Happy New Year!

Yes, I know it's been ages since I posted anything on my blog. Part of the reason is that I really didn't do anything creative in a long, long time. Between the class I was taking this fall and traveling and preparations for holidays (Thanksgiving in Ohio, Christmas on Cape Cod), I simply didn't get much accomplished in Nov. and Dec. that was blog-worthy. I vow to be better this year!

Speaking of resolutions, I have a few quilt-related ones this year, including attempting not to buy anything new at the store unless it is something I need to help finish a project for which I already have the majority of the supplies. I have loads of projects around here (and loads of WIPs), and it's time to get some of them done and save my money for some other fun thing. Ben told me he thought it was a stupid resolution: I couldn't just stop buying fabric when I was inspired. I told him he probably didn't realize how many projects I had around the house and I'm torn between being upset at his lack of support for my resolution (OK, not really) and thrilled that he thinks I should continue my fabric purchasing habit! We'll see how long it holds; yesterday I had to buy some fabric online because I'd made a really stupid error in calculating what I'd needed for that particular WIP. I'm not in violation yet!

I am fortunate to have family members who totally support and enable my quilting addiction. This holiday brought me a new portable Sew-Ezi quilting table, a rechargeable OttLite portable task lamp, a gift certificate to Keepsake Quilting, a beautiful Mint Chip Bali pop, a Michael Miller Fairy Frost fat quarter pack, an OmniGrid portable pressing and cutting station, and a couple of quilting books. Am I set to have fun or what?

I have dug in and gotten some things done in the sewing room in the past two days. Yesterday, I pieced together three backings and cut batting for quilts to drop off to be quilted in the near future, and I quilted the first of three of Star of Wonder panels that I sewed at my quilting retreat in early November (unfortunately none of these were finished for Christmas). I still need to apply 36 buttons to the yellow inner border and bind it up, but I'm really quite pleased with how the quilting turned out.

Today, I sewed fifty blocks like these three to make a quilt from the Batik Beauties book by Laurie Shifrin. The blocks went together quite quickly. I think it might have taken almost as much time to cut out the pieces on Wednesday night while watching one of the Pierce Brosnan James Bond movies (seriously, he has got to be the hottest James Bond)! I'm not sure how pleased I am with the overall color combination, but I'll share photos soon, I'm sure.

Happy New Year and happy sewing!