Stars in my Eyes

It took all day, but I managed to get my 16 stars for the Sundress quilt finished. Remember these?

They've been turned into these.

Also, while I was making these, I re-wrote the lyrics to that Johnny Cash song. See if this sounds familiar:

You sew sixteen stars, what do you get

Another day older and deeper in debt

Saint Peter don't you call me 'cause I can't go

I owe my soul to the fab-er-ic store

It could be a hit, don't you think?

So, I tried at least three times to get the stars stacked on top of one another for chain-piecing. But each time I ended up with mismatched pieces, or extra pieces, or something else that wasn't right. Finally I decided the best way to sew them was to do them four at a time. So I laid out four stars-worth of half square triangles.

I covered them with rulers for safe-keeping because, you know...

And, you know...

Lucky for me, they each took a turn on the quilts-to-be-quilted pile.

When I had the first set sewn together, they looked like this.

Continuing on, I sewed the second set together.

I had the third set partially sewn together when it was time to go pick-up our CSA share.

When I got home, I planned what to do with all the veggies and put them away. Then, I got straight back to work on the third set of stars.

I had the fourth set all laid out when it was time for dinner.

Mike has been working outside after dinner, and that gave me enough time to finish up the fourth and last set. When I pressed the last block open, oops. That ain't right.

Usually I wouldn't notice something like this until it was sewn into the quilt and quilted over. But I set it to right and the fourth set was finished. Ta-Da!

Miss Sadie helped me cut another piece of fabric for yet another embroidery take-along piece.

I'm moving along with the Sweet Land of Liberty block, and so that makes me think I need another one to take along...just in case, you know. This morning, I'll trace out another shorty, this one from Bird Brain Designs.

I wanted to do something small, and something I could pull from my left over stash of floss. Robin Kingsley is the designer at Bird Brain Designs. She suggests perle cotton for this piece, but I'm going to use three strands of floss from already wound floss bobbins in my many boxes of floss scraps.

It's going to be a busy day. I'm getting my monthly pedicure, and I'm also getting my hair colored. You might remember I was supposed to get a perm last week, but then it was rescheduled. And then my friend, SJSM, gave me a different idea. She told me she only colors her hair now and the color gives her the body she wants without the need to perm. And that reminded me I used to color my hair, and I remember it always gave me nice body. So instead of perming today, I'm going to try getting some color. It's a good time to do it, and I can always perm next time around if I'm not happy with it. I'm not going to change the color of my hair...I'll just get color to cover the one or two thousand strands of gray I've seen.

Also, I need to figure out the food for our upcoming trip. Picking up a load of CSA vegetables just a few days before we leave complicates the picture. My refrigerator space is limited in our truck camper, and so I need to be creative for the beginning of our trip. More later. For now, it's time to get going.