Getting Ready for the New Year!

I have a lot on my list of things to do for the new year! First though, I wanted to do a book review...a rare thing for me to do!!! I recently purchased "Thread Work Unraveled" by Sarah Ann Smith.
I don't buy very many books. Most of the time I am disappointed in them and feel like I wasted my money. This book arrived last week. I figured a book is always something that one can read and then pass on to others when they turn out to be less than expected. I was already wondering who I would send this one to!

I expected this book to be primarily about thread painting. Boy was I wrong! I was tickled to see what all was covered in it!

There was info about threads, machines, needles, techniques, and MORE! All this information was right there at my fingertips! I don't have to be tied to the computer to read up on them. I knew a lot of these things but never can remember them when I need to. Now I have, what I consider to be, a terrific reference book! I will be able to take a quick look to see what it was I needed for such and such a technique, and I won't have to surf the web and waste time at my computer! Besides, I always get distracted at the computer and take too much time away from my sewing.

I really liked one of the quilts featured in this book. It was the one with the trees and fence in a wintry setting. I was also inspired by one of the fancy stitch ideas she shows in the book and will be using it on one of the next blocks I do for my U is for Unicorn quilt. There is a lot of thread work and appliqué on that quilt and there are several ideas in Ms Smith's book that will be tried out!

I am VERY impressed with this book and definitely will NOT be passing it onto anyone! It is MINE MINE MINE! lol I understand the author plans to do a companion book to this one. I won't hesitate to add it to my small but VERY selective library of quilting must-haves!

In other news, I've been beating myself up today. I USED to own a Q-Snap floor frame, a Grace floor frame, and a Grace hoop/floor frame. I kept the Jasmine Heirloom frame out of the four, when we moved, thinking it was the best one I had, even though I had never actually used it. I had tried the other three. There were things I did and didn't like about each.

Today I started trying to load the hexagon quilt onto the Jasmine frame. Ick, ick, ick, I hate this frame!!!!!! I am pretty sure I will be quilting this humongous quilt in my biggest hoop, in my lap. I just can't justify buying one of the other frames right now, though I AM leaning towards the Q-Snap again. lol

Here is the start of loading the hexagon quilt in the Jasmine frame:

I am still hand-quilting the little hexagon table runner. That is my warm up exercise for the big one! My ten yards of Moda muslin is expected to arrive at any moment, via UPS. I will then start cutting squares for the Cathedral Window Quilt. I am all ready for the quilt guild meeting on the 11th too. Phew! I think I need a nap!!!