My Harry Potter Weekend

Like many many other people, my weekend was all about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. My local library called me at 9:00am Saturday morning to tell me that my reserved copy of the audio CDs had arrived and was waiting for me. Of course I was already a couple of chapters into the book because I had picked it up at 7:00am that morning but I dropped everything and ran out. I was listening by 9:30am. :-) And quilting. First on my list for my HP weekend was machine quilting my dog bed. Below are the results. I think it turned out ok. I had planned on finishing up the dog bed this weekend but to my dismay, I did not have enough wool batting in my stash to work on the bottom piece so I had to put this project aside to wait for more batting to arrive from my online source. This has been the never ending project. I actually started this over two years ago! And in the process have pieced two separate tops (for the first top, I hated the fabric I picked out after I pieced it - too baby quilt looking, all light yellows and peach), quilted a bottom (which matched the first top and was too small for the second top) and have spent a small fortune. I had to order two more king size down/feather pillows for the insert on Friday (but I knew I would have to and I was relived to find out on Friday that four would work and not the six that I had first feared). I think I'm way over $250 for this odd project. :-) I could have purchased both dogs their own top of the line Bowers Bed in what I've spend on this. Oh well, live and learn. And of course I'm still not finished. I have to quilt the bottom in a simple grid pattern and quilt the side panels AND put the whole thing together. At least two more weekends I'm thinking.

When the dog bed top made it into the washer and drier, I moved onto the next project on my list. Finishing the piecing of my matching lap quilt (it's 80" x 80") using the Chocolat fabrics from 3 Sisters/Moda and a pattern from Miss Rosie's. I'm happier with the colors now that it's pieced. I do plan on sending this one out to be quilted. I have too much to get caught up on to quilt this one myself and in any case I'm not that good yet at the style of machine quilting that I want for this quilt.


By the time this was finished it was close to 7:00pm and I was ready to get comfy and stitch. So I picked up my Village and worked on block 3. Above are the results of Saturday and Sunday evening's stitching. I'm almost finished! Just one color thread to go. :-) I listened to HP and stitched to close to 11:00pm. I really wanted to get half way into the book before I stopped for the day so I would be able to get to bed Sunday evening at a decent hour. It's worth mentioning that while I could have completed reading the entire book on Saturday, listening to it took over 21 hours. But I love Jim Dale's interpretation of the HP books and I never really considered experiencing Deathly Hollows for the first time in any other way.

On tap for Sunday was piecing a quilt wall hanging that I have had in my stash for over two years. I went through a period a couple of years ago where I thought I needed to expand my quilting horizons and I purchased a couple of bright batik quilts kits. I have since decided that there is nothing wrong with just working on what appeals to me and this kit just sat on a shelf. These colors are just not me. But they will be perfect for a friend I have who lives in Alaska. She can put this in a dark corner in the winter and brighten everything up. I had planned on machine quilting this also but as I wrote before, I didn't have enough quilt batting. That's too bad as I would like to send it to her sooner than later and I won't work on it again until the dog bed quilt is complete. And who knows when that will be. :-)

Here is my progress on Celtic Heart from M Designs. It looks much better ILR I think.

Now onto my review of Deathly Hallows. Stop reading if you don't want to hear what I have to say. I have mixed feelings about the book. I'm happy with the epilogue - I loved the way JKR tied everything up. But I'm really sad about a couple of deaths that she put in. They just seemed so senseless and didn't advance the story one bit. And with one of the deaths, she didn't even say how it happened! Harry just saw the bodies laying there. That actually made me angry because it just happened to be one of my favorite characters. :-( I just didn't get why she did it. And I was not happy with the Severus Black resolution. I always felt he was on the good side but didn't like how she got there. I'm kinda sad it's all over. And what really struck me as odd was this is the first book that I don't plan on re-reading right away. So I guess it really is all over for me. But my hats off to JKR - she really created something wonderful. I don't think I have laughed and cried and felt so involved with a story as much as these seven books. I look forward to reading what she creates next. If she does...