Yaaaaaaaaaaay!

I finished the quilting on the Spools quilt yesterday. I also trimmed the edges (removed the excess backing and batting), cut the binding (I use the technique in Quilter's Complete Guide. It's tedious but it makes a long continuous strip of bias binding). I started sewing the binding on but didn't get very far.

I started this quilt, I think it was in January 1997, when a bad snowstorm closed things down for a few days. I started piecing it then, using scraps of muslin I had and reprints of Depression-era prints (I'm very much a traditionalist when it comes to quiltmaking). I finished piecing it early in 1999, before I knew I was moving down here. I remember marking and basting it on the kitchen floor in my mother's house.

I started quilting on it in fall 1999. It's taken me until now to finish it. Partly because I quilted it in a grid (never again; it takes too long) and partly because I have so many other things I like to work on.

I used to quilt almost exclusively. I made a lot of miniature/wallhanging size quilt tops that I've never quilted and have tucked away somewhere. Around spring 1997 I got interested in knitting. I still quilt, but not as much as I once did.

I do have another top all marked, ready to be basted. (ugh, another part of quilting I don't like. And the Spools quilt shows it - I didn't baste as well as I should have and there are a few puckered places).

After dinner, I decided I didn't have the energy to wrestle the quilt any more to get the rest of the binding on. So I finished reading "The Problem of Pain" and finished the heel on the first Rio sock.

then I turned the heel. I used a "French heel" with these.

I'm getting better at knitting and reading at the same time. I'm going to start "saving" reading-related chores for the evening when I can sit home and knit, and do more active stuff like grading during the days.