What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

I hope everyone has recovered from their Christmas! It was easy for me to recover from mine. We ended up doing nothing. Nope, we did not watch a movie. I won't go into details, but working out the details of the movie (at home, no less) became a production, so I decided to read instead. 

I learned years ago to expect little at Christmas time—I don't mean that in a negative way. But the more pomp and planning, the more likely someone will be disappointed. So, if you have no expectations, you are NEVER disappointed. And that ...

Someone mentioned where my feet are located on the floor, and that is a good point. They both need to be firmly on the floor, not twisted on the chair leg and have no crossed legs or ankles. I don't know that BOTH of my feet are always flat on the floor, but I'll be more aware of that. I'm still trying to learn all the things I can and cannot do and to avoid pain. 

And YES- I will follow up with my doctor next week to see what else can be done. Thanks for all ...

 Are you moving during the day? I confess I did something I hadn't done for a long time yesterday: I read almost an entire book in one day. However, I can no longer sit in a comfy chair for long with this silly leg issue. By comfy, I mean the chairs in our living room. Even stretched out, they don't work. Although I sat there long enough to attract the girls, and they put on a show for me. 

MOM - can you see us?

It's all how you look at it! I never considered getting up and down from my sewing machine as a squat. But it's a SQUAT! I'll take it! Elle mentioned that she works inefficiently in her sewing space, and so do I. We all need to keep moving, or you'll end up like my Mom. She can't move, because she didn't move! I need to move - if I don't, my body is going to seize up, and I'll be in worse shape than I am. 

But I love this little command station ...

When I left last week, my desk was pretty clear. Now, it looks like a disaster. It's not even old paper - it's new stuff that landed on my desk that I must deal with. There are even two piles on the floor. ACK!!! OK - some of it is older stuff I found as I'm clearing the class folder I took to the retreat. We had Monday sewing yesterday, so there was no time to deal with it, but this morning, I plan to attack this paper and get it off the desk. 

Some of it is stuff ...

Well, this is my first blog on the new computer. All is good—I'm connected to the Wi-Fi at the retreat house. What is impressive—well, not really—is that everything is FAST!!! My goal will be to keep the crap out of the memory and the storage to keep it fast! 

By the way, we are at the Springhouse Retreat in New Hamburg. It's a great place to sew! I got a chuckle when I went to bed. Some people have mentioned that my bedroom is cold, so imagine my surprise when I saw winter-themed flannel sheets ...

LOL—I'll have to get Elle to write a list of her suggestions and post them on the blog! She's almost as popular as I am! Maybe we should ask her questions. Perhaps we can get her to give us her TOP TEN decluttering tips! 

I have two questions. By the way, she worked full-time in the medical field for many years, so she wasn't sitting at home figuring out what to declutter next. 

1. Did she ever have clutter? And what about her SO? 
2. If so, when did the lightbulb go off for her? 

There is nothing to report about progress in the office except that I did deal with a few things sitting on the floor beside my chair. I must get that pile dealt with before I dig into one of the containers on either the filing cabinet or the desk. I'm excited to tackle one, but I had three Zooms yesterday and two today, and there was a wee bit of prep involved. 

All the homework except one email is done, and the two presentations are ready today. Yep -- I'm trying very hard to keep on top of things ...

Thanks for all those fantastic comments and suggestions!! I guess I could safely say that the art of decluttering has now become a daily routine in my life! I'm excited about that, but I'd rather spend the time sewing. However, the new "clean" house makes me want to do more, so getting rid of the junk is very positive. 

I had some work to do in the office, and I actually had an OPEN flat surface upon which to do that work. The surface is nice and clear this morning, but it was a euphoric moment to know ...

I thought about the stride thing yesterday with my KMs, and it's NOT the stride. I did measure that way back when I got a FitBit. I tried to verify it last night, but do you think I could find that in the app? Nope! 

The big issue is the translation from my FitBit records to the data on the Virtual Challenge site. It's sporadic, and I have no idea what's happening, but have a look and see what I mean. 

The data from the Virtual Challenge website for the last two days

For comparison, my FitBit ...

Good progress was made yesterday with the presentations and the sewing! Yeah! It will be a busy day again today, but I think I might just make it! It was an interesting day as I snapped pictures and put them in the presentation. Then, I received pictures from people that needed to be added to the presentations. I hope I got them all in the correct place! If not - well, we can laugh about it. 

OK—you have to check out this video! When I was at Golden Peak Media Studios to film a couple of Fons and Porter's ...

I am still a slug! Every day is better, but that energy level is still missing. All that travel and carting stuff around took a toll on me. A few more days, I suspect, and I'll be as good as new. I'm much better than earlier in the week, so progress is going forward, which is a good sign. 

As for DH -- let's just say that he has a new appreciation for what surgery means. I swear he thought he would be incapacitated for the remainder of the day he had his surgery, and then he could ...

I must start going to bed earlier (at my usual time) instead of later because my body wants 8 hours of sleep. So I'm losing my two productive morning hours because I'm going to bed later and getting up after 8 hours! I will say that when I go to sleep, I'm out like a light, and I have never slept so well! 

I had two big adventures yesterday, which didn't allow me to touch much in Studio B. I had to move stuff off a table so we could work, but it still looks like ...

You could go down a rabbit hole discussing operating systems. Between iOS, Android, and Windows, I suspect those three cover a considerable part of the market. What is surprising is who owns those companies! It's mind-boggling how large some of these companies are. Did you know that Google owns Android? They bought them in 2005! And they have purchased many other companies as well—we just don't know that because they keep the original name. 

Oh, I remember a conversation about who owns Tim Hortons! Check it out—it's a tangled web. They are NOT 100% Canadian-owned ...

 About decluttering: Once you get the bug, you will NEVER want to return to your old ways. The surprising thing is that it takes much less time to stay organized than it does to be messy. If everything has a home, it's easy to put stuff away, and there are no decisions to make. You could do it while talking on the phone! 

I wanted to add a couple of things that I thought of yesterday. 

1. If you take something out to look at it or work on it, try to finish it (OK—that's hard) and then ...

And just like that - the quiet and calm is shattered in a million pieces, just like my patio tabletop!

I was doing so well until I received two emails announcing two short (2-hour) events near me. With travel time, each event will consume a lot more time. I don't need to attend these events, but I want to. OH—and they are both this week when I'm supposed to be prepping for a couple of events and my blog posts. 

I signed up for both events, meaning I will have to forego the leisurely tea on the front ...

 Let's start with the classes before I get lost in my thoughts!!! 

There are TWO more classes at The Hobby Horse, so I will post that link again. There are the October to June monthly one-hour lectures on finishing your quilt. There is so much to share in that! And there are FOUR in-person sessions—two of them are on machine quilting, and two of them are demos on various topics. Angie and I will be doing those two sessions as a team. It will be super fun, a chance for you to get out of the house and ...

One final word on doing things alone. It's not that I don't have friends - I have friends and acquaintances I could call on to do some things. It's not that I couldn't drag DH along, but here's the thing. We need to learn to live with ourselves and FOR ourselves. When we are alone - how do we handle a crisis? How do we handle the good times when we have no one to share our victories with? How do we handle the mundane things that happen every day? If we don't know how to ...

Thanks for the comments! Yes --- other crazy people like me love scraps. Most people love scraps to some degree, but the definition of scraps to some people kills me. It still blows my mind, and let's face it, people have no patience, so they toss what they don't want. NO - give it to us scrap users! There's a good story coming about some scraps. I got a note yesterday, and I'm unsure how to respond. I must look at that later today. And then I can tell you the story!

It makes me laugh, but as ...

I'm going to confess right up front- this will not be a pretty blog post. 

I'm having one of those days—a pity day, perhaps, but I'm so frustrated that I feel like throwing in the towel, ditching all the technology and people. Curling up in a chair and reading—not just for today but forever—is tempting! I told you it wasn't going to be pretty!

OK, I feel better having written my frustrations out and then deleted it! 

I feel that there is too much of everything in this world, and people are trying ...