A bit of focus is called for...

I recently signed up for Donna's Secret Santa Christmas Swap and have been wracking my brains for a while as to what I could make. Inspiration was a bit low - several ideas were thought about but later abandoned. Anyway with the deadline looming I was thinking I'd best get my act together. We need to have our gift posted by Dec 1st so this week I really wanted to be decisive. Off to my enormous pile of magazines I went for ideas. The good news is I now definitely know what I'm making and I'm really excited about it. In fact I'm going to make 2 and keep one for myself - lol !! The bad news is I got side-tracked and have started another project. Before you all shout at me for my lack of self-control let me exonerate myself by explaining this will be a Christmas present. For my ds Patrick who really, really wants a quillow. Anne is busy making some for gifts and whilst reading her post it reminded me that Patrick has been asking for one for months. Ever since I explained to him what they were. By the way his little party was a big success and he declared it the best birthday ever..

In the British P&Q magazine from a couple of years back I found a pattern for a starburst quillow. Patrick loves stars and indeed has a quilt called Patricks Starry Night on his bed at the moment. Don't think I've shown that one yet. So I've made a start. If this is successful - I've never made a quillow before - I may make more for gifts. Then again -maybe not.

There are 2 blocks to this and hopefully depending on colour placement a wonderful secondary pattern will emerge. We'll see...

At the moment my sewing room is an absolute tip - it's like sewing in a war zone. If I was more focused and actually stopped myself from going from one thing to the next maybe I could pause for breath and do some tidying up. But where's the fun in that ! It's only ever me and Jason that use this room - I've very graciously allowed him a corner of my room for some of his computers - aren't I kind ? Occasionally he looks at my mountains of mess and mutters but that's as far as he goes so no matter...

I have also finished my paper pieced top that I started a few months back. I'm going to hand quilt this and it will go on my sofa as a throw. I'm planning to decorate in the new year and this will tie in with my new colour scheme. I absolutely loved making this and feel a little sad it is all done. As the pieces were not too small it grew really rapidly. I'm not ready to quilt this yet as I have another hand quilting project on the go and want to finish that first. I will leave the tacking and papers in for now until I'm ready. These pictures are not too clear as the light is going. They are clickable for a better view. The background fabric is a lovely creamy yellow with tiny stars.

I'm still working on my split flying geese border and hoping it will work. If not it's back to the drawing board - lol! And talking of flying geese in my magazine search I came across a wonderful flying geese quilt that I have just the right fabric for . . . . told you I needed to focus :-)