Found time to post!

The beginning of the week is always difficult for me to blog, I get bogged down with work (apologies for the four letter word there) Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and then treat myself to some sewing on Thursdays, finally getting to blogging for a few days before we start with Monday all over again!

So, excuses over, and here I am

So an apology for being tardy - and here are the photos of the very high tech give-away random winner generator:

Basket of scraps of paper,

and the first two slips drawn from the basket. 

 

As you can see, neither Plum or Teje relieved me of decision making, but they did narrow it down!  I decided to go with two children's charities

So the vanishing nine patch will go to the Foster Network, organised by a friend of Plum's, and the fail fence zig zag will go to Great Ormand Street hospital in London

 This going-to-be-a-whirly gig top hasn't progressed. :-(  I couldn't find any suitable border fabric locally, so went on-line and found what looks like the perfect fabric, and ordered it.  It was only when I got the dispatch email that I realised I'd ordered it from Germany!!! so hopefully that will arrive next week

 I have however managed another texture block for Hilary's quilt.  She has no idea that this is happening, but i needed to know how best to do these braille dots.  I stitched the braille for 'texture' in a few different ways (satin stitch, running stitch outline, triple stitch outline etc) and got mum to take it and ask Hilary for her help on a project!!!

So with Hilary's help (she chose the satin stitch) I have created another surprise block for Hilary - isn't that great!

One last piece of news before I go and pack my stuff for a lesson at Chertsey Museum (we are going to tackle hexies (and pentagons) and make either a pin cushion or a child's ball), I finally have furniture again in my living room.

This arrived on Monday, and is so squishy and comfy, I love it, (even if it is a tad too big for the room LOL)

Need a good home ...

I have two quilts that are nearly finished.  I have been putting off the last hour or so of finishing as they don't have a home to go to, so I've been doing other projects instead.  However, I am getting to the stage where I need the space, so I would like these to go to a good home.

Please have a look at them and help me out - do you think of a deserving person or charity when you see these?  Can you suggest someone who would appreciate one?  Please can you use the comment form to suggest either an international charity, or a UK based charity or deserving cause, and I'll pick two suggestions next weekend and send the quilts.

Disappearing 9 Patch from Moda's Arnold's Attic range

and a Zig Zag rail fence.

TECHNICAL STUFF: measurements ... ZigZag: 170cmx130cm, D9P (browns and greens): about 115cm x 140cm.  Both 100% cotton top, quilted, and 100% fleece backing.  Machine washable to 40 degrees C)

not enough space

I have now tidied my sewing room (it seriously needed it) but I'm shorter on space than I was before.  I claim to not understand it, but between me and Mr Mastercard, I know exactly why there is less space... 

... 3m of curtain fabric from Ikea, for Lisa's bedroom

... 10 FQs for £10 from Cottonpatch, well, it could have been rude not to as such a good price - aren't they YUMMY













... 2m pink batik to border the pink and purple pinwheels

... and these Moda Aviary fabrics to compliment the ones I got from CrossPatch a while ago; the ones I used for Kelli's baby's quilt.  I got these form the states - they got sent to dad's to save on postage costs, and astonishingly, one of the grandparents at school has a house just 5 minutes from Dad's so she kindly brought it back after their recent trip :-)




And the final photo is an almost-finish.  This is the Arnold's Attic fabric I won at Christmas that is finally quilted and half bound.  I've stitched the binding to the front, and pinned it to the back, but I'm fed up with it, and it doesn't have a home planned, so it can go back into to the pile until I fancy some hand sewing!

Done some sewing :-)

Today I've finished three black bin bags full of fleeces to be embroidered, I've made pinwheel blocks from the batiks and arranged them, and I've arranged the Arnold's Attic vanishing 9 patch blocks (the ones in the earth colours)

I've pinned the two patchworks in strips, and I'll need to sew them fairly promptly as I've only got 4 pins left!  My bed is fairly high which is great for pinning, but rubbish for getting photos of blocks!

(Now that I've got Windows 7 I cant seem to turn these photo, so please feel free to tip your head to the left if it helps!)

So these are the pinwheel blocks

and these are the vanishing 9 patch blocks

My Poppies opening ceremony plaque was shown in the local papers: two photos of the plaque, one including the lady Mayor, and none of anything else.  A bit of a result for me, but a shame for the organisers and all the mums and kids who turned up

and a final photo is of the lovely sunset that I saw when I was upstairs pinning the blocks

Now I have a busy week coming up: 5 hour, 9 hour and 6 hour days at school at the beginning of the week, and then  teaching at the museum, at the library and at the church at the end of the week.  Added to this we lose access to the sitting room tomorrow morning for 4 days while the new floor is laid, and sometime I need to get something for Brian's birthday on Saturday.  Ho hum.  Of course I will NEED to do some sewing if only to get my pins back!!!

Managed some sewing - yippee!

I knew that, as usual, I wouldn't get much sewing done on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday (dratted W.O.R.K!), and Thursday wasn't too exciting as I had a dozen fleeces to embroider for a local builder, but yesterday and today have been sewing days :-)

I won an Arnold's Attic Layer Cake (from Moda) in the Christmas Giveaway over on Stash Manicure, and finally (with help from Niki) decided to do a Vanishing Patch, but with 42 squares there wasn't quite enough to make five nine patches.  I had just bought some (reduced) Moda from Julia at CrossPatch, and she'd been really helpful, so I decided to put my trust in her and ask for a few fat quarters in a  fabric/range that coordinated with Arnold's Attic  She came back with Bistro (see to row, middle fabric) which I LOVE! and got 3 meters of it!

So . . . 45 10 inch squares stitched into five 9 patches.  (I carefully chose my favourite fabrics for the corners as they remain whole, and the smallest print for the centre as this will become the smallest section of fabric)

Then each 9 patch is cut into quarters (first in half then in half again)

Leaving me with 20 blocks like this.

I cant go any further yet because I don't have anywhere to lay them out and arrange them how I like them.  However in just under two weeks time I am going to mum's and she has floor space, and a good eye for colours, so we'll do it then, and I can pin them at mum's and bring them home to sew into a flimsy. (Thank you mummy!)

I feel all de-stressed now that I've got some sewing done!

Now I've got 30 t-shirts to embroider for a local transport company - boring, but will pay for the Bistro fabric I just bought, so I cant complain :-)