Beginnings and Ends

I've been a slacker for a while now! With Jeff gone to Afghanistan, it's hard to stay motivated to keep the house nice and clean.  And busy-ness and deadlines and the like have kept me from doing those tasks that, while not earth-shatteringly important, sure make life easier!

Laundry has been piling up in my room for several weeks.  I DO laundry! :-), I just don't get it put away.  But a message at church on Sunday about the privileges of faith (Thanks, Pastor Trevor),  convicted me of my responsibilities!  Further, a service call to a TV repairman finally got my butkus in gear, and my room looks like it should! Ironically, the TV "fixed" itself, and the TV guy didn't have to come, but the room is clean!  :-P

So the end of clutter, the beginning of a season of better behaviour! LOL

I also completed one of the six "commissioned" quilt tops on order for various people/causes.  I'm sorta the "assembly girl" for my quilt club, Mountain Laurel Quilters, when we provide a donation quilt for a community event or charity.  Last week, I put together a Civil War Repro fabric top for the local Optimist Club to raffle for their Youth Programs. It will be displayed at our annual quilt show, A Quilt Gathering with the Mountain Laurel Quilters this weekend (Oct. 15th-16th).

Paula Philpot at Paula's Quilting Pantry did the machine quilting and another club member bound it for us. 

I've already got the next set of blocks, made of 1930's repros and donated by our club for the local chapter of the American Cancer Society, on the design wall.  I'll meditate a few days on the setting and put it together before passing it along to the same able quilter.

So the end of one project and the beginning of another!

It's a good week so far for getting things accomplished.  I hope the remainder of the week goes as well.  It should!! I have LISTS!  Here's a list of my lists:

1. Things to do today. 
2. Things to do this week. 
3. Things to do this month.
4. Things to do by the end of the year.
5. The weeks remaining in this year so I can map out what I'll do when.
6. Thing to do in 2011!!!

(You are positively REELING from the details, huh!? LOL)  There's the usual innocuous stuff like house cleaning (I'm behaving better now, remember!?), but the majority of the lists are about quilts I want to do.  Kits and Blocks of the Month to complete.  UFO's and WIP's and such to conclude.  Deadlines for projects.  New projects I want to start.

Beginnings and Ends.

God is all about beginnings and ends.  He starts out His Word with "In the beginning..." (Genesis 1:1).  The Gospel of John tells us "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning" (John 1:1-2).  I love how Jesus concludes the Revelation.  In Chapter 22, He says, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End" (v. 13).

Over the years I've heard people say, "It doesn't matter how you begin; it's how you end that counts" and I suppose that is true.  But the nature of God is to begin well (didn't He say of creation, "That's Good!!"?) AND end well.  I wanna be like that.  As His nature is perfected in me, I want my beginnings to be equal to my endings, to do all things well to His glory.

It's probably a good beginning to end some things before I begin those new projects that I want to end in 2011. Oh, man.  Maybe I should make another list.... Help me, Lord!

Blessings!