Pefect weather for binding...

Twenty-eight degrees and falling to four tonight. Eight inches of wet, heavy, crusty snow on the ground. Good day to stay inside, drink hot chocolate with steamed milk, and sew. And sew. And sew.

Guess what I'm doing all day? Sewing? How'd you know?

I really don't have the attention span for this.

Thanks so much for all the encouragement and helpful comments. It's moving slightly faster -- I rounded my second corner this afternoon. Hardly the home stretch, but I'm getting there.

I still don't think there's a chance in hell I'm going to finish this by the time I leave town. Worst case scenario, it gets wrapped up as is and Mom and I can finish it next week, though I'm not so sure just how enthused she'll be to have to finish her own Christmas gift.

Now that I have more than just a small section to look at, I absolutely love the way it looks! I used a two and a quarter-inch strip to start, so the binding is nice and narrow. I'm a sucker for the stripes, and the hand finishing was definitely the way to go here.


And in an effort to multi-task...here's the Malibu Monkeys quilt in its entirety, fresh from the dryer. It's a little more haphazard than I'd originally envisioned it would be, but this is what happens when you have neither a plan nor enough blue blocks. I think my Monkey Girl is going to love it no matter what.

I really wanted it to be the right size so the back was a seamless landscape of monkeys and beach. It fit perfectly, finishing at about 40" x 50".

No, it's not your eyes --the lighting here is frighteningly yellow.

All right, enough messing around on the blog -- there's sewing to be done!