His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama

Yes, today I am spending the day listening to his Holiness.  I have long been inspired by this man and the chance to see and hear him in person was an unexpected opportunity, not to be missed.

Clearly a follow up post after today will be forth coming.  

On the quilting front: I took on doing a secret challenge with a deadline.  Yes, after promising myself no more  deadline projects this year...I could not resist this new adventure. It was just something that my heart insisted I do.
Each morning I spend some great reading time of various blogs across the internet, some long time favorites, and always a new link or two to check out.  I continue to find amazing quilters and sewists doing creative and inspiring work.  
 I still have my donation quilt waiting to be bound and another donation top on the design wall.  
Neither of which deterred me from plunging into this new project.  
I am up early on what would usually be a slight sleep in morning-so, I am using my "extra"  time as a chance to  post here, enjoy some quiet time and...cut some more squares for this new "heart" project.  

hope your day is filled with joy!  

surfacing from ...

 This weekend has been my most productive yet in busting stash and completing not one, but two quilt tops!  

The small green bucket is now empty of flannel squares and I am thrilled.  The first top is sandwiched and quilting will start in the morning, as I continue to put in up to an hour before off to the work mines this week. 

The second top will hang on the design wall until I finish quilting the first top.  I pushed my time tonight to not only have the top done but indulge in a bit of blog reading and write this post.

It was a rainy weekend-as gardening was out, quilting was in.  Once these two quilts are totally finished I will be up to date on my goal of a donation quilt a month.  

Next weekend will kick off doing all the house chores and what gardening the weather allows prior to the 19th.  My sister arrives that evening and I will gladly ignore all but the most required chores to enjoy as much time with her as I possibly can.  

My sister lives on the other coast, so we are lucky to get together once a year.  It has been this way most of our adult lives, but, I still really, really do not like it.  There will be much silliness, laughing, and playing.  I can hardly wait!  

I also bound off my gorgeous lavender cowl...once I stitch it together and weave in the ends..I will share a photo of it..  And, I am probably less than six rows from  finishing my second hat.  A flurry of finishes!

I have a request for a modified cowl from my sweetie, so will be casting on that project very soon.  I really enjoy knitting in the evenings.

Time to call it a night...a busy week ahead.

word block...at last

I finally buckled down and thanks to a play date with a fellow quilter friend, finished up a birthday word block for Carol.
I thought asking for specific word blocks to help her celebrate her big birthday was a fabulous idea!  

I also got a final decision on what (as in, table runner or quilt) to make with the one block I finished last week from a long ago FAB inspired sew together time.

So...here is the word block and once I hear from Carol, it will get mailed off and off the design wall for good *big smile*

Next up: make up the blocks needed for the table runner.

Bit by bit, I am getting various lagging projects off the design wall and celebrating finishes.

 In fact, it's very close to being empty now...only 4 items left!  Sorry, but I am not sharing them-several will wing their way to a few long distance friends and the last remains as inspiration for "something new". 

Cher