spring sickies

I shouldn't have bragged that we had good luck avoiding sickness all winter long. Apparently we are getting walloped with the back log. Everything from Swimmer's Ear, upper respiratory infections, intestinal troubles, chest colds, migranes... it's been a bad couple of weeks/months.

That said, spring has arrived! At least while we are grumpy inside, the garden is coming back to life outside. And there are some fun smart phone camera apps to play with.

scraptastic

Today was a much better day. Bennett and I spent it making muffins, hanging with friends, a Dr checkup (all is well with the baby, PERFECT time for that reassurance), and a lovely asparagus frittata with a strawberries/cream/angel food cake chaser.

In all that fun goodness I forgot to take better photos of the works in progress that I blasted through yesterday, so I guess I'll just post the mediocre ones now.


The first is some of those scraps I have been compulsively trimming down for a while, paired with Kona Ash. I'm trying to decide what to do with it. I started it thinking I would use it to make one of Anna Maria Horner's patchwork sleep sack, but I'm not so sure now. Part of me wants to finish it as a quilt, sell it, then donate part or all of the proceeds (Red Cross for Japan relief came to mind, especially as 2/3 of the prints are Japanese). Grief work provides comfort, but the association looking back becomes a weight once the project is finished, when the "work" is through. Maybe I should donate it to Cherry House's project? Anyone got other ideas?


The next is Bennett's tool quilt, intended to be a quick and sturdy lap/toddler quilt for him to drag around his "workshop." The sashing is a bright blue Kona, the back will be pieced in the remnants of the fabrics as well as navy and the bright blue. I have some ideas for the quilting...

Next is to finish the Brown Bear quilt for the new baby, three quilts for three babes.
Not too bad for a day of sewing.

Burke

Four years ago today, Burke slipped into this world, but unexpectedly, had already slipped out again. We didn't know this at first. It took several days of seeing him in the NICU unit, attached to tubes and sensors (along with a battery of tests) to determine that he was gone. Unresponsive. Brain Dead.

The emotional din and crash today could only be managed by putting two pieces of fabric together and applying my foot to the sewing machine pedal.

I had Finding Nemo stuck in my head: just keep sewing, just keep sewing, just keep sewing...

I pulled out unfinished quilts today, thinking about the upcoming International Quilt Festival here in town this weekend and have decided to use this time to get a couple of these projects closer to completion. Grief, though not a good motivator for things like laundry or dusting, stirs in me the old need to DO, to CREATE, to try and make something you can touch, something useful to provide some comfort.

More soon, with photos...