Friday 11 December 2009

I'm nearly a week behind which seems to be the story at the moment...

Anyway, last weekend was clear apart from my work Chrimbo party on the Friday at The National Media Museum. Even though it was a free bar i managed to not get spectacularly drunk (probably my mouth didn’t stop flapping long enough for me to drink very much) so i wasn’t nursing a hangover on Saturday morning.

My normal pattern for a weekend is to give myself a completely unrealistic to-do list, and then get all cranky on Sunday evening when I’ve only got hardly any of it done. I still had the unrealistic list but managed to get enough done to avoid the crankiness on Sunday evening!
I was up fairly early both Saturday and Sunday as Curly Boy was snoring like a lion. I was spitting feathers when i couldn't stand it any longer and had to get up, but i guess i have him to thank for me having so much time.

Amazingly I got my Orange and Teal wonky log cabin quilt finished!



I quilted it on the frame and I finally remembered to take a pic of the frame with the machine on for those of you who have asked. Sorry – i did mean remember before now, but better late than never?



I don’t know how I’d describe the quilting. Sort of lines and squares? I love how it looks on the front....



but it shows up even better on the back.



It was good fun and QUICK to do. 5 hours including the ½ hour ish to put it on the frame. I didn’t realise having THAT much fun quilting was possible and judging how achy my legs and bum were on Monday morning – fantastic exercise too.



I even hand sewed the binding down apart from ½ side which i finished on Monday night. The binding it wasn’t even on my list! That’s a grand total of 2 UFOs done!

I also made a block for the Around The World Quilting Bee, finished the last couple of bits on the Reversible quilt (blogged about on Saturday), prepared a few blocks for the Josephs Coat quilt a long, embroidered a label for the Bento Box and even did a bit of tidying up!

Saturday 5 December 2009

Busy busy...

I think i have had the busiest 3 weeks in history not helped by my back.
2 evenings of rotary cutting last week and I managed to totally cabbage my back to the point that the muscles around my ribs have been so tight that my stomach has been really upset, and I’ve been a bit pukey. Nice.

But being a brave little soldier (yeah...right!...) I managed to do just about everything i needed to do with the exception of going and seeing my favourite girlies dancing last Saturday night. I was gutted that i missed it and I’ve been popping the pain killers ever since until i could finally get the Osteopath last week to get it sorted. Thankfully it’s on the mend now but I’m trying to avoid the rotary cutter. That shouldn't be too hard as i shouldn't be cutting out for anything new anyway with a list of UFOs as long as it is!

The evenings I spent rotary cutting was the fabric for 2 quilts that Mum and I made at a class last Saturday. My Mum is THE hardest person to buy for so i thought i'd book us into the class as her birthday pressie. Here’s my finished lap quilt made with Amy Butler Love.

Front...



Back....


I chose Moda Panache for Mum and it looks lovely so I’ll try and remember to snap a pic of it next time i’m at her house.

I finally stopped ignoring the Bento box and after unpicking the crappy pattern I did last week on 4 blocks, I cracked on with it again.

After a disastrous start to the whole quilting frame malarkey – like EVERYTHING seeming to go wrong – this was an absolute breeze. I started quilting it on Sunday and finished the last 20 minutes before work last Monday. Probably 5-6 hours work in total with very little hassle and no thread snappage! I love the swirls and loops and it was a joy to do. It’s all bound and washed although, the downside of using unbleached cotton is that it wrinkles like the hell for the first 2 or 3 washes until it softens.





That’s 1 off my list of UFOs and I've managed to quilt another one today so I'll show you that when I've hand sewn the binding down and the light's better. So, it's nearly 2 down, 10 to go!