Shortly after my last post, my laptop did an update and now my picture files aren't accessible when I want to dip into them and use a picture on my blog. I tend to let these sort of problems go too long because I'm not technically savy with computers and don't have a resident computer nerd. Irritating but not the end of the world. I just need time to learn how to fix it or whatever. I'll try to get the pictures I need on the unfinished red Welsh quilt project. Maybe it's a good thing that I was running a little slow getting it quilted.
Another distraction has been my going back to work part-time. I'm now working a couple days a week at Gee Gee's, a quilt shop in Yelm and I really like it. It isn't that I'm working so many hours, it's just that there's been a lot to learn above and beyond just cutting fabric and offering some quiltmaking advice. It's my first time using a computerized register and while it's really a great system with a lot of common sense built into it, I'm still a bit slow because I don't want to make any mistakes. I feel like the old Far Side cartoon of the kid in the classroom with his hand up, asking the teacher if he can leave because his brain is full. It's times like this when the perfectionist in me creeps out into my life and tries to do life without mistakes which we all know is not going to happen. Actually, I find my struggles to learn all the details about the computerized register kind of funny because I haven't worked on a register since 1973 and even then, the registers I had worked on all had gold decorative scrollwork on them... in other words, they very old and very basic. They were the kind that when you pushed buttons, the numbers popped up in a window. I think I missed a generation of technology. Oh well.
Now to more important things. Many people have commented that they'd like to have a copy of my Handbook and since I've discovered a few in a box over at the shed, I thought I'd let you all know. You can contact me through the email on the blog information page and we'll work out the details. I will sell it for $25 (post paid) to anyone here in the lower 48 States but I can't sell overseas due to the cost of processing but you can contact the Jen Jones Welsh Quilt Centre and order one from them which helps support the Centre.
When I wrote above that the books were in the shed, it occurred to me that it might make you think that I kept them in a leaky old building which isn't the case. The 'Shed' is a building that my husband remodeled for a teaching studio and I did do some Welsh marking classes there but it wasn't to be. Now I use it for getting away and fiddling with metal jewelry making and collage. It's like going back to those long ago art classes in high school and picking up where I left off. The little garden to the left is nice on summer evenings. My 16 year old yellow cat, Yellow Max, still goes over and lays in the middle of the catnip plant... and nibbles a few leaves. Maxine, our gray cat meets her friend, the black neighbor cat there also... no dogs allowed.
I'll get the Welsh quilt project back on track this week as soon as I figure out which pictures I still need. Below is a picture of the project I started after deciding to stop teaching earlier this year. I thought I'd just use the book to make 6" blocks when I had a few minutes but instead of it being a fill-in project, it turned into one of those projects where you just can't stop until it's done, It's been a great way to use up fabric scraps but I still managed to buy fabric for it. I really like the way the purple fabrics sash the blocks.
