A finish, another quilt share, and another win!

This weekend I finished my totebag for the totebag swap! Whoohoo! My first quilting finish since jumping back into crafting this summer. I can't say that I like it as well as I was hoping - it didn't work out like the picture I had in my head. It's still pretty cool, though. I made sure to take pictures before wrapping it so I can share after the swap is done. I started a second totebag at the same time - I normally like to make two of each gift-type project so that I always have extra gifts on hand. While that worked well in the past, I've found it's not realistic right now, so will likely finish that second tote in January after all my Christmas projects are done. I can always use a another tote!

Another of the quilts my parents made for me was finally caught by my camera this weekend. (Yes, my parents spoil me!) It's my "I need a hug" quilt that I seek out when I'm sick, homesick, or just having a tough day. It's a twin made from the softest flannel that's just wonderful to cuddle up in. It also has a cool pieced back (which I didn't manage to get a picture of). The twins are heavily into pretend play now, so on this day the quilt had an adventurous afternoon, going from being from a tent (camping) to a castle (knights) to a cave (dinosaurs).

Here's a close-up:

I got more good news this weekend - I won another drawing! Lesly at Pickle Dish drew my name for a set of Quilt Patis templates! You can see the quilt she's making with them here. I had been admiring her diamond quilt, so am very excited to win the templates! The hand-work I've been doing toward my swaps has been a saving grace this fall. I have several points through the week where I have to spend some time waiting for a boy or three, so having a handwork project with me has been wonderful! As I'm also almost done hand quilting my SSCS swap, I was starting to search around for my next hand project. Now I'm set! Whoo hooo! Well, after I spend some time cutting!