last december my dear friend melinda at quirkygranolagirl moved from wisconsin to washington dc. this made our usual meetup place in lacrosse, wi rather unpractical, which is sad... but means that last weekend i got to go out to dc to visit her!
we were so busy crafting and chatting and having a wonderful time that this is the only photo we managed to take together!
the crafty goal for the weekend was to get me to finish my little apples quilt, i'm sure you remember... the quilt i started, ahem, a year ago october when melinda and i were in lacrosse, and then haven't looked at since... yeah, that quilt.
melinda was dead set that i was going to take a finished quilt back with me to minnesota and therefore took it upon herself to do a lot of the work for me (some of it had to do with her being a good, accurate, quick sewist while i am a sloppy, crappy, slow sewist, but mostly it was because she is amazing and talented and generous and helpful.)
here she is putting the back together for me while i sit like a weasel and crochet... yes, i felt very spoiled, selfish, and lazy... but also rather happy to just let her do whatever she wanted!
she showed me how to baste and then left me to it. (i was good at pinning, since it doesn't require the accuracy of sewing straight lines!)
after a demonstration i was also able to mark out my quilting lines and then did almost all of the quilting myself!
i made sure to get melinda to take a photo of me at the sewing machine so there was proof that i actually did some work!
with a great burst of determination (and lack of sleep) we (and by "we" i mean mostly melinda) got the quilt 98% finished before i left! i just have a little hand stitching to do on the binding and it's done!! i would like to publicly promise melinda that all her hard work was not in vain and i will have the stitching done by the end of THIS weekend!!
while the crafting was the major focus of our meetup, we also took some time to go and play tourist in downtown dc with her wonderful family!
some of my very favorite moments of the trip were spent in the back seat of their car singing "if i had a million dollars" with henry.
thank you so much melinda for all your help and encouragement (there was a moment when i attempted to pout so i wouldn't have to reload the bobbin myself and melinda just looked at me and said, "are you trying to pout at me?!? go load the bobbin!") and your humor and kindness and friendship!
i had a wonderful visit, i hope we can do it again soon!!
-melissa
Glad you managed to meet up with Melinda. I can't wait to see a photo of your finished quilt!
Posted by: josiekitten | November 10, 2013 at 10:53 AM
Your quilt is looking very lovely! Sounds like a great time was had! ROs
Posted by: snoopydog | November 10, 2013 at 02:29 PM
oh it sounds like an absolutely ideal and wonderful and perfect meetup! so so glad you two were able to get together! love to you both!
Posted by: claire | November 11, 2013 at 02:19 PM
Looks like an awesome visit! You are a cute weasel.
And Melinda is hilarious. I forsee quoting her "are you trying to pout at me?!" a lot.
Posted by: Lindsey | November 12, 2013 at 09:27 AM
Sounds like an awesome time!! What fun!
Posted by: Charlotte | November 15, 2013 at 03:48 AM
you are not a sloppy, crappy or slow sewist. i probably was a control freak. or i didn't want to flounder with counting my knitting when i could work on finishing your quilt and chat at the same time with more ease. i'm so happy that you and Henry could bond over music and that you got the chance to meet Ben and see where we live now. i have so much more to show you here but i think we hit some of the high points. thanks for tolerating the tour of my stash and for taking some home. why did i feel the need to drag it all out? i'm a dork. but i'm a dork that lives with boys and knows barely any knitters, so you caught the brunt of my neuroses. i know that you finished the quilt but i skipped past that post so i could go in writing order (dork) so i have to rush off and read that. xoxo, come and visit again soon!
Posted by: melinda | November 17, 2013 at 11:46 PM
This is great in every way.
I'm so happy for you that it worked out (perfectly) you got to go visit her...
Also that you called yourself a "weasel".
Weasels are crafty too!
Posted by: blair | November 22, 2013 at 11:09 AM