Half done

How's that title for putting a positive view on achievements? I'm halfway through the quilting on the baby quilt and it's looking really good but the pen marks are very slow to disappear. I could always be miserable and tell you I'm only halfway through but I'm so happy because it's going well and much more quickly than I anticipated. Although I've started the quilting on the nine patch quilt as well I've been concentrating on the baby quilt as I'd really like to gift it next week. Hopefully both quilts will be completed by the end of January.

In between sorting and quilting I found time to do some hand stitching. I find it very relaxing whilst watching TV in the evening. I've been working on the sky on the christmas tree cross stitch.

I've done a little more work on the tree and I also stitched the star so I can now just work the sky down that side. The side of the tree down to the level of the base of the star is complete and I'm trying to finish the sky down to this level by the end of the week.

I took time out from the cross stitch to make some hexagons for the Grandmothers garden quilt. Usually I stitch a few of these on train journeys but because of Christmas I haven't had to travel for work. Tomorrow I'm travelling to Reading so lots of stitching time because I catch the stopping train.

I'm linking this post with Slow Sunday Stitching at Kathy's Quilts Why not visit and see what everyones been stitching this week.

Lyndsey

Prep for stitching.

The last couple of days have been very slow as far as sewing is concerned. I haven't been near my machine and it's sitting on the dining table moaning to itself about not being loved. This evening I gave her a few strokes and promised that I would get on with the blocks tomorrow. Machines are tricky items and I don't want any tension tantrums or broken needles when I finally get a chance to sew tomorrow evening. Saturday is usually a good day for catching up on my projects but unfortunately we have two graduation ceremonies at work tomorrow so John and I will be out most of the day. Never mind there will be some space tomorrow evening.

This evening I took the half square triangles I'd made and marked a diagonal line across the middle and paired them up ready for sewing tomorrow into quarter square triangles.

I'm hoping to have this top completed by the end of next week so I need to get a wriggle on.
I also prepared the brown hexies ready for stitching together to make the next block. I love all of these brown fabrics, they just make me feel happy.

I spent a little time finding my scraps for the Rainbow scrap challenge. I'm a little behind this year - well 3 months blocks behind to be exact. I was hoping to get the block pieces cut out so I could just sew them together tomorrow but I just felt too tired.

The weather here has gone a lot colder with the top temperature tomorrow due to be 5 celsius but feeling like -1 because of wind chill. A few weeks ago I bought myself a new duffle coat so I'm excited to get the chance to wear it. 

I hope you've had some sewing time this week.

Lyndsey

What's in my piggy bank?

It is simply ages since I last had time to write a post and almost as long since I last did some sewing. However I'm starting to get excited. I still have marking to do but it will all be finished by the end of this week. So one module with 16 students and the other with 12 students will be done by Tuesday. Then I have a module with 28 students to mark by the end of the week. Then blissfully I will be able to take lots of time out to sew and I've already started organising my projects.

As I have several new projects I want to get started on I need to buy some fabric. A trip to the fabric shop to buy for a new project is always a joy but puts quite a strain on the old purse. However a year ago I signed up to the piggy bank challenge at Val's Quilting Studio and  this last week was the week for counting up what I had saved. 

Here's my fat piggy bank that I used this year. I also used a tin to save in because I misplaced my pig earlier this year when we were having work done in the house. I had to go through boxes that were still packed up and enjoyed the feeling of finding treasured possessions. Not only did I find my piggy bank I also found my grandmother's garden hexi quilt flowers. More about that in a minute, first the piggy bank.

Although I hadn't put any money in the pig since January it felt quite heavy and I was amazed to find I had saved £103 plus a few pennies. Since January I had saved £45 in 20 pence pieces and another £10 in small coppers. So the grand total in my savings is £158. That will do very nicely to fund my fabrics for the new projects.

Val is running the Challenge again this year and I'm in. I shall be using the same piggy bank and I shall be starting my saving from 1st August. I'm not starting until then as I am going on holiday the last week of July and will be enjoying ice creams and cream teas and maybe a trip to a fabric shop so there won't be any cash to feed the pig. I wonder if I can save more next year?

I said I'd tell you about the grandmother's garden hexi quilt. I started this for Lucy some time ago. I think it may have been back in 2012 but I'm not sure. I'm working out from the middle flower and I don't sew any flowers on until I have the number needed for that round. I had been working on the indigo round (did I mention I was doing the rounds in the colours of the rainbow?) Anyway once I complete each flower I put it in a box until I have enough for that round. I have been looking for the box since March but couldn't find it but in looking for the piggy bank I found where it had been packed away. So now I can add the next round. In case you are worried my memory is getting a bit ropey (I know I do at times) I must point out that I didn't do the packing. We needed to clear an area in one of the bedrooms so that some work could be done. I wasn't at home so had no idea where anything was packed.

I must remember to post a picture of how far the quilt  has grown. I should have used bigger hexis as they are only 1 inch so it is taking quite a time to complete. 

So pop over to Val's Quilting Studio and see how people did with the challenge this year and then maybe decide to join in too. I'm looking forward to picking out my fabrics with it all paid for from my savings this year. 

Hope you had a good weekend. I cleared a lot of marking. It meant I didn't get much exercise but the job is almost done. I can then declare the holiday session open and get on with my sewing. This time next week my machine will be purring.

Lyndsey

A sewing day at last.

Today's been a busy old day. I only had a couple of hours sleep on Friday night so I had a lie in this morning. Just what I needed and it meant that when I finally woke up I had loads of energy. I had some chores I needed to get done including catching up with my ironing but I had promised myself some sewing time.

I had an ironing mountain that had taken on the proportions of Mount Everest so I desperately needed to reduce this. I spent the early part of the day ironing. I had already done a couple of hours on Saturday but there was a lot of shirts to be done. I ironed for an hour and a half after which I needed to take Scamp out for his walk. The last few days have been wet and yesterday we had to cut Scamp's walk short as it got very wet and he couldn't cope in the wind. 

Today we managed to take a long walk over Wandsworth Common. The weather was dry and warm and lots of families were out. The leaves are all on the turn so the colours are looking beautiful ranging from greens to reds, oranges, yellows and browns. 

Once home and after lunch I got my machine set up and was ready to make a start. I want to finish the Star Trek quilt top this month. I thought I had finished all the blocks but when I got the project bag out I realised I still had two blocks to do and had to sew the border on the central block. I was sure I would remember how the blocks went together so got straight on with a block. Turns out that my memory wasn't so good so I had to rip out several seams on the first block. Never mind I finally finished all the blocks.

The blocks finish at 24 inches. I laid them out on the bed. The central block is just one fabric piece with a border but the other 8 blocks are pieced. There is sashing to be added and a border. Scamp came to help take the photo but when the doorbell went he disappeared in a blur (top left hand corner of the photo).  I thought the quilt top might be too dark but instead it is very bright and cheerful. Tomorrow evening I will add the sashing and hopefully the border. This will be a large quilt.

As I've been busy this week I haven't bothered getting the sewing machine out. Instead i've been sewing hexi flowers for my grandmother's garden quilt. It started will a red central flower and each row going out is the next colour in the rainbow. I am up to indigo or purple. I need 30 flowers for this round. So far I have made 18. I've got several more hexis made but need to sew them into flowers. I was working on that before I started this post and will do a couple more later.

I hate they way the camera changes the colour of the fabric. All of these are various shades of purple but in the photo they look brown, pink, well just about anything but purple. I must take a picture of progress so far.

I have also been knitting. I'm working on a jumper for John but in between I've been using up scraps of double knitting yarn to knit a blanket for a dog or cat at Battersea dog and cats home. It is very relaxing as it is all knit.. no purl rows, no pattern just knit knit knit.

Each band of colour is 10 rows. I only started this last week so it is growing quickly. Last week I decided to try and knit or sew for at least 15 minutes a day. This is so relaxing to do it has been my way of winding down after a day at work. It should be finished by the end of this coming week.

So my sewing day has been very productive. All blocks finished for the Star Trek quilt top and the sashing and border all cut out and ready to add. Quiet hand sewing making hexis and stitching them into flowers. Just another 12 flowers to make and I can add the next row to the quilt.

I hope you've had time for some sewing this weekend and the the weather where you are has been good to you. Here in London there is a weather warning for heavy rain and high winds overnight and into tomorrow. That will make the morning commute to work interesting!


Lyndsey

Slow stitching and heavy lifting.

Here in the UK today was the late summer bank holiday and as often seems to happen the day in London was a complete washout. It was raining when I woke up and hasn't stopped for most of the day. In fact at 10.30 this evening we were finally able to take Scamp for a walk without getting wet. Originally our plans for today had involved a walk but John remembered that he had agreed to help remove the flats from the stage at the church hall so the rain didn't spoil our day. There were five of us doing the job although one person had to leave early as they had another engagement. The whole process took 3 and a half hours (or 16 hours if you take the number of people doing the job).

The final job was completed this afternoon when John and I went back to unscrew the picture that sits behind the doors on the back flat. When not covered up for alternative scenery it looks like the doors lead into the garden.

The stage is quite a big space when empty. The floor is in desperate need of a good sanding and finishing. Last year I got a huge splinter down the side of my finger nail from it and several others have been injured. The floor is being sanded and finished tomorrow and at the weekend the bits all need to go back.

At present they are resting at the back of the church hall covered by the stage curtains. 

It doesn't look much having finished the job. There was a remarkable amount of heavy wood and other bits stored behind the flats and this all had to be moved. We managed to find homes for everything elsewhere. Once we put everything back in its place I will take a photo of the stage since I forgot a before picture.

Yesterday I went through my project bags and found that I hadn't fully stitched the green hexi block for the Rainbow Scrap challenge from a couple of months ago. I finished this up whilst watching the second Hobbit film.

I had to hunt  around for the backing fabric. I still need to make the red and yellow hexi blocks.

I hunted for some brighter green fabric for this months blocks  and found this to make the hexi block. I still need some more fabric for the nine patch blocks.

I'll finish this one up tomorrow evening if I can find a good film to watch.

Tomorrow I plan on starting the quilting on the quilt I'm making for Hannah. This is one of my projects for the 'See you in September' blog hop. My day is the 4th September so you'll have to wait until then to see the completed quilt. If I have time I also have a new project I want to start.

For now I'm heading off to bed as it is 11.52 and I'm rather sleepy. I'm hoping that by the time I wake up I will have decided on the colour scheme for my next quilt. Did I tell you that the other morning I woke up from a dream in which I was stroking some beautiful fabric to find myself gently stroking the edge of the duvet. Does this mean I've been overdoing the sewing?.........

Lyndsey

A little bit of this and that.

This last week has been another busy week, one where you feel like you're in continuous motion so I was pleasantly surprised to discover that I'd actually managed some sewing along the way. Last week I started the 15 minute challenge. I was going to try and do at least 15 minutes of stitching a day. I managed the 15 minutes each day but that was about all.

I had decided to make a hexie block each month as part of the Rainbow Scrap challenge. The block finishes at 16 inches square which will give me a nice size lap quilt when it is finished. In making this block I found that I didn't have that many blue scraps. The hexies are made by the English Paper piecing method and then machine appliqued on to the backing fabric. Note to self need more blue fabric

Earlier today I was looking at my millennium sampler. I had put this away as I couldn't get the butterflies to work. When I picked it up today I decided to start work on the crown. I haven't got very far with it but at least I've made a start.

Yesterday as part of our plan to get out more we visited Kew Gardens. The weather was nice and bright and not too cold, the perfect day for a walk. I took my camera with me intending to get some views for you but I forgot I had it until we were almost at the end.

This peacock wanted to get his head into my hand bag which is what reminded me I had my camera. The colours of his feathers were amazing.

There are quite a number of old trees that are interesting shapes. I particularly liked the shape of this one

Here is the view across the main lake

and we came across several geese busy grazing.

After we had walked round the Palm House Kathryn our older daughter took the opportunity to have her photo taken in front of the Unicorn of Scotland. She has always loved unicorns.

When we had arrived at Kew we had parked our car in one of the side streets which happened to be near one of my favourite quilt shops. Tikki of Kew has a fabulous range of fabrics and I just had to pop in. I bought 5 FQ's  The reds and the black and white FQ's are for my February NewFO. The purple is for the EPP grandmother's garden quilt I am making for Lucy. I've spend quite a bit of time this week making purple 'flowers' for the next round. 

I haven't posted about my January NewFO yet and I've almost completed my January goal for ALYOF. I'm hoping this coming week will be another week when I get to do some sewing every day. For now I'm going to get back to my cross stitched crown. I want to finish that this week.

I'm linking this post with Kathy's Slow Stitching Sunday. It is so relaxing to slow the pace down on a Sunday and do some hand stitching. I hope you've had time for some stitching today.

Lyndsey

A little baking, a little sewing, a lovely day

I have always liked Sunday because we try and keep it as a time for church and family. When the children were younger we would take them out on a Sunday afternoon to visit places of interest or for a walk in the park. Over the last few months the pressure of work has meant that many Sunday afternoons have found us sitting at our computers working. John and I have been having long conversations about the quality of our life and what we want from it and it was no surprise when our first decision was that work on a Sunday had to stop. So this Sunday was different.

Now although I said no work on a Sunday I decided that a quick clean and tidy was required. So we swept, mopped and dusted before we started our quiet Sunday. It didn't take long with two of us. The shock of a quiet Sunday threw us a little and we had to retire to the garden with coffee to decide what to do next. I knew I wanted to do some baking and it had to be a lemon cake.

Tangy Lemon Cake
This recipe was submitted by Mrs Judith Perry from Sutton St Nicholas, Hereford to The Complete Farmhouse Kitchen Cookbook which was published in 1984. I copied the recipe from my mother's book several years ago as I couldn't find the book anywhere.

The top of the cake goes a darker brown after cooking as you pour a lemon syrup over it.

125 g /4 oz butter
175 g /6 oz caster sugar
Grated rind and juice of two lemons
2 beaten eggs
175 g / 6 oz self raising flour
A little milk
50 g / 2 oz granulated sugar

To make;

1. Cream butter, caster sugar and lemon rind until fluffy

2. Gradually beat in the eggs

3. Mix in the flour and add about 4 tablespoons milk to soften the mixture. It should be soft enough to drop off end of spoon when shaken gently

4. Grease a 1 kg / 2 lb loaf tin

5. Bake in a moderate oven, Gas 4, 350 F, 180 C, for 45 to 50 minutes until risen and golden, firm on top and shrinking from sides of the tin.

6. Just before cake is ready to come out of the oven, prepare the lemon syrup. Heat the lemon juice and granulated sugar gently until the sugar is dissolved.

7. As soon as cake is out of the oven, while still in the tin, pierce top all over with a skewer. Pour over the lemon syrup. Leave the cake in tin until it is cold.

The cake is very moist with a nice lemon tang to it. Great with afternoon tea in the garden. 

This was fun as I haven't baked a cake since Christmas. Next I started some sewing. I was working on my piece for the 'bird' hop that starts tomorrow at Sew we quilt. My day is next Tuesday when I will reveal what I have made.

I also did a little work on my grandmother's garden hexi quilt in the evening. I haven't worked on this for quite a while. Here is how far I had got last time I posted about it.

I now have 3 more green flowers to sew on to complete this round. The next round is blue and all the flowers are made for that so I just need to sew them on. This is a work on in the evening quilt whilst watching TV or chatting with family. The individual flowers I stitch together while travelling to work on the train.

So that was my Sunday, a great companionable day with John and a really good sewing day. Today John is out walking with members of our church. Some members of the congregation decided that they would like to do 3 to 4 walks a year of 8 to 10 miles. The asked John if he would be willing to lead them. As he loves walking he jumped at the chance. Last time I went along as well but today I stayed home. My knees have been sore recently and I don't want to over do things plus I didn't have much chance to sew last month so I need some free time.  I'm now going to switch the computer for my machine and get on with my swoon blocks.

I hope you had a good weekend and for those of you in the UK I hope you enjoy the bank holiday. I'm going to enjoy some more May for Me time

Lyndsey

February decision

It's already February 6th and I hadn't decided what to concentrate on this month. Finding my pile of stitchery UFO's didn't help. I've already told you how I got on over January with my finishes and you can click here to read that post. In short I completed what I had said I would do. So here goes for this months' goals.

This month I am going to get all the quilting and binding done on my Dresden quilt. I finished the top in January and I have started the quilting but it is slow going. I love the way the quilting looks on the back.

As you can see some of my lines are wonky but I will get the hang of FMQ eventually. 

I am also going to work on my Christmas quilt. I have made 27 of the 49 blocks of granny squares so far. By the end of February I plan to finish all the blocks. The icing on the cake this time would be to have the whole top finished but I have other projects to work on as well.

Although I found heaps of stitchery I am going to continue working on my millennium sampler for now.

Away from February plans I have been working on my grandmothers flower garden quilt that I'm making for Lucy. This is made with English paper piecing and the hexagons are 1 inch. All of it is hand stitched. 

We decided on a rainbow theme with red at the centre. The orange and yellow rounds are complete and I've just started adding the green round. I have bought some fabric for this quilt purely because it was so cute but mostly it is made from scraps. I work on the flowers when I'm travelling by train which is currently only on a Friday. It also works when sitting watching TV or chatting.Each round needs six more flowers than the previous round so there are 18 green flowers and there will be 24 blue ones.

I'm linking this post up with Connie's Tuesday linky party at Freemotion by the river, Melissa's Lovely Year of Finishes at Sew Bitter Sweet Designs and Lynne's  2013 The Year of the Finished Project at Never Too Hot to Stitch. Why not go and visit and see what everyone else is up to.

Work in Progress Wednesday

This week has seen slow progress on my cross stitch as I have tried to give some time to other long term projects. However I have completed the border on the left side and started the next picture square.

I rather like the border.

The latest square is also rather fun.

I think it is about time I did some more work on the columns and scrolls. Unfortunately this is where I lost interest in the work last time. So my plan for next week is to match the time I spend on the ship with work on the scroll. 

This week I have also spent time on my English paper pieced quilt. I am making a 'Grandmother's flower garden' quilt for my daughter Lucy. I usually work on this on my train journeys to work but as I haven't been travelling by train recently this hasn't progressed very much. I am now on holiday so no more train journeys until September so I need to include this in my stitching time at home. This week I cut out 300 more hexagon templates,

The templates stay in the work until it is complete and are then removed. I also cut out and tacked the fabric to another 40 hexagons. These now need to be stitched together. I also bought some more fat quarters of flower patterned fabric to use in the quilt. Each area of flowers will have green paths between.

If you haven't come across English Paper Piecing patchwork before have a look at the tutorial here. The whole project is really portable in the early stages.  At the request of my daughter I am just using hexagons for my quilt however you can make a good range of other shapes with this technique. You can also mix shapes within the patchwork so long as they have an edge of the same size to stitch them  together. My hexagons are 1inch. To make a double quilt (80 x 95 inches) I need 2930 hexagons and 63 half hexagons to make the edges straight. So I have a very long way to go. At the moment I haven't decided if it is going to be all hexagons or if there will be some borders (paths) within it. Obviously this would reduce the number of hexagons I will need. 

Nearly at the finishing line

This week has been a time of nearly finishing several projects. I have almost finished quilting the yellow and brown block quilt and then just the binding to go. Also nearly finished the toddler quilt which I haven't yet shown you a photo of.  The Rainbows (5 to 7 years old) have finished their rainbow quilt top. This has been made as part of our Linus quilt project. The girls designed the top. They all drew out what they would like on the top after we had talked about it. As a group we then put the ideas together and I drew out a picture of what it would look like. I still have to add the borders to add and I have to appliqué some raindrops, a crock of gold and some butterflies. The girls really enjoyed pining the squares together and then stitching them on the sewing machine. They did extremely well with only two squares needing to be unpicked and re-sewn. It has taken 6 months to do this project as we haven't worked on it every week because we didn't want the girls to get bored since we wanted them to enjoy making it. It seems to have worked as they want to sew something else now.

The photo doesn't show the top of the quilt which has a cloud on one side and the sun on the other. Each square is 2.5inches so without the border the quilt is 45 inches square.


On the bunting front I have loads cut out and waiting to be sewn. I have put medium weight interlining between the two layers of fabric to give it more body. I have  piles of completed flags waiting to be sewn onto the tape ready for it to be used. We still haven't decided exactly how much bunting we need to decorate the boats. However if we make too much there isn't a problem as the group hold a summer ball every year and the bunting will be used to decorate the venue.

I have had quite a bit of time travelling this week so I used the time to make 'flowers' for my grandmother's garden quilt.  My pile of completed flowers has now grown to 30. I have also decided I am making the quilt for Lucy. I thought about only using fabric with Roses on as her middle name is Rose. However I have already made several 'flowers' with other flowers on them. Chatted with Lucy about it and we decided that the fabric had to be floral to be included.

On the knitting front I have about 20 rows to complete the last baby blanket and I am still working on the hexipuffs. I haven't managed to fit in any embroidery this week but will do so once the guide quilt project is over. Finally yellowy has been finished and is drying having been washed. This was a little traumatic as he is very fragile having had so much love over the years. I will take a photo of him for my next post. Once the Guide quilt project is completed I can start work on the old quilts I was given. I know many people have loads of projects on the go at any one time but I find I waste time deciding what to do if I have too many things to choose from.


On Saturday John and I went walking with friends, completing the next section of the London loop. This section was from Enfield Lock station to Chigwell. It managed not to rain for most of the day and was a very good bird watching walk with herons, cormorants, a little egret, greylag geese and lots of coots with chicks. There was also  a field of Shetland ponies and a red fox.

Where did the week go?

It seems as if this week has raced past in a flash and I seem to have achieved very little. I realised on Tuesday that I was teaching all day today and needed to prepare the classes. I also realised that tomorrow I am running a training session for leaders who run Rainbows ( 5 to 7 year old members of The Guide Association) and this too needed to be organised. So sewing activities have been rather slow this week. However slow doesn't mean I haven't achieved anything.


On Tuesday having gone through all my stash of fabrics and come to the conclusion that I didn't have anything suitable to use as a border for the quilt top made with the left over squares from the Guides I headed to the shops. I found a great mustard coloured fabric that works really well and the border just needs sewing on. At the same time I picked up a couple of remnants of fabric with roses on it for my Grandmother's garden quilt. Whilst travelling I have managed to complete 4 'flowers' although I am not sure if I am going to use the one with the pink outside layer as I think I want more flowers on each piece. I also decided that I would not add another round to each. I have had great fun drawing out different ways of using this design. I haven't finally decided how I am going to piece them together but that doesn't matter as I need to make a lot more.

I said I would post a tutorial on how to do the English paper piecing method of patchwork. This will be completed at the latest by Monday. This really makes a portable project.


As for Yellowy he has a fleece patch on his head as the hole made by Scamp was too big to close. He is also sporting a new ear in fleece with chamois on the inside. The second will be added tomorrow evening. I hope Lucy likes him when he is finished. Since even if I wash him he won't come up yellow I think I will have to make the new fabric look less pristine. I am considering adding embroidered eyes and a nose.

I have completed 5 of the Dresden plate blocks so only 4 more to go, which I aim to do next week. I also have a quilt top waiting to be quilted. I haven't taken a photo yet but will do that next week. I am going to keep the quilting simple and I am going to do it on the machine. The last time I made a quilt many years ago I hand quilted it. I need to practice machine quilting so I can master the beautiful patterns that can be created. At the moment my machine is in control rather than me.


On Wednesday evening the Guides got down to finishing their quilts. Only a few more to go. They really have worked well on this project.

Lots of things to do

Since my last post I have been very busy with work and home but I have still managed to find time for some quilting and knitting. Wednesday was Lucy's birthday but was also our first evening back at Guides so we had a birthday party. Yesterday was spent driving Lucy back to university in Bath for the final term of her second year. By early June she will be back for the long summer break and feeling inspired is hoping to make a comfort quilt for her boyfriends birthday.


I have almost finished the final knitted baby blanket for our Linus project and I have also managed to complete a blanket for a friend of Richard's who is expecting her first child in May. The only problem with them is that they were too large to be very portable so were knitted in the evening whilst watching television. However the hexipuffs are perfect for knitting on my twice weekly train journey to and from Reading.

Having started the new term at Guides it has been a busy time sorting out the quilts the girls are sewing,checking the seams, pressing and cutting out the backing fleece. They are looking really good and all should be finished by the deadline of 30th May. I have just got to order the labels to say made with love by Isleworth Guides. The final job will be hand sewing in the labels. The photo shows some of the quilts with their fleece backing waiting to be sewn.

A friend of mine, Barbara, is a leader with 4th Streatham Sea Scouts and they have 2 boats taking part in the Thames Diamond Jubilee Pageant on June 3rd. We were considering how to decorate the boats and decided that royal purple bunting, (the groups scarf colour) was needed. We have decided on the size of the bunting but haven't fully worked out how much is needed for decorating as it mustn't get in the way or impede the view of the young scouts who are rowing. However I am about to start the cutting out and will then be stitching two together with heavy duty interfacing in between to give it added body. The aim is to have it all sewn by May 19th.So far I have cut the template and taken the fabric out of the bag!

I am still working on my Dresden plate quilt and waiting for inspiration for the old patchwork quilt I was given. Yesterday I also started a Grandmother's garden quilt, well I've stitched the first 7 hexagons together. I downloaded the hexagon template from moxyideas The templates are available in different sizes but if you want to use them remember to download the file and print from the downloaded version as printing directly from the web doesn't give you the accurate sizes. The hexagons I am using are 1inch and it is a truly portable project so my train journeys will be more interesting from now on as I can alternate activities -the hexipuffs one way and stitching the hexagons the other. I am using the English piecing method for making the quilt, which was my first introduction to patchwork and quilting aged 10. In case you have never tried this before I will post a tutorial when I have time later this week.

One final job added to my list is to make yellowy new ears and repair his face. Yellowy was given to Lucy when she was one day old. He is much loved and very delicate. Unfortunately Scamp got hold of him and played with him rather enthusiastically hence the damage.