Moving forward, standing still

I had a colourful birthday! On top of all those yummy hand dyes we made in my mother's studio, I took home a bunch of colourful gifts too. At left are the gifts from my family: Freddy and Gwen Collaborate Again and a pair of orange/salmon/pink Birkenstock sandals. (OK, I live with a bunch of guys, and I was unsubtle about what I wanted. I may have even picked out the sandals myself. But aren't they great!)

At right is an apron from my friend Cheryl, who pieced it from Laurel Burch scraps and brights passed along to her. (I think I contributed some of those strips at the bottom.) Very fun, and I'll feel well-dressed in the kitchen, and it coordinates with my sandals. I live in my Birks, and I think this is my fourth pair over 22 years.

Of course, quilters give each other quilty gifts, and my new quilt friend Heather found some word fabric for me. Fun, fun, fun. I may make some re-usable gift bags from the birthday fabric. The postcards at the right are from Laura, who found these on Etsy. I'm imagining that the quilter who owns this bike stopped at just one more quilt shop on the way home to add to the tower of fabrics on her bike, or maybe she dashed into a coffee shop on her way home from a guild exchange, or she's buying some chocolate to share before heading off on her annual quilt retreat.

These are great gifts and I'm going to enjoy playing with them.

These days I'm excelling at procrastination, but only at certain stages of the quilting process. I'm fairly quick to throw new fabric in the washer and get it into the stash, and I might even cut into it within days of getting it home.And I can design and piece tops quickly. If I'm hand quilting, I'll even layer, baste and pin it, and then get to stitching and binding. But if I have to mail it? Nope, can't do it. These four little quilts for the AAQI have been done for months, but somehow I haven't found time to photograph, register, and mail them. (shame, shame.) Got a mental block on that one.
As I have with that stack of flimsies on below. I think it's six! or maybe seven. Two of them date back to last summer and just need tying. I'm not sure how to proceed with the other. Some are baby quilts for the local kids hospital, others are just because, and at least one is for me.

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