Patience . . .

the quality of being patient, as the bearing of provocation, annoyance, misfortune, or pain, without complaint, loss of temper, irritation, or the like.

Frustration - a feeling of dissatisfaction, often accompanied by anxiety or depression, resulting from unfulfilled needs or unresolved problems.

Hmm . . . which was it . . . patience or frustration . . . or both?

When the longarm runs smoothly it hums so sweetly and the sewing is FUN and effortless.  When the longarm is tempermental, that's when patience turns to frustration.  It's best to walk away.

And so it was over the weekend.  Two simple little quilts needed some quilting and what should have been a couple hours of JOY turned into 5 or 6 hours of torture.  Yikes!  On the second quilt, I finally admitted defeat, turned the machine off and took a nap.  Later I rev it up again and continued on with the patience/frustration journey.  In the end I got 'er done, but it was painful.  Looks like this weekend I will allocate some time to take the machine apart again and try to get it right.   . . . all because I just had to change that needle!!

Last week we had our company end of year party.  I know, it's March . . . but an end of year party for us is after the December year-end accrual is finished and the auditors and tax people have signed off.  This was our reward:

How FUN is that?  I highly recommend the Cirque du Soleil shows if you get an opportunity to see one.

And last but not least, I went out for a 6 miler on Saturday, 2.5 miles yesterday before work and 4 miles tonight.  Yay me!  Hopefully I'll be ready on May 1 for my next half marathon.  Cross your fingers.