Get're Done

My Iditarod musher, Heather Siirtola, has returned to the trail after her mandatory 24-hour rest with a run starting at 4:30 a.m. She just checked into Takotna after running for almost three hours to cover 25 miles. She will now tackle a particularly desolate 90-mile route. She is expected to rest somewhere along the way. She still has 12 dogs in the race. Lance Mackey who has won the Iditarod the last four years, is down to 9 dogs. He is way up at the front. There are 55 mushers left in the race, Heather is in 49th place, about 23 hours behind the race leaders from what I can tell.

I'm trekking along on my Iditaquilt. I've gotten the tricky musher border with an inner and outer navy band around it. It is too big for the design wall so here's a peek.

I spent a lot of time working with EQ7 to think through my final borders. I'm pulling in some mini star blocks and wanted to lessen the number of those to make so I put them on point.

98 x 110

I didn't want to spend too much time making the musher fabric accurate for the mock-up so pretend that part looks like the actual quilt. Notice the large size. I find this is the perfect size for my king size bed. I lose 2 inches each way once it's quilted.

Yesterday the mail lady brought me the thread I ordered for this project. 

I pretty much work with King Tut on the top and Bottom Line in my bobbin. The smaller spools are coordinating Bottom Line. The bigger spools are Morning Sky on the left which is silver with shades of pale lavender and baby blue...I like it! The other is Baby Moses...soft variegated blues...also gorgeous. No idea what my quilting design will look like so I wanted a couple of thread options. I already have darker shades in my stash. I expect I will use two colors.

I ordered an extra wide Tonga for the backing and have it washed and ready to size but just remembered to order bleached batting a few days ago...hope it comes early next week! Local prices for batting are so high I try to order...especially since I now like to double my battings. Found some on sale...a good thing.

I'm very chatty today...avoiding chores I think.

 My prayers for the Japanese. They are very strong people and will handle this tragedy as well as any nation can.