I'm still having a lot of mouth pain, so not doing a whole lot. When I was at the dentist he told me that the two he was pulling out were not the only ones that were having problems and I wonder how many more I will lose. I go back tomorrow.

I started quilting on what I call Hexagon Star this morning.

I decided to use red thread since so many of the fabrics in the quilt are red. I put the walking foot on and I am just quilting straight rows down the middle of the hexagons. I found that I had left a couple of the paper templates in, but unfortunately after I had already quilted them. They are staying in. Eventually with washing they will disintegrate, I hope.

I finished the first set of paper piecing for the new quilt, so I printed out these pages so I can start to work on the next set tomorrow. So far, so good, and I am really enjoying the process with the next one to paper piece already planned, a twisted log cabin in blue and yellow, a combination I love. I don't have enough fabrics for it though and it will have to wait until I can afford more.

That's ok though, there is a lot of piecing yet to do on this top. I've only just really begun. The name of the pattern is Joy by Jaqueline de Jonge. I don't usually buy patterns, I wanted to try one that I knew would work before I began designing my own paper piecing. I am a pretty quick learner though and the possibilities are endless.

David is in bed with a headache, nothing I do disturbs him much though, but I will spend a quiet afternoon doing hand work. I am making more Grandmother's Flower Garden blocks to use up the hexagons I have basted and ready to go, as well as work on the mosiac one that I have planned. I am starting to think the English Paper Piecing projects are starting to wind down, when they are done I will go on to something else.

Day before yesterday I went to the dentist. It is a low income clinic, first come first serve. We got there at 7:30 am and got out about 11:00 am so that wasn't so bad. I had two teeth extracted, I had no idea my problem was two teeth, and it wasn't even the one I thought it was. Oh well. I go again on Tuesday because they think there are some more problems and I believe it.

More cheerful news though. It looks as if I have sold the kiln, potter's wheel and all the ceramics stuff. Since I had to do it I am just glad to get it done. I finished packing up the glazes this afternoon, David is going to do the ones I can't reach.

I did manage to finish the 2nd Tumblers bed runner before I got busy with other stuff. Yesterday I didn't feel like doing a lot. There was snow on the the ground this morning, just a light dusting, but enough to know that winter is set in. I don't think I will be able to get a picture of it's completion until tomorrow, everybody is busy.

It does have some of my very favorite fabrics in it so I am glad I am keeping it for myself. A lot of reds, I love red so that is no surprise. I love the little blue sailboat too. I have one more quilt basted so I'll start on that tomorrow; I am going to do sitd (stitch in the ditch) with my walking foot on that so it won't take too long to finish either. And now it's time to settle in with my afternoon's handwork and coffee, and be thankful for a warm house, a warm loving daughter ditto for son in law, and no toothache!

Abcessed tooth, the words give me terror, yet they are nothing new to me. I just hate it when it happens. We have no dental insurance, but there is a low income clinic. The only thing is I have to be there at 7:30 am and wait until they can see me. And if there are more than 10 people there and I am 11th I have to try again the next day. I am hoping when they see the pain I am in they will bump me up in the line. There is an upfront copay and we don't have the money, but they told David today they will bill us. Everybody bills us. Anyway last night was the second consecutive night of no sleep because of the pain so in I go in the morning.

Last night I finished the first turtle top. They are so cute and I love the way it turned out. It will be in the next batch I quilt.

I finished quilting and bound this during the morning. It is a Tumblers wall hanging that I am going to hang above the bed and use for a padded headboard. I have made two so I can take it down and hang the 2nd while I wash the first. With my dust allergies I can't leave anything in place too long.

This is the pieced back showing the hanging sleeve on the right. I don't know when we will get it hung, David is never in any too much of a hurry when it comes to "getting around" to something I need done and he is the one who will have to hang it, so we will see.

The second one is pinned and waiting to be quilted, I will start it tomorrow.

Meanwhile I'm going upstairs to look for some pain relievers!

Starring Pinwheels finally done.

 It was beginning to feel like I would never get it done. It didn't help that for nearly three weeks I couldn't work on it due to my sewing corner being out of commission and my machines put away.

I really like the back too, with the contrast of the color of threads I used to quilt. I don't often do very many that big and I am glad to say there isn't another one in the pipeline right now that is that big. That is number 25 for the year. I am not sure how many I tops I have waiting to be quilted right now, but I won't get them done next year. I don't need to worry about running out of UFOs next year either. I will have to slow down the pace I am starting to get burned out. I won't do any actual quilting until Monday now. We are having guests tomorrow and I'll have to be available to help with what ever is needed. I'll probably sneak a little sewing time in, but just some piecing, I still have some bobbins wound with black that I need to use up before I start quilting with white thread again.

I have my next hexagon quilt in mind and I have starting sewing on that down here in the afternoons as well as some crocheting. Maybe by the time I have that top done most of the ones I have ready to be quilted will be caught up again. Maybe not either. Go with the flow.

Sorry about the tv, that's the problem with such a small room, but I work around it. This is Hexagon Stars, the one I am working on down here on Ernestine. The problem is not how to square it up, it is that I somehow got it lopsided. I think I have the solution though and I will take it off the wall tonight and start to even out the lopsidedness. After that I will square out the corners. That won't be a problem although I will run out of the striped I am filling out the stars with. I can figure out something else to use.

This is a closeup of it, the colors are a little darker but I couldn't get it any better down her in the basement.

I finished quilting Starring Pinwheels this afternoon. I am really glad, I feel like I have been on it forever. Tomorrow morning I will bind it and get a picture. I didn't do anything besides quilt this morning and I put in a long day on it. Tomorrow I will also work some more on my paper piecing. I would have done more today. I woke up at 8:00 this morning and I knew if I got up the bathroom would be busy, so I decided to go back to sleep for fifteen minutes until I knew the bathroom would be empty. Never do that! It was 10:00 before I woke up and I didn't get as much done as I wanted. Tomorrow I will do better!

My second attempt at paper piecing went very well this morning and I am loving it! I can see that I am going to use more fabric than I anticipated though. There seems to be more waste doing it this way, but I am hooked. It took me well over an hour to piece these two strips; I know I will get faster, I am still feeling my way through the process. Learning this skill the possibilities are endless and the creative juices are flowing. If I am not careful I will have another tub full of UFOs.

My pretty girl was posing this morning. It's hard to get a picture with the light behind her that way, her silhouette is nice though. If we let her out she wouldn't like it, it's cold this morning. Winter is on the way, no snow in the forecast but this time of year we know it won't be long.

I wonder if I am alone in this: Whenever Ambrosina wants something David always has time and energy to do it. There are things that he has promised me he would do months, if not years, that I am still waiting on that he hasn't the time or energy for. Does a daughter always get precedence over a wife? I find it annoying in some ways although I myself would do almost any thing for her. I still think that he could get around to some of the things he has promised without me constantly reminding him. Oh well.

I am down to one row of blocks on Starring Pinwheels. The blocks are going faster now that I am actually spending the time on them. After that the borders. I want it done! I am thinking by the end of the week, but we will see. I am surprised on how tired doing all the little circles on the blocks is making my arms. Pushing through to do a  whole row of blocks makes them feel like they weigh a ton, the quilt is so big and heavy. It will be nice to do something smaller for a change.

I find I am getting negative, time to give myself a pep talk, after all the glass is half full, isn't it?

 I got this put together this morning. I still have a few things packed away that are waiting on the living room to get painted but the sewing corner is mostly all put away. The foot Brunehilde the Viking was packed but I got it out this morning and used her to finish this top.

 These are closer views of the blocks put together. It will have to wait until I get the ones I have basted now done. It seems like I have been on Starring Pinwheels forever, but that is just because I had to wait to get my sewing corner put back before I could work on it.

I tried my hand at paper piecing for the first time this morning also. I didn't quite get the hang of it, although I did do enough to figure out what I was doing wrong, and tomorrow I will give it another go. As usual I want to spend more time quilting the tops I already have done rather than make more tops that need to be quilted. The plan is still to get them caught up so I can make a quilt right through from start to finish. I wonder if that is dreaming the impossible dream?

I printed out some hexagon graph paper this morning and i am going to plan (yes, plan) the next hexagon top. I have something in mind and I want to see if I can do it. When I run out of ideas, if I run out of ideas, then I'll donate the rest of the prepared hexagons somewhere and go on to something else. I still have too many ideas that I want to try out. I am getting really fast at hexagon quilts though!

So now it's out with the colored pencils and see what I can come up with.

The first turtles quilt is coming along, picture as promised. I don't know exactly when I will finish it, I only work on it for about a half an hour a day. There are quite a few tops waiting their time to be quilted so I don't have to hurry. I stopped and counted the blocks and I made 650 of them. I didn't plan to make so many of them, they are addictive. I didn't know that I was making that many but I want to make them for the grandkids, I think there will be enough! The pieces dangling on the right are bird blocks that I am using between the turtle seams so I don't have to have long threads hanging everywhere. I am not planning on making 650 if of those though.

So that's about all today, I'm mostly just trying to catch up on my quilting to make up what I lost when the house was all a messed up. I still have a few things to get unpacked and I hope to do that on Monday.

The tatted doily finished. I didn't realize it would be this big. It didn't take all that long to make, I didn't work on it steadily, I had too many other things I was doing. Anyway it has satisfied my lace making desire for a while. I was planning the next hexagon quilt a the same time, and I decided on a design, sort of. I need to get some hexagon graph paper and draw it out with colored pencils.

I quilted on this during the morning. I had four bobbins wound with white thread and I didn't want to waste it so I put Starring Pinwheels aside for the morning and emptied those bobbins, then I could wind them with black and I wouldn't have to stop so often to rewind bobbins with black. I see more bobbins purchased next payday.

Starring Pinwheels is looking pretty good though. Each one of the stars takes a full bobbin of thread and a half an hour to quilt. There are 15 stars and they are 18 inches, so they are big. The white of the background and sashing strips is done, so I just have the pinwheel cornerstones, the pink stars and the border to do in black. It is time consuming since I am doing the stars in such small circles. I'll call them pearls, they are about that size!

I got a good start on putting the first turtle quilt together last night. I think it's going to be very cute and I will have a picture tomorrow or the next day, I think. Hexagon Stars is also getting near to completion. I'm not in any hurry for that one, I'm getting too many ahead of me to be quilted again. Losing all that time by having my sewing corner disrupted upstairs put me behind. Next year maybe I'll get the UFOs all completed. A person can always dream.

And I hear the boys are home, time to run up and see how their day went.

Starring Pinwheels is coming along pretty good. I forgot and wound all my bobbins in white, so that when I got to the black thread quilting I only had 3 empty bobbins. Each one of these big stars takes a full bobbin of thread. That is a lot of quilting! I like the way it is turning out. Each one of these circles is about the size or smaller of a dime which is needed going into the points. It takes a while though. I think I will pull one of the other basted quilts out of the trunk and empty the white bobbins on it so that I will have more bobbins to wind black onto. That way I won't have to stop so often to unthread and wind black bobbins.

It has turned off cold, I need to pull out my winter clothes and get ready to start bundling up. Sigh. Soon I will start to putting the heater on to take the chill off as I get ready to settle in to do my afternoon's handwork. Right now is about the time I start figuring out how many months it will be before it starts to warm up again. Not that it helps any. I know I can live through it, I've managed before. Every year in fact, just like everybody else! I do so love the summer though. At least this year I will have enough quilts to put on my bed!

I got my upstairs sewing corner back this morning. While there is still a lot of things to get unpacked 1st assistant Happy was pleased to get her quilt back. I got a little quilting done, but mostly just putting things away and getting myself reorganized. Tomorrow I will get a little more done, including cutting lattice for the turtles quilt. I am as Happy as Happy!

I am promised my sewing corner back tomorrow. I don't know how long it will take me to put everything back and put it all away, but at least I can get a good start.

Meanwhile down here I got quite a bit done.

Hexagon stars. Not done but getting there. These seams are all y seams so they take a little longer to get right.

All the turtle blocks are done. They still need pressing and I don't have a final count yet, I think it will reach about 150. Once I get the sewing area upstairs back I can cut out the lattice strips and cornerstones and start putting them together into tops.

I also finished all 6 of my "girl" blocks by hand. They were fun and fast with applique and embroidery, just don't look at the backs! They will be in a wall hanging so it won't matter that I have never been able to make my backs look as pretty as the front. I have the fabric to finish them already so I can cut it as soon as I get my sewing area upstairs back. I don't know when they will be quilted as tops are starting to pile up again since I haven't been able to quilt.

It has also turned out cold and we expect our first frost tonight. Ambrosina is going with the boys after school over to the garden and gather everything that is left. There will be more pickling and canning and freezing to come in the next week or so. David also opened the heater vents down here and cleaned out the lint trap of the small space heater so we are ready to go when it gets too cold. I will also spend more time upstairs to save heating costs.

I have started pinning Drunkard's Path bird blocks, which is the time consuming part of the pattern. I am not ready to sew them yet, but I will have the prepared when I am. I am hoping to use up the remaining solid color pieces I have cut out on the birds and then I can use prints for the fish that I have in mind since I will need a square the same color as the body of the fish. Sounds a little complicated, I need to sit down and draw the pattern I have in mind.

I am hoping that things will get back to normal soon, I am really missing Brunhilde my Viking sewing machine and have many winter projects planned. For now it's back to the hand work that I love so much!

Today was my monthly shopping day. A few things at Walmart. Then my favorite thrift store. And did I score big. Two bags of quilting fabrics!

This bag of lovely pink stripe combinations.

And this bag of shirting plaids, I know exactly what I am going to do with them but I have to wait  until I can sew upstairs again.

I also went to Joann's. Since Hancock and Mill Ends closed their prices are gone up. They know they are the only fabric store in town.

These blues for bird backgrounds cost 3 times as much as all the other fabrics combined. Thrift store availability is whatever someone donates, I can't often get what I need for a certain project unfortunately. I have to take what I can get and shop for particulars at Joann's. I like what I got at Joann's, I just wish it didn't cost so much; there weren't any sales there today either.

Well, the shopping is done for another month. There was an old Singer Touch and Sew machine at the thrift store but I didn't get it, it wasn't in very good shape and rusty. I liked the one I had many years ago, I used the decorative stitches a lot, but I don't need it for that I have Brunhilde the Viking for that now and space is always at a premium here.

My upstairs sewing corner is still unavailable, I know Ambrosina is working as fast as she can. The holes have to be taped and muded and painting touch up done and that takes time to dry between coats. It gives me a chance to work on patience, and heaven knows, I need that.

The first of the appliqued and embroidered girl blocks is done. I figured out last night how I want to set them when they are done. There are six in all and I love them! It's fun to do something simple and easy, makes a nice change. When they are done I will go back to the hexagons. The second is almost done so they won't take long to finish.

Now it's time to put my loot away and finish my coffee. There's work to be done!

The insulating is done, now comes the hard part--clean-up!

I couldn't get many pictures, just going up to the bathroom set off my asthma and got me wheezing. The furnace fan is going full blast to get the air filtered. Soon the plastic will come off and things will be going back into place. We will all be glad.

This was a major family effort. It was Malachi's job to turn the machine off when they needed to move the hose into the next hole to be filled and soon he was able to tell when the hole was filled without being told and turn off the machine, pretty good for a nine year old. It was Sammy's job to bring in the bags of insulation, a celulose fiber. The bags were big but not heavy and he took his job very seriously, no one had to wait, one was there waiting when needed. Phillip helped fill the hopper of the blower and made no complaints what so ever. Am I proud of those three boys? You bet!

I stayed down here and treadled at Ernestine. I also took the machine apart down here and did their major clean and oiling. I will be helping with as much clean up as possible; we are all anxious to have the house back to normal. Ambrosina is going to patch the holes room by room. She wants to repaint  this winter anyway, and I am sure it will be worth all the work to have the house warmer with fewer drafts. She is hoping she won't have to put plastic over the windows this winter because of it, but I don't know about that.

So, I am hoping my upstairs sewing area will be available early this week, I would like to finish the quilt I have on the table, but patience is important, the boys need their rooms put back to normal first and I will just have to be supportive, if I can do nothing else.

The cats were shut down here while the work was going on and they had a running battle all over the basement as a result. They knocked a lot of stuff over down here and I have to put that stuff away as well. I think I have too much junk! It is time to get busy!