Off topic

Not much sewing done in the last two weeks. Life has conspired.   I have been taking stock of where I am and where I'm headed. I am Rubenesque girl, I have been for along while now anyway, since I stopped competitive sport.  My dad was a big  chap, I take after him in a lot of ways. These days, a lot of my interests are sedentary, which isn't doing me any favours  as I approach middle age, I can see me having similar health issues in 20 years. A lot of things have come together recently to make a reality check necessary in all areas of my life.  I have listened to other peoples life experiences, taken advice on board.   Time to stop struggling and change my health status along with a lot of other things.   I have a week off work this week, to look at jobs that need doing and put a different regime in place-literally getting my house in order!     

Happy to say that lots of quilty projects will have come together by the end of the year, as I have overcome my doubts about free motion quilting and stopped striving for immediate perfection (a character fault that often stops me trying something as I know I can't achieve it immediately!)  

This week I have to finish the baby quilt, before Master Gurr is actually here in the middle of next month! I can show you that once its completed and handed over. 

Then  this charity quilt to be bound, along with two more VE1 series table mats.  Then, four more charity quilts that are already pieced are ready for my free motion practice.  Lets face it, children aren't the quilt police!  

I have been reading a lot: losing myself in a book separates me from reality a little and gives my mind a space to ponder. I struggled getting through Moby Dick by Herman Melville for a month- it was a fascinating historical document of life on board a whaling ship, so I'm not sure why I found it so much hard work!

This weeks read is a RABCK (random act of Bookcrossing kindness)  for fellow Bookcrosser 3vie, My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurrier.  I have a lot of books bought form charity shops to read. Literally hundreds!  As a way of choosing my next read I ask Bookcrossers to pick one for me, I read it and send it to them.  On the 'to be read and sent' pile are Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, The Difference Engine by William Gibson, Creatures of the Earth by John McGahern, Treasure Island by RL Stevenson and The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera.  That will keep me busy for the next 6 weeks or so!  Sadly, I can only send within the UK now s its often more expensive to post a book abroad than it is to buy a new one!
 

I had a couple of days on Brighton this weekend house sitting for my son. Saturday was rainy and dreary, no one about at all in the morning,  sad to see my home town like that on a bank holiday weekend.  There were eldery ladies out for the day on the pier prepared with wooly blankets!  In August! I took lots of photos for the Flickr 'empty seats' group-thankfully Sunday and Monday were warm, otherwise it could have been another financial disaster for local businesses, on the tail of last years bank holiday washouts.


Off to move furniture, I need a third coat of white on my bedroom walls, the streakiness is disturbing me! 

A stroll round work

I found this little lovely-we make vitreous enamel signs. This is a sample plate of yellows on dark blue for a customer.   The yellow is matt because its been screened but not fired a second time to set the yellow.  This would make a simple but effective 'man' quilt in dark/light blue, and yellows.   A few partial seams  of light blue (where the light blue skylight is reflected) against the yellow, but not too difficult.

Sewing is much the same, pink and kiss in the corner; nothing new as I'm trying to FINISH something!







I saw this in a Sussex village the other day. I was amused. It called this nursery rhyme to mind-I had to look it up, I couldn't remember it from my own childhood, it wasn't something my boys would have been interested in!

 

 

"The three little kittens, they lost their mittens,"

The three little kittens, they lost their mittens,

And they began to cry,

"Oh, mother dear, we sadly fear,

That we have lost our mittens."

"What!   Lost your mittens, you naughty kittens!

Then you shall have no pie."

"Meow, meow, meow."

"Then you shall have no pie."

The three little kittens, they found their mittens,

And they began to cry,

"Oh, mother dear, see here, see here,

For we have found our mittens."

"Put on your mittens, you silly kittens,

And you shall have some pie."

"Purr, purr, purr,

Oh, let us have some pie."

The three little kittens put on their mittens,

And soon ate up the pie,

"Oh, mother dear, we greatly fear,

That we have soiled our mittens."

"What, soiled your mittens, you naughty kittens!"

Then they began to sigh,

"Meow, meow, meow,"

Then they began to sigh.

The three little kittens, they washed their mittens,

And hung them out to dry,

"Oh, mother dear, do you not hear,

That we have washed our mittens?"

"What, washed your mittens, then you're good kittens,

But I smell a rat close by."

"Meow, meow, meow,

Sensory post

 We have a house guest, Bob, the Roborovski hamster. He is not tame and is very bold-my elderly cat is mildly interested, but she has seen it all before at 17.  Bob lives with a dog, so a mere moggy doesn't bother him at all.  He is a funny bug-eyed thing with big feet for his size.  He is the size of a large egg.  His wheel is noisy and he doesn't smell!

The roses that Linda gave me make me smile

She is a trained florist and her choices are always beautiful to look at.
Thank you Linda! xx

I am reading:

Xeelee by Stephen Baxter, the last book of four in this omnibus

I am looking forward to three days away in London at the end of the month, the first time I will have stayed there-I usually go for the day. And planning my itinerary (V&A museum is on the list).  I am staying in Kew and Docklands.

Yesterday I put together

some of these tactile strips

                   with

 some of these

and took it apart again!
  It just didn't look right.  So, there will be two beach blankets of different designs.

Cozy Sunday

I counted the bow ties, 270 done.  I will need about 1100 for a quilt top. 

Today I will be ironing mini moths and making up the border for moth in the window.  Once that is on I need to wait for son and daughter in law to choose the backing from my stash.  It may be a while, as we have a few inches of snow: those of you from the UK are familiar with the ridiculous chaos this causes!  Its not cold out, really quite pleasant: soft falling snow, no wind, perfect, if it HAS to snow.

This weeks read is my first Iris Murdoch, on Kindle.  

So, I'm set for a cozy day in. The freezer needs defrosting but somehow it's lost its urgency........

Blue footed booby

Regular readers may have noticed I'm a committed sewer/crafter  with an interest in everything.  

This causes difficulties  when you are also blessed with an enquiring mind and the practical attention span of a blue footed booby. 

 

 Earlier on the year I listed over 30 ideas and WIPs and UFOs (yes, I am making a distinction there it makes the whole mountain of things easier to comprehend!!)  The total is now at 'around' 35, with not one item finished this year.

I have used 'development as a quilter' as an excuse to 'just try this'' most of the year. I have done that twice in the space of 10 days!!!   

I started a little bit of crochet  for the tactile quilts and 'tried' out the tile  log cabin technique this week. 

I have seriously defaulted on my commitment to finish the had quilted wedding quilt.  That's really bad news.

So. Deep breath.  I will not begin another project this year.  

No wait.  That's not enough.  

With so many begun, I can faff about for the next three years and not finish anything.  'Completion' has always been an issue for me and I can never work out whats at the root of that.  

Regardless, I need to master it!

NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS

1. I will buy no quilting fabric for one calendar year.  IGNORE THE SALES!!!  THERE WILL ALWAYS BE BARGAINS!!  (Notice I have left an opt-out here, with regard to charity shops!)
2. I will work on on one machine project, one leaders and enders project (bow ties) and one hand pieced project at a time unit they are finished and gifted or in use. 
3. The first hand sewn project will be the wedding quilt.
4. The machine project is moth in the window.

5. I will complete a tactile quilt by February 13th as I have bagged a Linus fund raising day at work for 14th (UK Valentines day).
6. A colleague at work encouraged me to commit to three finishes by the end of March.  That's my first target. On my birthday I will re-asses.
7. I'm going to add to the list: I will not buy any books for one year, charity shops or otherwise!

Just has a skype call with my son in the far east and I told him if he catches me buying fabric this year I'll give him £50  .His response?  I'm quids in then!  I thought you were supposed to support addicts, not tell them they will fail!

Excited!

I work as a purchaser for a sign company.  

 One of my key suppliers, a metalwork company, that I have spoken to every day for 7 years has made me a quilting frame for Christmas!!!

 

I sent him a design sketch 18 months ago and it fizzled as an idea, but he's done it now as a gift!!   I supply him and his small workforce with cakes on a fairly regular basis as I am often harassing him several times a day, poor man, to do-this-do-that NOW pretty please.

It's still in the car at the moment, so no pictures yet...........yes, I *really* want to try it out, but I had an accident last Sunday-I was steam cleaning the living room carpet and knocked over the machine, spilling 4 litres of water!!!  I have been sitting hand quilting with a fan heater on full blast pointing at the carpet for a week that I scrounged from work, trying to dry it out.  Took a while to figure out how to point it downwards without it scorching the carpet..............

I think were OK now, so I will be able to finish the other half of the carpet later today and re-assemble the living room into some sort of normality!

I was talking to a colleague at work about my UFOs, and have made a commitment to finish three by the end of March....erm!

Her sister works with severely disabled children and receives quilts from project Linus in the UK (I have previously donated fabric and wadding but not sewn). 

Well, they are in need of specialist sensory quilts, so I have at least one to make by 14th February (UK Valentines day) as I have bagged a fundraiser day at work and I need an example of around 40 x 40 inches to show everyone. 

I will be doing red, yellow, blue, black and white, bold colours. I found some cheap fur fabric and silky lining on the internet, so now to practice my texturing- I have this lovely book for ideas......

So, actually, that's FOUR by the end of March.  

I'd better get on with it!

Manic

I made it sewing through until 10.45 last night, after staying up 'till 1am the night before, amazing!  Most of the cutting is done-I did it in batches between bouts of sewing-all I need are some 1 1/2 " purple strips to make the cornerstones.   

Today, progress.............I have done about 8 hours!

I wasn't sure I had cut enough of these.............turned out fine..........

Love that basil fabric

Matched sets of reds

Matching the oranges. Peachy.

Blue, purple, red, orange, yellow, green sets for the 'window' sashings all stitched up now.  I won't have to iron these, finger pressing will be fine. Also sewed up the scraps for the cornerstones today.  If I do another one of these I think I will vary the 'moth' colour, not the cornerstones, it will be much quicker!

I lost my glasses for 10 minutes, even the picture is fuzzy without them, couldn't see them for looking!  Doh. There they are.  I need one of those chains that go round your neck.  And a leash.  And behavior classes!!!  Forget the agility though.

The 'oil' reminder came up on the Bernina today, so I took the plate off, brushed it all out, then spent 10 minutes looking for the sole plate.  I had put it away it the box with the brush and the oil. I had just found my glasses then, I think I had a caffine dip, or some such!

Yesterday night I chain pieced stitching the squares to a set of triangles.  I think I have done WAY more than 100 sets!  Tomorrows task is stitching these into pairs to complete the moth blocks.  (Happy to say that my hand piecing has proved to be accurate, that I had done on the triangles, you can see it in this pic. Smirk). Breaks will be ironing and cutting the stitched scraps that I did yesterday into 1 1/2" chunks for the cornerstone.  Love the salad fabric too!

I have done a few dozen of these already to try it out.  This will be the        l   o   n   g   e   s   t        job, I think! I will be able to finger press them, no ironing, the centre seams flatten out OK

Another hour at the machine, then off to bed with The Great Gatsby 

 (;@}

Night night!

The demise of Starbucks in Horsham

Not that I'm fond of coffee particularly.  I use it as a drug for when I have to face anything other than food shopping ('cause shopping is wasted sewing/reading/chilling time, right?).  I do most of my buying on the Internet (somebody stop me!)

The above mentioned franchise had my local Bookcrossing zone shelves, where I took a lot of my releases. Of late, I have generously been given boxes of books on a regular basis for release onto the shelf, I need to find another zone that's active and not too far away. And also has an interesting stock of books! 

There was a good atmosphere in there early on a Sunday mornings. I always went on Sundays as it stopped me buying books in the charity shops as they are closed on Sunday.  The music wasn't intrusive, you could read and sip and relax.  Take a look at my Bookcrossing shelf on the link.  You will see my issues!  In fact, join the community-unless you have already joined, in which case tell me your tag!




Change of topic, if memory serves, this is how being 9 months pregnant felt.....

Dealing with two dead boring things at once

If I'm going to make myself suffer psychologically because I really have to do the ironing, I may as well go all the way and cause physical discomfort as well!

Mozart is a comfort.  Of course it is actually making me more intelligent the more I listen.

~{;@?

My reward, later: to watch a film and finish the mini stacks of strips for the rainbow hexie that are lined up on the overflow bookshelf, before they get too dusty!

Lazy day

Going to hand quilt this evening.

Even though I am off work, I haven't felt that relaxed and can't sleep well.  I have stayed up until 1am most nights and still had trouble sleeping.  I caught up this morning, I didn't wake up until 10.30 am!  I have a desk job and don't get enough exercise, so after four days out and about I think my body was protesting!   I've had a lazy day today reviewing Alex Anderson's hand quilting lessons on TQS and watching some free shows (register for free and you get more free shows).  I was a member for a while and learnt a lot.

The neighbours came to visit earlier (to be truthful they visit ALL the time).  Blackie was asleep in my herb basket (I've had to forget the herbs!) and Belly-up comes for a play/purr/belly scratch whenever hes called. He is going to make someone the most darling cat, most kittens aren't interested is fusses but he loves it.  Someone in the house is allergic so they have to get rid of all six cats, they will be missed. (:@[