Ok… This is the longest I’ve ever gone without posting.
And that means it has been the longest I’ve ever gone without QUILTING.
I am a horrible, no good quilter.
But at least give me a chance to explain myself!

After well over a year I am back working on my Hawaiian quilt!
I know.
I can’t believe it either.

All I have to say about my long absence is, 2008 certainly was a long, long year.
In addition to two surgeries, the last of which took me quite a few months to recover from, my family and I relocated. My last surgery, as you may know, was foot surgery, and I didn’t walk for over a month. When I did begin to walk again, it was not without the constant burning pain of RSD. Yes, I still have RSD and believe I will continue to be riddled with it for the rest of my existence. For this reason, this realization, I have finally moved on. Yay! So, once again I am a college student, and once again I have taken up the hobby of quilting. YAY!

Right now my only project is my Hawaiian quilt. I am currently basting it together and am also counting my lucky stars that the pins that have resided in the quilt for so long haven’t rusted the fabric. The basting is going to take me some time, but I will certainly rest easier once those pins are out of it. I definitely look forward to the time when the hand applique process can start. For that is my absolute favorite part of the Hawaiian quilting process. I find peace in the needle-turn applique technique. And it’s a good thing, too. I expect it will take me a very long time, years even, to complete the applique process.

Until I have more pictures to show you of my Hawaiian quilt’s progress, I noticed that there are a few quilts that I have neglected to blog about. The first is the Sunbonnet Sue quilt that I made for my little girl before she was born. I love Sunbonnet Sue (or Holly Hobby for those acquainted with it in the 70’s) and my favorite color is red… Hence, the creation of this quilt.

This next quilt is what I believe is called a “stack-n-whack” quilt. I took this class with my MIL and my little sister finished it (she sewed together the blocks, assembled the top, and quilted it) for her senior-project in high school. Of course, I am the one who taught her how to do all that so I think that I should get some of the credit for this quilt as well. (I mean, after all, I am the one who cut out all the pieces, pinned all the layers together, and I put on the binding. Not to mention I taught a seventeen year old to quilt. Gah!)

Anyway. That is that.
I am working hard on my big HUGE Hawaiian quilt and I will post more pictures of it soon.
Who knows? Maybe I’ll start working on my block of the month from 2005 again!!
We shall see!

I cannot BELIEVE that I have not posted in almost three months.
I suck at quilting.
You see, I only post on here if I’ve done something… Anything, really.
And since it has been three months since I’ve been on here, that just shows how dedicated I am to my supposed “favorite” hobby.

I’m sorry!! However, I hope to make up for it with the picture that I’m about to show you.
My Mom was in town to help me out with my kids a month ago (I’ll tell you why in a minute…) and she helped me lay out my ENORMOUS Hawaiian quilt.

WOW!, right? I absolutely love it and I am sure you all are massively impressed. I could not have done it without assistance, so I am so grateful that my Mom was here to help me do it. She helped my iron the background fabric, which was a BIG chore that absolutely takes two people, and then she helped me lay out AND pin the big design to the background. I think it took about three hours to do and we did it in the dead of night when my kids were fast asleep. Now I need to get on the stick and baste that sucker together so I can get those pins outta there so I can begin the hand appliqué. (Which I estimate will take me, oh, I don’t know…. For.Ever!!)

Basting will take me some time to do, so now I am searching for someone local to help me out. FYI: I’m not a big fan of basting. I hate it, actually. So I am hoping to wrangle my sister into doing most of it for me under the pretense of me teaching her to “sew”. (hahahaHA!)

During this whole adventure I found out that I have severe carpal tunnel syndrome in my right hand and borderline in my left. Three different doctors have advised me to get surgery to correct it… I just don’t know if I can. The recovery involves THREE weeks of no movement of the hand. And then for a month or so after you can’t lift anything and there are other activities that will be limited as well… But I guess I have to wait for the surgeon to tell me what those activities are.

I’ve got two kids.
One is almost five and the other is three.
Taking my right hand away from me would be disastrous.
I mean… you KNOW that quilting would be way out of the question for a while.
And we all KNOW that I love quilting so much that I just couldn’t stand to ever abandon my hobby.

Clearly, I am a horrible quilter.
Have you noticed that I only update this site about once a month?
It’s not because I am a horrible blogger… because I’m not. Really.
It’s because I only quilt about once a month.
Isn’t that terrible?

What is my problem? Maybe it’s because I’ve got two small kids and a painful nerve disorder…. but still. I love quilting. It is relaxing and creative. And it is something I do all by myself. Most of the time, I love the loneliness of it all. But I have to admit that sometimes I don’t want to be so lonely quilting. I want some companions. Oh how I would LOVE to be part of a quilting circle. I don’t know how to go about finding one close to me, but if I found one I’m sure I would quilt a lot more often.

Anyway. That blither-blather isn’t what I came here today to share.
I came to show you all the baby quilt that I just finished for a friend.
Now, before you look I have to tell you a little bit about it.
I wanted this quilt to be simple and fast. So. Only two fabrics were used.

See what I meant by simple and fast?
I can’t say that this is my best work… but I wanted this quilt would be used and I didn’t want the Mother to be afraid to use it.

In the past I have made quite a few baby quilts. And it has been interesting to see what the receiver’s have done with the quilts. Some of the quilts have been loved to death. And I LOVE that. And then some of my other quilts have never been seen again for fear of it being ruined. So this time I wanted to make sure that the quilt was cute and usable. Hopefully I succeeded.

My Hawaiian quilt has given me many problems as of late so I have been avoiding it. Long story short, I misjudged the amount of background fabric I needed and came up short when I was finally ready to lay the floral design out to get it basted together and ready for the appliqué stage. It was a HUGE slap in the face when I realized that I had to buy MORE fabric and start all over… at least with the background fabric.

So now I get to fight with the endless yards of fabric and my iron. I HATE ironing this much fabric because it never goes well. The fabric still ends up a tad wrinkly and the creases that I need are very, very difficult to get right. Ew. Just thinking about this makes me want to avoid it for at least another month. But. I’ve got to get this started and finished! I’ve got to!

See how I need encouragement?
See how I need the prodding of a quilting circle?
Now if only I could find one, I’d be set.

I know I would…. right?

1. I have FINALLY re-finished my ugly sewing cabinet that holds my very first sewing machine.
   
2. I have FINALLY cut out my hawaiin quilt design.
   
3. I have FINALLY finished block #6 from my 2005 block of the month subscription.
   

If only I could get it together enough to post on this blog more.
I so desperately need quilting friends… real life or cyber. It really does not matter at this point.

I went with my husband to my local fabric haven this week.

Oh yes ladies. My husband went with me.
He had to.
We were picking the colors for the king sized hawaiian quilt that I am making.

I say, “making”, because I finally started!
~applause~
Thank you. Yes. I know.
~pat on the back~
oh. You are too kind.

I bought the pattern online from Poakalani Hawaiian Quilt Designs.
See? Isn’t it pretty?

Anyway.
I did finally start the massive undertaking that is a king sized quilt. And all I have to say is that I must be crazy. Everyone I tell about my project looks at me like I’m nuts… So I must be.

The very day that we picked out and bought the fabric, I came home to find out that freaking Pottery Barn is currently selling “hand stitched” king sized “hawaiian” quilts for… TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS!!!

WHAT?!!?

How? I just spent HALF that amount on fabric alone! And what about all the many hundreds of thousands of hours spent “hand stitching” those authentic hawaiian quilts? All for two hundred bucks? Again with the how?

I am so angry. Who would have thought an item in a catalog could tick me off so much? The fact of the matter is that I’ve lost my motivation for this HUGE project. I was operating under the assumption that a real hand stitched king sized hawaiian quilt would cost upwards of two or three thousand dollars. I was certainly motivated to save that kind of money on something that I’ve wanted for over six years.

But now? Now I’m not sure why I would spend possibly over a year making something that I could just buy for mere pennies compared to the money and hours I am going to be investing in the project.

The practical side of me is saying that there is NO. WAY. that Pottery Barn is selling true blue hand stitched quilts. There has got to be some loop-hole that they are using to be able to say that these quilts are hand made. I mean, who knows? Maybe these quilts are “hand stitched” in that an actual hand was touching the machine that was doing the stitching.

The part of me that needs the motivation though? That’s the part that is really scared that Pottery Barn is actually being on the up and up on this one. Maybe they did find people that are willing to do hand work for a fraction of a penny an hour. Maybe they just decided that they didn’t need to turn a profit on this item…. Maybe they are selling this item at a loss.

Yeah. Right.

Anyway. So here I sit. Trying to decide if I should continue on with this massive undertaking. So far all I’ve done is buy, prewash, and iron the fabric. Oh… and I’ve also have folded both pieces into an eighth.

I’m sure I’ll proceed… I just don’t want to right now.
It’s a shame I had to look at the Pottery Barn catalog this month.
Had I not, we would be having an entirely different conversation right now.
Probably about how excited I was about finally starting a project that I’ve been looking forward to for six years.