Step 5 Crushed!

From Step 5 Blocks

The temperature's dive turned out to be a winning situation for everyone in my family: my husband went off to his poker game without a twinge of guilt, the kids wrapped in blankets and watched a movie on the couch by the fire, and I fired up my sewing machine for a marathon of Orange Crush.

Thursday the Wanna Bees helped me choose which greens to use for the center of my album blocks, and Lene even added a perfect piece from her own stash (see the center of the block on the bottom right, the swirly lime green? Thanks Lene!) After getting the Step 5 pieces cut out at bee, I was ready to sew these last blocks.

So I tuned in to my boyfriend, Chris (Meloni...Law & Order: SVU...are you paying attention?). My friend, TiVo, had taped a marathon, so I was good for a few hours. Not only did I get all of Step 5 done, including those &%^$ half and quarter album blocks (I had to go back and rip out 4 of those half split four patches AGAIN!!!), but I also got a nice bit of sewing the blocks together done. I cannot wait to post the pictures of that and show you when I'm done.

It does look a bit...busy. To put it gently. It is starting to calm down now that the blocks are going together, but when I first laid out the whole quilt I almost cried. It was so loud. I really wondered if Gracie would ever be able to sleep under it. Hopefully some solid borders will give the eye a place to rest, because right now it looks like it could be used in a double blind study on epilepsy. Seriously, MarioKart for the Wii poses less danger to people with seizure disorders than this quilt! I am VERY concerned.

I am starting to think of names. I'm not sure I want to just call it Orange Crush, partly because my orange isn't really reading that way. I'd like to incorporate some of the mystery and/or something significant to my daughter in the title. The orange is reading very much like flames and she was actually due on July 4, so I had considered something like "Firecracker". Let me know if you come up with any brilliant ideas.

Please consider spending at least some of your time on Monday working on those charity projects as part of the National Day of Service. I thought this was a great suggestion by Cheri Sullivan. And if you have a blog, help spread the word!

So I'm going to get back to sewing, but I hope you all have a great long weekend and stay warm.