The Fun Part Begins

Any quilt I make that is bigger than my sewing table I have to put together on the tile floor in the front hall. I tape down the backing fabric to keep it from shifting before I add the batting and the quilt top and start pinning. It took two hours, as I'm pretty slow with safety pins, and I jabbed myself a bunch of times. Happily I didn't bleed anywhere on the quilt.

I was super happy this time to find I had a large section of batting leftover from another project that fit this quilt with room to spare, so I didn't have to open my very last bag of new batting.

I considered using just a vivid blue cotton thread for the hand quilting, but that will blend in the dark patches and stand out too much with the light patches, so I'm going to use threads that match (or are close to) each color in the patchwork. I don't have any thread in the charcoal or the orange shades, so I'll make a trip to JoAnn tomorrow for that.

This is how using different shades of quilting thread looks.

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Stuff

After finding this Caron one pound skein of lovely peach yarn in my thrifted lot I raided my stash for two cakes of Mandala in Pegasus, which matches it perfectly. For practice and hand therapy I'm going to make another Worth Street Afghan with this free pattern , but this time I'll use the yarn that was recommended for it plus the one pound skein. I'm not quite ready to do the vintage/recycled linen quilt I had planned (still a bit too nervous about the idea), so I'm going to use some color therapy and make a quilt from these thrifted green fat quarters. I considered doing another Yellow Brick road patchwork pattern, but I might go with a split rail fence like this one.

Journal Find

This is a page from my 2010 poetry journal. My handwriting isn't the best, so I'll transcribe it: If my heart survives to tell all the secrets kept inside it will be an abalone shell in which the beauty did reside. But I think I will always be lost to the tides that rage in me . . . humbling and polishing . . . I don't write many self-portrait poems, but this one isn't too embarrassing. A bit overly dramatic, but the girl I was eleven years ago went through some tough times. I'm in a much more peaceful place today.

The Numbers

Back in March my diabetes doctor changed my medication and encouraged me to alter my diet and exercise more in order to bring down my A1C, which at the time tested out at a dismal 8.3 (normal is 5.8.) So for the next two months I dealt with the increased meds, stuck to my decidedly grim diet and added a lot more walking to my exercise regime. P.S., it's never fun to be a diabetic, but over the last couple of months I've really tried to keep a good attitude about it. Attitude isn't everything, but it helps a lot when you have to make significant changes while battling a disease like this. Yesterday I performed a home A1C test, and I'm currently at 6.5. That's pretty amazing results, even for me. If I can get it down another half point before I see the doctor in July I'd be over the moon, but I feel like I've already done great. Image credit: Image by Daniele Liberatori from Pixabay

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