January 2014

Life has been interesting.  I was laid off from my job the week before Christmas.  What a blessing that turned out to be.  I actually had time to spend with the family over the holidays.  I didn't know if I really wanted to go back to work.  I was toying with the idea of trying to sell quilts or table toppers or something.  I didn't feel the joy of making these things for pay.  I much prefer making them for love.  That idea was scratched.  My mother (with Alzheimer's) is living with me, and we thought of having her contribute to the household.  That may still happen, but wouldn't supplement my income enough.  I ended up accepting another job, doing something similar to what I had been doing, but different.  I went from coding anesthesia and wound records to coding for ambulatory surgical centers.  I haven't started coding yet-I have been taking an online course to try to figure out what I am doing.  The course has a lot of minutiae in it that I won't need for my job.  That seems to be such a waste of time studying this.  I want to get down to the brass tacks!  

Here is our visiting hawk.  I think this may be a  red tail hawk.  He/she sits on our fence eating quite often.  I have no idea what it is eating, but this time it was pretty large.  

My daughter started college and wanted me to make her a bag for her laptop.  I guess these can be pretty expensive.  I started by following a tutorial I found, but the directions weren't quite right.  I ended up making some changes and it turned out pretty nice.  I put a large double pocket on the outside and a smaller pocket on the inside.  For the handles, I made a contraption so I could use the smaller straps called for in the tutorial.  I already had them made when I realized the sides were going to buckle in if they weren't wider.  The tutorial had the flap be the same width as the bag front and back.  No way that would work since the sides weren't compensated for.  I made that smaller to fit the space better.  I should have gotten a picture of it with the laptop in it.  It worked out very well.

Here is my Celtic Solstice, Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt for this year.  It is now on my frame.  I guess I won't have a lot of time for quilting until I finish this course.