Tools of the Trade

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A many faceted star from the Red Quilt, 2009.

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Yesterday and Today Himself: Estate sales, lunch, museum, dinner with the Feasters…Lee is failing, is miserable, and has no strength. We are sending prayers and thoughts his way. We are not a young bunch….D too has one lung with fluid, and Jay1 has great difficulty standing now to lock his braces but continues to do life his way. J1 and J2 have now been married 50 years. Wonderful stuff that. Herself: …and the quilt blog too: The only item I found worthy of note at the estate sales yesterday was a chili cookbook…which also has the H. Allen Smith article that started all the chili cook-off’s in it. Good reading. Snipping, polish silver, and dinner with the feasters. My Babylonian Captivity: Do stop in and read Tugster's experience as a human shield. He corrected me by reminding me with a smile that, “ i was captured in kuwait (where i was teaching in the kuwaiti air force) not iran.” Gratitude: Tugster’s correction….you bet.

The Geezer found a Fiscars ‘thingamabub-cutter” at Amvets-Escondido, and he leapt on it. Just like a map cutter, this one cuts fabric using a bar that lowers and stays in place topped with a rolling blade on the bar. It was missing a piece. That didn’t bother him, and he snagged it to bring it home.

The missing cutting surface was very expensive, so there it sat.

I went on being miserable while cutting askew pieces for the new quilt. Then one day at a Hillcrest estate sale, the Geezer found a cutting mat at a very low, very cheap price. He used a utility knife to cut a piece off, pounded it in the empty slot, and presented it to me with a flourish.

I didn’t fully appreciate it….my bored factor and misery quotient with cutting quilt pieces was running high. Days later, bored to death with the cutting process, I tried it. Zip, it cut a 2 1/2 square accurately and easily. Poof…there it was. I didn’t need twenty squares that size, I needed only one, and the machine cut one with ease. Goodness.

So yesterday, while he was off at the Automotive Museum…where there were some decent crowds for a change, I cut little squares. And more little squares out of some of the many hundreds of blue scrap fabrics in those big bins downstairs. Enough big and little squares for two more rows of ten blocks each. My ability to cut quilt pieces had just improved exponentially. My mental condition lightened considerably. I found myself smiling.

Zip….slide that little rolling blade, and one more 2 1/2 inch piece was cut. Zowie!