Happy 2023!

A new year, and new possibilities. 

The Hubs and I were busy from Thanksgiving through this week making decisions and purchases for the new house, and there are more of those coming up.  Things have been moving at what seems to be light speed on the inside of the house.  Three weeks ago (I think) the drywall went up.  The brick was delivered two weeks ago; cabinets and trim were installed last week; and paint starts this week.  This morning we selected indoor lighting and purchased our gas fireplace logs.  Photos are up on the house page.  It's been a whirlwind, for sure.  I told Billy the Builder we were meeting with our loan officer last Friday to lock in a rate.  He asked, "How many days?"  "Ninety," was my reply.  His response?  "Oh, we're done way before that!" WOOHOO!

I’ll have a 2022-what-I-made wrap-up soon, but I have to wait until I gift what I made for my family for Christmas. We didn’t meet for Christmas because Covid stepped in and took the Hubs and me away from meeting with our family for Christmas for the THIRD YEAR IN A ROW.  It was devastating, but we will regroup.  I thought it would be this weekend, but Covid has been running through other members of the family.  I think we'll start a pool to see who guesses when we're able to meet. 

Speaking of Covid, the community level was high for our county last week, and that meant we all worked from home last week.  We're back to the office this week.   

While off from work during part of the holidays, I spent a little bit of time in the studio, making grocery tote bags and a baby quilt top and backing.  Earlier in the month I finished piecing together the Whacky Rails UFO, and my plan was to quilt it on Cindy's Bernina Q20 yesterday, but Covid changed that, too.  I need to make a label for it.

The baby quilt is for neighbors of ours.  The little boy is due the end of March but I won't be surprised if he arrives next month; his sister was a month early.  I purchased the panel and some coordinating prints from Moda's ABC...xyz fabric line by Stacy Hsu.  I kept things very simple and knocked out the top in an afternoon.  I'm debating about quilting it on The Beast or The Beaut or trying it on Cindy's Q20 before I tackle the Whacky Rails quilt.  We'll see.

And about my sewing/quilting plans for 2023:  With all of the thought processes for the new home and especially in the area of organization (studio and otherwise), I'm feeling a strong urge to name 2023 the Year of the UFO / NESTY.  Working on Whacky Rails also pushed me toward that thought; it felt so satisfying to complete the top of an 18-year-old project!  I also successfully avoided the "Click Buy Now" rush I usually get with the post-Christmas fabric sales; there are a lot of pretty fabrics I wanted, but I have plenty of fabric in my stash that wants to be used or re-homed.  We will see what happens.  

So...no photos in this post.  My PC went a little crazy when importing photos the other day and now they're not appearing in chronological order; in fact, they're kind of all over the map date-wise, which makes it harder to find the photos I can add to the post. I was able to get the photos of the new house up; go figure. 

The new home is going to be front and center for the entire year; furnishing it and putting our stamp on things will take a little while, but I will always squeeze in time for sewing and quilting; my sanity requires it.  For now, though, I need to pack. 

Go make!