How about doing what I am doing - my project for the summer -- I am cross stitch embroidering a 48x48 Christmas quilt. My brain is machine sewing, but I am sitting in a rocking chair on the deck with my Marie Bostwick audiobooks and a nice glass of Chardonnay or Auslese, cross-stitching my little heart out. I have been working on this for about four years now and probably by 2020 I will finish. No, I'll get it done. I have until the 21st of September to get as much as I can done and then I set it aside for when I go somewhere or have to wait for someone in the doctor's office or something. Then I get a few stitches in and inch by inch, it'll get done. You can get kits to sew them up - comes with thread and everything. Mine came with 26 different colors - Actually "Merry Christmas" has three shades of red! And I don't like holly or holly berries anymore!!!!!!!!! I am heading to Milwaukee in September and can't decide whether to bring my treasured (from my husband) stork scissors for clipping, or bringing the old toenail clipper. I like the scissors and it has only 1" of sharp, but it is my treasure and I am assuming that other sewers/quilters use the nail clippers only because they don't want their favorite scissors confiscated! I guess it'll be the toenail clippers!!!!! One flight I took not too long ago; the stewardess wouldn't let me sew because she didn't want me to poke my eye with the needle in case of an emergency - Heck, if I am going to die in an airplane crash would a needle save my life? Duhhhhhh!!!!!! Safe Trip. Edie