Lots of pretty fish

Today has been a fun sewing day. I had loads of other jobs to do, such as the ironing, but I really wanted,.... no I really needed a sewing day. Sewing is my favourite way of chilling out and as the last few weeks at work have been very busy, chill out time was top of my agenda today.

Yesterday when I left off sewing I had all the pieces cut out for the background and I'd stitched a couple of pieces together.

 I had also cut out the template for the fishes.

My first job was to cut the fishes.

Next I stitched all the pieces of the background together. I laid the top on the bed to take a photo. As I was taking the photo the covers started moving. Picasso had snuggled under the bedclothes and he wasn't happy to be disturbed.

Next I ironed the fish onto the quilt top. I'd used some iron on adhesive to aid the applique. It stuck very well to the fabric I used for the fish but it didn't work so well attaching some of the fish to the quilt top. I was disappointed by this as the fusible was quite expensive. I pinned the fish onto the top to ensure they stayed in place.  By the time I packed my sewing away I had top stitched all the orange and green fish to the top.

I'm very pleased with how this quilt is coming. Before I started making the quilt I was a little worried that it might be too boyish but the bright fish and cute fish fabric make it suitable for both a boy or girl. I'm making the quilt as a gift for one of my work colleagues whose baby is due in June. She doesn't know the sex of her baby and doesn't want to so I needed to make a gender neutral quilt. 

Normally on a Sunday I try not to machine stitch but to do some hand stitching but I wanted to get on with the quilt. Having put that to one side I pulled some hand stitching. I had been working on my millennium sampler but I wanted a change so I pulled out the christmas tree cross stitch. This is where I left it a few weeks ago.

So this evening I was working on this whilst watching TV. I carried on with the sky as I didn't need to keep changing threads. I'll see how much I can get done this week. It would be good to finish it for next Christmas.

I'm linking this post with Kathy for her Slow Sunday Stitching link. i can't wait to see what everyone has been doing.

Lyndsey