2012

Nightmares, school and some gardening

Last night, Paul and I watched the movie "Taken" until 11:00PM and then headed to bed.  We had already seen the movie, but it must have stuck with me again, because at 11:21PM, Paul placed his hand on my shoulder, and asked me if I was okay.

Gosh!  Was I RELIEVED that he did that!!!  I had fallen asleep quickly (for ONCE!), and I was having a doosey of a nightmare!  Have you ever driven your car when you know you shouldn't have because you were so tired??  Well, a dream must literally have started just as I dosed off, because it started with me in my car, driving....and resisting that feeling of falling asleep.  And I couldn't fight it; I dosed off just as I approached my driveway, and I kinda "tilted" into my garage sideways; I could hardly keep my eyes open.  And from somewhere, Paul materialized ...and we were in a cellar/basement.... I started heading to a basement stairwell to get up to the main floor to turn the lights on;  they were off.... and Paul closed the car door putting us in complete darkness.  I turned to talk to him to open the car door again so I had some light to manuever the stairs....and I reached the top, opened the door, reach around to find the light switch....and ARMS wrapped around me!  It wasn't Paul.  And I couldn't scream....I started breathing heavier...but no scream would come......but my mind was thinking that if I breathed hard enough that Paul would come running to the rescue..

and that is when Paul touched me and asked if I was okay because I was breathing just has quick and panic-heavy in real-life.  I can't remember the last time that a dream/nighmare FREAKED me out so badly.... but this one did!  It was that sheer frozen fear panic ... that I couldn't scream out for help.

So, are you a dream analyzer?  Does this dream have deeper meaning than just a simple "Taken" movie?  Is the anxiety and pressure of school starting getting to me?  ... something else?.....

Anyway....after a few moments of calming down (LITERALLY!  I was shaken up!)... I told Paul about the dream and then laid there and laid there and laid there.... NOT able to get back to sleep for quite awhile :{  **sigh**

Paul's alarm clock woke us at 5:15AM, and after some tossing and turning for 30 minutes, I fell back asleep until 7:30AM.  A quick shower....and I was at school by 8:05AM.

A GOOOOOD morning at school!  I planned out my first "flexible" week's schedule for all my classes;  I debugged and learned a few more things with my new calculator Navigator software, and by 11:50AM, I was ready to head home.  Feeling happy :)

Once at home, I needed to dump some scraps into the pig's trough, so I took a moment to look around the garden.  I haven't been in the garden for quite some time!  My allergies have kept me locked up, and with the whole lack-of-motivation going on last week, ...yeah...nothing has been touched in over a week.

Oh
Boy!

Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes, cucumbers, more tomatoes.... :-)

After lunch, I sucked it up and headed outside with girls in tow!  (And know this:  I have NOT taken my allergy meds for a few days because they dehydrate me so badly!  I have had 'cotton-mouth' for the past week and NOTHING had been touching the severe thirst-ugh!)

An afternoon of cutting tomatoes, cooking tomatoes and seasonings, and food-milling....

lead to a HUGE pot of "seasoned tomato sauce" in the making.  
I fear I started this too late, because the sauce didn't start its reducing stage until after 5:00PM :\  I haven't made this recipe before, and NEVER this much, so ... I'm kinda wondering how long it is going to take to reduce this amount.

Ah well..... tomorrow, I am not going to school!  I don't know exactly what's on the schedule yet, but NOT school!  We still have some school shopping to do;  more tomatoes are calling my name; the Quilt-for-Kids tops are waiting the quilting-phase.  Plenty to choose from.

OH!  And the whole allergy business...  :\  I've gone through half a box of kleenexes this afternoon.  Ugh. Ugh. Ugh.

Sunday, August 26, 2012

Quilts for Kids tops

Last Monday, I received a Quilts for Kids package in the mail that I requested sometime last month;  these kits come precut and ready for piecing.

They are quick designs;  this center was completed in just over an hour.  And then......"school-mode" started hitting me.  I already feel my quilting-mode leaving me;  little by little I am losing ambition and motivation to head down to the sewing room.  I dunno... it's a weird feeling that I can't really put into words.... 
...but anyway, the center remained waiting on my ironing board until this morning.

The final borders were attached.  It now awaits quilting.

I try to always send an additional quilt to the QFK headquarters made from my own stash.  Some time last year (?) (or was it this year?), Nancy (Patchwork Penguin) sent me some of her scraps.  A couple strips of Cars-Lightening McQueen fabric was included, in addition to this amazing blue dyed fabric.  Together with a yellow FQ and black yardage from my shelves, I was able to create this little quilt.  I initially was planning a disappearing 9-patch (D9P), but I never measured the two strips of Cars fabric; they looked the same.  I grabbed one; it measured 6.5".  I cut it in half (3.25") in order to make a strip set with a matching 3.25" blue strip....pieced, subcut..., and when I grabbed the second strip.... it measured 6".  :\  Ummm......well, snafu :}.  Thankfully, I'm not new to snafus, so..... I made up some D9Ps from the first set... and then used my design liberties to turn them into the unique blocks shown; and then used the last 6" strip for 1.5" borders.  I think it all worked out.  AND, if I'm up to it, when I quilt this top, I plan to use yellow thread in the middle of the black sashing units to have them look like roads.  {{Yeah, yeah...I know!  Lightening McQueen is a race car...and race tracks don't have yellow lines.  Oh well!}}  :0)

Saturday, August 25, 2012

Gettin' too old for this

Three years ago, Paul and I put the word out that we were retiring from our summer sand volleyball years.  

So....we have NOT touched the sand in a lonnnnnnng time.

A few weeks ago, a friend (former 'teammate' of sorts) contacted us and kept contacting us over and over to play this "King and Queen of the Beach" tournament they were hosting.  Finally, last week, we caved and said yes.

The first year this tournament was played (6 years ago!), that same friend who contacted us and his partner, along with Paul and myself....we won the whole thing and were crowned Kings and Queens.

Today----it was a little different story.  HA!
The rundown of this tournament is this:  you show up with a partner (male/female).  There were 18 "partners" at the tournament today; which meant LOTS and LOTS of playing time!

You play with every partner-set once (4-person) and will face every partner-set twice.

"Back in the day,"  Paul and I were a great combination;  5'3" setter and 6'6" outside hitter.  Great duo, right??  :)  We actually met playing volleyball;  it literally was a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-brother-of-a-friend type delio oh so long ago.  So that's a brief history on how Paul and I met.

Today....it took quite a few games before Paul or myself were getting back into any kind of groove, but considering that everyone else has been playing all summer...in "sand" shape.... LOL!  Let's just say that we'll walk away with our 17th of 18 teams place and say...."we're gettin' too old for this!"

The girls were WONDERFUL all day!  12 hours of watching Mom and Dad play volleyball could have been enough for them to go a bit stir-crazy, but they were great!  Cassie was our photographer and Candace got some footage on the iPad.  

THANKFULLY the weather cooperated!  Cloudy/Overcast all day;  upper 70s.  If that sun would have been beating down-----today would have had a VERY different outcome!  (Okay, not VERY different, but I put money on it that we would have taken 18th place and would have needed to be rolled home!)  But...Paul and I survived and are very okay with our registration fee "donation" on the day.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Cassie's First Cross Country meet

School hasn't started yet, and won't until September 4th, but the sports programs are in fullll swing!
In fact, in just over an hour from now, we'll be heading out for the home opener Football game!  Wahooo :)

But back to Cassie....
Our school's setup has a 3-6 wing, a 7-8 wing and a 9-12 couple of wings; therefore we still call our 7-8 a Junior High (working on changing that to a Middle school philosophy this year though.)  Therefore, 6th graders are able to compete in Cross Country and Track at this point.  Hence, Cassie is in Cross Country this year, only 1 of 3 6th graders.

The middle school team was quite small last night;  only 4 athletes competed;  two 6th graders and two 8th graders.

The middle school runs a 2.5K race; and this course was one of the more hilly courses she'll face this year.  (UGH!  Mom knows allll about hills!  Remember Paavo '08, Paavo '11 or the dreaded Birkie?)

Being a spectator at a Cross Country meet was a new experience for Paul and me.  Thankfully, the course was designed in such a way that we had different points along the way to meet up with the athletes and give them some shouting encouragement to keep them driving along.

And one part of the course was off in the distance, but thankfully the camera has a decent zoom feature.  Look at that stride!  Gotta love downhills, huh Cass? :)

And then, around the turn she came towards the finish line; kicked it in gear passing two athletes in the final stretch to finish just over 14 minutes.

Ohhh.... I know that face :\  She was a hurtin' unit with that final kick at the end...

Coach came over and worked on calming her breathing down.....

And she survived her first Cross Country race.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

We're Turtle sitting!

A friend of Cassie's is heading out of town for the weekend, and so we were asked to Turtlesit for her 3 baby turtles.

Oh my goodness!  
These lil' things are sooooo stinkin' Cah-uuuuuuuutttte!



Tuesday, August 21, 2012

I've become "one of those" quilters...

Brief history lesson on Amy:
2000 - started considering the idea of quilting and made my first quilt.  I was 25 years old.
2000-2007: continued learning some quilting fundamentals - NEVER took a class, just all self-taught
2007 - inherited Grandmother's/Aunt's quilting supplies (including fabric) - I mark this the beginning of reallllly becoming obsessed in quilting as my "life outside of teaching"
2008 - January:  turned a room downstairs into "MY" sewing room - Once I had my own space... quilting took on a whole new life and obsession.  Always set up, always ready to go.  I was born again.
2008 - April;  created this blog.  I was turning 33 this year.
2010 - April: Purchased Juki98 and Grace GMQ-PRO quilting frame

Okay.....during my early years of blogging and really allowing myself to become a quilter (2007-2008), I would often see ladies posting "orphan block" creations.

And honestly, I thought...."What?  Orphan blocks?  How on earth do you get to have Orphan blocks?  Don't you just make what the pattern calls for?  I don't get it.... :\"

Then...the more independent I became with quilting and designing and trying out new things (and cutting TOO many "Bonnie units" for one of her mysteries or another...) :D

I
Have
Become
An
Orphan
Hoarder

I spent the morning at school; a post to come on that later
I started a quick little Quilts for Kids project that arrived yesterday;  a post to come on that later

But just now.... I'm trying to "find myself."  Hard to explain, but transitioning back to school is already changing my mental outlook on priorities, and I can already feel the "anxiety" of being able to find that balance of schedule that happens every year around this time.

So...when I got home from my morning of school (ALL RELAXING too!!)... and grabbed a bit to eat... and headed downstairs....  Nothing called to me.  Didn't feel like making more Flying Geese units for Hawaii Sunset; didn't feel like finishing up the Quilts for Kids project, didn't feel like piecing Framed Rectangles into rows.  Actually....I think that it's..... I didn't feel like SEWING!  I'm antsy right now... I have no interest in sitting sitting sitting and pushing fabric through a machine.

Instead.... I saw my growing stack of "orphans"... and I started laying it all out.


Ummmm.....WOW!  This is my 5th year of "true quilting obsession".... and...WOW!  Where did all of these come from?
What a ride!!!!!
* My 2010 BOM attempts, but I didn't like the background fabric, so onto the pile they went...
* Extra blocks from Candace's Stars:  no idea how/why I have extra, but I know I could look back at these posts and jog my memory
* Extra blocks from Bonnie's Carolina Christmas mystery:  all of my posts on that quilt
* those blue/yellow or blue/light blocks??  Where/When are those even from????  Must not have liked them....onto the pile they go!
* extra Fun with Bricks units - 2008
* extra Wafer Cookie units - 2009 to PRESENT!  Yes...hanging head.  STILL not quilted!
* left over Cathy's Auny Sukey units - 2008
* an attempt of an applique rose for Now-n-Forever - a quilt that never happened; but instead turned into Candy Dish - 2010
* a new addition:  a midget that didn't turn out - 2012

On and On the years are recorded in these blocks.  
So, I have reached a mile-stone.  I am a quilter.  I have orphans.  And I want these orphans to be turned into something for me.  

And so now.... I simply am going to post this.... sit back and look at the picture... and see what amazing images come to mind on how to accomplish turning these seemingly unrelated units/blocks/scraps and interconnect them to a 2007-2012 melody.

Tiny Tuesday: #26 Old Snowflake


The recommended piecing for this block was altered up quite a bit.  Rather than paper-piecing all of it, I elected to rotary cut and patchwork piece the hourglass blocks.
 
I like how these rulers are labeled!  It doesn't take much calculation at all to determine strip sizes for blocks!  I knew that the finished hourglass block needed to be 1 1/2", so I grabbed my Companion Ruler (a quarter-square triangle ruler), looked at the BIG outer numbers (which show the FINISHED size of the block), and cut strips at the width of the inner/center/smaller measurement listed.

Then I cut up the recommended paper-pieced units for the corners of my nine-patch block....

Then pieced the 9-patch together :)

Still plugging along :)
Heading to school today for a few 'relaxed' hours this morning;  slowly transitioning into school-mode :)

Monday, August 20, 2012

Harvest storage...

For those of you who have commented that I never seem to rest.... 
I definitely have my moments! (ask Paul;  I'm sure he'd say I don't do nuttin') :)
But remember... I have NO STRESS in my life right now (or at least...not much).  When I wake up in the morning (6:00 lately to get Cassie to Cross Country practice), I wake up raring to go on most days
HA!  Okay....raring to go ONCE I've had my cup(S) of coffee and have caught up on blogs and emails :)

So, this morning.... the counter needed major de-cluttering from our Saturday of harvest!  
DUH!  No picture taken... we (kids and I) were already scurrying about to put everything away before I thought of this post.

As I was organizing the canned goods on the shelves in our cellar.... I kinda wondered if anyone was interested in seeing how we store everything we've been harvesting.  ??  I never really know what holds the interest of all of you blog readers out there;  yes, I mostly quilt, but I've also been turned into quite a preserver thanks to the push and guidance from hubby, Paul.

This shelving unit is in the basement, in a secluded, cement-surrounded cubby that we use as a storm-shelter if weather ever hits.  It's unfinished;  still a dirt floor; no heat, no AC..... So we (Paul) turned it into a root-cellar last summer once we realized we were outgrowing our previous pantry.

Beans, tomatoes (whole and juices), corn, pickles, salsa, ketchup, pizza sauce, chicken stock, peppers....everything we "can" comes in here for long-term storage.  We keep a couple cans of everything in our kitchen pantry to have "on-hand." 
Eventually, potatoes will also be placed in here in Paul's homemade potato-crates.  

Out in the garage, we have a chest-freezer inherited from my Grandmother.  More corn, all the meat Paul processes (pig, deer), berries, rhubarb.....not even sure of EVERYTHING that is in here :-}

Paul picked up another Freezer/Fridge combo from a buddy, so that's also getting used;  mainly with Chicken and stock (and he hides some freezy-pops from the girls. You might be able to see a slight glimpse of red and green...below the ice-maker boxes on the left) ;D

Inside the house in the freezer, I have this year's batches of jam, although we still have a bountiful amount in the chest-freezer from last year's harvest.   (Yup!  Ice cream pail on top.  I'm not a huge ice cream fan--I think that's a good thing.  But chocolate.....oh....put chocolate in front of me, and I've lost all will-power!)

I think I am going to try to attempt to finish the corn-sealing process.  With everything going on around here yesterday, it didn't even CROSS my mind that we hadn't done it yet :\  If you go back up to look at the chest-freezer pic, you'll see the bags aren't sealed yet.  I'm a little worried that the top bit of corn in each bag has been 'burned' :{  So, wish me luck.  I think the directions are still in the box ???

Happy Monday

Sunday, August 19, 2012

13 hours!!! of sewing. **heavenly sigh**

Yes.....from 7:30 AM until NOW (11:00 PM), {{minus a 2-hour dinner break}}....

It was GLORIOUS GLORIOUS GLORIOUS!

Ready to see it all!?!?!  :D

The day started with binding.  LOTS of binding.  First up:  Star Path - QOV Mystery #28
And it didn't take very long for me to reach my first snafu of the day :\  Hm.....tension! (AGAIN!  Remember that post not too long ago about tension?)  I re-threaded everything...and moments later, my thread broke.  Hmm.....someone wasn't happy.

Alright lil' lady!  I'll give you a thorough cleaning, if you insist!
Cleaned, oiled......... and we were back rolling :) with BEAUTIFUL stitches and a softer hummmmmm...... She was happy again!

And don'tcha hate it when this happens......??

No biggy.... leaned over and grabbed another random red 2.5" strip from the strip bin....
Didn't even clip the threads;  just kept toodling along to add the additional red strip and kept going on my merry way.

And did NOT think ahead!  Duh!  I should have trimmed up the binding a bit as to NOT hit a seam in the corner turn.  Oh well.......

Star Path (65" x 75") -- The first of the day;  DONE! 

Then, after a coffee refill, I pulled out Old Glory for the next binding session....

Really Amy!??!!???!  TWO quilts with short binding??!!?
Oh well......I wasn't about to be deterred!  I grabbed another strip....NOT REMEMBERING to cut down what was on the quilt! so the seam met in the corner : AGAIN! 

Old Glory (55" x 69.5") 

Whoo-hoo!  The biggest (only?) goals of the day:  Accomplished!  Before Noon, even :)  These two will be hitting the mail tomorrow on their way to Karen; Wisconsin's QOV representative.

And since I was on a binding roll:  

Star Harbor (59" x 73") was also finished up!  Wahooooooo!  THREE finishes in one morning!  I wasn't sure about the gold binding at first..... However, it framed it all quite nicely, if I may say so :)

And all complete---WITH labels! BEFORE NOON! (I think-----it's all kind of a haze to me now)

 So.... wow!  Three finishes.....what to do next, right??!?!?

Start a new project, of course!!!! Ohhh....... I blame Andee and Andra for this one!  They've twisted my sewing arm!  The three of us are working out some unit swaps for this......


With Andee on Facebook chat, I spent my afternoon working on some 9-patches and 4-patches.  Not finished with either pile... but a good start. 

And then..........HOLD ME BACK!  
The flying geese units!  I have NEVER needed to make flying geese this ADORABLY small before!!!  In fact, I didn't even hesitate to just snip off the bonus triangle without double-sewing!  **GASP** Way too small!  The trimmings were snipped into my (giveaway) crumb box.  I don't crumb quilt, but I save them up and give them away once the box is full.  Another person's trash..... :)

Around 4:30 in the afternoon, I excused myself from Andee (and Kathy), and made dinner.  Tacos tonight.  Usually a big hit with my family :)

And then.....BACK AT IT!  But I was honestly about to close up shop;  getting poooopered out!

And LOOOOOOOOOOOOK who ended up joining in my evening! 
First, Bonnie is the small video on the middle-left of the screen.  What????  She's leaving for Bali TOMORROW!!!!  I can't believe she Quilt-cammed tonight.
And then.......after some chatting with Nancy on Facebook, she called me up for a video chat.  What a blast!!!!  Little did she KNOW that I keep my camera with me at ALL times in the quilt room!!!!
A second wind hit me..... and I quilted the evening away.

By 11:00 PM EST, Bonnie bid us goodnight.  Nancy stuck around for a bit longer to finish up the last few of her 9-patch parts before heading out.

And then...........

SILENCE!!!

DEAD SILENCE!!
After hours of SOMEONE with me in my quilt room via technology...... it was eerily silent.  I had finished up the last of my prepped flying geese units and was trimming off the triangles.... so... it was REALLY silent!  I hadn't turned the music back on when Nancy and I ended our call...the only noise was coming from the hum of the light above me and the slicing of my scissors.

BUT!  I have 252 flying geese done;  separated into 3 different sets of 12 geese;  my plan right now is to keep creating 3 sets;  one I'll keep, one will go to Andra and one to Andee.  

How many does the quilt need??  SIX HUNDRED!  I think I spent about 8 hours alone on these geese today/tonight.  Quite tedious..... But after Bonnie mysteries....psht!  This is SO do-able!

AND THEN!!! Just as I was about to turn everything off, I stood and saw my design wall. 

 
See the gaps!?!?!?  I FINISHED the "C" blocks today as my leader-enders.  Bonnie's timing is PERFECT to start a new leader-ender project: Spoolin' Around  She said she would blog about that tomorrow morning with measurements before needing to get into Bali-mode.  I can't wait!  

I took the "A" and "B" blocks down from the wall... and joined them in with the "C" blocks.....
I just put them on the floor;  haven't done any moving around of blocks yet.  

No wonder I don't have much more in the way of blue scraps!  Actually, I don't have a SINGLE blue 2.5" OR 2" strip left!  (other than what I've set aside in my QOV strip bin).

So, there ya have it.  My computer screen is showing 11:56PM right now.  WOW!  Almost an hour to write this post.  I certainly will miss the leisurely schedule of summer! This week, I need to put in 16 hours at the school (flexible time), and then inservice is next Wednesday and Thursday.  I still have a few days of summer left;  and you can betcha that they will be filled :)

I hope hope hope you had a wonderful weekend!