The end of January

So now January is at a close and still 10 months and 7 days until leave in December or 1 Month depending on whether my job is deemed necessary.

January saw the completion of the blocks for the front of an Irish chain and pinwheels for the back of the Irish chain.

The swirl quilt was revisited as more quilting was needed and as at the end of January all of the diamonds have had a line quilted through them and now only the border needs more stitching. I am thinking of adding leaves and flowers onto the border as the border is supposed to be a brick wall around the garden (the swirl) and walls always get flowers growing over them.

The mood at work is a bit suckish as the future for most of us is uncertain.

Here's hoping.

Well let us hope that February turns into a good month filled with love and cheer.

Have a good one.

Friday ponderings

With today being Friday and the world of work being shaky with overseas companies making my job insecure, I am sitting here pondering whether this is the right time to try my hand at making stuff to sell at fairs. As yet in life I have not been brave enough to actually give up the security of working in the corporate arena. That is the trouble with working in IT, you get paid well to do it, and seeing as I have been doing it for 35 years it is a frightening idea to give it up. So as I said, I am sitting here pondering. Interestingly enough life will actually just happen.

Have a good one.

Covering a stool

This weekend we re-covered a stool that has been in the family since 1890. The stool was used on the farm in years gone by. The first thing I did was strip off the layers of previous covers. This was a seriously gross exercise as all the filth from each decade came floating into the air and made my hands soo grubby that I needed to wash them off every few minutes. The first stuffing was straw with a subsequent update in the 70's being foam rubber. Both were horrid.

The slats of the stool had totally disintegrated and in the 70's re-cover two planks of wood had been screwed to the bottom to stop any person sitting on the stool from falling through. We removed all of the previous grossness and re-did the slats properly

Our cat currently believes she owns the stool as this is where she sits when we are all in the study playing on our computers.

The stool all by itself in the sunshine ready for the next 25 years before somebody else starts poking at it's insides.

Spikey not looking particularly impressed. He decided that in the middle of the desk was a much better place to sit as this affords the most attention.

Have a good one!

Q7 Irish chain

This is quilt in a bag, this is achieved by dilligently covering pieces of paper with material and then sewing them together. To get the best results make sure that all of the blocks that you sew together are all of the same size so that they look like a nice stack of pretty colour.

This is what it looks like when it spills out of the bag. In the picture you can see the empty bag. The cat named spiley. The pattern, Pinwheels for the back of the quilt and various bits of the quilt.

 The cat testing the crinkely sounds made by the papers covered with fabric.

 The cat giving his 2 cents worth about the colours chosen and the quilt so far. I think his biggest concern is not knowing which will be on his corner of the bed and whether all the colours actually go with his hair colour. Oh my it is a tough world for a ginge.

 Oh my gosh... Spike realizes he is gorgeous and his concerns were not needed. This is his best coy act.

So this is where it stand as at the beginning of 2012. I had better hurry seeing as we are being theatened with the end of the world in 335 days. I we are going back to the stone ages then yay for being able to create bedding. Though being able to grow food would make Spikey a whole lot happier.

Have a good one.

Happy 2012

Happy 2012, may the year be filled with creative goodness. As at the start of 2012, I have finished the front and back of a block of the month quilt which I did to learn how to follow somebody elses pattern. It was great fun to do as the colours were all solids and in the primary colour range. Rachel helped and we learned a lot about inches and eigths etc as our knowledge bas is cm and metres.

My irish chain is now in 25 X 25 cm blocks with 122 waiting to be sewn together. For the back I have made 22 pinwheels to scatter on the back to hopefully as a touch of whimsy to the feel of the quilt. The border caused me great problems and I had done half of the border when I realised that the looked like little Inca feet and legs stomping around the quilt. After much procratination the irish quilt is now going to have a smooth blue and white border that I will probably quilt the rolling pattern thing in.

Once I had all of the blocks for the Irish quilt, I did abandon it in the sewing room as I wanted to add more quilting to my swirl quilt. Well when I say I wanted what it should read was that I was lazy the first time around and quilted a swirl, following the line of the colours on the quil, well my dear husband loves the feeling of ridges on quilts, so now I am adding many more stitches to the quilt. I think it will be much more fun to sleep under with more quilting as currently it feels quite flat. For the border I am playing with the idea of quilting daisies all of the way round.

Rachel has started High school, which now gives me an extened drive twice a day. The afternoon are quick but in the morings all road there and back do their impression of a slow moving parking lot. Think of a parking lot being moved along a slow flowing lava. At work things are in the air. So yay for quilting it will keep me sane.

Have a good one.