Nothing Much

It's Wednesday already, and I haven't told you how my weekend went. I'm sorry for all of you who were holding your breath waiting for the update. You can breathe now. :)

My weekend went well, thank you for asking. We had another laundry weekend, but this time I spent time in CollegeTown doing college things. The professors talked about the economy - and I have come to the conclusion that the reason I don't understand isn't that I am stupid, it is that I don't trust people who just give me the big picture. I want to see the whole picture. They said $700 billion is just the beginning. Not what I wanted to hear, but that I can believe. Also watched some musical performances. My daughter even asked me what I thought of them. Imagine that - her talking to me, instead of me asking her a million questions to get a semblance of a conversation. It was wonderful.

The wonderfulness even overrode the migraine I developed and had much of the weekend.

Since then I have been looking at that to-do list. Since it might rain, I can't put weed killer on the weeds, and can't paint the garage door. There are things I can do - like wax the kitchen floor, but I was thinking I should do outside things while the weather was nice. I have done things, that are not on the list, but needed doing anyway. I do write it on the list so I can cross it off, but the list doesn't seem to be getting any shorter!

I have finished making all the stars. I just have to put them together into a top now. Kim has written a tutorial for a jack-o-lantern quilt that is so adorable. Right now I am thinking that I could quickly throw one of those together after the SITP is a top, since it is going to take a while to manually quilt it.

Shared Fabric

When I gave my daughter a quilt, I was showing her some fabric I had used in other quilts. She said she wouldn't remember, and really, she didn't care. I do, so I thought I would document the fabric I used in the stars. There was even some scrap fabric that I don't remember where I used originally, so I figure I'd better do it while I still remember the rest. You probably don't care either, but at least you get to see a mini quilt show of my quilts.



You are going to have to trust me about the shared fabric with this quilt, since this photograph doesn't show the shared fabric. The story maze quilt also has shared fabric with many of my other quilts.

I called the fabric green in this summer swap quilt, but I am calling it blue in the SITP.

I don't think I used the blue fabric in the SITP, but at least one of the background whites is shared. And no, I'm not going to take the time to see which one.

The crossed kayaks quilt also shares a white with Lilebeth's Garden, and probably with the SITP as well. It also shares a couple of the blues. I didn't have a lot of extra fabric in this quilt, and I used some in the denim circles quilt, and want to save the rest for the border.

This denim circle quilt also has a lot of fabric from many of my other quilts. This photograph shows some great matches. The white with blue flowers in the top left is from my Storm at Sea, and I have that fabric in the SITP as well. The second one, the flower bud, is from a dress my daughter and I were going to make, and I have that fabric in the SITP. The brighter blue underneath that one is in the Arkansas Snowflake, and either it, or another fabric from that quilt is also in the SITP. To the right of that - the solid blue, and the plaid one on top of it, are both from a simple quilt I made for my niece. Fabric from that quilt is in the SITP as well.

Here's the storm at sea. The white background fabric with tiny blue leaves is shared.

This is the Arkansas Snowflake. The snowflake print is shared.

Another blue quilt I made at about the same time. I gave this one away. I'm just showing it to you since I am showing the blue quilts, but maybe it is the source of the mystery fabric.







The dark blue fabric in the Evening Stars quilt is in the SITP.

I didn't think I had a lot of leftovers from this Kanji Wishes quilt, but I was excited to find a strip of blue batik and mottled fabric to add to the SITP.

Here's another one of my blue quilts. Most of the blocks are swapped blocks but I did add a few. Maybe the mystery fabric is from this quilt.

Here's another quilt that isn't blue but shares the white background fabric with the SITP.

Power

I've been watching TV while I have been ripping seams, and am trying to keep up with news and happenings. It constantly amazes me. You know the news - financial crisis, Hurricane Ike destroys things in Texas, election campaigning, etc. You know what our headlines are?

It is about electricity coming back to the city. Every station, every headline. All week. Yes, it is important stuff, but the electric company has been working all week getting power back. Right now 99% of the city has power, so they interview the 1% of people who don't have it. They have long extension cords from their neighbors across the street. I'm not saying it isn't inconvenient or important and shouldn't be in the news. They do need to keep the electric company accountable. I'm saying it doesn't have to be the leading story, every day. They spend five minutes on that. Then another five minutes to tell you the rest of the news. Then the rest of the time they talk about sports and weather. Yesterday, they finally talked about people returning to Texas to see their entire houses devastated.

Meggie was talking about watching John McCain on The View. Meggie is way over in Australia. The only reason I know Australia exists is because I saw it on a map, and some fellow bloggers say they live there. Oh and I watched a couple of Nature shows about parrots and crocodiles in Australia this week. I have no idea about their politics. I'm not saying I want to, but I just think that if we keep talking about the same thing every week, it keeps us from finding out about the other people who live in the world with us.

Happy Autumn and Quiltathon Results

My calendar says Autumn begins today. Happy Autumn. Since I haven't finished everything I wanted to do for spring and summer, I have my work cut out for me. I've made a list, and hopefully today I can get more productive. If I can get off the computer, that is.

I have been quilting this weekend, because Judy said we had to. It's Quiltathon time. What did I do? I cut up lots of fabric and sewed them together, of course. Isn't that what quilters do? I went through my scrap basket and cut up some squares from quilts I have made before. I found all sorts of lovely blue fabric - from the kaleidoscope quilt, my niece's quilt, the Evening Stars, the story maze quilt, the Japanese quilt, the denim circles quilt.

I've made a lot of cutting mistakes on this quilt, so I trimmed one eighth inch off of all my squares. Fun times. I have enough fabric to cut all new squares (for several quilts), but then I would have to figure out what to do with this size square, and I would rather try to reduce scraps. And to think, there was a time when I was envious of scraps and wanted to make some.


I am glad I didn't tell you last week that I had finished with the outside star points. I was almost done with all of my little flying geese when I realized that I had added dark squares to the sides of the big flying geese when I needed light squares. It wasn't that much of a problem to rip them out, since it was something I could do while I was watching tv, and I need that size square for another part of the quilt, so it isn't wasting much.

Two steps forward, one step back. I'm not sure why I am making so many mistakes in this quilt. I think it all leads to not paying attention to the directions as much as I usually do. I've been spoiled by step by step directions. Even though I understand the directions in this quilt, everything leads to the picture and I think I know what it looks like, and don't bother to look at it as often as I should.

Eventually this quilt will get finished, and hopefully I will have discovered all the errors I want to correct before it is all finished.

Lost and Found

I thought I'd cover up my last dreary post with some good news.

Remember that quote from Pirates of the Caribbean?

lt's an island
that cannot be found ,
except by those
who already know where it is.

Well, I have one of those places in my house, where I put Important Papers. This is a separate place from ordinary newspapers, offers, papers, bills. These would be bills that need paying right away, big coupons that need to be used right away. It is a very special place so that those Important Papers get acted upon right away. I know where it is - I can locate it right away when I am putting these Important Papers aside temporarily. The problem is, I don't know where it is when I need those Important Papers.

Recently, I have been looking for an absentee ballot. And the $40 coupons for the DTV converter boxes. Very Important Papers that were nowhere to be found. The sad thing is that both of these things are distinctive - the ballot is in a blue envelope and the DTV coupons are like credit cards and are bright red. They should be easy to find, if I hadn't put them in that Important Papers place.

I finally gave up on the absentee ballot, and found the form online, so that part is done. After frantically searching for two months for those DTV coupons, (you have to use them within 90 days of requesting them), I finally thought to ask my sister. Apparently I had taken them with me one day when I went out shopping with her and I left them in her car. Phew!

I went to Walmart because I am a cheapskate and proud of it. You'll be happy to know that I am now ready for the digital age. Of course, I wound up buying extra stuff I didn't need, but really wanted as well.

Financial News

When I wrote about the effects we saw from Hurricane Ike, I figure that all of my readers know that what we had was nothing compared to the real hurricane effects people felt in Texas. We didn't have to board up anything or evacuate, etc.

I was thinking, though, that someday, I might want to print out this blog, maybe even print it out in book form, and if my future family sees it, they might remember the context, or may not understand that Hurricane Ike didn't really come here.

I figure I would throw in a quick post about the current news situation. I should probably put something in here from time to time, instead of one big post.

The historic presidential campaign is going on. John McCain and Sarah Palin are running on the Republican ticket, while Barack Obama and Joe Biden are running on the Democratic ticket.

American soldiers are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. Whenever another country is mentioned on the news - Russia, Pakistan, etc., it makes me worry that soldiers will be sent there as well.

Many companies are downsizing or going bankrupt. Even big ones.

Many homes are in foreclosure, mostly due to variable rate mortgages and lax due diligence on the part of banks and mortgage companies. Many homeowners decided that when the price of their home dropped and they couldn't refinance their loan, that it was better to walk away instead of carry the debt, leaving their credit rating in ruins. This left many banks and the entire mortgage industry in crisis.

Insurance companies are having problems on two fronts - first they have had losses due to Hurricane Katrina and Hurricane Ike. They are also having trouble with the investments they bought.

The US government decided to help Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (quasi-government agencies that buy mortgages). This week they decided to help AIG (insurance company), and will print more money in order to do so.

There are many middle class people who have stayed away from the bad mortgage loans, and have been trying to save money for their childrens' college education and their own retirements. Stock brokers and financial "experts" have been touting a 10% historical return in stocks, and have encouraged people to buy and stay in the stock market. The stock market is tumbling. And as more and more people get more and more worried, they will sell more of their stock and the tumble will continue. This is about the time when the baby boomers are coming into retirement age and will need to withdraw the money they have been saving up. A stock market downturn was expected, but not this much, and this early.

The US government is working on a bigger plan to help even more. This quote from today's news feeds straight into my fears.

The chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, Chris Dodd, D-Conn., warned on Friday that the United States could be "days away from a complete meltdown of our financial system" and said Congress would work quickly to prevent that.

I have worked in the financial services industry. I wish I could think through all these things and figure out what will be next, but it is too complicated for me. I get asked what people should do with their stocks, and I don't know what to tell them. I know that the stocks will continue to go down, and eventually they will go back up again. But when and by how much, I don't know. I also don't know how much of what I know is the sales pitch I have bought into, and I don't know whether the middle class will trust the stock market after this. And I don't know how the government intervention will factor into all this.

Hurricane Ike

Since G'Owens On Round Here took the time to show you storm pictures, I thought I would do the same for my city. The storm damage has been pretty much cleaned up around here, and the city has been busy picking up all the tree debris. I did manage to get a couple of minor pictures for you today. There were whole uprooted trees, some fell on power lines, etc. These are tiny branches in comparison. We are asked to bundle things up. There were a lot of places still without electricity, and many school districts (not just particular schools) have cancelled classes even for today. Many of them announced very early - yesterday afternoon - that they were closed today, so apparently it has to do with more than just whether the electricity is back on. The only thing I can think of is the planning of the lunches. Maybe they wait to make sure the school can open before ordering lunches. I remember last year they took "snow days" for something other than snow, and they are doing it again so early in the year. It is such a beautiful day out today.


I am out of milk and I am afraid to go to the store to get some. I've been to a local grocery store when the power went out and I know for a fact that they do not have generators to keep their food cold. I would think that all grocery stores in areas where there are lots of trees would have generators as a rule, but apparently they do not. Many grocery stores were closed during the storm. Now I'm sure I will be able to buy milk and other perishables, but I wonder how long it had been sitting in an uncold environment.

I was passing time at the library yesterday before class started (because my classes aren't cancelled), and was browsing the new book section in the childrens' room. A lady was standing beside me looking at the section as well. She turned and started talking to me. It was my sister! When I am at the library, I am looking at books, not at people. I certainly hope that people who know me don't think I am deliberately ignoring them. I tend to do this a lot - not really looking at people - which in a way is a good thing, because people don't want to be stared at or looked at as they too are looking for books and videos, but on the other hand, if I do know them, they are going to feel slighted.