REALLY Early or Fantastically Late

Spring hit me pretty hard this week/end.  I'm adversely affected by low-air pressure and have been pretty lucky so far this year weather-wise but the skies unleashed the torrents of spring rain and I wasn't  particularly social. (Unless you were my nephew, who received most of my attention the last several days...) However, I have finally finished my Figgy Pudding quilt! (Cue the parade. Enter trumpets and streamers.)

It was begun in January 2010.  Yes, 2010, shortly after I received the kit for Christmas. I'm not a kit person but I absolutely loved this pattern and couldn't not do it exactly the way it was.  The trees float off the back, which is even more prominent now that it's quilted and washed.

 I finished the top in February of 2010.

I pieced a back with scraps and a mottled blue batik in August of 2010 and basted it.

It sat, folded, with the binding rolled neatly on top, waiting.
It waited until August of 2011 when I started the quilting.  And I hated what I was doing with it and decided to wait until I either learned how to make my sputtering, squealing, grinder of a sewing machine do free motion quilting OR until I saved the pennies to get a new machine.

Then I got a new machine for Christmas 2011. YAY.  I am now free motion capable, albeit somewhat challenged by the fact that I haven't done enough of it to call myself anything other than a novice.  I really need to make myself keep a constant speed/motion ratio.  If I don't, the tension gets a little *ahem* interesting...

However, this weekend, after unpicking every last stitch that I had already quilted (luckily less than a few blocks worth), I sat down and quilted it with my beloved Oscar. Friday was a one-game hockey night so I  had some free (motion) time.

These pictures did NOT turn out great.  I was in too big a hurry and borrowing a babysitting grandma... :-)

Basic stippling. The only thing original is the back.  Also, leaving a quilt for 2+years means the lint accumulation is insane.

But it's done, (un)dusted, and crossed off the works-in-progress list.  It's currently waiting for December to deck the couch.

In semi-related news, I haven't seen my quilt labels since last December.  It's distressing me greatly and I fear they may have accidentally been tossed in the Christmas chaos.  I'm hoping for just lost instead of tossed, and soon to be found, but I've been looking for two months... :-(

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Scrappy afghan is also nearing completion.  All panels knit.  Ends woven in.  Seaming and felting (though maybe just fulling) to come.

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Sourdough:  There will be an update. Oh, there will be.  In saga form.