the last two rows

I fell off the wagon...again...

(the quilty wagon, thank you)

I haven't been doing much more than the required rows for the Row By Row exchange, but that's better than nothing, right?

Last month's row started with Mary Jean's row:

She wanted us to create a row that represents what Michigan is to us.  She included the fabrics you see here and asked that we stay within the color scheme, but we could add as needed.

I had to buy a pattern (it's hard to wing it with paper piecing!) AND fabrics to properly complete my row, but it's definitely Michigan to me.  And I did stay within her colors, just needed something a little different from what she'd included...  I didn't remember to take photos of the fabrics and then left what I hadn't used in the box for the next row or my friend to use in the completing of the quilt.  I didn't even take photos of the quilt in progress!  So no sneak peaks of this one.

And then this month I got the last box:

This theme is "Spring" and my friend Ruth chose blocks that had spring names...Birds in the Air and such (and added Contrary Wife because she's feisty).  I like this idea.  We were do something that represented spring to us.

And my mom has a BIG box of floral fabrics that are of all sorts, but include many that fit well with the florals in this first row.  And since I was taking her out for her birthday anyways, I borrowed the box.  Ruth requested that we wash everything ahead and my mom often doesn't, so I had to choose and then wash...

Messy!  But I promise they look better now that they're in a row.  I made choices and changed my mind and changed my mind again.  Finally I had what I thought was a good idea, but decided to walk away from it for a bit because this last idea just wasn't screaming "MAKE ME".  5 minutes later I had new idea and this one was screaming so loud, I was mad the dryer wasn't done yet!  But this row was by far the hardest as far as decision-making goes.

I got the box on Thursday, started work on it Sunday and had the row done before bedtime that night!  Compared to the other rows I've made, this one is simple, but it's perfect.  At least I think so.  I hope she likes it.  I hope they all like their rows.

We exchange boxes again - get our own boxes back - on May 21st and I'm so excited to see what everyone did with my idea.  But I'm also having a lot of fun so it's sad to see it end so quickly.  You know you'll get to see all sorts of photos when it's safe to share and I'm hoping to have whole tops or even quilts to share as we gals turn the rows into quilts.

Time to go catch up on blog reading and then get some chores done.  This morning was a visit to the vet for my oldest kitty, Skitter.  She's my scaredy-cat and was acting just not quite right.  Turns out she had two full, nearly impacted anal glands (yuck, I know) and a bad tooth.  After taking care of the yuck, they drew a little blood and, pending favorable results from the bloodwork, she'll be returning for dental work to take care of whatever is up with the tartar-covered tooth.  My hubby rolled his eyes at me that I was making something out of nothing, but this visit proved me right.  Something wasn't right, but I caught it before it was a huge problem and though today was expensive, it could have been a lot worse.  And she's nearly recovered - this was a huge trauma for her...

Happy quilting,

Katie