Thursday Thread

Yesterday ended up being sort of a lazy day. I didn't do nearly as much sewing as I thought I would. Always a person who accomplishes more under pressure, it seems that on days I don't have so much to do, I end up sitting around more than I expect. Oh well. My goal had been to start quilting today, and so I was a day ahead of my imaginary schedule. Being ahead of schedule is yet another nail in the coffin of good time management.

Nevertheless, I did get the first block quilted on the Shoot for the Moon quilt. I have lots of ideas of the blocks of this quilt. For one thing, I figure I'll just give all of the moons some craters. This block happens to have the space alien, and I gave his (or her...can't really tell) spaceship some exhaust fumes...because, you know...gasoline.

Also, I decided to give the star cornerstones some extra quilted points on the stars, turning them into 10-point stars. I'm using a black Bottom Line thread on the quilt back, and a black YLI machine quilting thread to stitch around the blocks and applique pieces. I used a gray Aurifil thread in the image above.

The problem with switching out thread colors (and brands, and types) is that it meant fiddling with the tension between each change. I won't make that mistake from here on. For now I'll stick with one thread at a time, do all the quilting with that thread, and then switch to something different.
While I have some good ideas for the blocks and the cornerstones, I'm still sort of stuck on the sashings. I quilted the sashings around this one block yesterday, but then I wasn't happy at all with what I'd done. I showed it to the Resident Engineer when he came home (whose position often entails design consultation), and he agreed...it was no good. Shoot...as if I expected he'd see the artistry in what was clearly crappy quilting. (Awesome Alliteration.)
We always watch TV in the evenings after dinner, and I spent the entire time mooning (pun intended) over the fact that I was going to have to take all that out. Then, I knew I wouldn't sleep because of said mooning, and so I took it all out before getting into bed for the night. It took two hours. If you don't think taking black stitches out of black fabric is a royal pain in the keister, then you would be thinking wrong. I was so worried about making a whole in my fabric. A magnifying glass comes in handy. It was a bummer to have to spend all that time taking it out, but it's good to be beginning again with a fresh start. I still don't know what to do with the sashings, but something will come to me. For now, wavy lines are looking good.
This morning I finished up this tree section of my Gingerbread Square block. Look at that sparkly garland on the tree. What fun!

For as much fun as it is to work with that sparkly thread, it's a bugger to thread onto the needle. It wants to uncoil, and it seems impervious to the usually indefatigable Mom Spit. Anyway...that part is done.
I can almost hoop the remainder of the piece in one shift of the hoop.

I'm a little wistful about finishing it up. It's like coming to the end of a really good book and wanting more. Thankfully, there are still eight blocks to do on this one. I imagine I'll be feeling less nostalgic with subsequent blocks...especially when I get to block nine.
Today is a swimming day, and then I'm getting a pedicure. I don't know how much sewing I'll get done today. After all that quality time with my seam ripper last night, I think I deserve a pedicure, don't you?
If I'm going to get to the pool, I'd better get going right now. What's on your agenda for the day?
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