The temperatures dropped yesterday from the 80s to the 50s in an hour, and tonight we are expecting it to go into the 30s. We have pulled out our Fuzzy Feet and our hot water bottles with their little woolen jackets. It is autumn runner definitely knitting weather, but the wedding gift must be completed before I surrender to the siren call of wool.

The wedding present in question is a table runner in the “Stripe it Your Way” collection of fabrics from Textile Creations. I am basing it on a pattern from Creepy Crafty Halloween, not that anyone will be able to guess that when I finish, and adapting a motif from Laurel Burch Quilts. It is not that I expect any of you to want to recreate this piece, but I know that I always want to know that stuff when I read about other people’s projects.

end motif I’ve reached the point with the table runner where I’m not sure which way to go. Early piecing is sort of the adolescence of quilts, at least for my quilts. They do not look their best, and it is hard to imagine just how they will look once they have their batting and backing and quilting and binding.

The pattern I’ve based it on (the one up there with the pumpkins) uses two appliques, one at either end of the runner.

However, the shininess and brightness of the fabrics I’ve chosen for the wedding present version and the size and elaborate nature of the applique motifs are making me wonder whether it might not be better in this case to use just one in the center.There is still embroidery as well. I don’t want to over-egg the pudding and move from festive profusion to excess.

I am bearing in mind that the recipient wears shiny pink shoes, and trying not to retreat from the whole shininess and pinkness situation. I am trying also not to be pressured by time concerns into choosing the quicker option if it is not also the better option. After all, I have broken the process down into steps and written them into my planner for all the available days between now and the wedding, and I know that I will be able to finish, as long as I skip the gym and don’t spend too much time reading blogs.

Your opinions are humbly solicited. center motif

#2 daughter started her new job as Music Minister last night with a choir rehearsal. I haven’t yet heard how it went but I assume that she did well. Our choir rehearsal was fun. We are doing some fancy stuff for Christmas, including “Now Is Time for Yuletide Glee,” a Thomas Morley madrigal which is new to me. Our director’s approach is to give the first part their note and then everyone just hares off sight-reading the music as best they can. Considering the level of skill at sight-reading in our choir, the effect is like a bunch of bumper cars. We lose our places and fall out and try to catch back up and then everyone gets back in for the last note. If actually asked to do so, he will allow us to hear the first page played, but I hate to ask every time. He is a band director, and this is perhaps how bands do it. There are so many instruments that I suppose it wouldn’t make sense to run through the bassoon part and then add the clarinets and then the tubas and so on. For singing, and especially the singing of madrigals, it is customary to do at least a few lines with the basses and then the tenors and then add the altos and then the sopranos — not always in that order. But we do not do this. I used to sort of wait and listen and sing pianissimo till I knew what I was doing, but I have discovered that I am no less likely than anyone else in this group to get it right, so now I just plunge in like Alice in the Wonderland croquet game. I would not recommend this to #2 daughter for her choir, but it is fun if you can tolerate the chaos and cacaphony.

Tonight we must get to the Chamber Singers rehearsal early for costuming, and I have errands to do for my boys this morning. Sleep deprivation is causing me to respond to these extra demands with faint irritation, but I will get over that.