Did you ever feel like you're putting together a puzzle when quilting?

often I do!

This was my status last night before throwing my hands up...no longer motivated because I didn't know how to "finish this puzzle"...((Back-pedaling)) Yesterday found me by-passing Chunky Churndash because I was suddenly motivated and inspired to finish up Lucidity. And although this quilt LOOKS simple, for those of you that aren't border-making lovers, this would be a monkey on your back with all those lonnnnng blasted sashing strips!!! Really---it was like putting 11 borders on one quilt! As stated, this was my status as of 8:00 last night....backing ALLLLMOST pieced, and I simply didn't have any passion left after being 6 INCHES short!!!!!!! Bad calculation?? No, I just crossed my fingers and hoped it would fit...... sadly, it didn't...

...so, after tucking Candace into bed last night (and seeing what I had done with HER pieced backing), I was inspired this morning to throw in a strip of left over blocks. CrazyMom throws these dandies into her backings quite often too. I'm growing quite fond of them myself. This decision meant that I needed to rip out the seam I made last night and spent a good hour piecing (and cutting) the extra strip for the backing...
But my puzzle play wasn't through...noooooooooo. Next, I went to my roll of batting, not really knowing how much I had left on the roll. 20 inches SHORT across the entire width!!!!!! Scrounging in my storage cabinet, I found one package of 60x60 batting, but didn't want to cut into that yet. Hmpf.... I should have taken a picture of the what the downstairs looks like right now, because I dug (DEEP) into my bag(s) of leftover batting, tossing batting all over the place in hopes to organize it somehow.... All sizes; some large, some long strips, you name it. I ended up piecing 8 total long/little/stubby pieces together to have enough batting.

Back to work....
...with my Princess helper. Caitlyn prepped my basting pins for me and even helped me put a few in. She was so proud.
Nothing fancy with the quilting. I chose one of my decorative stitches and travelled the length of each sashing strip in purple thread...
...and Lucidity sees a finish! Binding-n-all (just no label YET).
Plans for this one??? Not sure, but it's wrapped around me as I type. The colors are lovely, lines are crisp and clean.

And tomorrow---Goal: Finish Christmas Lights I'm ALMOST done with that one too (worked on it yesterday). I only have binding left on it. SO, I'm doing well on my goals I posted about last week:
1) Finish Chunky Churndash (We'll see how close I get to that, because I'll work on that tomorrow as well, EVEN if I need to stay up until Midnight!!! Oh, wait! I'll probably be doing that anyway!)
2) Finish Lucidity. CHECK!
3) Finish Christmas Lights . CHECK! (Almost) I'll only need a couple of hours to check this one off my list.
4) Start Carolina Christmas. CHECK! I'm doing the last part of step #1 as a leader-ender right now.

Nice way to finish off 2009....stayed tuned for a final '09 post tomorrow evening!

Happy Wednesday!