I think I've found my Silver Lining..

so things are looking up.

no, i haven't started my pink & green Winding Ways quilt yet, but all the fabric is washed and ironed. I just can't justify cutting it and starting the project I know will consume me fully when Costas is still here. I want to give him my attention for 10 more days, and after he is safely on the plane to Athens, then i will take over the house with quilting, hehe.

but, the past 3 days have held two sweet surprizes..
First, i was invited out to pick fiddleheads with Makiba and Keiko, near Keiko's home in Pembroke, MA. I knew it would be quite a drive (almost an hour) so I figured I might as well try to combine it with a quilt shop visit, if there was one close by. Sure enough, Tumbleweed Quilts was 5 minutes down the road from her house, and I had just enough time to stop in and browse. Oh. My. I was sooo happy, so comforted, so, relieved that a real quilt shop actually existed within an hours radius from my home. The clerk was nice and their fabric selection, while it leans more towards "folkish," was still huge compared to the other shops i've been in around here. I will go again. I felt bad that I had nothing I "needed" to buy, so i got a spool of pale green hand quilting thread for $4.25 (on sale, man i missed quilt shops, hehe) and promised to be back again soon.

*content sigh*

The next sweet surprize, and the Silver lining, as I'll call it, to my cloudy dreary quilting experience here so far is....
the Silver City Quilt Guild. They just started up 3 months ago, and it's big already, 60+ members, but they meet close by, just 10 minutes from home and not far off the highway at all. I heard about them from the women I saw with at the Bayside Guild meeting two weeks ago. (the Bayside mtg, btw, was disapointing again, the atmosphere there is just too.. cold.) The room was set up so that we were kind of sitting in a horseshoe, and we could see each other. I was only younger than the youngest member by maybe 3-5 years, and not the usual 20+ years, like the other guild. yay. nice young active quilters. Of course their membership dues are $30/year, which i paid because i was so happy to have people express interest in the Quilts Japan issue I had brought with me, and actually engage me in conversation in a variety of topics. One woman was even handquilting at the meeting. how promising. Next month they're having a bag auction--- make a bag (any type) and they will auction it off for a fundraiser. They're already talking about having a quilt show next spring.
The best part, I left the meeting 1) smiling, 2) hopeful, and most importantly 3) inspired.
I hope this lasts.