An Idea

 This morning as I was trimming 1/2 square triangles I had an idea.  My green cutting mat, which I've had for many years, is getting very beat up where I do most of the squaring up of blocks.  I've used it with the numbers right side up and reversed.  This morning I thought, I should try turning the mat over and seeing if the blank side is the same material, giving a new cutting surface.  And YEAH!  It was a fresh, good cutting surface.

The funny thing about it was that as soon as I turned the mat over the "new cutting mat odor" rose from the surface.  I was so surprised that it smelled new, just because that side had always been face down on the cutting table.

Yesterday I was able to finish only 6 blocks.  I try to do 8 each day, and sew them together into rows and attach the new rows to the ones already finished.  It was just not a good sewing day.

This quilt is probably the most difficult I've ever made, and that's because it is just chock full of points that have to match exactly.  Because the background is a pretty stark white, any slight discrepancy in a point match shows up.  There are hardly any blocks in this quilt that have not had at least one seam ripped out and resewed.  Many intersections have been redone three times, some four, and one memorable one was redone six times!  I am really, really sick of ripping out and redoing.

But as you see in the photo, I'm nearly finished with the last panel.  I have just two and a half more rows of four blocks each and then this panel is complete.  The making of the three layer "sandwich" and machine quilting don't take all that long.  I would really like to finish this before I leave for Arizona on the 18th of this month.  But I will quit working on it after next Tuesday's quilt club meeting.