Did I mention that I got a new laptop for Christmas? Now that I've worked up the nerve to plug it in and get the virus software set up, I'm seriously loving the fact that I can set up where the action is and look at quilty blogs while I can watch the kids. No more waiting for a chance to slip off into another room! It's what I could do at the old house, with my computer desk in one corner of the room that was called but couldn't possibly be used as a dining room.



It's bleak outside today, but I love the way the branches look against the grey sky. And it's not raining or freezing.



I'm really anxious to see how the madder snowball blocks look once they're assembled. I loved the colors in Root of the Madder from Connecting Threads and bought a bunch of fat quarters when I had a coupon to combine with a sale and went on a bit of a binge. But then I didn't know what to do with them.

My first idea was a bento box, but I didn't have the right combination of lights and darks, so the fabric sat and waited for me to come up with a better idea. And I made my Bento Box with that Moda scrap bag that didn't have any selvedges.

I saw a snowball quilt at a show that I loved, but it had alternating light and dark blocks -- still not enough light fabric. Then I found a snowball quilt pattern in a magazine that was all dark blocks with light corners. If I threw in some reproduction shirtings that I was holding back for something special, I had enough fabric to make it work....as long as I resized everything because the pattern was written for half yard cuts.

I can do the math to redraft a block, but the part that throws me is figuring out how to get the largest number of the biggest squares I can make from a cut of fabric. My fear of messing it up paralyzes me. That's why I've never started my special sweatshirt quilt even though I've got all of the stuff for it.

It's a sign of how much I want this quilt that I pieced almost a hundred snowball blocks without whining about how boring they are! Now I'm planning to send the kids to bed as early as I can get away with so I can try to get it assembled tonight. I've even got matching backing and thread.

Can you tell I'm just a bit excited about this quilt?

And finishing it will mean that I've used up almost all of those Connecting Threads collections I binged on last year. Country Breezes is a finished quilt, Mama's Kitchen is a finished top, I used the indigos I bought for Leif's Snails, and now there's this one. That just leaves a handful of the blue and burgundy indigos.

See, I do use what I buy. Sometimes.

I got this neat little gizmo at Joann's yesterday. Imagine, all of my bobbins stuck in one place without coming unwound and getting all tangled up! It does confirm my suspicion that I don't have nearly enough bobbins, though.