Happy 40th!

Wow, I wish I was 40 again. No, my eldest turned 40 at 1:06 this morning. We just got off the phone with him and he seems to be handling it okay. Earlier this week when we talked he was having a hard time with it. I did the same thing so I can relate.

Yesterday was a productive day in the studio. I needed to do some spring cleaning out there and straighten out some things in the retreat tote to prepare for that in a few weeks; along with my daily stuff. 

I did the strip first off on DW and then while talking to our kiddo in Germany, stuffed and made the pincushions for the retreat caddies.

These look simple enough, don't they? Even with Jim helping me it took us until lunch to get them all done. And I had already made the inside shell and the outer cover as well as having had everything cut out and pinked. 

Once we finished lunch and he retired into his basketball-filled man cave I headed back in to clean and get organized. 

I have a couple of [secret] projects I'm going to be working on at retreat and had those set aside to go into the tote. When I pulled the lid off the tote I found something I've been kind of ignoring since January.

I worked on this at the Creative Escapes retreat and I knew the border I started attaching there was pretty messed up. Which is why I was avoiding dealing with it. And, this top is huge; muscling it around the pressing table wasn't really on my fun-things-to-do list. 

Amish With A Twist II

But, while the Spartans gained another win at March Madness, I was able to correct the messed up border, attach the other two pieced borders and get the last set of borders attached as well. The flange is made but won't be attached until after it's quilted.  

I didn't come out of the studio until nearly 8:00 working on this and Jims game started at 2:30 or thereabouts. The studio is clean and organized and I've got way more than enough stuff to keep me busy at the retreat. 

No studio time today. It's going to be a rest day because the remainder of Dianes tops need to be done before retreat and I have another customer coming to the retreat that needs her top finished as well so I see long hours in the upcoming week.