Every Quilter has a Bad Day

With my customer's permission, I'm posting her e-mail message to me:

I have a quilt top (small ~ 40x40) that I'd like to get to you at the guild mtg. It's my quilt from hell and I'm not sure if you want to quilt it.

First off....I love the material -- Katherine's [another guild member] hand-dyed fabrics, and I love the pattern -- Roxanne Carter's "Stars on Parade" but absolutely EVERYTHING that could have gone wrong DID.

I got my first 2 blocks made in the class then put everything away. When I was moving to Susanville, I was going through fabric and cleaning out (throwing out) stuff. Ran across the blocks and pieces (all in individual baggies) and said, "I think I'll keep this and complete it." Didn't happen in Susanville so I moved it to Sac. A couple months ago I was rummaging through my stuff and pulled out the "parts" and said, "I'm going to finish this!"

Well, I start working to complete block #3 and think it's looking a little different than the first two. Of course, the first two were sewn on my old machine and I had the wrong 1/4" marking. So I said, "no problem, I'll just use those two blocks for pillows or something," and continued sewing with the CORRECT seam allowance on the next blocks.

As I'm into block #5, I start thinking I'm missing some pieces. Originally I had pulled out the pieces for the first four blocks and pinned them altogether, but apparently I had thrown out a baggie full of an entire set of cut pieces when I was clearing stuff out in Quincy. In fact I can remember seeing the baggie and thinking, "what's this?" and I must have chucked it. But, I had some larger pieces (triangles) that I could cut down so I figured I'd do that and just end up with fewer blocks. No problem.

Then I get to block #7 and the dyes in the fabric start to bleed. NO problem. I'll just wash it with Retayne or whatever once it's all done.

I get the center of the blocks (only nine now due to my having to recut other pieces) done and start to work on the strips around the centers only to find I cut them incorrectly. NO Problem. I can make this happen. A little stretching [eek] here and there and life will be fine.

Then it's time to think about sashing but WAIT, I didn't cut enough sashing when I was cutting the pieces originally and now I have used all the fabric up in other projects! NO PROBLEM! I'll only sash in a couple places. It'll change the design, but this is my quilt, so I like it. Of course, I need to square everything up first and I CAN'T GET ANYTHING SQUARED!!!!

My blocks look like some wild axman has attacked them, but NO PROBLEM!!!! I'll just put the damn thing together, try to make it as square and flat as possible. Match seams? Are you f****** crazy? The HELL with matching seams, or points, or anything else!

And then I say to myself, maybe Dorothy can quilt it so it looks "ok". Maybe???????

...pretty please with fudgy brownies

If she actually shows up with the fudgy brownies, I think I'll give it a go!!!

After asking whether I could post this, she not only agreed but says she's named the quilt "Humility"--no explanation needed.