"All Patchwork", even when I'm not sewing.

Yes, I cannot wait to get back to quilt-making.

What has intervened? Let me provide a visual metaphor.

Let this ratty ironing board cover stand in for the kindle wars, marked by scorched-earth kik messenger battles, staying-up-all-night ambushes, and explicit-music-download skirmishes. I have had random command support functions (e.g., driving B. back and forth to school when she was kicked off the bus for a week). I was also self-recruited to a nonviolent body-piercing resistance movement and the snow day Special Forces team. Yes, foster parenting in the dead of winter has been quite the riot.

There is some progress. The Roxy quilt got finished up by my friendly long-armer, and delivered to a very appreciative recipient, who (great news!) has started courses at the community college and feels that things are finally looking up (if she could only get that homeless family out of her small apartment, where they're "doubling up"):

Look at that rich, ruby-red, wide-wale corduroy backing! Thank you, Zenia Rene, for encouraging me in that bolder choice.

I also had an apron order to fill for Wheatsfield Co-op in Ames. I've been making double-sided aprons with a "locally stitched" label for at least two years, maybe three. This has been the source of my scrap bounty. I've adapted two different patterns, the Chef Style and the Domestic Diva style, to fit one yard of fabric on each side (for ease of fabric purchasing). I usually get 2-3 square feet of scraps from each apron, although the shapes are curved and wonky.

 

(In case you sewists out there are wondering, yes, you are welcome to steal my business plan, which is: buy fabric for aprons, earn back cost of fabric by selling aprons, get 2-3 free square feet of scraps!)

 

Up next, I am excited to begin FMQ-ing the BF quilt. No, not for the boy friend. He fell by the wayside a long time ago. But the best friend has remained a stalwart presence and a "B. buffer" for me. I am so grateful to her. To remind you, here's the "snowball" top I made, plus a fun backing I bought -- yes, BOUGHT -- for the project (she deserved it).

 

 

As my friend Roxy likes to say, "Peace Out!"

“We are all patchwork. And so shapeless and diverse in composition that each bit, each moment plays its own game. And there is as much difference between us and ourselves as between us and others.”

— Michel de Montaigne