It's a new day... and I'm feeling good!

Well, as Muse put it in their song *.. It's a new day and I'm feeling good! And what a good month May was. I'll actually sad to see it go! Welcome to anyone joining me from the Lily's quilts blog hop and hello to everyone else!

It was a sad month too. I run a Ranger unit which is the oldest section of Girlguiding (the UK version of Girl scouts) that girls can belong to and our oldest member is moving away to another city with her boyfriend. I've known her since she was 10 and it's been nice to see her grow into a confident 22 year old from the shy girl she once was. We had one last meeting all together and my sister made cakes for the occasion. They were burgers and she make sugar cookie chips (fries) to go with them. they went down very well.

I FINALLY finished making the starry quilt that I feel like I've been making forever for a friend. She hasn't got it yet but at least it's done. It was my first attempt at free motion quilting and although not perfect I'm rather impressed with how it looks.

I've also been joining in with a paper piecing quilt along this month. The first quilt along I've done and also my first attempt at paper piecing. Subscribers may recognise some of these pieces but the first 3 are my new ones from last week and I have another 3 to get made for this week then it's all done! Sorry the pictures are sideways. No idea why or how to turn them.

I've also been working on that quilt for my friend's wedding. It's not until October but best to get things done early. The easy bit is all done now. I've got my coloured squares all made and I now have a fair idea of just how giant this quilt will be. The centre of these squares is blank for Guests to write messages and the big gap in the middle will have pictures in of the couple when I a) get them and then b) work out how to get them on fabric! This isn't the actual layout. I promise I'll mix the colours a bit more.

This month, inspired by watching the Great British Sewing Bee on telly, I've also tried my hand at making clothing instead of quilts or random items. I've made a trial version of a dress and a top. Neither have been made in proper fabric yet because I haven't worked out which fabric to use. I'm rather impressed with myself and my invisible zip inserting skills though.

I've also been shopping for fabric. I'm a bad person. My stash really is big enough already but I can't resist the pretty fabric, especially when it's on sale!

My ebay fabric

 And then there's what's been happening in my life. In the middle of the month I went on an occupational therapy open day at the local uni. I really think that's what I'd like to do with my life so I'm looking into how to do that. I think I'm going to have to go back to college to get some recent eduction and I'm probably going to have to try and get some work experience too.

The most exciting and recent change though is that after many years of searching and saying I was going to change jobs because I hated my current one I have a new job! It all happened so fast when last Thursday I got an email asking if I was interested. I went for 1 interview and then on Tuesday I was told I had a 2nd group assessment on the Wednesday then on Thursday afternoon I found out I had the job. It's not the most glamorous in the world - it's in a call centre but the money is better and the hours are more sociable. No more getting up at 3am for me :) I handed my notice in at work today and Thursday if my last shift.

That chapter of my life is over and another one is about to begin.

Now begins to great search for a bike so I can cycle to work... 

*other versions of feeling good available.

A finish at last!

That's right. I've finally managed to finish the starry quilt! Unfortunately the weather here in Newcastle has been rather rubbish so I haven't managed to get a decent photo of it but I promise I will once/if the sun ever comes out again.

The finished quilt yay!

Finishing the quilt should of been as easy as just sewing a bit of binding on but I don't know if it was the tiredness of not having a day off work since the previous Sunday or what but I managed to make it harder than it should of been. 

It all started when I was changing back to my cream thread and I lost a tiny little screw from my bobbin. Oops. It took me about 10 minutes to find it because it is so tiny and it fell on very thick carpet.

Just to give an idea of size. look how tiny it is compared to the pin head!

Next up was the shop bought binding. I thought this would save me time but it took me forever to get the pieces joined and for the folds that were already in it to line up. Grr. 

Finally I did it although I suspect my technique of sewing the full lot on with a sewing machine could use a little practise.

My 1st attempt at free motion quilting a quilt. If you squint you may even spot some stars that look like stars and not just pointy lines.

I have also had a try at paper piecing this week in preparation of hopefully joining the sew along that Ellison lane quilts are hosting!

Flying Geese. Not bad for a first attempt. Excuse the random fabric and that I've not squared it off.

On the clothing front not much has happened. I've downloaded the pattern for a sorbetto top from Colette patterns so I may make a fake one of them this week. I love that it is American sizing because I can take 2 size of my UK size. Always a confidence booster.

My friend with a bit of dress making experience also got to see me modelling my unfinished dress mock up and has concluded that when I put the facing in it the neck should be fine although apparently I could do with more darts in the bust. She offered to attack me with pins but I politely declined.

Oh and because I've had such an awful week at work with them cutting my hours with no warning I splashed out on some fabric. It's yet to arrive but there will be pictures when it does. (Well I need something for this sew along!!)

..and finally...
This week when browsing around all the new blogs I follow (sorry - I can't remember where I found it) I came across a wonderful tool - Palette Builder 2.0. It goes without saying that I played around and some quilts may appear in these colour ways at some point! I'm a huge fan of the one with the daffodils.

Until next time when I will hopefully have fabric and decent quilt photos!
Thanks for reading

1st May! Where has the year gone?

How is it May already? Where has the year gone? Will summer ever arrive?

I'm joining up with the small blog meet that Lily's quilts hosts because I'd love to think someone is actually reading my blog and I'm not talking to myself (which I'm fairly certain I am at the minute). hopefully with a few followers I'll remember to post more often on here although I've been good recently.

April has been a productive month for me, I finally finished quilting my friend's star quilt and I finished the tiny cathedral windows blocks I'd been working on. I made a bag out of a kit I bought from hobbycraft (you can never have too many bags!) And in the middle of all of that I managed to have 2 birthdays and a wedding anniversary happen!

I've yet to bind the star quilt, hopefully this weekend I can get that done. I'm also thinking of making a pincushion that's a cathedral window. I've found a blog with instructions so we'll see how that goes. Probably rather ambitious for the 1 day I have off. The joys of working in retail eh?

I've started work on a quilt for a friend's wedding and I have help from someone to make it although before last Sunday she'd never used a sewing machine before so we are having fun with me teaching her to sew.

Inspired by the Great British sewing bee I've started making a dress. Well, actually, I've traced and cut out a pattern to make a fake dress to get a practice run. I daren't make the real thing because I'm currently trying to do the Insanity workouts and hope to shift quite a few inches so I'll look good when I wear my dress I'll make :)

Oh, and yet again I gained some fabric... The tube map on and the apron one were a birthday present from my sister and the others were all acquisitions in the hobbycraft fabric sale. Amy Butler fabric at half price is too good to pass up and I'll find something to do with the rest.

Oh I've also spent most of this week being attacked by spiders. I've pulled one live one out my hair (dunno how that got in there at work), had one drop infront of my face when eating breakfast at work and had one fun at me in our house. I'm beginning to feel there is a spider conspiracy against me. I thought they were meant to go outside when the weather got warmer not appear near me?

Oh well. Hopefully I'll be posting next time with either a finished pincushion or a quilt that's finally been bound!

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Back again and inspired by great British sewing bee

Well yet again I'm back. I'm awful at this blogging thing. I suspect this is because I only have 1 follower and so I doubt that anyone actually reads these! Although who knows. Maybe if I posted more I would get more followers?

Well onto a catch up of what I've been doing.

Remember those hexagons I was hoping to turn into a tablemat for Christmas? Here they are all finished.

Yay! I do like them and I think they work well with the linen.

That starry quilt I was making for my friend? That's been free motion quilted too. I finally plucked up the courage to do it and managed to do the whole thing in a day. It isn't perfect by any stretch of the imagination but for a 1st attempt it's OK  It looks really good from afar. The quilt just needs binding now and I've cheated and bought some binding to do that.

Since my last post I've also gained more fabric (oops) including some very funky tube map fabric that I got for my birthday, rather a lot of Amy butler fabric that was on sale in hobby craft for £6 a meter (silly to pass up that chance) and some home dec fabric from ikea to make a bag. I would to to make Amy butler's weekend bag but I suspect that's a little beyond my skill level so I'm going to limit myself to something from the bag making bible instead.

I've also for some reason agreed to make a quilt for my friends wedding which is in October. Plenty of time right? The theme for the wedding is a vintage tea party and so I've had to buy a lot of fabric to match this theme. I had nothing in my funky stash that would work. It's a basic quilt with lots of squares for people to sign and we ate hoping to transfer some photos on too. I've put my friend who is one of the bridesmaids in charge of gaining photos. It's all a secret from the bride and groom so I'm having to be very careful what I say on Facebook.

my newly gained fabric. lots of flowers

I'm not alone in making this quilt though. I have help! The friend who is a bridesmaid is helping me make it. She's never used a sewing machine before which is just a tiny problem so last weekend I spent a Sunday afternoon letting her loose sewing straight lines and we got a few blocks made. She loved her time using the sewing machine and is really looking forward to our next sewing get together in a few weeks.

7 of 66...

And then we get to the great British sewing bee TV show. For those who don't know what it is... If you've ever seen great British bake off its the same thing but sewing. Lol. Basically a group of very talented people complete challenges to make items every week with people being knocked out every week until the finale. I have no idea how they are making those things in that time. I mean seriously I takes me months to make anything. Never mind making an evening dress of a tailored jacket in 8 hours from start to finish! Utter madness.
I was given the book for my birthday last week and I also magically at the same time managed to gain a dress pattern from as magazine. It's a sign I tell you! I've always quite liked slightly vintage dresses (not so much the flowers. Kath kidston flowers make me cry so you can imagine how I'm feeling about that wedding quilt) and with my recent (and hopefully continuing weight loss) I've decided now is the time to try and make a dress! You never know. Summer may appear yet. I'm also aware that making a dress may be a stupid and expensive thing to so when I'm still loosing weight and planning on starting the insanity workout DVDs so I've opted to just have a trial run and see how it goes since its the first item of clothing I will ever of made and will be only the 2nd zip I've put in (everyone has to start somewhere right).
The fabric has been ordered, the invisible zippers and zipper foot for my sewing machine have been ordered, the book will give me hints, and the pattern gives me basic instructions. How wrong can it go? I'm hoping to blog the lot so you (dear reader who has done very well to get this far) can see. If I can make a dress anyone can.

The pattern. Can I do it?

Coincidently the woman who won the sewing bee had never made a quilt before. At least I've done that even if I've never worn anything I've made! lol. Hopefully next time I post I'll have started making that dress. Or have more of the quilt made... I'm rather excited about the dress option tbh...

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.

Birthday

It's been a rather odd month - especially these past few weeks. We heard on Easter Sunday that my dad's mum had a stroke and was in hospital down south. Dad spent the week worrying before receiving a phone call from his brother and deciding to drive all the way to the hospital (about 5 hours drive!) to see her. On the Tuesday my dad found out he was diabetic (My sister and I are refusing to move all the sugary goodness from the house. How mean are we?) and then on the Wed I found out that my other gran who lives nearby is having problems with her blood pressure and was onto her 3rd trip to the doctor/nurse in a week on Friday to get a heart monitor. I'm fairly certain my family are falling to bits.

Despite all this we've also managed to squash in 2 Ranger meetings this week (my big Aqua Guides - the 14-26yr olds) where we had a wii and movie night and then yesterday went geocaching in a local country park. We had the full age range of 15-22 there and despite what some people say about there being such differences in age range and life experience they really do all get on so well and encourage each other. At one point we discovered we were following other geocachers around and we started running and missing caches out to leave message for each other. So much fun. Unfortunately it's me who now has to sit here and log the lot on the website.

In other news, it's my birthday today and my sister very kindly decided to buy me some fabric as a pressie! It's a rather random selection because after her sitting next to me and looking through fabric on-line we very quickly discovered that although we are identical twins we have completely opposite ideas about what is pretty fabric.

In the end I sent her away with a website and told her to add stuff she liked (or thought I would like) to the shopping basket then i was called through to whittle it down to an acceptable price. lol. I picked a selection of fabrics - some in colours that I don't have many of in my stash (look no purple or light pink!) and some fabrics that I just loved. Who shouldn't have fabric with owls?!?!? I do love the expressions on the faces of the foxes on the walk in the woods fabric.

The pretty birthday fabric!

Of course that's not the only fabric I've gained... I wish people would stop pointing out sales to me. I finally gave in and bought myself a selection of fabric from the innocent crush range which I fell in love with when I saw This quilt. I'm not totally certain what I'll do with it. I want to do a quilt with the pattern I originally saw it used in but can't use the same colours.

Innocent Crush

The other fabric I bought purely based on the fact I liked the colours (as usual). Again, I have no project in mind for it but I love it all the same. it's from the Camelot Range by Jason Yenter. The colours are just so bright and vibrant and I even discovered I already had some of his fabric from my post xmas buying spree! Now I just need to think of a way to use it.

Camelot fabric

I have promised myself I won't start any new projects though until I get this star quilt finished for my friend. I'm ashamed to say very little has been done on it since last time I posted pictures. I think I need a week off work to get it done.

It was on a starry night...

I've just returned from a weekend away with my Guides in the middle of Northumberland with no phone signal or Internet or anything and it was fun!
We did activities based on traditional guiding, we did some archery with the village archery club (and I won the line contest although I didn't count according to the guides. Lol) and we had a campfire outside.
I think one of the things that amazed my guides the most all weekend though was when they went outside on the first night to look for cardboard rabbits and bats which we'd scattered around and stuck reflective 'eyes' on and my sister told then to look up. The girls are all from in a city and we've never really taken them anywhere that it's so dark and remote (at least while there's been clear skies) so they were all amazed at the number of stars up there, and the shooting stars they could see, and being able to see the milky way (even if faintly). I suspect if we'd still been up there this week we would have been able to see the northern lights and that would blow their minds! Every night some of them took their hot chocolates and just went outside to look at the stars in wonder.
I guess we often forget to take pleasure in the simple things like seeing the stars (or for me the peace and quiet and being cut off from everything, well once the girls finally went to sleep anyway).


But on the topic of different stars I've made some progress with the bright starry quilt for my friend. I'm about half way there with the big blocks but still have a few small ones to get started on.

My favourite blocks are the pink and purple and the green and grey. My sister is very drawn to the blue and blue block.