I am a happy quilter. Yesterday I dragged all of the kids up to the President's Day sale at Joann's, hoping to come home with some packaged batting and a nice backing for my friend's quilt.

I've decided to experiment with polyester. I love the Warm and Natural batting, but maybe not all of my quilts need to be finished with my favorite stuff. Maybe I can skimp on some of the little experiments that the kids are going to drag around and make forts out of. Especially when it's on sale for 50% off with a 10% off purchase coupon. I bought four different brands to play with. Now I just need the quiet time to try some actual quilting.

There was also a half off sale on clearance fabrics and I must've hit the store just at the right time because they had a lot of nice cotton that worked out to $1.35 a yard. One print is perfect for that disappearing nine-patch I've been playing with -- and was actually cheaper than the solid cotton I'd planned to settle on. I'm not sure how many backings I wound up with, or which quilts they'll eventually go on, but I've got a lot more backing choices now.

If the four-year-old had been more cooperative, I might've realized what a good deal I was getting on the backing for my friend's quilt and bought enough of the same print for my own. Considering the mood he was in though, I did pretty good. I even remembered the black embroidery floss!

Today's job is to decide on a layout for my friend's quilt. The pattern is Scrappy Mountain Majesties and I've laid it out two different ways.

Stacked Lanterns:



Mirror Image Mountains:



There's also a "jagged diamonds" layout that I managed to miss because I could never get that picture to show up in my browser. I found it while I was looking for names to put with the pictures and if it looks anything like I imagine, I think I might like it best!

My Irish Chain is growing fast enough that I'm resisting the temptation to make more than eighty-one blocks. I keep finding shades of dark brown that I missed when I was sorting fabrics and then reminding myself that I can make something else with lots of browns. I've even got patterns in mind.



And this one is supposed to be a lap quilt -- I'm going to use some self control and not make it huge!

Today, I should be cleaning out the pantry so we can schedule the furnace repair guy. It's very hard to stay motivated. We have heat, the furnace just isn't working quite as well as it should. As soon as I clear the floor, someone will dump in a load of laundry, or a bag of junk, or six pairs of mis-matched shoes. And since it's likely that someone will be my husband, I can't win.

Besides, I've got quilt blocks calling to be assembled. If I get the Birds in the Air blocks together and the birds ironed on, I'll have blanket stitch to do when we watch TV tonight.

I pieced ninety-nine blocks so I'd have something to applique the birds onto. I'm not sure I needed the quilt to be this big, but I wasn't about to leave a single one of the birds off.



Isn't the tone-on-tone black print I found great?



Back to the pantry... Did I mention that it's dark and depressing in there? I think I'm going to set the timer for an hour and then sew some blocks together as a reward.