I have a dream ....

It's all very well working on UFO's - indeed I will very soon have two more to cross off my list - stay tuned for those - but I have broke rank today and indulged in a little scrap therapy. I have boxes of little scraps separated into colour and recently saw something on a blog ( forget who's -sorry ) that had me hotfooting it to etsy to buy this pattern  Pretty, pretty.

So a little bit of mess later I have these.

The dream I have is of one day having a sewing room of my own.  For now I have my sewing table set up in a corner of our bedroom.  I have plenty of space but when the kids leave home I am going to take over one of their bedrooms and spread out... In this room will be all my sewing machines, fabrics and all the usual paraphenalia and in a corner will be room for a tiny little bed - just for me - lol.  If I want I can escape the snores of my DH and sleep amongst my treasures.  On this bed will be a quilt ( of course ! ) and I have decided that it will a Rose quilt - so here is a long term project - by the time I get this room - way in the future - I may just have enough blocks ( quite time consuming making these ) to make my quilt. They are 6 inch blocks and have 51 pieces...

Now I have a lot of scraps so they should see me alright for a while.  I have a ton of blue scraps and although in real life blue roses are not the norm - because this is my quilt I am thinking I will make one in blue and see how it looks. We shall see.

I have loads more stuff to catch up on so will be back soon.  This weekend I plan to do one of my favourite parts of quilting - binding - love it.

See you soon xx

My Oldest UFO and catching up....

In an old box rescued from my parents house along with school reports and certificates I came across a piece of embroidery I had done in Primary school.  I thought hard and actually remember working on this - I was 10 years old and now I am 43 so it's quite a treasure.  It was tacked roughly onto a piece of cardboard and was stained in several places.

I carefully unpicked it from the cardboard and with my heart in my mouth washed it very gently in my kitchen sink.  I was so hoping it wouldn't fall apart or that the colours would run.  Luckily neither event happened - phew !!  Once dry I trimmed it down and added a couple of little borders.  Then I hand quilted it and added binding.  I really love it and am so glad to have it done.  I will add a label and may even mount it in a frame.  My DH can't believe I embroidered this at age 10 but I guess I was always destined to have a needle in my hand. Here it is...

Whilst browsing through my photos I realised I have never shown photos of a quilt I finished last year.  There is a bit of a story to this one.. A while back I was unable to sew due to a back injury which turned out to be a slipped disc. During this time I did a lot of crochet as I could manage to do this whilst lying flat on my back.  But my fabrics kept calling to me and one day I put some fabrics together that would end up in a quilt. These were put in a box and forgot about.  Months later I came across them and whilst browsing about on the web I came across a pattern on the sewwequilt website.  Here is the link. I decided to get this quilt done and it was the quickest quilt I ever made.  I love this quilt so much - I have named it my Morphine Quilt because those were the pills I was taking when I chose the colours - lol..I use this quilt a lot when I'm reading and feeling a bit cold. 

Not the best photos - really must get a new camera.  My friend Julie loved this so much she is making one in 30's prints. I will try and get a photo when it is done. I have loads more to show but am going to try and keep to smaller posts until I'm caught up.  Carolyn and I have an agreement to try and get our blogs moving again - lets see how we get on.

Long time !

Hello - I am still around.  A few minor health issues and other stuff have gotten in the way of blogging I'm afraid.  I'm still reading all my blog list and even commenting but this poor old blog is very sad....
I have been hard at work finishing some UFO's and just need to charge up my camera and take some photos.  I was quite dismayed when I counted up my started projects and discovered I had more than I thought - every time I thought my list was complete I remembered another one - lol.  
My final total was 27 and that for me is too many.  My aim is to try and get to single figures by the end of the year.  We'll see how it goes.
I am going to try and have a proper catch up post within a week - now it's in writing I may just stick to it - see you soon xxx

This and That

Yes I know it's about time I blogged - should try harder.  Been doing lots of stitching but have had no motivation to get on my computer and post.  This may be a long one - you have been warned......

I won't show you everything I've been doing - will save a bit for again.  But for now here goes

You may remember these

leftovers from a quilt top I made several years ago.

They turned into these

Which eventually ended up as this.

And a close-up.

There is a bit of a funny story about this.  My Mum had asked me to make a quilt for a Christmas gift for my Dad's sister and her husband,  I asked what sort of design and colours etc and Mum left it to me - the only info I got was that her living room ( as this is sofa size ) was quite neutral with creams, tans, browns etc.  So I got making this.  When finished I took it to Mum and she liked it so much she didn't want to give it away so ended up buying it for herself and getting my Auntie something else - lol !  Love it...

It was snowing the day we took it to Mums and I got a very rare snap of  DD Jess ( too cold to take her hat off ).

I have another couple of finishes for last year but have just realised I have no good photos of them yet.  Will do that next time.

Seeing as it is a New Year and all my UFO's are done ( lololol - I wish !!! ) Don't even want to count them.  Anyway when I saw this Quilt-a-long I knew I would have to join in.  I decided to try and tempt Karol-Ann into it and although she put up a token amount of resistence she quickly joined in.  Go see her lovely blocks.

Instead of going with my normal scrappy I decided to have a colour scheme going on with this and was inspired by a small bundle of FQ's I bought last year.  I am picking colours out from this fabric.

I have also had fun going through my stash and seeing what else "goes with "

Here are two

And two more with background fabric added.

I went to Abakhan Fabrics and bought a great piece of pale mustardy yellow to use as background but when it came down to it - it just seemed a bit flat.  I was just sorting through my neutrals to see what else I could use and this pinky/bluey mottled stuff was in the wrong drawer.  I took it out to put back with the pinks and just quickly placed a block next to it and whaddya know - a winner - lol !!

Last night I got a bit more prep done

should be good for the weekend.

I have had a lot of headaches this week so once I come off here I'm going to have a nice cup of tea and do some relaxing hand-sewing.  Should be filing our Tax Returns really but not much fun in that is there ?

Yesterday was so wet and dark that I decided I needed to brighten up my day a little and knocked up a couple of these - rainbow pincushions.

I did the ROYGBIV thing but needed 1 more colour to make up the 8 segments so added the pink.  These are BIG - about 7 inches across as that is just what I wanted.  Later tonight I will probably sort out my pins - flower head - applique - glass head etc and put them all in the different sections - yes I am that sad - haha ! Will be nice to have them all in one place.  I will give one to my friend on Tuesday at our sewing group.


Just one more photo for you cat-lovers.  A rare snap of all three of my babies altogether.  They all get on fine but tend to like their own space so I love this photo.

Have a nice weekend everyone xx

A quilt for Isla

My friend Bren is raffling a beautiful quilt in aid of this young lady.

Please go to quiltforisla.blogspot.com to read all about it and see if you would like to help.

Back soon xxx

SSCS 2011

For whatever reason I have been unable to access my blog for a few days ( I think DH has been fiddling with settings on our server though he is admitting nothing - lol )

So I have been unable to show my bounty from Chookyblues annual swap.  Don't worry though I sent a thankyou email on Boxing Day to my partner Deb for my wonderful goodies.  Here's what I received

All I can say is - how fantastic !!  Such lovely items - gorgeous fabrics and beautifully stitched.  I feel very lucky indeed. 

Close-up of  " Mary " - even down to the little painted shoes.

Was well worth waiting til Christmas Day for... Thanks Deb xxx

And here's what I sent to my partner Tracey

Machine pieced and hand quilted Mini.

Scrappy zipped bag and hand knitted welsh wool hat.

Little felt tree ornament.

What a great swap yet again.  Many thanks to Chooky - she is taking some well-deserved time off to herself just now and who can blame her - can you imagine how many hours she has put into organising this ?

I was going to end the year by listing my UFO's but that was too much like hard work.  For now I am simply saying I will NOT start anything in January and work on some of my many WIP's.  I just could not resist joining in with the quilt-a-long on Jeanne's blog. I do not plan on making one a day though as I know I will never keep that up so will probably just stop when I've had enough.  I am making mine a bit bigger too - 5 inches.  I have re-drafted the block and made plastic templates and have been going through my scraps tracing out the little pieces.  I have quite a few ready to go.  Was a bit naughty and stitched one up just to test it out.  Which was a good thing as I had stitched the door unit and window units together wrongly - silly me.  Have re-done this now...

so technically as this block is done the project is now officially not a January start - haha - have I convinced you ?

Have a very Happy New Year folks and look forward to seeing what crafty goodness 2012 brings !!!

A lovely package

Hurray - my SSCS parcel arrived a few days ago ( been meaning to post but my DH has "man-flu" and we all know how that goes - lol ).

The main present is tucked away safely for Christmas Day but I was allowed to open this

A cute gift in itself.  Inside was this very sweet little bag.

What a beauty - lovely, lovely, lovely !!

I am debating whether to snoop around Chooky's blog to see who my partner is but I think I will wait and see til I am allowed to open the card that came with the gift.

Thanks mystery partner - I look forward to opening my pressie - not long now.....