Blocks and embroidery

I haven't posted since the 10th April and it feels like a lifetime. I also haven't kept up to date with my blog reading during the whole of April. I'm not entirely sure why not but I'm putting it down to pressure of work and tiredness. My lack of posts was due to the want of a working charger for my laptop. The charger had been playing up for a little while but it finally gave up the ghost on the 11th April. Both my son and daughter use the same make of laptop and both have chargers but they never seemed to be available when I needed one. My son told me he had a spare I could use but he couldn't find it, so in the end he ordered me a new one.  Normally I'd have got quite stressed by the experience but the truth is I haven't had time to miss it. It has been a very pleasant change to be unplugged and one I may implement again in the future. I've been on holiday since the 10th April and having no dedicated computer meant I couldn't access any work. 

John has also been on holiday and we have stayed at home. This has given me the opportunity to do some spring cleaning and catch up on some projects. My 4th chemo treatment took place on the 19th April having been moved back a few days because of the bank holiday. That was good as I had lots of energy to enjoy the Easter weekend.

Over the holiday I made some blocks. I now have 10 of the 20 star blocks I need for the next border of my compass quilt. Once I've finished all 20 I'll trim them. 

I made a couple of blocks for the Austen Family album quilt.

Again these blocks will all be trimmed when they are all finished.

I have also had time to work on Gertrude, the bag lady for April. She is nearly finished and I'm getting excited that I'll actually have finished her within the month. I'm hoping to get the rest done tonight but it may take a little longer than I expect, after all there is no rush.

I'm going to take out the french knots forming her necklace and do them again with three strands of floss as they aren't really chunky enough. I was going to change the flag to the British flag but I decided against it as I like the stitching as it is.

Over the Easter weekend we celebrated two family birthdays. Older daughter Kathryn's birthday was the 13th April and baby of the family Lucy had her 26th birthday on the 18th April. We couldn't arrange a full family dinner for either of the dates but we went out to a lovely vegetarian restaurant with Katy for lunch after John, Katy and I had been to the Russian Revolution exhibition at the Royal Academy. Lucy was working on her birthday but John, Richard, Lucy and I celebrated that evening at home with Lucy's choice of a Mexican meal. 

In between the two dates was Easter itself and John and I went to the dawn service which started at 5.15 a.m. It is quite a wrench to get out of a warm bed so early but well worth it. The service starts outside with the lighting of a fire from which the Easter candle is lit. The service is conducted by candle light and by the end the church is bathed in a beautiful dawn light. There was some champagne following the service for those who wanted and there is always a full cooked breakfast. John, as usual, was roped in to cook the eggs. 

We've done a few walks over the holiday but I'll post the pictures and tell you about that tomorrow or Tuesday. For now I'm going to finish cooking dinner and settle down for the evening with my stitching.

I'm linking this post to  Kathy's Quilts for her Slow Sunday Stitching Take some time out to slow down and see some hand stitching.

Lyndsey