Need Something Done? Ask a Busy Person

 This morning I told my husband I feel like I've gotten nothing done this week. He told me I've been way too busy to have gotten nothing done. 

I had to stop and think about it. I certainly have not had any quilt finishes this week, though I am about 3/4 of the way finished quilting a baby quilt for a great niece. Four quilts backed with minky in a row is too much for my arm, so I'm quilting shorter periods of time on this one. I think the next quilt I back with minky, I'm going to baste from the back, so the minky is on top. I'll run the risk of getting a pucker on the front, but my arm won't hurt. 

I made four pairs of pajamas pants for DS the Younger's family. I need to mail their Christmas package early, before he's deployed, so they can celebrate Christmas early. I finished those, wrapped all the gifts, and packed the box. DH is off mailing it now. I cheated and bought t-shirts to go with the pajama pants. I still have 16 pairs of pajama pants and two nightgowns to make before Christmas. I made four in one day, so it's totally doable, in fact, my goal is to get them done in November. If I make the nightgowns in December, that's ok, but I want the pajama pants done this month. 

I processed a bunch of scraps, cutting them down for the scrap user system. I told myself that I couldn't put up the Christmas tree until I emptied a big bin of scraps I had. I'm almost done with that, I should be able to finish this weekend or early next week. I like to put up the tree Thanksgiving weekend, so I should be able to do that. 

If anything, I'm getting busier and busier. In the next three weeks, I'm attending two parties, throwing two parties, helping run a weekend long scooter rally, plus there's Thanksgiving. 

DD#2 wants to host Thanksgiving this year, which is fine, but her family keeps getting sick, so I'm making a plan B just in case she can't do it at the last minute. I'm doing the rolls and pies no matter who hosts, so that's no problem. 

I had some leftover leaf blocks, and I found some Thanksgiving fabric in my latest thrift store fabric haul, so I'm thinking about making a Thanksgiving table runner. If I use a couple layers of wool or cotton batting, it works great for putting hot dishes on.

Now to decide which setting to use. I think the fabric I had in stash will make a good border. I already asked DD#2 is she'd like to have it, and I got a resounding yes, so I'll be sewing this together  ASAP. 

The scooter rally is next weekend. I've got all the sewing for that done. I made 50 luggage tags, 50 rally bags, and the quilt for the raffle. This week I wrapped candy bars with a wrapper we printed out.

It's got the club logo on it. Tomorrow DH and I will be filling the rally bags with all the goodies we've gotten for them, some of which was purchased or made, some of which was donated. 

On Thursday I'll be baking jumbo sized cookies for the rally bags, then I'll be making part of the food for the rally breakfast and dinner on Saturday. I'm not making all the food for either meal, which I've done before, so it's not overwhelming for me. If I didn't have so much experience entertaining it might be. 

My South African SIL is getting his American citizenship, and I said I'd throw a party when he got it. I had NO idea the government would work as fast as it did, so now I'll be throwing that on the 19th, but it's more of a group effort. DD#1 reserved a ramada at a local park, I'm in charge of decorations, dinnerware, meat and bread, (DH is smoking the meat for it so that's not even on me) DD#2 is making the cake, and the attendees are bringing all the sides. Outside is a good option for this, and the weather is usually great this time of year. 

My sister's birthday party is the next day, but it's just family and the menu is already decided, so I'll be busy, but not going crazy. Thanksgiving is an unknown, since I don't know for sure if DD#2 will end up hosting or I will. 

After Thanksgiving things calm down a LOT. So much so, that after much self debate, I decided I would join in Bonnie Hunter's mystery quilt. I still have plenty of projects going to keep me busy, so unlike my usual scrappy preferences, I'm only going to be using four fabrics in the quilt. Scrappy quilts take a lot longer to cut out, and if I limit the fabrics I can easily die cut all the pieces. I have a couple other quilting projects I want to finish in 2022, so by making the mystery quilt cutting faster, I stand a better chance. My fabric choices are these.

The teal on the far right will be my neutral. I'll be using the plum for Bonnie's orange, that orangey-red paisley as Bonnie's purple, and black instead of aqua. I have enough of all the fabrics to make the quilt full size, but I might make half the units instead. I haven't decided yet. I still haven't finished last years mystery quilt, which I actually divided and will be making two different quilts from. One of those is in rows, one of those I still need to make alternating blocks for. At least I remembered to write down my plans for all that, so when I get around to it, I won't be trying to figure out what I had in mind. The last couple mystery quilts I've made with men's shirts, and I certainly have enough shirts left to do this in men's shirts too, but using only four fabrics is a stretch for me, and as long as it's all from stash, I'm OK with trying it. Besides I used men's shirts for the Ruby Jubilee mystery, so it's fair to use yardage for this. I just love that plum-ish purple, and I couldn't do that color scrappy from stash, it's a hard color to find. I've been on a teal kick, this is the second full bolt of it I've bought. Maybe after using it as a background on the mystery quilt I'll be ready to move on to another color.