Thank heaven for little people...

Even though I keep saying "No more baby quilts", they are my great saving and keep me going through periods of thin inspiration and scarce time.

Every baby needs a quilt... they're my favourite way to celebrate others going where I dare not follow. A baby quilt is an opportunity to make something smallish, light-hearted, useful and still original.

So... here's my latest, for Ryan. His dad is an astronomy buff.

It even has back art! fuzzy flannel, so it won't slip off the cot

Fidelity issues

Dear quilts, I have been unfaithful. And not just once.

Confession is good for the soul so here is just how bad it is: A weekly rehearsal date with choir, monthly Crafternoon (beads!), monthly Albany Beauties, nightly music practice (well, sometimes), occasional baking and other cooking, sometime housework... and going to work 5 days a week. Sometimes I even go to a play or gallery opening.

This is not a small fidelity issue. It's a great big glaring discrepancy between what I think I love best and what I actually do with my time.

All of these other things are either enjoyable or necessary - some are even both. But they all take time, and attention away from the BEST thing.

So I'm going home right now to line up a bit of quilt stuff for the weekend. Maybe I'll even cut or stitch something

back into the Zone.. maybe

nothing much happened after the velvet skirt... except I wore it very happily.

I've missed several "sewing dates" and felt generally uninspired, until I picked up a little pack of reverse-applique elements for the Absence/Fertility work I designed at Symposium. Just the easy re-start I needed. They're done, and I'm ready to make 6 more, and then assemble the whole work.

Also basted the Whirling Squares quilt and will begin to quilt it this weekend.

And, most exciting of all, I've started the "Pharmaceutical Comforters" using felt and pill cards. That concept has been a long time in the baking.

It's all about giving it time, and not giving up on it :-)

What to do when you're burned out...

...Chill out! Don't push it - there's no hurry. We're doing this because we want to, remember? It's not a Production Environment where some pre-specified level of performance is mandatory.

And when it's been long enough, back-to-basics is a great plan: stroke some fabric, do a little mending, go look at art. Give yourself some easy points on the board.

Today I'm making a bias-cut skirt out of silk velvet. This fabric has been waiting patiently in the stash for maybe 5 years. It's my simplest and perhaps most successful pattern, enhanced this time with an invisible zip in the side seam. Love those things! It's going great, and I know that tomorrow, as well as having a great addition to my winter wardrobe, I'm going to be back in the Zone, and ready to make something more original.