Unexpected Visitors

I was quilting along yesterday thinking I'd have Maggies first quilt done at the end of the day and at just about public studio closing time an SUV pulled up into the drive. This happens occasionally where retreaters from down the road come and visit the studio thinking I'm a quilt shop. Because it was 4:00 the sun was shining in my eyes as I greeted them asking, "What can I do for you ladies today?". 

It was Jims aunt and his cousin from another aunt and I recognized the aunts voice immediately. What a pleasant surprise to have them come by for a visit.

They stayed until about 6:00-ish and by then I was past working on customer quilts and moved over to Foster. I have all the black done and only have the bottom half of the colored areas to do.

Here's Maggie's first quilt...

I love these subtle colors

The thread I'm using in this is So Fine! 50 and talk about hard to see. I know there are areas I have overstitched some of the motif I'm putting into the center section, but as long as I do it more than once, then it's a design choice, right?

While the furnace ran a couple of times yesterday I worked on my acrylic sleeve for the SewEZ table and finally finished this...

A sleeve for Jay/Ellies acrylic

You're wondering why I can't long arm when the furnace is running. We knew this would be an issue when we built the studio, and honestly, once the room gets up to temp, it only runs about five minutes at a stretch. The blower for the hot air is at the bottom of the unit (if you look close you can see it behind Maggies quilt) and I don't want my machine or the customer quilt to be exposed to direct heat. I get it up out of the way when I hear the furnace "click" telling me it's going to fire in a minute or so. 

And, I don't want me to be in front of it because I'll get all warm and toasty and think the rest of the room is too cold. 

I'll be finishing Maggies quilt today, frame ironing the next back, and hopefully finish the quilt on Foster so he and DW can head down to Lansing for their PM's and timing issues. We finally received some rain today (we were very dry which, for autumn is odd) and are expecting more later this morning. Happy Friday!