Balancing the weight (and fabrics)

This is it - I've lost 40 pounds! My goal now is to just be healthy. I love playing football, so I'll continue that in the fall. I need to get back into swing dancing too. And I'll stick to the gym - I get pretty sore from some of the classes that I take there and that means it's working.

Here is my official "fat pants" picture. These pants went off to charity, along with the 10 other bags of clothes that I out-shrunk, to be put to good use. I don't need them anymore, and I don't really desire a reminder on the top shelf of my closet of the size that I was.

In exchange for all of these clothes and shoes in the boxes/bags above, I've probably spent $200 at the outlet mall on some basic essentials. Even more exciting than that, my quilting coworker gave me a drawer full of fabric that I can sew with! Yes, Mom, that's my dresser, but I don't really utilize the bottom drawer because my closet is so huge. Now I have scraps, I might make a pair of Disney Cars shorts, and I can practice my free hand quilting! (Once I get a free motion quilting foot. I'll get there soon!)

Yee-haw! It has been over a year since I moved to Texas. Last summer was a "record breaker" where there were over 40 days of 100+ degree heat. I've heard the words "record-breaking weather" far too much this year too! Yesterday, it got up to 105*, and has been the hottest in the state this summer (or so I've heard). Houston beat us by a pinch to get a blurb on cnn.com yesterday. I'm all about being the best, or breaking records, but I'd rather not be reminded of the heat when it's right outside. Remind me in December when it's below 0* at my parents' house. The heat doesn't bother me too much - I like being warm. My only complaint is that there isn't a garage at work. Have you ever tried to breathe in 120* air with a heck of a lot of humidity in it? Not fun. But hey, at least I can quickly dry off my towel that I use after I work out. Happy trails to you... I'll see y'all around the waterin' hole.

My Second Quilt

Sadly, this took me almost a year to make. I started in July of 2008 and finished in May 2009. I am a big procrastinator, and after finishing the baby quilt, I realized I needed to do one project at a time, and start to finish! It matches my dishes too! For the quilting part, I quilted in the ditch around all of the black edges - around the star, around the black & red square, and then in the rectangle that makes up the border.

I also wanted to show you another project I did for the baby. This corkboard was originally gold, but the baby's room is mostly pink & brown. It was an interesting project, and I got two small hot glue gun burns. For next time, I'd invest in a pressurized stapler. (Is that what it's called? With big, heavy-duty staples that will staple wood.)

My First Quilt

Ah, a blog that doesn't crash and lets me upload large pictures!

Here is my first finished quilt that I made for friends that had a girl in May 2009. The picture on the left shows details of the quilting (look for a light pink thread through the middle of the sashing). This was a setting on my maching, which I thought was fitting for this quilt. Mom, Dad, and Baby are all happy and healthy! I tried to teach the baby some sign language last night, but it's hard for a 6-week-old to pay attention!

Testing Out the New Blog...

I thought blogs were silly. I never had one until a co-worker convinced me to join a quilting blog. I realize that I want to share more than my sewing projects on a blog, and I don't want to distract the hard-core quilters with how I went to the annual Austin motorcycle fest or went to San Antonio for the weekend.

So here we are folks, here's my first post. I hope this can help connect my friends and family back in New York to my exciting adventures in Texas (or wherever the airplane takes me!)

I got a new camera - pictures and adventuresome blogging to come!