City Tracks Quilt

The City Tracks quilt is coming along.  I laid it out yesterday and man alive it's bright.  Much brighter than I anticipated.  Don't know why really - especially since I have a coat in the same color which I love.  Perhaps it's a scale thing.  My coat does not take up as much real estate on the living room floor.  Yes, I vacuumed first - grudgingly.

I like the layout.  I walked around it.  Squinted my eyes looking for color gaps.  Looked at it upside down and sideways.  I walked away and revisited it again.  Did I tell you how bright it is?  Once I settle on the layout I use little bits of painters tape to label the columns with a little arrow indicating which way is up.  I have screwed up the piece directions in the past.  This is followed by long sessions ripping out seams, muttering under my breath the entire time.  Best not to repeat that fabulous experience if it can be avoided.  Just sayin'.

It's trimming time.  No matter how carefully I cut the original pieces or stitch them together I need to true them back up before I run them into long rows.  I made a quilt for the Kidlet's birthday recently and didn't trim.  What a big mistake.  Nothing matched up - no nice seams coming together (wait for it) seamlessly.  By my original calculations it should have worked out perfectly.  D'oh!  I did figure out a solution but it resulted in a different quilt than what I originally had in mind.  Still all good, just different.  The Kidlet said he liked it and it matches his sheets at school.  Whew!

The City Tracks quilt is designed to result in 6.5" pieced blocks.  I wished I had cut my strips a smidge larger so I would have room to trim.   I am now trimming to 6" which will result in 5.5" finished blocks (see above paragraph).

I have my fingers crossed that there will be a finished quilt top by the end of the weekend.  In the back of my mind though, I know I am completely delusional.  It always takes longer than anticipated. 

Changing topics.  The snow 'event' turned out to be a non-event.  Great news really - at least in the Seattle area.  A couple inches of snow, no wind storm, no thundersnow (bummer).  Once the snow finished falling, a blast of cold air came through and it has been really cold (from a Seattle perspective anyway) for the last couple of days. 

I have my fingers crossed that all those new shoots and flowers I photographed last week have not been nipped by the cold.