Workshop results

The weekend workshop has come and gone.  Four large centre blocks of a quilt were started, and while they are a long way from being finished they have been put aside in favour of sewing which needs to be completed before we head off overseas.

The square in the middle will become a circle, and the whole large piece will be appliqued onto the background fabric.  My colour choices turned out rather dull when made up but hopefully the bright pink/purple centre and background save it, because I am not making it again.

 My favourite next, this one uses some of my Holy Fabric stash - we all have some, the fabric that is so beautiful and precious to own that you can't bring yourself to cut into it; the centre circle will be the multi-coloured spot and the whole circle will be appliqued onto the blue speckled background.

These two pieced circles can be appliqued onto the background using wide ric-rac braid, but mine will have bias strips instead.  

Another three of these shapes below to be made and joined together, then a nine-patch is appliqued over the centre, mine will be yellow, blue and lime green..

 Not much done yet on the fourth block.  The centre pieced circle has another smaller circle appliqued on top, while the odd-shaped piece on the left will be trimmed into a triangle and another three made.  These are actually pieced - not appliqued - into the background, in this case a yellow daisy print.  The beautifully matching points in the centre of my green and purple pieced circle were noted and complimented by the teacher......as they should be, this year it's 50 years since I sewed my first ever item of clothing so I've had a lot of practice in matching seams.

Would I take another workshop with this teacher?  Doubtful......she's not a bad teacher but her method wastes a lot of fabric, and every time I cut off yet another piece and dropped it into the bin I thought to myself "geez......I paid money for that!"

This morning we had insulation installed in the roof of our house.  It's colder than it should be in winter considering we don't live in the deepest Arctic depths, so recently we had it checked and found out there is no insulation at all up there.  Three blokes, one truck and a couple of hours later we have insulation!  Just in time for the rain forecast early next week and the cooler weather which will follow.  Australia's climate is fairly mild compared to other parts of the world but our houses are not built for the cold, which is a bit silly when one thinks of it.  People from colder countries overseas complain about how cold Australian winters are; they aren't really, they just seem like it because of how our houses are made.

From other things we have noted (and in some cases corrected) our house was probably a budget build.  Short cuts seem to have been taken which probably saved money at the time of building, but one ends up paying more for them further down the track.  The walk-in wardrobe (closet) in our bedroom is icy-cold in winter and unbearably hot in summer, the door is kept shut and it's not affected by temperatures in other parts of the house - hopefully that will change now.  It's not a basic house, so we don't know why the build wasn't a better quality.

Recently I joined the local historical society, so no doubt my social life will improve even more!  Last night I attended their monthly meeting and found out that I knew many members already; as a new member I was welcomed, the guest speaker was very interesting, and supper served after the meeting was scrumptious indeed.  I was born in this town (although I did live in the Big Smoke for 40 years before moving back five years ago), my mother was born and spent all her life here, her father was born in the district and lived here all his life, while his parents moved to the area in the 1870s......so my roots are well and truly here.

"Society is divided into sets, according to their breeding.  One set may be said to have no breeding at all, another to have a little, another more, and another enough; and between the first and last of these there are more shades than in the rainbow.  Good manners are the same in essence everywhere - at courts, in fashionable society, in literary circles, in domestic life - they never change, but social observances, customs and points of etiquette, vary with the age and with the people."

Wonder which set I belong to?

Enjoy your days!

First WOW for March

I haven't shown a quilt for some time, so here is a Double Wedding Ring quilt that I made a few years ago using foundation piecing. The background is deep rich purple, the squares where the rings meet are two lavender prints with writing; one has tiny hearts with the letters I and U in different colours, the other has words like "sweetheart"and "I'm in the mood for love". The rings range from pale cream through yellow to deep gold. It's 16 inches (40cm) square, is backed with lavender solid fabric, and has a label made of a small embroidered white-on-white doyley. The rings were made and joined into a lattice, then they were appliqued onto the background. And I may live to regret this - but I left the foundation papers in place to give the rings more substance. It has its turn on the wall in rotation with other hangings.....let's hope it never needs washing.
The fridge in our kitchen has several wombat magnets and magnetic notepads, some of which have been gifts over the years and others bought on our travels. There's a little magnetic beanie wombat peeking over the top. The wombats in the picture were part of a beautifully carved chess set, all the pieces were Aussie animals and the wombats, in two different coloured woods, were pawns. It was on display last year at a gallery not far from here; the picture was on the card advertising a woodcarving exhibition. The notepad on the top right has a picture of a wombat lying on a hot water bottle with the caption "so much to do, so little motivation". My thoughts exactly.

Kiera-Oona is busy making stars for the bushfire quilt project, I have been slack in not making any but that will rectified soon. She has posted a pic of a pretty pink star block on her blog and links to the information.

This morning at the local Salvo thrift shop I bought a two-tiered shelf for my sewing room, now I can move my hi-fi out there to have music while I sew. We're old-fashioned, we don't have an ipod, but we have music playing all through our house just the same. Today I am trying to drown out the workmen's radio on the building site next door, and the noise of the big digger thing they are using, and their rather fruity language. Perhaps I should stick my head over the fence and tell them they are offending the little old lady (namely me) next door, but somehow I don't think they would care.

Jennifer