What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

I am on the home stretch of the craziness that was September. There are still a few days left, but come Friday, when I don't have to travel for a long time and only have one class to prep for this weekend, it's going to be heaven. 

I hope you realize that I typically have more than one class on the weekend, two of them back-to-back on Saturday. I intentionally did NOT start the jacket class this month because I knew it would be silly from a timing perspective. That one starts in October. Yeah me! See -- I ...

Oh great --- the blog got scammed with many comments, and I don't have time to deal with it this morning. As a matter of fact, this blog post will be kind of short as I'm running short on time! 

However, there is good news, but I didn't seem to have taken many pictures yesterday. 

The binding was finished on that last quilt! Yeah!! I also remembered several other quilts that would be appropriate for this show, so they were pulled and packed into the suitcases. 

One more machine embroidery design was completed, and I've packed supplies ...

OK -- someone turned off the heat! It's cold. I wore shorts yesterday, but I think I'll find some pants this morning. 

So far, so good on the jet lag. With the full day of travel and the ability to sleep like a baby on the plane, I didn't need a nap yesterday and went to bed at my usual time. I did wake up in the night, but was able to get back to sleep, and so the day is now just like any other day! Let's hope I don't get hit with a whammy ...

Someone had asked me a while back if I was excited about this trip. It's hard to get excited when there is so much work to be done and so many things happening between now and then. Even now, when the departure is fast approaching, it's hard to get excited. I'll be excited when I step on the plane. 

Yesterday was a very long day, but I'm happy to report that the project I was working on is done. Or I should say complete enough that it looks done. There's a wee bit of hand ...

 Lots of questions today! 

First, Lexi and Muprhy have a babysitter to keep them company. I'm afraid I'm going to come home to find them with many new bad habits! But that's OK. They will get short walks, so they won't be totally wild when I return. I HOPE! 

How will DH cope? I'm not sure, but one thing -- he will NOT be climbing the mountain. He is doing his thing for the days I'll be in high altitude. It wasn't even up for discussion! 

The portable office? Well, the only reason I ...

The countdown is on for this trip, and I'm pretty much organized. I packed my small backpack yesterday - the important one with my protein bars, all the medication, and a few other things, like three pairs of glasses! I have a few other small things to pack, but it should easily be under 10 lbs. 

I got a chuckle as we've heard many times about small planes that you need to get from one destination to another, which we have to take for parts of this trip. I believe the maximum weight per passenger is 20 KG, and ...

I am a bit of a dolt, but we all knew that! I struggled a little bit with fatigue yesterday, but there wasn't an opportunity to take a nap. That's OK. But by 7:00 PM, I knew something else was wrong. OH MY GOODNESS -- I have a fever! 38.5! That would be a result of the vaccinations I had the previous day! I don't know how long I had the fever, but it was when my body just said, "we're done," that it crossed my mind! 

Having said that, I took some medication (although ...

It was the final day of Quilt Canada, which was exciting. It was still a busy day, but definitely not as crowded. There are pros and cons to attending the show on which day. The first day is always insane—and this time, there was so much pent-up excitement that it was doubly insane. Day two is always much calmer, and day three is nice. The final day was still quite busy, but you were no longer the salmon swimming upstream in mud - you were the otter who lazily swims along in a river! 

I noticed a comment on Facebook ...

Balance - that's a good word. There's balance in life, as in work-life balance, which I still struggle with occasionally. OK - I struggle with it a lot, but I still get lots of ME time. There's physical balance, and it's hilarious because it seems like such a simple thing, but it's a critical factor in our physical well-being. As I left my doctor's appointment the other day, she said, "You are taking care of yourself, and that is good. Be sure to work on your balance!" Not that balance was an issue in why I ...

Where did all this humidity come from? I don't mind the heat, but the humidity can be a killer—it makes everything feel damp! 

But I continue to walk—it's good practice for my upcoming trip. One thing that I'm very much looking forward to is that most of that walk will be done in the countryside or small villages, and there will be no cars or very few. The idiots in this area are, well, idiots! TWICE yesterday, people came whipping around a corner, looking left as I stood on their right! 

One must be vigilant ...

Yesterday, I was up early and got some sample-making done. Everything was bagged and ready to be sewn later on at the retreat. Dogs walked, clothes packed, and it was time to pack the car. 

Look who slipped by the closed door. She did NOT want to get out of the car. 

Murphy -- you can't stay in the car!

It feels like I'm on a treadmill, and it's speeding up with no chance of getting off! But there's no need to panic - everything is fine. Just a tad busy. This is temporary, as December will be pretty much dead. DO NOT LAUGH! How do people do this all the time? 

The second day of training went well, and I think everyone walked out of the room filled with excitement, a bit of trepidation to remember it all, and so much work ahead of them to make samples!

I had all these plans when I got home ...

Dare I say that I actually feel relaxed with these few days at home? I have loads that I'd like to do, but I'm just glad to be here puttering! 

I've almost got everything unpacked from the last trip, and I'm packing for Monday. But I'm being smart. There was a small table set up for another purpose, and rather than put it away, I made stacks relating to each topic, and this is so much easier than just slapping things in a bag. 

Packing and sorting for the next trip

This is also the ...

Another day - another city - another time zone. 

But first --- look at the Murphy! She's an attention seeker, to be sure, as I was trying to play ball with her and accidentally threw the ball into the pond - I would NOT make a good baseball player, to be sure. I grabbed the net, rescued the ball, and tossed it -- into the flowers, and she took that as an invitation to plop down. 

MOM -- thanks for the cozy spot!

So is it just me, or is it always like this? I don't think I've ever left on a trip and not been in frantic mode the day before. Why is that? 

I know why -- because when we're away, we don't have the same access as we have at home to computer files or whatever, or we know that we can eke out a few minutes here or there to do a job when we're at home and can't do the same thing when away. 

Well, it's been non-stop all day, and well ...

I've decided that I need 30-hour days to get everything done! I'm not giving up my walking or my sleep! So a few things will be late, and that's just life! I hope to clear off a lot of the computer work this morning. None of this is rocket science, so I'm not worried. Just in case you are waiting for an e-mail from me.  

One of the things I love about walking is you get to see stuff in the neighborhood. And way back in April, a car drove into a house. I'm not ...

I didn't get all of my elephants in line and in their respective rows until I got back home from the weekend retreat. I knew better than to take anything more than mindless sewing! (A few may have had reversed trunks... maybe.) Several undistracted hours of solitude had it all sorted out.  I suppose that all of my brain power might had been expended on packing to go last Friday morning.Here's all

I didn't get all of my elephants in line and in their respective rows until I got back home from the weekend retreat. I knew better than to take anything more than mindless sewing! (A few may have had reversed trunks... maybe.) Several undistracted hours of solitude had it all sorted out.  I suppose that all of my brain power might had been expended on packing to go last Friday morning.Here's all

Gregory and his Star Wars quilt topOur two local grandchildren have had an extra week off from school this week. Gregory (and his sister) spent the day with us yesterday and helped us to un-decorate the house. There's something about packing away the trees and all the decorations that makes everything look so bare and wide-open; it's sort of a clean sweep and re-examination of spaces that, just

Gregory and his Star Wars quilt topOur two local grandchildren have had an extra week off from school this week. Gregory (and his sister) spent the day with us yesterday and helped us to un-decorate the house. There's something about packing away the trees and all the decorations that makes everything look so bare and wide-open; it's sort of a clean sweep and re-examination of spaces that, just