I am sadly and just ridiculously behind with the one quilt project.  You think, “it’s one square a month, I can handle that.”  And then it becomes another thing to actively blow off while making other things or trying not to think about while camped in front of the tv. I am very good at procrastinating, but crap at coming up with excuses. Of course once you start you realize: 1. it’s not that hard and 2. it doesn’t take that much time at all and finally 3. why did I blow this off in the first place, I like it.  The pale yellow that Beth sent for October’s block did actually throw me off; it’s just not a color I ever choose. I tried bright purples and oranges with it, but it looked too football, too Minnesota Vikings for my taste.  So I went with blue and gray, which is what I always do and damn if pale yellow doesn’t just look good to me now. I used this for inspiration because it is just so awesome. And even though mine is not as awesome I’m pretty okay with how it turned out.

I knocked out a square for Leah as well, but this one was much less go with the flow and more rip and swear real loud. I saw this pattern on the internets, neglected to read the instructions, and had a hell of a time making everything at least almost match. I need a lot more practice when it comes to quilting and I hope Leah can forgive me, this is as good as it gets right now.  I think the picture makes it look a little worse than it is (or maybe it looks better in my head). The concept is good (though not mine) but triangles are hard.

Dorie from tumbling blocks asked me if I’d like to help her start a quilt block swap much like the virtual quilting bee and common thread, where 11 people make a quilt block for one person each month.  Of course I said yes and many months later we actually got the thing up and running. Dorie had the first month and picked some pretty fantastic fabrics. I had the idea to do some sort of fussy cut looking at the tree print and came up with what I thought was a pretty simple design. It took much longer than it should have. Nothing big went wrong, but every single little thing did (bobbin threaded wrong, a batch of strips cut too short, out of white thread mid block, and on and on).  So finally it’s done and in the mail a day late, oh well. I don’t really have much quilting experience (here is my one and only quilt) and piecing is harder than it looks–at least for me.  This swap should get my piecing skills up to snuff. It’s my turn next (well this) month to pick the colors and eveeeeeentually make the quilt.  It’s for our bedroom because I spilled bleach all over the quilt we normally use in the summertime (it was just a store bought one, but still. damn). I only have one color in mind so far: gray. I need to get crackin.  You can check out everyone’s block at our flickr page if you like and see all the lovely ladies who are involved.

I just realized I never posted a picture of my finished mobile I made for the swap.  My partner was very patient while I got it done. From top to bottom it goes: big house, cabin, barn, ice house. I explained how I made it here and there are more pictures here and here. I’ve received some lovely comments about it on flickr and a couple requests to sell them, but I’m not sure about that. I couldn’t find my X-acto knife when I was making these, so I used a box cutter–a sharp one, but a box cutter nonetheless–so it took longer than it should have. If I get an itch to make something with paper again, maybe I’ll put one or two up for sale.

A couple of you are concerned because you never received a mobile from the swap and I’m sorry for that. It could have gotten lost in the mail like mine, or maybe your partner’s life just got in the way. I try to think of these swaps as an impetus to make something different and try not to focus too much on what you might get. I’m going to host another mobile swap next year, so hopefully it will go better (I was a little lax when it came to managing it this year–I didn’t think it would be so much work!).