Something new:

I have spent the whole Easter weekend with my family and I have not been near my beloved Bernie. With the holiday weekend behind me I am hoping to do some serious sewing. Just before the Easter break I started something completely new. It is a Tone Finagann quilt from her book called Sew Pretty Homestyle. It has a lot of embroidered flowers and writing on the blocks. I am not the best embroider, in fact it is something I am very poor at but I wanted to have a go. So far so good and the colour scheme is all those lovely pastel blues, pinks and green and I am very much into those at the moment.

A Mothers Love:

My lovely daughter heard an announcement on the radio a couple of days ago advertising a Vintage Fare in the Metquarter (Liverpool)on Saturday and the first 250people through the doors would receive a goodie bag with a Mac Make up bag inside! Now Michaela is a big Mac make up fan but seeing as she was in work today, I was given bus fare and instructions to get there early. Obviously, to be one of the 250 people through the door. On hearing this my niece Paige decided to come with me and off we set this morning, before the shops even opened. When we got there we discovered that the radio presenter had read it out wrong and it was the first 250 people through the door would receive a Metquarter tote bag. Paige and I got our free tote bag (no goodies inside) but we did have the added bonus of enjoying the vintage fare. Paige even bought herself a lovely bracelet.

Oliver Twist and Buttons:

On Saturday I went to Southport to the Sewing and knitting shop and I have been booked to teach a work shop on Journal Covers on the 20th August. The lady of the shop Sue asked if I could design a cover using Oliver Twist stuff and buttons as she sells both in her shop and she would like to promote them through the workshop. Of course no problem as I also love working with both of these products. So I purchased a few bits and pieces and her is the finished product. I am really pleased with it, I adore blues and greens together and luckily i had the perfect Batik fabric for this cover. i am particularly pleased with the flower I have made using the silk pods. I am hoping to go back today to buy some more to make a few into broaches as i think they will make nice little gifts for selected friends.

Journal cover :

I know yet another Journal cover!! But hopefully I will be doing a work shop in the very near future, teaching people how to make a journal cover. Its very early days yet so more about that later. For now I decided I needed a good variety of covers so hence another Journal cover. This time I decided to see what one would be like using the selvage's I have been collecting for my good friend Janet. (Don't worry Janet I still have quite a few for you). This is the second time I have sewn selvage edges together and its not as easy as it looks so I don't think I will be doing this again. To fiddly for me but the effect is very pleasing. I'd like to say off to do more sewing but alas I'm off to do the dishes instead :(

The Past, the Present and the Future;

I have been working really hard to day trying to finish my little Funky Birds quilt. I have used the lovely threads given to me by my very generous friend Judith. Apparently, the threads belonged to a lovely lady named Primrose, who sadly passed away last year. Today I dug deep in the bag of threads, for a gorgeous firery red and look what was still attached to the tag. It is a price sticker and it says, Woolworths 5 1/2p. The half pence coin went out of circulation in 1984 which means Primrose must have bought the tread before then. I wonder if it was in a sale or if that was the actual price of Clarks Anchor threads in Woolies at that time? Whatever the case, I am sure Primrose would be happy to know that her 5 1/2p was well spent because 26 years later the colour has not faded and the thread is still beautiful. I have left the little price sticker in Place in the hope that one day (in the very long distant future)when I am gone, somebody else will come across this little bit of the past. I hope it makes them pause for thought and think about the people who used the threads before them. Meanwhile back to the present. I made a small Journal cover with the off cuts from bits of the fabric I used to make my Funky Bird Quilt. Notice some of the fabric I have used is the four fat quarters I won in the January QGR13 news letter. I think the quilt is fun and quirky and I am looking forward to layering it and quilting it tomorrow.

Yearned for, longed for, bored of:

I craved this range of fabric, I could not wait for it to arrive, all the way from the good old USA curtsy of Dot. Now I hate the sight of it! 180 blocks later and I need to start something new. I have discovered, all be it very expensively, that I am not a range of fabric quilter. If there is such a thing? (Forgive me if I offend anyone, who enjoys making quilts using ranges of fabric, I do not mean to)? I would much rather mix and match fabrics and colour schemes myself. I have also discovered that I am not a big repetitive quilt person. The quilt I am currently making is an Amanda Hall design from Monkey Buttons and the original is just fabulously gorgeous. Mine on the other hand is not doing very much for me! I have completed 3 of the 9 blocks that make the whole of the quilt. Each block consists of ten brick and ten square blocks. I have decided that I must now go and search through my fabric stash, start a new project. however, each day I will complete one of the remainder 6 blocks.

How lucky am I????

Look what dropped through the letterbox on Saturday. I won the quiz in January's issuse of region 13 quilters quild news letter. The fabric is lovely and I got a very nice card telling me I had won from Ruth, the news letter editor. Thanks Ruth x

Off to the races:

My beautiful daughter and her partner Ian went to the Grand national on Saturday. They go every year and have a fantastic time, they say the whole atmosphere is great. I myself have never been but I always have a little bet 50p each way (haha last of the big spenders)and watch the race on the telly. This year I bet on Oscar Time (came second)Hello Bud (I think this fell)and Silver by Nature (came 14th). I am not going to get into the rights or wrongs of this events because like everything in life you can never please everyone. Anyway? Michaela going was a very last minute decision but she still managed to buy two gorgeous dresses in a space of a couple of days, then changed her mind. She plucked a lovely black and white dress from her never ending wardrobe. Only to discover it was a size to big and at 1/4 to midnight on Thursday had me taking the dress in and amending the little orange belt she had bought because it had a very nasty tacky shell clasp. I was asked recently by my exceptional friend Janet if Michaela was artistic like me and I said no. However,i have since thought about my answer and I was wrong to say no. Michaela is very artistic when it comes to fashion and hair and beauty, in all three categories she is a very talented young woman and I am very proud of her.

Waste not want not:

Rmember that BOO BOO I made with one of the blocks on the Spring Flower Quilt? Just look what it turned into " a cushion". I just couldn't bare to throw it away, it is one of my favorite blocks on the quilt. I looked at this morning and thought tote bag or cushion and the cushion won. However, with that said its such a pretty block I might just make another one and make a tote bag as well? Decisions, desicions, decisions!

I've started so I'll finish?????

Last week I had an interview at Liverpool community college and I took several pieces of work with me in an A2 plastic carrier. Today I decided it was time to put it all away and have a good old spring clean of my work. I carefully went through the big plastic box, where I keep it all, finished or unfinished. In the middle of the pieces I came across last years Liverbirds Christmas card challenge. (Make something using an old Christmas card for inspiration) This is what I originally started before the Twelve Days of Christmas interrupted. I started making this on poor old Mrs Jones and it was all wrinkled and puffy because Mrs Jones does not have a walking foot. I decided to unpick it all, put it back together and have a little play with free machine quilting. It was a very good size for practising free motion quilting on and I now have one completed UFO. All be it with some very dodgy free motion stitching. hehehehe!

Not a happy bunny???

I am not a happy bunny today and I should be delighted, I finished my Spring Flower quilt last night. I have worked really hard on this quilt top but sadly there is something just not right with the colour scheme. The fabrics are all so lovely but now I have put it together, it just looks washed out. This is such a shame because it is a lovely piece of work. Never mind, I will just have to make another one in a different colour scheme. With that said, it will have to wait a little, as I have yet to finish sewing the binding on the twelve days of Christmas and this morning I layered my lavender simple sampler. Not to mention the Luna Notte fabric is screaming to be cut up and I have just the quilt in mind for this courtesy of Dot.

Im such a Hare.

You know the story about the Hare and the Tortoise, well I am the Hare when it comes to making a quilt. I have been steaming a head making my Spring Flower Quilt and last night I was burning the midnight oil, trying to put it together. I only had to join all the panels this morning then on to the outer boarders. Then Shock set in as I discovered I had made a big boo boo. I had totally mis-read the measurement for this block and cut it 6 1/2 x 12 1/2 when it should have be 6 1/2 x 16 1/2. I know quite a bit of a difference in size. I have now cut another block and bonded the pieces on so I can take it to the blood clinic with me to blanket stitch the applique. I know its not a race, I just get so excited and engrossed at the prospect of gorgeous fabric being cut and then transformed into a thing of further beauty. In this case a QUILT.

When I grow up I want to be............

Remember when you where little and an adult would say, "what do you want to be when you grow up"? God only knows what answer I gave but you can bet it was not "I want to be a quilter" (I didn't even know quilts exsisted until about 2004). I was not very good at needle work, at School and was constantley having my knuckles tapped with the ruler by Sister Bernadine, for poor uneven stitches. With that said, I still enjoyed it and I really wanted to take it as one of my options. Sadly the timetable clashed with art lessons and for me there was no contest. I took these pictures of Cole yesterday while he was making one hell of a racket, I wondered what his answer to this question will be in a few years, Drummer possibly?

Spring Flowers:

On Wednesday at the Liverbirds my wonderful friend Janet gave out the final instructions for her new Spring Flowers Quilt. I had yet to start this quilt due to a number of reasons. One of them being that i wanted to make the quilt out of Luna Notte fabric. As gorgeous as this fabric is, when it arrived I felt it was not right for spring flowers. So off I went to Dots on Thursday and bought different fabric. Friday, I spent the whole day in my sewing room and made a start on my spring flower quilt. My other wonderful friend Judith gave me a big bag of embroidery threads (thank you Judith) and I decided to use them for the applique in my Spring Flower Quilt. I have to say this is the first time I have stuck to hand sewing the blanket stitch, I normally revert back to my faithful Bernie. However, I am delighted with the results so far and the little blocks for the quilt are growing.