August... gone in a flash!

Well I had a couple of update posts planned for August but it turned into such a busy month that I never got a chance to post anything.

At work I had a month of 1.30pm to 10pm shifts so that rather messed with my days a bit. I've never been a morning person and I always panic about being late to work so I spend most the mornings not doing much and waiting until it was time to go to work. That's not to say I didn't get much done.

The giant green quilt was quilted and finished off to be bound by my friend before she handed it to the lucky couple who were expecting it.

I literally had to empty most the furniture out of our rather large living room so that I could baste it. It's just huge! (Excuse the stuff on the sofas. This was done just before we went on holiday so things were all over the place)

And here it is folded a bit so that my friend could get an idea what size box to buy for it. I think she gave up on boxes in the end and just wrapped it in paper.

I've been informed that it was very much appreciated and loved by it's recipients. Now I need to get going on the quilt for my friend's wedding!

We also squeezed a weekend in the lake district into this month. We go over every year on this weekend and explore the lakes as a way to remember our mum. She loved it over there and we spent a lot of time climbing hills and mountains and wandering around lakes.

This time we went for a weekend instead of a day and it was much more relaxed (well except for some very narrow country roads)

And it was also wet. Not such a surprise in the lake district though. I did manage to forget my walking boots so had to buy some new ones when we were over there but they came in very handy on the muddy ground.

Would you believe this is the main road to one of the lakes? Just random sheep wandering along. I love it over there. So peaceful and relaxing compared to being back at home. I could happily live there with all those beautiful views. If only I could make this quilt thing pay the bills.

Skip forward a week and I was off to York races for a hen weekend. It was lovely to catch up with my friend's I've not seen for ages but it was a scary reminder of how close the wedding is and how much I still need to get done on that quilt.

Oh, and if you're wondering yes that is a horse made of vegetables (random!). It's the first time I've been to the races and my horse picking approach of putting a bet on horses with the best name did win me a whole 9 GBP (yes, I've yet to work out how to get the pound sign to work on my keyboard)

As for the hexagons... They are coming along nicely. At this rate I'll have a quilt by next winter. My problem is I want no 2 hexagons to be the same so soon I'll have to dig into the scraps to find hexagon sized scraps then I'll have to hunt eBay for scraps I think. I can't bear to cut random pieces out of all my stash fat quarters.

  

It's also been a rather sad week this week for us. We took our Uncle's dog to the vets in the middle of the month to have a lump removed from her leg. The results came back on Friday and it turns out the lump was cancerous so she's now going to have chemotherapy. Poor dog doesn't know what's doing on. We're having to wait for the insurance company to open on Monday before we can call to find out if they'll cover her. I hope they do or it'll be very expensive. Good job she has insurance.

Looking slightly confused after her operation

You'll also notice that for a change there is no photo of new fabric. Yes, I've been really good this month although this Petite Street fabric bundle from Plush addict is rather calling my name at the minute...

I do admit to buying a small amount of fabric but it's not that exciting, just plain coloured fabrics that will be useful stash builders.

What I am looking forward to this month is getting my payment for quilting the giant green quilt. My friend is very generously buying me a glamping jelly roll. the rest of the family aren't impressed that my fabric collection is growing again but never mind..

The other thing I've been doing this month, and the thing that seems to have been taking most my mornings, is geocaching. I'm fairly certain I've explained geocaching in previous posts but for those not in the know it's basically like a giant treasure hunt where you use a GPS to find a 'cache' that other people have hidden. Lots of them are boxes with log books and room for swaps of toys for children but some are very sneaky. I've seen some in shapes of rocks, some that are holes drilled into sticks so just a log can fit, some inside toys and hidden under trees and lots of other types.

This month there has been a challenge on the geocaching website to get a cache every day of the month so I've been heading out with my sister every morning before work to do that. Thank goodness that month is over.

This month 2 of my friends have also announced their engagement within days of each other. typical huh? I gained the task of organising the gifts from our friends which is like a military operations of getting 2 brides 2 different bunches of flowers and gifts and making sure I talk about the right things to the right people all whilst packing for holiday and having the green quilt to finish. I managed it somehow and both loved their gifts and flowers.

One of them has even asked me to be her bridesmaid in Cyprus when she gets married in a couple of years. 1st time I've been a bridesmaid so I'm excited. Pity I'm also terrified of flying. Something that we'll have to work on I think. The other had announced her wedding is in April next year. She better not want a quilt...

So, onto plans for September...

I love September. It's nearly Autumn (fall for you Americans) and I am finally justified in digging out my boots and wearing cosy jumpers with my jeans. I love all the colours and the crisp feeling in the air. It will be a busy month again though. We're back at Guides and I need to get the quilt made before the wedding in October.

So my list to get done this month:

1) Work out how to print photos onto fabric for the wedding quilt

2) Finish the wedding quilt (or at least just have binding to do)

3) Make a few autumnal cushions to try out some funky free motion quilting

4) Get some more hexagons made. I at least want to finish off the paper hexagons I have cut out

5) Make a start on that grey and multicoloured quilt for me

6) If feeling brave attempt to make the weekender bag so that I have something funky to take to the wedding.

At least I'm working slightly more normal hours of 9.30am - 6pm so I can eat with everyone else again and I can sew after work when I don't have the stress of needing to be somewhere at a certain time.

I hope you all had great summers and have slightly more relaxing Septembers planned.

Oh and linking up with Lily's quilts fresh sewing day and small blog meet so hello to anyone from there! I promise I don't normally post such huge posts.

Memories lost and made

It's been a busy and sad week for me this week. I think I'll start with the busy and try to pretend that the sad doesn't exist until the end.

At work I've now had mock certification week and I passed that. I'm currently in the middle of certification week. This is after 2 weeks of classroom training and 1 week of practical training. Who knew that working in a call centre required quite so much learning and faffing around? The air con isn't brilliant and the UK has chosen this time to have the nicest weather we've seen for years! Typically I'm stuck inside sweating and staring longingly out the window. I'm making the most of this by sitting on the grass outside at lunch time to enjoy my lunch.

The bag. grey and owls!

Unfortunately for me now that we are out of our training room and onto the call floor we aren't allowed our bags with us and as we don't have a locker yet we are expected to just put our stuff on top of the lockers. Obviously I'm not too happy leaving my expensive Kipling bag there with mu car keys, my purse and my phone. There isn't too much I can do about the car keys and phone but I've switched purses so I only being a small amount of money to work and I went out today and bought a new bag to use.

I think it's rather distinctive and cool :) Even better, it's oilcloth so when our normal weather returns it'll also be waterproof.

One of the Guide leaders, my friend Viki, has been making a quilt for her friend's wedding this summer. She finally finished the quilt top and has passed it onto me to be quilted. This quilt is a monster!

Before I made her remove some squares it measured a massive 123x132 inches! It's now a slightly more reasonable 111x101 inches. I still will struggle to get it laid out to get it basted.

giant quilt enjoying the sun in my garden

Certain things about this quilt will irritate me too when I'm quilting it. Mostly that the fabric isn't all going the right way. It's a pet hate I'm afraid. She's done a very good job for her first quilt but just seeing the wonky fabric makes me want to cry...

wonky turtles and rabbits :(

But because I'd gained this giant quilt a little bit of retail therapy was needed. Well I had to buy some batting didn't I? So I also bought myself a bag pattern...

The weekender bag

... and a tiny square of green fabric with baking/kitchen prints that was on offer.

Green fabric and it's pink friend

But I didn't realise when I ordered that how much white thread I had left and just how many pins I'd need to baste this monster! So a trip to Hobbycraft was needed. As any Brits know that's a dangerous place for crafty people to go. I think I did very well leaving with what I did! I bought the thread and some pink and white fabric that was just adorable... and a scrap book.

It's actually called a smash book and it comes with a pen that has a 'glue' stick at the other end. I say 'glue' because it's quite possibly the least sticky substance I've come across.

My pink stash book

At this point I should explain my sad news that I mentioned earlier. Last weekend my external hard drive died and I now can't access it. It contained all the things from my old computers, my iTunes library and even more importantly than that (although loosing my music is irritating) it also contained the pictures that I have left of my mum from when she was alive. I'm absolutely gutted I don't have them backed up somewhere. I'm just hoping that some of the memory cards I have hanging around my room have some pictures on.

This set me off on in a mood of wondering what if.... what if my computer dies again... what if something happens to me? will people have anything to remember me by? .. What if I get old and forget things? How will I remember what I've done.

So when I saw this book I thought what a good idea it was and bought one. I'm working my way through putting bits and bobs I've collected in there as a nice place to keep my memories together. No more relying on the computer for me!

The first page is dedicated to my mum. I found a couple of photos and I'm hoping to find another one to fill the gap. I've put some tickets in for events I've been too, mementoes and autograph books from Guide camps I attended, things from when I was at university and pictures of animals I've owned/looked after and I'm still going. I'll have this book full soon!

In other sad news Guides is done for summer now. We had a BBQ at the beach and our 2 oldest girls gained their Baden Powell awards and have now left our Guide unit. On the opposite end one of our new Guides made her promise! She's the last one to make that version of the promise as the new version takes effect from September.

I guess life is like that... just have to keep moving on. Or in my case at the minute just keep staring at the monster quilt and hope it quilts itself!

Hope you've all had better weeks than I have.

I'm back and I"ve been busy!

Well it's been a while since I've posted (I know I'm such a bad blogger) but it's been crazy busy at work and I've been a busy bee in General! I've been on holiday to Devon (where I'm fairly certain the country's population of VW camper vans are!). On a sad note I've also been to Southampton to visit my gran who isn't very well. She had a few stokes and is now very ill. I was hoping to show her some pictures of my sewing but she was asleep the whole time we were there.

So onto what I've been doing! I started making the bag from 'make'and just have the button holes left to put on the straps so I can use the bag. It was nice to make the bag but it's a little smaller than I'd like. Can't fit much in there!

The next thing I made was actually another project from 'make' and it was the jewellery roll. I made this for a friend's birthday and just dug some fabric out of my stash to make it. I think she liked it but I'm always a worrier when I give people gifts that I've made. I did rather like it though and may get around to making myself one at some point. I was so proud of myself because this is the first time I've sewn a zip into anything!

And then the olympics started. I was persuaded by my sister to go see a football match at St James' park in Newcastle and we saw the New Zealand and USA woman's quarter final. It was the first football game I've been to but it was actually good fun and the crowd were all in a good mood. Not what I imagine from a normal football match!

After the Olympics and hours spent glued to the TV and computer when not at work it was the turn of the paralympics. I'd spotted some Christmas fabric in a sale (the Blitzen by basic grey charm pack infact) and had bougt that. I'd also been rather taken by a table mat I'd seen somewhere and so decided to make that. Back to my dreaded nemesis of hexagons! I had no idea where I saw the pattern or what size hexagon to make so I just cut my charms into 4 and made my hexagons from there (They turned out to be 1 inch hexagon). A few days after I started I saw a review of a book called hex-a-go-go and lo and behold there was the pattern I'd seen! I bought the book and luckily for me I've made the right size hexagons. I say 'made' because all I've done so far it cut out hundreds of hexagon shaped bits of paper, and basted about half of them so far. Will it be done by this xmas? Only time will tell!

Carrying on with my hexagon obsession I decided to make a case for my new phone - an iPhone5! This case was made out of small scraps of fabric I had left over from the 2nd quilt I ever made and they are 1/2 inch hexagons. How tiny! I lined the case with a microfible cloth which was a bit of a faff to sew. It's a little shorter than I wanted but the phone fits in so long as it's not in another cover.

So with that we move onto this week. We are getting people in to do our windows and doors so my lovely stash of fabric has to move to a new home as I'm no longer allowed to store it in boxes on the dining room table. We bought a Beno cd holder from Ikea to store it all in our spare room/office. The family had joked would it hold all my fabric and I've given them evil glares. I don't have that much you know...

Well as you can see from these pictures above and below I actually do have rather a lot of fabric. Oops. I see a lot of fabric from my stash having to be used in quilts in the future. It's all just too pretty to cut though. You may also be able to tell that I spent the time to organise it by colour with all the xmas ones together, the batiks together, the novelty prints together.... Me obsessive? never...

  

Looking at it I also feel like some colours are missing. I hardly have any blender type fabrics. most of them are bold and bright prints.

  

And look at the extra space that has no fabric in it. That means I'm allowed to buy more right?

Hopefully I'll post another update soon. I'm currently trying to persuade myself that I don't REALLY need to but the oh deer jelly roll that's on sale at Simply solids...it sure is pretty though

   

Productive week!

Well my week off work was rather productive as far as sewing goes! Pity that the weather was awful so i didn't get a change to go out for a wander in Northumberland somewhere and go geocaching but I did manage to get all this sewing done - a lot for me!

The first thing I work on was this cute bag that came with Patch! by Cath Kidston that I got at Christmas. Making it revealed to me that I have NO patience whatsoever for paper piecing things. i hated having to cut out fabric with scissors and then loads of paper templates then having to baste it all and then sew it together. What a faff! I much prefer using my Dresden ruler I have which cuts half these steps out and means I can rotary cut it all. Another leader from our Guide unit also had the book and made her bag about the same time as me on her new cheap sewing machine. We both had hours of fun making the puff for the middle. She managed to make her's too small and I made mine too big and as you can see had to pop an extra bit of fabric in the middle because the fabric supplied only had the print on 1 side. Oh well...

I also made myself chuckle as I sewed all the seams inside and I blindly followed the book which said to do a zig zag stitch on the seam to make it stronger. just as I turned the bag the right way around I realised not only do I have a hemming foot with my sewing machine (doh!) but it also has a pre set stitch for it! (double doh!). I'll have to remember that for my next project which is the bag fro the Make! book that I was given for my birthday by a friend.

My bag

Project number 2 was the starry quilt (yes, the one I started earlier this year that is a birthday pressie for someone who's birthday was in feb). I FINALLY got all the stars made and spent a good hour with my twin sister working out the best layout so we didn't have groups of colours or collections of the same type of star together. I guess a lot could be said for planning and not being spontaneous but where's the fun in that! My sister is  huge fan of the grey/pink/yellow star that's in the middle column 2nd down. She's requested a whole quilt of it (not demanding at all!). I on the other hand am a fan of the purple and green one in the top left corner and the green and grey one in the bottom centre. I love the idea of making a quilt with a grey background and using bright colours to really add some 'wow' to it.

As much as I love this quilt and will be proud of it when I've finished I still would have preferred it on a black background but the recipient wanted it on a creamy one. I think black would of looked fab. This quilt is all pinned now and just needs to be quilted which leads me to project number 3...

Starry Quilt - top all pieced!

Project 3 - learn to fmq on my new(ish...) sewing machine so i can quilt this quilt with stars - it seems only right for it. I sat myself down one afternoon with a couple of large quilt sandwiches and just sat playing with the tension and everything to try and get it right. It would appear that changing the stitch length to 0 has a huge impact and once I managed to get the tension right for a straight line (I have to loosen the bobbin tension every time I put a new bobbin in because my sewing machine hates me lol) I was whizzing around and actually getting rather good results fro my first attempt. The tension was perfect even around corners although my stitch length was a tad dodgy in places - all in all i think I could get the hang of it easily because it just seemed like such a natural thing to do. I bought a couple of star templates and some air vanishing pens to mark the quilt so hopefully if i get a chance this weekend I may get the quilt done. I'm so excited!

As for my other project of the week - Herman - he worked OK but not brilliantly. I blame it on the instructions I was given being in American (I have no idea what a cup is when baking - obv in real life it's what holds my tea). This time around I used a recipe that had English measurements and he looks a lot happier. I'm due to cook him this weekend so we'll see how he goes!

hopefully next time I write I'll have a quilt that just needs binding (or is finished!)

Herman the house guest

On Friday last week I gained a new friend who wanted to go home with me. His name? Herman. And he's not a real person - he's a German friendship cake yeasty mix that's doing the rounds.
Luckily for me he's not that demanding and as he was already rather old when I got him I've only had to stir him so far and don't need to feed him until tomorrow when I also have to split him up! In theory I give 2 portions of him to friends, keep 1 for myself and eat the other. I think my dad and I are going to have big arguments about what we add to him but I may struggle to give him away so we may make a few cakes!

The best news this week though is that I have a week off work so I'm intending on relaxing and finishing that star quilt I started for my friend (yes, I am a bad person who hasn't finished it yet)

I have managed to do some sewing today and I made a bag that came with a book I got. In making this bag I have discovered that I have no patience for paper templates and basting things then hand seeing. Yawn. What a faff. I like rotary cutting and making a nice fast quilt.