The best cat EVER.

Thanks for your comments about Gershwin. He put up a valiant fight, but had used up all nine lives, and I let the neurologist put him to sleep this morning when he stopped breathing on his own.

I got one last visit in yesterday, and as out of it as he was, he cocked an ear as he heard my voice, and when I laid my hands on his back, his heart rate and breathing slowed, so I know he knew it was me.

I was hoping for a few more weeks, or months, but in the end, it was all up to him, and he was so, so tired.

He was special, and loved, and Lord knows I gave him the best care I could. He was wonderfully handsome, incredibly photogenic, and reluctantly joined me on road trips across Michigan, exacting his revenge by waking me up at 5am, a good two hours earlier than usual. His last days were a blur of medicine, and monitoring, and I'm feeling guilty for the sense of relief that has washed over me along with my sadness.

It feels odd to publicly air my grief, especially over a cat...but everyone with a pet knows how strong the bond, how difficult to let go when the time comes. It was relatively quick, and that's what we wish for: to not have them suffer, or struggle, and go in peace. Which is what I got.

It's amazing what a big hole such a little animal can leave.

I inadvertently cursed my cat...

I named him Gershwin. It was meant to be an homage, not an omen.

Gershwin on the piano, his favorite spot

He's been an amazing companion, roommate, alarm clock, bed warmer, and siphon of my disposable income with some of his health issues for the past seven years. And worth every penny.

George Gershwin at the piano -- probably his favorite spot, too

George Gershwin died prematurely at the age of 38 of a brain tumor, and my fuzzy friend, at the age of 12 (I think -- he came to me by way of Cleveland as a stray), has just been diagnosed with not one, but two almond-sized tumors, one over each little orange ear.

He's still hangin' in there, but there's no music in the air today, folks.

Nothin' like a new book...

...to send me careening off in another direction like a creative pinball. There are at least three quilts in here I'd love to get started on right now.

I'm excited to finally put these two jelly rolls to use -- I picked them up at the International Quilt Show this spring, and every once in a while they call out to me from the stash corner of my kitchen (not the black hole of UFO's -- that's the other corner. I try to separate the two so that the new fabric is ignorant of its potential for living out the rest of its days in a plastic bag).

But work beckons. Oh, to live a life of leisure!

And BTW, here's how the Hopscotch quilt looks now. It's hard to see pale green quilting on white blocks (I'll try to get a better picture, but it involves laying down on the floor and contorting parts that don't contort so well anymore, something I didn't have time for this morning), but I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out.

When done is still unfinished...

I was getting this quilt ready to wrap up and give to its 16-month old recipient (which, in my house, amounts to making sure there's no cat hair left on it) when I stepped back, took a good look, and decided there wasn't enough quilting on it. I loved the look of the Minkee sashing without any stitching through it, but let's face it, it's going to a toddler and needs to be relatively indestructible.

So it was back to the machine...and I made a fun discovery: if you hold down the reverse button long enough on my machine (Bernina 440QE), it stays in reverse! I was doing a little funky straight-line pattern in the white blocks, and this eliminated having to pull the bulk of the quilt through the arm of the machine over and over again. Of course, I discovered it by accident and had to rip out the stitching that went in the wrong direction, but hey -- better late than never!

Did they teach that in Mastery Classes? I'm sure I would have remembered...

Anyway, I finished the last stitching this morning before I left for work, will de-hair once again tonight, and deliver it later this week to little Simona so she can put it to good use! Yay! Another project one out the door!

My new faves...

These blocks are the same size (5") as the little wonky & white ones I made a few days ago. I'm thinking of alternating them and using black & white polka dot for sashing. They're so much more liberating to make -- having just come off the Irish Chain project -- but they're messy! I'm usually pretty organized with my fabric during the cutting and piecing stages, but with this, there are scraps everywhere...tiny shavings from trimming the logs, and little bits that have somehow started clinging to the cat. He's had a rough week, and this is annoying him. But I'm having a good time!

I'd forgotten about this Wiggly Garden fabric until I was looking for bright scraps for my Shadow Box baby quilts -- and found the remnants of about 15 fat quarters I'd used for another top...so there's lots more where these came from!

Encountering a UFO...

In an effort to diminish my pile of Ziploc bags filled with unfinished thoughts, I pulled these out this morning before work, and darned if I can get back into it. I have a pattern, and a theme (they're all underwater-related batiks), lots of remaining fabric from the fat quarters, and a recipient in mind (me), but it's been so long since I started these that I've changed the color scheme of my living room...so I'm not really that enthused about diving back in.

The question, then, is this: is it better to try to force yourself to finish something, or just pack everything back up and return to it when you feel a stronger connection to the project (realizing, of course, that could mean never)?

I feel guilty, and a little sad, because at some point, before some newer, brighter fabric came along to catch my eye, I had great hopes for these blocks, and invested some quality time in producing them. It might have been a long holiday weekend, or a vacation day in the middle of the week where the creative juices were flowing and I was thrilled to finally be making something out of these fat quarters I'd been collecting for over two years, I really don't remember. But no doubt, the radio was on and I was enrapt and the next thing I knew it was 4pm and I hadn't even eaten breakfast yet. Time hadn't mattered at all -- it was all about creating in the moment. And now? I still find them attractive, but they just don't do anything for me any more.

It's kind of like running into an old boyfriend, really.

The best laid plans...

I fully intended to come home from work yesterday and get back into the wonky log cabin groove, but instead was met by this: possibly the most miserable cat ever.

So miserable I had to capture it with my camera, which angered him even more.

So instead happily stitching away with an ear cocked toward bad Monday prime time TV, we spent most of the night at the emergency vet clinic.

He's much better today and very happy to be home, but there was no sewing going on.

Cleaning up just gets me into trouble

I was straightening up yesterday, sorting through scraps leftover from the shadow box quilts, and ended up making these:

I think I was just tired of SQUARES. Also encouraged by the prospect of participating in an improvisational quiltalong (no pressure, AmandaJean!).

Not sure what I'm going to do with them yet. Needless to say, I never finished straightening up.

What I was doing when I should have been doing something else

So instead of bringing my parents' quilt home last year and getting right back to work on it so they could have it by Christmas, I made a whole bunch of other stuff instead.

Two jelly roll tops...

Cotton Candy

Cotton Candy Cabins

An experiment with four-patches...I used some leftover Minkee for the sashing on this one. Not recommended unless you use a stabilizer with it!

Hopscotch

A Monkey'n Round flannel quilt for my goddaughter, my Monkey Girl...

There was a matching doll quilt, but I never got a good picture of it because of this...

Gershwin claims it for his own

My friend Nikki had held on to a stack of fat quarters that her mother had bought many years ago...and wanted to make something for her own daughter in Mom's memory. I got three small quilts, one for Nikki's baby (Imani arrived last Monday!) and one each for her two cousins, Maddy and Sawyer.

All wrapped up and ready to go!

These are 2.5" blocks. In retrospect, I should have made them bigger...

Find the Monkey

I love how quilts look when the light comes through them...

(that's Sears Tower in the background)

Another experiment with four-patches. The dark pink pieces are Minkee dot...stabilized this time!

A quilt for Bella, the new arrival upstairs...

Then my old neighbor had twins. These have yet to be quilted, but are on their way soon...

At least I wasn't procrastinating unproductively...

Checking one off the to-do list...

Auditioning the binding

At last! I can breathe a sigh of relief, I have finished my parents' 60th anniversary gift. Well, sort of. The top is done, and I'm leaving it with the longarm lady on my way up to northern Michigan in two weeks. I'd be more proud of myself for completing it if it weren't over a year behind schedule.

The Irish Chain is an easy pattern and this should have been a no-brainer, but several things made this a painful exercise to complete:

• Originally designed as an oversized throw, Mom decided last summer she'd rather use it on their bed. My fault for offering the option, but I wanted her to be happy with it. So it came back to Chicago to sit on the UFO pile. On the top, but still relegated to what's become the black hole of my kitchen.
• Making more blocks meant cutting into my backing fabric, and not having enough for a single-fabric back. Not the end of the world, but not what I had planned, either.
• One wedding
• One set of twins
• A baby girl on the way and her two cousins and grandma's fabric
• A new Bernina with BSR that warranted quite a bit of experimenting
• Several subsequent experiments
• Another new baby girl
• One deathly sick cat, slowly recovering
• New machine=different seam allowance, which means the new blocks were slightly larger than the old ones. I hadn't realized how off my old Singer and I were!
• I came up four inches (four inches!) short on the off-white fabric
• Discontinued fabric -- both the backing and the off-white. Thank you, quiltshops.com and your thumbnail searches!

So the lessons learned here are obvious:

• To begin with, I should just finish what I start
• Buy enough fabric (though in my defense, I did...originally)
• In the name of all that is creative, let some of those "ooh, I could make this!" moments pass and just get it done already!
• Start making their 75th anniversary quilt NOW.

Hi, My Name is Kate, and I'm Addicted to Fabric.

Well, here it is: my first post. OK, my first substantial post.

Having read several fantastic and inspirational quilting blogs over the past few months, I have decided to jump in myself. While I can't guarantee I will provide inspiration, I'll do my best to commiserate with you. It's what I do best.

My joy in discovering the quilt-blogging world was to find that I wasn't alone in my compulsion, or my frustrations, or the ease with which I can drop a project in favor of new one. I am not the world's only fabric magpie, and have good company in forsaking critical tasks for the satisfying hum of a sewing machine. My stack of unfinished projects -- those that confounded me, bored me, tried my patience or just got shoved to the side by the early arrival of twins or an engagement announcement -- keeps growing, and I am forever grateful to the Ziploc folks for finally making two-gallon storage bags to at least keep them organized.

I have too many ideas in my head, and not enough time to execute them. I have too much fabric, and usually these new ideas require buying even more. There's not a flat surface in my house that hasn't, at some point, been covered with quilt blocks. I have more than a dozen rulers. I pour over the Hancock's of Paducah catalog like I'm six and it's from Toys R Us. I can't go more than a few days without sewing something. I see patterns in buildings, and walkways, and try to figure out how they'd translate into a wall quilt. I have called in sick to work to finish a project.

And I'm not ashamed to admit any of it to people who understand.

And for that, I'm truly thankful.

Posts are coming, I promise!

Just trying to find pictures, and projects, and, above all, time!