Modern HST Sampler QAL

Alyce of Blossom Heart Quilts is planning a Modern Half-Square Triangle Sampler quilt along. It's somewhat a mystery quilt because we don't know the blocks beforehand. I think it'll be fun to use my stash of fat quarters and play along. I was looking through and seeing what colors I have. The only thing I decided on was the background. I have always wanted to use black/white low volume for a background. I thought this would be the perfect time to use it. So I have 10 fat quarters of text and other black/white/grey fabrics that I'll use as my background. Even the sashing I'll mix some low volumes together. So I know that I want near solids for the HST. I was thinking something along the lines of a warm color palette. But I have not pulled anything yet.

JOSH!!!!!

I'M GOING TO SEE JOSH GROBAN IN AUGUST!!!!! I'M SO EXCITED! CAN'T YOU TELL!

I haven't gone to a Josh Groban concert since 2013. I'm really excited to go see him in concert again. I bought tickets this morning and I snagged amazing seats! I'm going with three other people and we're sitting in the center section a few rows from the stage. It's going to be so much fun! Josh is performing at USANA Amphitheater on August 20, 2016.

Salt Lake Comic Con 2015

This past weekend was Salt Lake Comic Con. For the most part I had fun.

My friend, Kim, and I stayed downtown at the Little America hotel. It was a room. They need to sound proof their street side rooms more. We both woke up during the nights we were there.

I spent way too much money but it was worth it.

I bought all nine of RaShelle Workman's Blood and Snow series. She was so happy. She signed all nine.

I bought my first comic book. I like the tv show so I bought a Green Arrow book.

He is so buff.

I waited in line and had Felicia Day sign my copy of her book. She is so pretty and kind.

I bought Dean and Cas.

Now Sam has his friends.

I got an Impala "Baby" poster. This was my favorite.

I got an Impala "Baby" poster. This one is good too.

I bought a Jared Padalecki photo. This shot is one of my favorite ones.

See. Pretty. Yes. I paid to get a photo with Felicia Day. I asked her for a hug. It was so much fun meeting her.

This was not planned but Kim and I both got autographs from James and Oliver Phelps. They are so gorgeous in person.

I got these tiny, cute glass blown dragon earrings from Cute Glass.

BOM updates

Lots of pictures in this post.

First off, let's take a look at the ward block of the month. This is the black and white with yellow quilt. The blocks are about 18".

Second, the few blocks I have for the Fabric Center block of the month. I'm calling this quilt Butterfly Jewel. The first block is the center block. It's about 40". The rest of the blocks are 15".

What do you want from me?

Mental Breakdowns suck

I was doing fine. I was getting to work on time. I was trying to go to bed on time so I could get a full 8 hours of sleep. Yes, my room has been getting a little messy. But that is not new. Moving from an apartment back to one room is too small.

And then yesterday I woke up and immediately knew I should not go to work. So I called in sick. And was admonished by my supervisor. We need all hands on deck at this time of year and blah blah blah. Well, yeah. But guess what? I don't do squat while I'm there. You won't miss me for one day. And then Mom came into my room, because she saw my car outside, and lectured me about not going to work. Because I need the money if I ever want to move out again. Yeah. You don't think I know that!? Why do you think I'm having a mental breakdown.

(Apparently, I'm not back to full chipperness because this still pisses me off. Although I'm not randomly crying so that's good.)

Anyways, I slept until around 1pm. And then didn't want to be at home, even though I have a lot to do at home. I went to the library around 2:30pm and was there until about 6:30pm trying to study my finance homework. After a few hours I just gave up and played games on my laptop. I went and got dinner and then went home. At home I folded some clean laundry and did a load of sheets and blankets. During this time I was randomly crying. It was so annoying. I don't why I was crying I just was. I went to bed around 9pm after I had switched my sheets over to the dryer.

So yeah, my anxiety got the better of me yesterday.

More Words

Hi. I actually want to blog more consistently. Because it's sad that I only have 10 blog posts in 2015. So here is for the start of round two...

Okay, so here's the deal.

Lately I haven't wanted to do much. I'm overwhelmed by the littlest things. Work is a struggle to get through most days. When I finally get home I just want to curl up on the couch with a good book or sew and do nothing. But I have to help make dinner, do the dishes, spend time with the family, and sleep. I have no time in the evenings to do what relaxes me. No time to do what I want. At least that's how I feel most days. Last month, I think, maybe two, I had a major mental breakdown at work. I went home around noon. And a few days later I was at work and it still wasn't right. So I told my manager that I was basically handing in my notice. I'm staying on until I find a different job or they find a replacement. I work 45 minutes from my house, one way. So that is 90+ minutes out of my day that I am sitting on a train or in my car. I can't do much on the train. Yes, I can read a book. I have even tried doing homework while on the train. That doesn't work to well. I take naps sometimes. But for the most part I feel like my commute is taking up too much time out of my day. I can't do laundry, clean my room, sew, run errands. If I'm being completely honest the commute isn't the only thing that made me quit my job. It's a good job. A career job if I let it. I work full-time in accounts payable at a university. I've been here for seven months, now, after working six years in a part-time cashier position at the university's athletics office. I felt like I was more appreciated at the ticket office. I got things done for my managers when they needed help. I liked talking with the customers most days. Although football season ticket time was kind of crazy sometimes. I did work part time so I was only allowed to work 20-hours per week. I took Mondays off. I worked for under $9/hour. I was happy when I got this $15/hour full-time benefited position. But I can't handle the politics of the office. I can't handle the 40-hours a week. I can't handle the commute every single day. At first I did really like it. I was inputting data and writing purchase orders. And then the semester ended and my job pretty much went into hibernating mode. Not much need for me to pay stuff because nobody is on campus. So I tried helping with the end of year budget, which is in July. And I help with the cash drawers every morning. That's pretty much it. I am away from home for 10 1/2 hours every weekday to man the A/P office and do nothing. I feel like I'm not allowed to play games or watch tv like I could when it was slow at the ticket office. I have started to do homework at work because that's when I have time. I feel like my Saturdays are full because it is the only day I can do all of my laundry, run errands, and sew for a good chunk of time. In addition to my things Mom has asked that I be in charge of making dinners on Saturdays. It's a new request and it isn't the most awesome thing because she still plans the meals.

Wait? Homework? Yes. I am taking two online classes. One is completely free. It's a personal finance course for college freshman taught by BYU. I decided to take this course because I needed to get back to the basics of personal finance. My budget is kind of nonexistent. Always has been really. So I wanted to get into the swing of creating an actual budget and tracking my spending. I'd like to save as much as I can. I want to save up for renting an apartment, going on vacations, possibly a newer car. I did start a new account at the University Credit Union that I automatically send part of my paycheck to each time. I don't see the money and I'm not tempted to spend it. But I feel like I need to save more and stop spending money on food for lunches and other things I don't really need. So that's class one. The second class I have only signed up for. It is an online class taught from the University of Utah. (Yes, I know I'm taking classes from rival schools.) This class is one I am really excited for. I signed up for it after a few days thought and decided it's one class. If I don't like it at least I'll know. The class is entitled "Change Using Positive Psychology". The class description sounds interesting: "This online course provides an overview designed to give students a taste of the positive psychology movement and how positive psychological principles can be applied to various areas of life to help individuals have greater life satisfaction and happiness." I've been thinking about taking some psychology classes for a while now. I'm starting with this. That class starts next week and goes into December. I started the finance class this past week.

So in addition to the bigger life things I have continued to read novels when I can. I joined a book club on Goodreads. August is our first month. It's a fantasy book club. Our first book was A Natural History of Dragons: A Memoir by Lady Trent by Marie Brennan. And the second book poll was just put up. We have a master list that the creator picks five or six books for the poll on what to read next.

I have also tried to find time to sew. I don't have lots of time in one sitting but I have taken an hour here and there in the evenings to cut out fabric, or sew part of a block. I got the last two blocks for my black and white BOM done. Now I'm caught up for that class on Thursday. I also sewed the very large medallion block for the Fabric Center BOM. The other day I even sewed a whole block from start to finish in a couple of hours. At this point with that quilt I have about six blocks to catch up on. I think I have colors picked out for each of them. So I really just need to sit down and cut and sew them together. I'd like to take photos of all of my blocks and update the blog with those.

So yeah. This week's plan...

• Take photos of my quilt blocks that I have so far.
• Clean my room. It's getting very difficult to walk.
• Also with cleaning my room I'd like to turn my bed to the window and finally put on the new comforter.
• I need to kind of rearrange my bookshelves so that I can put a few things I have collected on them. And I have a couple of books that are floating on my nightstand because I can't get to my bookshelves to put them away. (Did I mention my room is messy?)
• Once I move my other smaller book shelves out from under the window I need to arrange my fabric on them. Yes, I'm bring my fabric horde to my room where I can see it and when I get around to using it I'll have to bring it up two flights of stairs to the sewing room. But whatever.
• The bathroom needs to be cleaned as well.
• I have to wash my laundry and I still have clean laundry that needs to be folded and put away. I need to wash my bedding too.
• Basically I need to put my life back in order.

I joined a club

I joined the Pink Castle Fabrics Stash Stack Club because I loved the idea of getting a nice mix of fabric based on the color wheel. One color each month. I love the idea of being surprised with a different mix each month. It will be fun. I'll post a photo when I get the stack each month.

Fabric Center Block of the Month

Mom and I are taking a second block of the month class. This one is more "normal". The ward one is the simple. This class is with the local quilt shop, Fabric Center. The blocks are being designed by one of the ladies who kind of owns the shop. She did have a quilt made up. They used whatever fabrics they had that weren't selling so it's not the prettiest thing in the world but it get's the idea across.

I haven't started on any of the blocks because it took me a little bit to get the fabrics and then I got distracted by other projects. I think I have all the blocks designed and colored so I really have no excuse other then lack of time at this point in the game. So let's start off by showing you my fabrics.

The fabric I choose for this BOM is from "Emma's Garden" by Patty Sloniger for Micheal Miller Fabrics. It is gorgeous fabric! I always liked the reds since I discovered this line. So I played around and thought about which fabrics to use. This what I came up with.

For the focus fabric, which is the main fabric in the center there, and the backing I chose this awesome, big, bold, print. It is way more awesome in person and I absolutely LOVE it. I am also fussy cutting some out for the individual blocks if I feel like the block lets me.

Originally I was going to include this next fabric in the blocks too. After many discussions with Mom and her making one of her blocks using the background fabric in it we both decided not to include the background fabric in the blocks. It will let the blocks themselves pop and not blend into the quilt. It is also a gorgeous bold, but subtle, fabric. I think it works great as a neutral for this quilt.

The next fabrics don't go anywhere in particular. I got enough to go in the blocks as I see fit.

        

I also didn't like the on-point blocks. It makes this quilt look huge and I feel like there is a lot of dead space. So I have been reworking some math around. I still haven't figured it out completely but I can worry about that at the end when we are putting it together.

That's it for now. I'm really going to make an effort to catch up and sew sew sew.

And I'll post "real life" pictures of the fabrics later as well.

Block One

Block One for the Black and White Pop quilt is a simple four patch. But it's huge. Each square is 9". It is big, loud and awesome. And I really like this black and white idea.

Black and White Block of the Month quilt

Mom's friends from church are doing a beginner quilt along. Ladies get together every month and learn about sewing. We had our first meeting the other week. We got the quilt pattern that we are going to do. While they were discussing quilting and sewing and picking out fabrics I was online via my phone looking at fabric trying to decide what color scheme to go with. I decided on doing a black and white quilt with some pop of color. After going to the fabric store on Saturday I ended up buying three bright yellow, six different black and six different whites. I also found the perfect backing that is black and white. That fabric got me really excited about doing this sampler quilt in black and white. Mom seemed hesitant about the whole black and white quilt idea. But it's my quilt and I think it is going to be awesome.

The quilt design.

The quilt we are doing is called "Pioneer Sampler" designed by TK Harrison for BOMquilts.com. The pattern has directions for two different sizes. The baby quilt finishes to 36"x45". The finished blocks for the baby quilt are 9". The twin quilt finishes to 63"x81". The finished blocks for the twin quilt are 18". I decided to do the twin size quilt. I am not going to put the border on my quilt. I'll bind it right after putting the blocks together. So my quilt will be approximately 54"x72". That's 4 1/2 feet x 6 feet. It's a nice size quilt.

So fabrics ...

This is my backing. I LOVE this fabric so much.

Isn't it a lovely pile.

All of my fabrics are geometric patterns. I think that will work best with the quilt.

The Whites.

The Blacks.

The Pop of Yellows.

With the yellows I was looking for the base color to be the pop of color in the fabric. But I stumbled upon that white/yellow in the top left corner and it fit so well. And I need a third yellow.

Today I sketched out the blocks on graph paper and colored them with my color scheme. Now I have a better idea of what fabric colors will go where in my quilt. And I really do love this b/w/y idea so much. It's going to be awesome!