and sew it begins

Just getting going on Jan's quilt, this is her own design and an exercise in colorplay. It took me awhile to get it all loaded up on the frame, mostly because I realized that I needed white batting instead of my usual natural unbleached shade. So I had to track that down, of course, it was right there at Bear Patch but I had a few days off from the store so I don't drive the 55 miles to go there unnecessarily without a bigger reason than to pick up one package of batting. And finally I have it all together and a chance to start stitching this morning. Threads are all picked out and lined up--

I am putting complementary colors on each color block, so there is a bit of color juggling going on. I actually got to use my color wheel for this, to make sure I had it right. So the colors are paired up--

red and green

blue and orange

purple and yellow

All of the white outside area will be stitched in white. I have done one of the red areas with green thread--

Without the benefit of natural lighting this is as good as the photo gets! My longarm is in the basement without windows, which doesn't really bother me unless I want a better photo! Funny, though, that I just realized how much I love my upstairs sewing room because of the great windows and views, but I also love going down to the basement for the other part of my quilting. Must be a split personality!

Prior to quilting this red block I had started with the orange thread on the blue block, and really liked that color combo. But I encountered technical difficulties so it had to be ripped out. It is a brand of thread that I have not used before, and I just couldn't get the tension adjustments balanced and the stitches were nasty. I will be changing to another thread, I think.

Lots of talk around here about how cold it is again, no big surprise, it is winter, after all! I luckily don't have a job that requires me to be outdoors a lot, and on a day like today I am very lucky to be working at home, fire burning, machine humming, sun shining, it's 10:00 in the morning and already warmed up to 4 degrees (that's above zero!). And day after tomorrow I will be flying off to Phoenix for a vacation, yahoo!! So no complaints from here.

The key to successful aging is to pay as little attention to it as possible. --Judith Regan