Final finish for February

Last year I received a charm pack as an OPAM prize, in blues and whites, a colour combination that I love. It's been sitting in my drawer ever since waiting for the perfect opportunity to use it. My sister-in-law has a birthday on Friday and I've used about half of the squares to make her a cushion. I did it properly too! It has a wadded, lined and quilted front and a lined back, with a concealed zip. There are enough squares left to make another cushion sometime.

I've only just noticed that nosey little dog sticking her nose out through the cat flap.

Quilting

Last Saturday I went a machine quilting workshop run by Philippa Naylor. Those of you who watch The Quilt Show may remember seeing her a few years back. It was a wonderful day and I learnt so much and gained enormously in confidence. One of the things that pleased me was that I can now quilt well without using the BSR foot. Using the BSR foot undoubtedly helped me on my way, but I now find I prefer to quilt without it.

Here are some of the things that I did.

But if you want to see some stunning quilting you should look at some of Philippa's quilts.

A new back door

We've had a new back door put into the kitchen as the old one was so ill fitting and could not be fixed. So of course, a new back door needs a new cat flap. And a new cat flap needs to be investigated.

Another finish

I made this bag over the last couple of days. It's from another Bustle and Sew pattern from last year sometime, and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it and have had it in mind to make ever since. I'm so busy with the City and Guilds work that I can't see myself having time to make anything big for a while, so I'm enjoying making up these small projects.

Sewing room update.

We finished the painting pretty quickly in the sewing room and then I took a few days putting everything back tidily. We still have some painting to do - the windows and the door - but that will wait until we get some warmer weather.

The windows still need painting. The walls were repainted white but the pine panelling was given one coat of hot pink gloss. We left it at one as the grain of the wood still showed through and the paint looked like a coat of stain, rather than a solid block of bright pink, which we would have got if we'd done two coats. This photograph is taken from the doorway.

I finally got around to labelling my embroidery floss boxes. This is on the wall opposite the window, on the left of the doorway.

We bought these two new tall cupboards to give me some more storage. The bottom three shelves in each cupboard contain my fabric stash. It looks a bit pitiful doesn't it, but I'm determined to use up the fabric I've got before investing in much more.

Some little finishes

Here are a couple of little things I've made over the last couple of weeks.

This was a little felt hanging I made for Christopher in lieu of a Valentine's card. I apologise to the designer, but I can't remember who you are so can't credit you with the design.

I made a new cover for my sewing machine, using a pattern from Bustle and Sew. The background is actually cream, but it was difficult to get a better photograph that day. I hummed and hawed over whether to make it longer, but my machine is dropped into the cabinet more often than not, and then the cover fits perfectly.

Word Verification continued

I'm not surprised that so many of you are equally as irritated as I am about this problem. Jabblog left me a link to a wonderful post on the subject, and I suggest that you go and read it too. It says everything I'd like to say.

http://run-a-roundranch.blogspot.com/2012/02/word-verification-woes.html

If everyone started turning the word verification off and using comment moderation perhaps Blogger would get wind of our annoyance and do something about it.

I haven't tried the new interface because I'm too lazy to change something that seems to be working well, and now I don't think I'm going to bother.

Do let me know what you think about that post and pass it on to others who read your blog if you agree.

Irritated

Am I alone in being intensely irritated by Blogger at the moment? My particular irritation is that on blogs that have word recognition to prove that I'm not a robot, there are now two words to type, one of which is almost always illegible, plus punctuation. AAAaaarrrgghh! Is this an arbitrary decision by Blogger or have bloggers actually chosen to have it? Do bloggers know that this is happening on their posts?

Who do I complain to? Any ideas?

No sewing for a few days ...

until my sewing room has been painted and everything put back in again. I'm sure there was a good reason for deciding to decorate the room, but it's difficult to remember it when everything is in uproar. This morning I took everything out of the room and stacked it in the dining room though some of the things have ended up in the kitchen.

It's amazing how much stuff came out of such a small room.

The first view is from the door, looking straight out into the garden; the second view is to the left of the door and the third is the view to the right. And that's it. But it's a room I can call my own and where I can leave everything out that I'm working. I'm lucky not to have to work in a corner of the dining room or lounge.

This afternoon I washed down the walls and the woodwork, and Christopher filled up all the little holes left by taking hooks down. He felt that I'd been showing you too many pictures of Ruby recently, so here's a couple of Man at Work.

He likes to get properly dressed for the job in hand as you can see, even though it only took him about five minutes. But it got him in the right mood - and gave him an opportunity to ask for cups of tea!

Tomorrow we shall start to paint, and since it's such a small room, it hopefully won't take us too long to finish. Then I'll show you what it looks like.

Green

I've done a few things with my green scraps so far this month, and hope to do some more in the next couple of weeks.

At my City and Guilds course we were talking about prairie points, so I came home and started looking at different ways of making and using them, and then turned them into a small sampler.

At

This was also a sample for the C & G course, mitred borders with a binding made by bringing the back to the front. I used Susan Cleveland's method for the mitred borders, which was so easy to follow. The binding however was a nightmare!

Some more scrappy blocks to match the red ones I made last month. I've no idea how these will work together but it will be fun to wait and see.

First finish for February

Don't you love that alliterative title?

I watched the most recent episode of The Quilt Show with Renae Merrill and was inspired to have a got at something similar. I simplified the design for my first effort and really love the finished effect.

This finishes at about fifteen inches wide. For my City and Guilds course I have several assignments and the first is due at Easter. I have to make an accessory from my own design, so have decided to make a larger version of this as a table centre. If I'm feeling really brave I might try out making each section as a twisted log cabin as Renae Merrill does.

Last weekend we went to visit our sons in the south east and stayed in a dog friendly hotel in Brighton. Ruby had so many new experiences, walking through a city, going in a lift, walking on the beach and the most frightening thing of all, the sea. But she quickly made herself at home in our hotel room!

Help please

I'm sure there is a really simple answer to this problem, but I haven't been able to find it. I'm sure that one of you will be able to help me though.

I read blogs using Google Reader and there are often blog posts that I read that I want to keep track of, but once I've read them and go on to the next one the one I like gets lost somewhere in the ether. Does Google Reader have a facility for keeping blog posts once you've read them?