On Board

High marks to Norwegian Cruise Line for their boarding process. 

We were in the lounge, having a drink less than 20 minutes after the taxi dropped us off. (We paid for priority boarding - worth it!)

Not so high marks for actually getting passengers into their rooms. 

After 2 hours of “not ready yet” announcements, we headed to our room anyway, along with at least half the ship. One suitcase was waiting but the other took another 2 hours to appear. 

We wandered a bit, trying to get our bearings - 

this ship, with 20 decks, is huge! - 

before heading to the Commodore Lounge for a very good dinner 

and a window seat view of our departure at tug level. 

Travel Day

I waited to post this until we were safely arrived, but despite rush hour backups in LA,

our travel day went smooth as silk. Since this is our Big Anniversary Trip, we booked D-elta One flights which gave us access to a greeting team at LAX (no standing in line waiting to check in, plus they have their own security lane) 

LAX lounge

and first class lounges in LA 

 Late night snack at JFK

and JFK (food! drink! showers! comfy padded chairs!)

 Seated together from LAX to JFK…

Both 5+ hour flights were a bit bumpy 

 … seated apart from JFK to Reykjavík 

but who cares when you can eat dinner (surprisingly good food) 

then stretch out full-length and sleep until arrival time. 

Oh, no big deal but I saw the northern lights from the plane… (It’s a Big! Deal!! Whoo!)

 Main downtown shopping area, where our hotel is located. Colorful, funky buildings galore!

Baggage claim took longer than Immigration and Customs combined but 2-ish hours after arrival, 

 A present for Donovan! If we could get it on the plane…

we were in our hotel in downtown Reykjavik and ready for… breakfast? lunch?? 

Rainbow Road, or Skólavörðustígur in Icelandic. Runs between Hallgrímskirkja, the famous church,  and Laugavegur, the main shopping area where our hotel is located.

Since it was noon local time, we went with excellent fish and chips. 

  Hallgrímskirkja Lutheran Church, 244 feet tall, took 41 years to build

Two hours of sightseeing, walking through the downtown area, 

 

and we were ready for sleep well before we gave in at 6:30 pm local time.

 Leif Ericsson statue in front of Hallgrímskirkja Church

(Although Jaclyn and I had a very nice text chat about midnight - 7 pm for her. She wanted us to take her to the beach… sure Jac, as soon as we get back. 😂😂)

 

Today we board the Norwegian Prima for 10 days visiting Iceland, Norway, Amsterdam, and Bruges. So excited.

 Inscription of Leif Ericsson statue

 Reykjavik harbor, with the Sun Voyager to the left and our cruise ship in the background

The Sun Voyager, steel sculpture of a dream boat and an ode to the sun. Beautiful

Sew A Jelly Roll Day

Well, technically it was Jelly Roll Weekend but look what I finished!!

Since I was pressed (ha!) for time, I’d pre cut* (another ha!) all my pieces so that when 12:01 am Friday rolled around I could start sewing. 

I also picked a quick, easy pattern (here). My pals picked things that were more time consuming- 

Debbie is making Christmas trees

and Reyna has the cutest polka dot cats. Maybe next year I’ll up my game (although last year I did a complicated one…)

On the design wall, with half the column seams sewn

I thought this was going to be a charity quilt but… despite Jac telling me how ugly each color was (she has OPINIONS 😂), I kinda like it. It may live here or become a gift… time will tell.

* Note to self: jelly roll bars cut at 2.5 x 6”, top piece cut at 4.5 x 2.5”.

Flag Quilt #1

This sat for a week, just needing the borders attached. Thank goodness for deadlines or I might never have finished it. I do love a good procrastination…

56 x 62”

Of the two flags, this is my fav - almost entirely because it has more of the blue and gold sparkly blocks. They add a little something special (although nobody but me would probably notice.). 

This is headed to my longarmer pal tomorrow, along with Wheels of Fortune 

 42 x 42”

and Carolina Stars. 

 37 x 37”

I’ll have some nice finished quilts to look forward to when we get back from our cruise.

Testing, Testing

National Jelly Roll Sew Day is coming! 

Pretty colors in oh so not straight rows

A couple of pals and I are going to celebrate by using a jelly roll (a group of 42 2.5” wide by 43” long fabric strips) from our stash and whatever pattern catches our fancy to each make a quilt. Anybody want to join us?

The actual “holiday” is September 21, but since that’s my wedding anniversary (and hubby might not see the humor in my sewing all day…and night…) we’ve decided to spread the jelly roll party from Friday through Sunday. 

Picture from Pinterest

I wanted to make Tangled (above) but don’t think I have the time or brain power to do it justice (we’re leaving on an 11 day cruise the following week… and guess who hasn’t started packing yet…), so I’m doing my version of a ‘brick’ quilt based on a photo from Pinterest (no pattern listed.)

To be sure this will work (and that I did the math right), I sorted the strips by value and sewed a couple of test blocks. 

Looks good! 

Flag Quilt

The second flag quilt top is done. It got finished first since I want to take it to donate on Thursday. 

The original pattern didn’t have any outer borders but I think it looks more finished this way. And I really love gold framing on anything red, white and blue. 

Next step is someone in the guild with a long arm will quilt it, then another volunteer will attach the binding and label.   

 49 x 63”

Community Projects said recently that they are low on patriotic quilts, so hopefully this and Mighty Stars will both get new homes quickly. 

Done-ish

One done(ish).

I’m planning to add a thin stripe of gold as the inner border, then a 3”-ish, probably blue, outer border. 

Turns out I did not have enough squares cut for the second quilt (counting, not my strongest skill apparently…)

so I didn’t get as far on it as I’d hoped. 

Plus my shoulder is getting (really, really) annoyed again, so after these are done looks like I’ll be taking a quilty break. Color me as annoyed as my shoulder. 😒

Truly Scrappy

It took me most of today to organize, iron, cut and lay out my red scraps, but it was so worth it. 

I’d planned to use a red, white and blue 32 piece fat quarter bundle I inherited from a friend, but I’ve only had to use 2 or 3 pieces of it so far. I was actually surprised at how many red scrap fabrics I had. 

The columns for the bottom section of quilt #1 are sewn. The remaining top third won’t take long to put together (did I just jinx myself??). And the second quilt should be a breeze since all the pieces are already cut and ready to go. Whoo! So, what should I use that bundle for?

I’m thinking this ⬆️ might be fun… or this ⬇️ ? 

I ❤️❤️❤️ the mouse so much. 

On Schedule

Despite having to rip and fix* one of the center stars (good grief…)

I finished the blue sections tonight, roughly a quarter of each quilt. 

The color is way off on these pix

Planning to cut a million or so red and white squares** tomorrow and start working on the stripes. It’s too hot to go outside, so I might as well sew… like I wasn’t planning to sew anyway. 😂 (it was 103° today and may be hotter tomorrow. Yuck!)

23 x23” blocks

*This is why I take pictures of each section before I move on. I didn’t notice the goof until I looked at the photo - then it was super obvious. Wonder why that is… just my brain or does it happen to everyone?

** note to self: 45 red, 38 white for each quilt. 90/76 total.