the charity quilts

In my last post, I promised I would have the six baby quilts completed by the May deadline.  I should have no problem being ready to send these quilts to the Comfort Quilt Challenge in time...

Something lit a fire under me.

I have quilted all four of the tops!

I pieced backs for two of them and found pieces large enough to just use for the other two.

I had a very busy day at work yesterday, which led to a very late (2:15) lunch, which led to not wanting to eat dinner and settle in too soon after I got home from work, which led to quilting a second top!

I thought I took an in-progress shot last night, but I guess I just thought about it.  It's the pink log cabins made from the left over half square triangles...if anyone remembers that...

Today, after the super fun task of getting our taxes done (I've been paying H&R Block to do them for me since 2000 when I filed the 1999 set and haven't looked back.  Worth Every. Single. Penny.  It took about 30 minutes today.  Joint filing with the hubby and all.), I had a little time before I needed to make lunch.  So I threw quilt number three on the longarm!

(AKA Squirrel Poop)

I made lunch.  We ate lunch.  Hubby left for work.  Emma the cat sat on my lap until my leg went numb and I decided I should get up, thaw out the leg, and quilt that last quilt.

This is the oldest of them and somehow ended up at the bottom of the pile, despite much shuffling.

And then, binding!  I'd sewn the machine side of the binding on the first two, on the day I quilted them.  These two, quilted today, also got bindings sewn on.  Of the four quilts, I had made binding for two, which was nice.  I only had to make two sets!

Again into the stash and I found some nice choices.  But some of the binding fabrics aren't in the quilt.  Which is hilarious to me that a quilt judge actually marked someone down for that...

Anyways, I brought them all back down to where the light, on this dreary, rainy day, is better, for a glamour-ish shot...

...and then stacked them up neatly while I (attempted to) upload the photos.  I turned around and found someone putting some extra love into all of them.

He's crashed out over there now.  Way more than this.  Because uploading was quite the process.

Normally, from my phone, it's easiest to upload my photos into a private Facebook album.  And then I go to my real, big computer and save them onto here so I can paste them into my blog posts.  (Also, so I can delete the hundreds of random quilt photos off my phone and save space for cat photos.  Priorities.)

Today, after hitting upload and leaving my phone plugged in - upstairs - I found I couldn't retrieve my photos from Facebook.  So I went back upstairs to check on it.  Perhaps I forgot to click something.

No.

Facebook wasn't uploading my photos.  Because they had determined my internet connection was slow and were saving my battery (phone was plugged in) and data (we have an unlimited plan on the phones, as well as unlimited via Wi-Fi at home - it automatically connects to our home Wi-Fi when we're close enough).  So thank you Facebook, but I don't need your help.  Can I please have an override button?

So.

I know I can Bluetooth pair my phone and computer.  I've never tried before, but if Facebook won't let me have my photos now...when will they?

This required bringing my phone from upstairs - my intention was to have it charge while I type - back downstairs to be close enough to my computer to be able to pair.  That only took about 5 tries before it successfully paired and shared my photos.  And about 10% of my battery.

So thank you again, Facebook, for saving my battery.  Well done.

(The phone is back upstairs, charging.  And I suppose I'm healthier for the four extra trips up and down the stairs I made today.  But I'm not thanking anyone for the health benefits.  I could have taken a nap instead.  Hmmm...nap sounds good...)

But here's the thing - all the websites I clicked on from the big computer loaded just fine.  Perhaps a touch slower than sometimes, but having just been turned on, this monster sometimes likes to download updates and such as soon as possible (everyone rush for the open door at once!), so I'm used to it being a little slower at first.  So I thought this was a Facebook problem.  (Because I can look at how fast data is going in or out of my phone, but really?  What the hell does that mean?  And what's "normal?"  Because who looks at it when it's fine?  Not this girl!)

When I started to upload photos for the blog post, they did upload significantly slower.

So maybe it is me.  And my internet.

Dear AT&T: You are a HUGE company.  I pay you a LOT of money.  Please fix this.  Or at least let me know you know.

Oh boy, I went a while without photos there.

(Still loading slowly...darn!)

And now comes marathon-binding-time.

4 quilts x 36" each = 144" of binding to hand-sew.

I sure hope my internet is working fast enough for Netflix.

AND...the Rack of Shame has been reduced by FIVE quilts in the last week.  Sure, four of them were small, but FIVE.  (And I kinda want to go quilt Swoon...)

Happy quilting,
Katie