Resolutions

I know, it's not Hogmanay yet but I have been doing a lot of thinking about where I want to how with my quilting and the arrival of the last instalment of the Hello Sun block of the month reminded me of this.
I have so loved this BOM, every month it has literally added a bit of sunshine to my life, now my blocks are not perfect some are a bit *rustic* :-) but it's not something I normally do, has pushed my boundaries a bit and taught me a fair bit.
So next year, no indiscriminate signing up to any BOM which fleets past me but more targeted signing up for things which will challenge me and which I will actually enjoy!
Here are some of my blocks.

Black and white

I saw this pattern in a magazine months ago, me and my patchworking chum Irene decided to make it our project for one of our patchwork weekends. It's been a challenge finding just the right black and white fabrics, especially the white, some whites look too creamy placed alongside other more snowy whites. I was delighted to find the white and black versions of the number fabric going really cheap at the festival of quilts this year, I bought lots of yardage of both, they will do for many more quilts. I just eked out enough of the last border fabric, had to do a wee bit of frankensteining but I don't think it shows too much.
Once I master FMQ ing this will be one of the first babies to go under the machine!

Finishes for 2012

It's been a messy year, I was full of hope for 2012 and while I don't think it fulfilled its promise neither did it totally disappoint.
I felt during my treatment when I had lots of time off that I had clarified in my mind what direction I wanted to take quilt wise. I had lots of time to sew, going back to work and study full time was a bit of a shock. I felt during my treatment when I had lots of time off that I had clarified in my mind what direction I wanted to take quilt wise. I had lots of time to sew, going back to work and study full time was a bit of a shock. I think I now have more clarity, probably a lot to do with studying educational theory for my PG cert. Reading about surface and deep approaches to learning led me to think about my approaches to patchwork, mostly surface if truth be told. Well let 2013 be the year of a deeper approach. More in depth FMQ ing and less mindless joining in of any QAL which takes my fancy.
So with that resolution in mind, I will buy the Leah Day FMQ class from Craftsy and eventually crack the whole FMQ ing thing. My time off during treatment was great for getting my piecing loads better now my finishing needs attention.
So lets finish this post with some of the finishes I did in 2012.

Playing about

I have been playing about, making more changes, feeling restless. The digital photography course was good, but ... I am not a good photographer. It doesn't come naturally so I will keep trying to perfect it but I have a loooooong way to go.
So I will just plod along trying to make my photos better. The main thing I have been doing is catching up with my Flickr stream. Goodness I had been neglecting it a lot! And the more I had to upload the less inclined I felt like to do it.
Plus it wasn't helped by the completely useless apps for the iPad for Flickr. I have to say that's been my main bugbear with the iPad, the complete and utter useless photography apps. There are some great apps but you can't join them up? You can't access the photos in them from any of the Flickr apps which only seem to go to the official iPad photo storage. I may be missing something but this seems bonkers.
Anyhow, I found a new Flickr app, flickstackr I had to pay for it but it was under two pounds and it has just paid for itself. You can edit quickly and easily in upload mode, organising, tagging sorting is a breeze and it has a lovely flipboard style interface. Double plus good.
So here, apropos of nothing are some gratuitous photos, just because I can and they are all now lovingly sorted in Flickr.

The finished quilt from Bunny hill designs
scrappy Dresden quilt along.

My first two mini quilts from Moose on the porch it's a mini quilt along.
Now all I need to do is catch up with my naming of my farmers wife quilt along blocks ...


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Digital photography course

Well if you have been reading my blog (you haven't I've seen the stats :-) you would know my shame at my appalling photography skills, my non existent photography skills!
So I went on a course, digital plant photography at the Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh to be precise. Now what on earth do I know about plants? Sweet nothing is the answer but I figured plants ... Fabric ... What's the difference?
Soooooo what did I learn?
First thing is, don't get lashed into the wine the night before, always make sure you know exactly where you are going, saves on those pesky taxi fares *sigh*
It was a great course, fab tutor, really knew her stuff, was great with all the participants. I had been reading the manuals before hand but after today they make more sense. I now realise that my wee compact is probably a bit too simplistic and husbands big SLR thingy is a bit too complicated.
Now I am not going to talk confidently about ISO, depth of field etc, but neither will I feel like a complete numpty if someone else talks about them. I do now know what all of the buttons on the cameras do.
Having looked at my photographs, I now feel way more confident about experimenting, using different settings, i need to translate this into the quilty world, but all that need is practice!
I would thouroughly recommend this course to anyone in the Edinburgh area, if you are from further afield then have a look around and see what is out there, look at colleges, local camera clubs etc. Cameras are not cheap and I now feel I may just be starting to get  my moneys worth.
Here are a selection of pics from the day, it was a 2 day course so these are the ones I am taking back next week for the tutor to critique.

Ch, ch, ch, changes

I must come across as a bit fickle, only two weeks ago I was rhapsodising about my quilt class now I am on here saying it is all change!
I thought long and hard about going back, it costs a fair bit, about £65 for a seven week block so its a fair investment in both time and money, one night a week is a lot out of my schedule.
This week I went and didn't really enjoy myself, my (smaller light weight) machine was playing up, wouldn't feed in the fabric on point, kept on chewing it up. The ladies at the class are nice, they are not unfriendly, but I didn't actually speak to any of them, they were busy catching up with each other. Fair enough but it got me thinking what am I getting out of this? I am certainly not an advanced piecer by any means but I would say I am a fairly good intermediate piecer, I haven't needed any help from the teacher, the quilt is nice but one I could easily make from a book or magazine.
So I am cutting my losses and not going back, there were only two more nights to go.
Instead I got in touch with the Stirling Castle Quilters, their second meeting was last Thursday so off I trotted.
What a lovely bunch of ladies, made me feel so welcome. It's £20 for the year so I don't feel I have to go to every meeting, but I think I will. They only meet twice a month which is more in keeping with my schedule.
Sometimes you find yourself doing things out of habit, I need to question what I do more often, I am looking forward to these changes!
Just so I can add a picture of what I have been up to here is a pick of the latest bloggers block of the month from the BOM by Canton Village Quilt Works.

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Falling in love again

I have totally fallen in love with the Farmers Wife quilt along. I did manage to do three blocks last week, two fairly easy and one more tricky one, but, if I stick to the templates and don't rush at it, I seem to end up with some pretty accurate blocks, now how did that happen :-)
Motto of this tale is read and follow instructions and take your time.
Here are my wee beauties:

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