binding

The extra half day off work didn't make me much more productive.  It did allow time to make a cheesecake without being frantic, so there's that.

Friday I wanted to take it easy, but the hubby wanted his crew to have tacos for lunch, so guess what I did Friday?

Finally Saturday I had some time to myself and I got busy with quilty stuff!  I sewed bindings on all three of the quilts I quilted last week and then sat down...

...and bound the baby quilt.

(You can see I had some help...Salem is so perfect...)

It was a curl up under a quilt and bind another quilt kind of day (Mother Nature let us have it with snow this weekend...okay, okay, it was only a couple of inches, but still the first we've had all season), so you see two quilts in the photo above.  The pink roses is the back of the baby quilt.  All else is my Easy Addition quilt.

I still have to make and attach a label -  I think that will be the first project today, once I get done with all the chores (almost there, but it's taking forever), so I can send it on its way soon.  The baby is due soon, so I'd better get it done fast!

In other news, I mentioned a shark pet bed last week when showing you Toby's new octopus bed.  It turned up at the store this week and is nowhere near as cute as the octopus, so it didn't come home with me.  (Just as well, my groceries-and-more bill is getting big lately with adding in a few Christmas gifts each week!)

I also finished two books!

The author was born in Russia, but lives in the US now (or at least did last I could figure out).  It is a book of short stories, all of them a little oddball, and a mix of American culture and Russian folklore.  I have a hard time separating the stories from the writing here, so I can't say I really liked the book, but I did enjoy that the author grew up in another culture and brought that into her writing and stories.

Second up:

This author was born in Czechoslovakia and the two novellas in this book are set there.  One of them is the the book title and centers around the instrument.  The second is maybe a love story?  Both are a little different, but the writing (even translated from Czech) was good and I enjoyed the book.  It was a quick read and I again saw a little bit of life from a non-American perspective.

(Side note: I have no recollection of picking up this book - I still wonder if my  hubby was stuffing books in my "full" bags at one of the sales he went to with me since this is the second one of this nature.  Guess I can't complain because I've enjoyed both of the mystery books!)

It's amusing to me that though these were selected entirely randomly from my bookshelf (remember my numbered books and random number draw system for choosing the next book to read?) and are both short story collections and from countries outside the US, but so close to one another otherwise.

The next book is set in the US, written by an American author, which is what the majority of my bookshelf looks like.  But I am trying to branch out, so these last two helped!

Time to go make that quilt label...

Happy quilting!

Katie