Catholic Guilt

I can't imagine how long it will take me to shake the guilt of living a joyful life that I learned in my religion of my upbringing.

Labor Day
For the entire weekend (for non-U.S. folks, we had a three day holiday weekend) the weather was nothing short of perfect where I live, and the entire time, I couldn't help but feel guilty enjoying such fortune, over the folks suffering in the Mississippi Gulf area.

Susan did bring up a good point in her comment, and that was to encourage donating to hurricane relief efforts.

In the past, I collected funds for charity through this blog, and then realized as I was writing a check for the donor organization, that all the folks that contributed wouldn't have the tax benefits of contributing...I would. I decided at that point to just encourage folks to donate themselves.

I didn't think it was necessary to encourage folks about donating to this cause, because the horror of the situation seemed to make it obvious.

Current Knitting
I did some additional work on the Vineyard Throw (I'm up to row 20 out of about 100 on the second row of color blocks).

I'll post a progress picture in my next post.

I'm thinking that the current color combination is very off-balance, but I'm also thinking that the third row of color blocks will fix this.

Quilting
I'm making what I would consider to be incredible progress on the quilt. I added six more nine-patches.



Now it's 92 inches long and about 62 inches wide, and it's getting very difficult to photograph. Just 20 more inches of width, and I'll be deciding on how to border this masterpiece.

I am quite amazed at how much progress I can make on a quilt compared to the kind of progress I make on knitted projects. I didn't realize that a quilt could move along so quickly, and it's very satisfying.

I have also gotten more and more efficient at cutting, sewing and pressing, so that the quilting process is getting even faster. I keep thinking that if I was a member of the QuiltList (or whatever the KnitList equivalent is), there would be dozens of tips that folks could provide to make my work more and more efficient. I just can't stand the thought of being a beginner on a fiber list.

Readers' Comments/Questions
Kathy asks, "Don't you love visiting happy Lizaland and rummaging through the shelves upon shelves of gorgeous color? And gazing at my Benoit monuments and shrines?"

I am truly one of the fortunate people that Liza allows into her home/business to browse and shop for fabrics. Folks can't imagine how amazing it is to be surrounded by bolts and bolts of the most amazing colors and patterns.

As for Benoit, I think Liza has removed all evidence that you were ever there. The world is better off.