It is snowing again here in Eastern Massachusetts.  I love the snow, but I hate the clean up of 20″ at a time.  I am trying to convince B. to keep the car in the garage until the snow melts and just shovel the walkway for the mailman.  I’m good.  Pretty snow.  Lots of fabric.  Traveling daydreams.  Alas, he refuses to participate in this scenario.  Consequently, this winter I must keep shoveling in the back of my mind or actually in the front as I am mainly the shoveler and he is mainly the snowblower person, my back works hard enough.  To be fair, B. is the snowblower because I am a nag and don’t want him shoveling.  Anyway, this might sound ridiculous to most people, but I must limit my rulerwork to a couple of hours per day as otherwise, my back and shoulders will really hate me.  Why did I decide to bother with ruler work?  I have the time now and I wanted to see what would happen if I didn’t stitch in the ditch before working on this pattern. In the future, I will do at least some stitching in the ditch first.  I am also figuring out if I can abandon the ruler and templates.  I have let go of the ruler in this quilt, for better or worse.  I attempted the circles without the template, but although they were decent from afar, I was not happy.  This has made me realize I prefer quilting freehand curves.  I love freely quilting the ribbons in the small white squares.  I am playing and experimenting because this is MY quilt.  I don’t experiment on other people’s quilts!

I think I already mentioned that my mind has been absorbed with thoughts of my solo trip to Sweden.  I am trying to decide whether or not to bring one camera lens or two.  They both must fit in my purse and I am concerned about weight.  I’m planning on bringing my normal lens, which quiltwise looks like this:

This photograph is with my normal lens, 40 mm.  The first photograph above is 55mm from a wide angle lens 15mm to 55mm, weighing 6 ounces.  Here’s the quilt at 20mm with this same wide angle lens:

Let’s translate this into outdoor photographs.  The following two are my normal lens, 40 mm.

And for comparison:

This is the same view with the 24 mm, slightly more wide angle.  The 24 mm is 11 ounces.  Worth it?  I don’t think so.

Or:

Or 24 mm, 55 mm and 18 mm, top to bottom.  I have to say that I thought I’d be leaning toward the normal lens and the light wide angle 15-55mm.  Now, I am thinking I’ll only bring my normal lens.  Will I be sorry for the few landscape shots over the archipelago?  I’ll think a bit more about that.  The 24 mm, expensive and heavy, lens is definitely off the list.

You’ll now figure out how insane I can be about packing and containers. Or maybe I am just easily entertained.  Anyway, I am traveling on planes, trains and buses because I am traveling around Sweden rather than just staying in Stockholm.  I might have to walk up several sets of stairs as well, depending on my accommodations.  Consequently, I need light and limited luggage.  I do not schlep a backpack around, but prefer wheels, so that builds in about 5 pounds before I start.  And even though I will check my alleged 22″ carryon, I will not pack it full to leave room for fabric and a dala horse or two.  I’d prefer my smaller 20″ bag, but it actually weighs 11 pounds to start…not sure what I was thinking when I bought that.  And as I have so many suitcases, I am trying not to buy another one…even though I love them.  My weight limit is 16 pounds for the wheelie, which is doable for me.  So, I will travel with a light wheelie suitcase and a purse.  I’ll have an extra bag only for the flight in case my suitcase disappears, which I can then pack back into my suitcase when I meet it again.  Well, at least, that is my present plan.

I have read a few blogs lately where the people actually weighed their items and decided what to take based on weight, if they had any question at all.  Anyway, I decided to weigh these items: 

I have a pair of travel pants from Chico’s.  I found them heavy to wear with most of the weight in the legs, so I thought I’d start there.  These pants are in the middle left, 14 ounces.  They weigh two ounces more than my Banana Republic chinos and my Chico’s cotton/elastene pants.  They only weigh 4 ounces less than my NYDJ’s black jeans, which are my favorite.  So who at Chicos is in charge of their travel clothes and what are they thinking?  That’s nuts.  The alleged travel pants will stay home.  I’ll wear my jeans and pack the other two…or another pair of black jeans.  The long sleeved Landsend t-shirt weighs less than the travel pants as well, and my other shirts (probably 6) weigh even less.  So there’s my insanity.  Wish I could get going now, but planning is half the fun.   So here I am shoveling, quilting and dreaming!  Happy Quilting!