Juxtaposition

Well it sure is cold and miserable here at the moment. Today I was at home and tried to do some quilting. The cats too , thought it would be a great idea to do some quilting. Both of the sweet creatures curled up and undertook to do a six hour cuddle and being a silly softy I didn't have the heart to shove them off. I just stuck to the corner that I had access to and enjoyed quilting there. The quilting is coming along well. Hopefully soon I will be able to have finished pictures.

Here is another bit of the study. The word  juxtaposition comes to mind as nothing in this picture actually relates and yet is a microcosm of what me and my family likes. I find it interesting that although an outsider will see stuff, the people who live with the objects will actually see the history that each item reflects. The items on the study cupboard remind me of all the people who gave me gifts. Of the shopping trips to buy other parts of the items and the years that the items have witnessed in my life.
Well that is about it on this nippy evening.

Have a good one

 

Study stuff

I had to come home to deal with the telephone people so whilst waiting for them I took a few pictures of some of the fun stuff hanging in our study.  

This is a Turkish clock given to me by Melissa, I think it is way cool..

Then we have the piggies, I found this dish towel about 20 years ago and it spoke to me on individuality et al. so I had it framed 

The castle and dragon I had seen for about 10 years before I decided to stitch it.

The next are Chinese dragons that I gave Manie for his birthday, seeing as we all like dragons and love Chinese work.

The next dragon was an add on to one of manie’s games (Skyrim) but I thought it was cute enough to lurk in one of our corners,

This dragon was given to me by my sister, way artsy

Well that is a tour of some of the stuff

Have a good one

Making a square into a triangle

This is the stencil that I am currently using for the inside squares on my Irish chain. I like it cos it has cute hearts on the inside of it. The only problem now is the along the outside edge of my quilt I have made the various stripes end off in pointed bits so in between each of these pointy bits are triangles. I could have just crosshatched the bits,but, then it would have lost it's interestingness. So what I am going to try to do is take this square stencil and draw it with many more points so that it fills up the triangle. Well hopefully I get to it this weekend which would mean that I have finished off making little blocks all up and down the quilt.

Have a good one

View from the work place

I took this picture from the pause area at work where I sit and phone my husband. How depressing. This is of course just one view and taken at a specific angle as I thought it would make an interesting visual, if I had wanted to I could have twisted the phone about 10 degrees and taken a picture of a palm tree. It is the same as the story of the view of an elephant seen by a blind person, depending where you focus the place you are can look very different. I suppose that is true for the whole of life...how deep.

My work place is actually not that bad seeing as when I look out of the window at my desk, I look across at a golf course. The only problem is that the blinds need to be drawn or I cannot see my computer screen due to the glare, but, I know it is there when I need to look.

The last picture is what my husband looks at from his office. These ducks are living on the 9th floor of an office block. I think they are adorable.

Have a good one

Back to reality...

So that is Easter and a fun 6 days off work over and done with. I finished filling in the square of the Irish quilt and now I am squaring off the stripes. I hit the boredom level of the quilting process where it is more of a pain than a pleasure to do. I can see why quilters have many projects started and few finished. I think also doing all of this stuff by hand slows it down to such a level as to make the highs not be so instant, unfortunately the lows can take just as long. The actual problem is as old Chinese saying: “Be careful what you wish for, because you might just get it."

Well my wish is to spend every day just being creative and quilting etc etc, but the reality is that when that is all you are doing, the little niggardly whiny worm creeps out and gets bored. So now sitting at work and writing this blog instead of writing a specification, I am thinking with great anticipation of the moment this afternoon when I pick up my quilt again and start quilting.
This is a good thing to ponder over.

Have a good one

Irish chain - ouch progress

Stitching away for the second day in a row, and all I can say is ouch. Here are some pictures

This is the full quilt

Well that it is about it

Have a good one

April on my mind

 Welcome to the chilly month of April. In my youth April was known for 3 things, firstly Easter which meant delicious hot cross buns, 2ndly for the Rand Easter show which was the biggest show that Johannesburg held and our family would always go and have an amazing time seeing all of the sights and sounds and tastes. Oh what innocent times.

My eldest daughter went to a few and then all sorts of people on the full spectrum of political beliefs decided that this was a show to blow up to show their dumb arse opinions. This stopped me from going so it will always remain this thing of wonder instead of what it actually was and that was a general trade show, with a farming animal section.The other thing of course is the fact that I am way more cynical and the sight of swimming pools and caravans truly does not impress me.

 Should they show full long arm quilting machines then yes I would be there and salivating would once more commence, but seeing as the hobby show did not even have a single long arm quilting machine then the chance of a general trade show having it would be non existent.and back onto the start of the paragraph, the third thing that April reminds me of is sailing in a regatta and camping on the shore of the lake.

 This is why I have a Pavlovian fear of camping due to the freezing temperatures that always seem to happen over Easter. This and the fact that it always seemed to rain as soon as we started erecting the camp site.

But today being ancient, April has seen us use my Irish chain quilt for the first time and the wool inner is yummy warm. I am still quilting it but, it needs to be trained to be snugly.
So this month i can see me quilting away at the Irish and once that is completed I will endeavour to quilt some more on the swirl quilt.
I have ordered the dear Jane software but as yet it has not arrived. I have selected 30 fabrics for the colours and bought a bolt of cream fabric to be the background. This I will only play with once all the quilting previously mentioned is complete. I promise(to myself only).

I started with my new contract at the same place that I have now worked at for 6 years. Not really a bad place seeing as I came here just after being sliced in two, My husband and I both finished our degrees, My eldest go her honours degree, her first job and bought a car and the youngest did primary school and went to high school all in the time that I have sat at this desk. I smoked my brains out to start with but now have stopped for a year and a half. In the time that I have sat here I have got fat and thin and fat again. I am now attempting to get back to the thin cycle. Not that it makes me a different person in any way, but it is interesting how many more people will talk to you if you look skinny even if you look sick with it they will fawn over the thinness, what a bunch of wankers. I normally despise the people who will suddenly be friendly when you are thin and in that way it will not hurt my feeling when they no longer speak to you should you not maintain your perfect size.
After getting my degree and deciding that I was not going to study further until the youngest goes to varsity, Is when I took up quilting and yay for that as it really is as good as a religion without all the bullshit. You get to stare a wondrous colour and if you hand stitch like I do then you have to maintain Zen like calm otherwise your stitching screws up and your thread tends to form the most horrific knots.

A sad bit was that FB decided to stop a game that I had been playing for a year and in that game I had three squirrels and yes I know the we just and animated objects, but still I held affection for them and now I am sad due to the fact that they have been wiped from existence. We do not have squirrels in Johannesburg so they still maintain their wonder in my heart.


May you all have a blessed April period no matter what your belief system is and from mine all I can say is Stitch on...

Have a good one.