Saturday, I woke up full of energy and ready to tackle the world! OK, not really. Anyone who knows me, knows that I hate mornings, any morning. Even though I’m grateful that the Good Lord let me wake up – my mother has always told me I should be grateful for that – it’s not my favorite time of day, ever. I can be equally grateful that He lets me go to bed at night …

So the truth is, I stumbled out of bed on Saturday morning at 10:15 … something I haven’t done in ages. My wonderful husband had to leave for work just fifteen minutes later and I had the house to myself – a rarity with two teens and a husband. I sat on the couch for a little while, organizing my thoughts and enjoying my caffeine IV, and considered what I should do for the day. I knew my man wouldn’t be home until around 6ish, so I had virtually all day … and I decided that where I really wanted to be was the studio. I had bought a new charm pack on my last trip to my local, and it was bright and summery … I thought about what a cute lap quilt it would make, with the right “blender” fabric. I just hoped that I had some blender fabric in my stash.

Now, if you don’t know what a “blender” fabric is, let me enlighten you. A blender is simply a fabric that will tie everything else together in your quilt. Some folks call it the “background” fabric, but I don’t see it that way. A good blender will create cohesion in the quilt and make it all work together. Usually, my blender fabrics are marbled fabrics, such as the ones that Moda makes. Moda makes THE best marbles in the industry, in my opinion, and I would happily stack my studio shelves with bolts of this wonderful fabric, if only I had the money to do so. But I digress …

Once in my studio, I opened the charm pack and laid each little square out on my cutting table so I could get a good look at what I had. Ohhh I thought, this is some beautiful fabric. The colors were vibrant – orange, yellow, red, lime green and blue – and I could see them with something equally bright as a blender – yellow or orange, I thought. Black wouldn’t look right … it had to be something bright. I began digging through my stash.

And I came up completely empty handed.

But during the course of my excavation work, I found some wonderful nautical themed fabric. So once I was resigned to the fact that I had nothing to go with my charms, I decided to work on something nautical. But again, I was missing a blender. Darn, I thought … what now?

A little more digging found some strips I had sewn together while making my niece a quilt several years ago. It was a nine patch quilt made of 30s reproduction fabrics … Great, I thought, I can make another repro quilt and maybe give it away on the blog. But I was missing white fabric for the big squares!

By this time, two hours had passed and I was getting hungry, not to mention that I was pretty irritated that every single project I had started was missing key fabrics! These are things I should always have on hand, I thought. What is wrong with me?!

I’m pretty sure I’m going to have some more free time on my hands this weekend, when I’ll have time to spend in my studio. But unlike last weekend, I’ll be prepared. I’ve already made one quick stop at my local, where I purchased a yard each of orange and black marbles. You can bet that I’m not quite finished yet … I fully intend to get my hands on some white cotton that I can use to embroider for my 30s reproduction quilt. So watch this page … there may be a giveaway in it’s future!