My fabric diet

I began this year with an oath with myself to attempt to buy less fabric. My rule was only solids, prints that are on sale -- specifically, less than $8 per yard -- & vintage fabric. I feel like I've been doing pretty well. I've stayed away from my favorite online stores & when I do visit, I only look at what is deeply discounted. I've also not been going to many local quilts shops or big box fabric stores.

As with my physical health & eating habits, I want modest fabric acquisition to become a way of life, not a strict, short-term program -- no fabric fasting, just manageable buying that I can comfortably live with.

But, like my wise friend, RachaelDaisy, says, "Moderation in all things, including moderation."

I've been to 2 quilts shows already this year: QuiltCon & the Kansas City Regional Quilt Festival. Seeing quilts that get one's creative juices flowing, then visiting vendors' booths, with their arrays of fat quarters & half yard cuts -- Buy x, Get the x+1 Free! -- well, it's just too hard to pass up! At QuiltCon, my haul was pretty small. Vintage-looking colors & prints were speaking to me that day.

I did more damage at the KCRQF. That day, brown was calling to me, as well as birds & brights to go with them.

Then a trip to a favorite store, perhaps my favorite store in the whole world: Fabric Recycles. I can't explain it, but those 60s-70s era bright calicoes make me so very happy. So, again with the brown, then a large cut of cobalt blue with sweet, tiny posies. And to top things off, 2 baggies of these square-ish shapes. The semi-pinked edges make me wonder if they were remnants from a garment manufacturer. The previous owner had drawn squares on the backs of them all but had not done any cutting.

I wonder what she was going to do with them?
I wonder what I will do with them?

Unexcused absence

Where have I been?

No place exotic -- well, Kansas, which I like, but I would not call it "exotic". I went to visit my MIL. For fun, we went to the first ever Kansas City Regional Quilt Festival. Organized by 16 area quilt guilds, the KCRQF has been in the planning stages for at least 2 years. They put on a great show! A good do-able size -- not too big, not too small -- lots of great quilts, lots of vendors. MIL & I went together on Saturday & on Sunday, took our 13-year-old granddaughter/niece, our Next Generation Quilter! She was especially intrigued by the Bargello quilts.

Back at home, I rested from the 14-hour drive by catching up on work, housework, etc. Then, after a few days, I caught Shug's cold -- I coughed & snotted for about 2 weeks, very tedious & tiresome. I was itching to sew, but had no energy. Finally back in front of a sewing machine, I continue to plod away on the hummingbird stars. I like the block, but am not enjoying *making* the block -- it is fiddle-y & fussy -- so I'm going to make fewer than I had originally intended, then add big, wide borders. I've decided how I want to quilt it -- now I'm excited to get it done!

And geese, there always seem to be geese.