Lists

I love lists, I'm a librarian it's in the blood to love lists. I have a gazillion productivity apps on the iPad which help me make lists.
I was slightly horrified when I actually used one of these to figure out how many things I have on the go at the moment ...
--> stitch gathering ticket
--> lanyard for stitch gathering
--> farmers wife
--> silk quilt
--> craftsy BOM 2013
--> hello moon
--> pile o fabric skill builder
--> marks mum and dads quilt
--> layer up and bind hot chocolate quilt
--> layer up and bind shadow box
--> layer up and bind sew a row
--> layer up and bind b&w runner
--> curvy quilt
--> craftsy BOM from 2012 FMQ
--> star blocks FMQing

Flipping heck, that's a biiiiigggggg list but it's a lovely day and I am aff oot on my bike first before tackling said list.
Before I go have a little bug on a leaf saying hello to the moon:

A bit partial

It's been a funny old week, I think a holiday is long overdue. On the plus side I get to go to graduations on Friday and see all our lovely students one last time before they go out into the world, a very special,time.
Didi mention that I love craftsy? Well I do, particularly the block of the month they do. Laura Nownes is doing an excellent job this year, I had always hated partial seams and would blush to show you my last attempt at a lone star but after following her instructions I am quite proud of this attempt for the June block.

What's also been on my new cutting table? This rather charming hexagon block for the Alyssia Lichner block of the month. I won't say EPP is my favourite technique but I'm happy with this.

And yes I do now have a cutting table no more red tea near fabric ...

Claiming my blog

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/4974003/?claim=xmbzk2hw56k">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>
I think I am claiming my blog with bloglovin :-)

Cautionary tale from the patchwork room

Disaster has struck. I'm lucky enough to be in the scrappy trip around the world bee. I have five blocks to make, I made three dud blocks, at least half an inch too small due to seam error. But I persevered, spent lots of time carefully picking out fabrics my fellow bee members would like. I bought little packets of mother of pearl buttons to put in the packages, lovely postcards with vintage images of edinburgh on them to write a wee note on.
So all done ready to post off. I couldn't be bothered moving sewing machine to set up cutting mat on table so I just trimmed them up on the floor. I went into sewing room to have my lunch on Friday and had a cup of fruit tea with me that I laid down on the floor .... Well I don't really need to tell you want happened next, this picture paints a thousand words, there was not a single block left unruined. Needless to say a lesson has been learned.

Contrasts

These past few weeks have been very contrasty (is that a word? I'm a librarian I should know ...) working mainly on these two projects:
Sew a sampler from Popular Patchwork, I didn't think I was going to like this, really not my style at all but hey I eventually did like it, even though it has to be one of the worst constructed quilts I have made! I hashed up a lot of the rows, but I had fun.

These are the first few rows, I used up so many 2.5 inch squares which was great. The rows I really didnt want to do, the paper pieced houses turned out to be my faves.

With this quilt I fudged, I shoogled, I made a total mess of some of it. But I do love it in all it's wonkiness.



Compare that with the utmost precision needed for the Scrappy trip around the world bee blocks. I always stress about sending things to other people and these blocks need pinpoint accuracy:



Phew! I think I did it ok.

Stuff

At work we are trying to raise the profile of social media and how we librarians can help people navigate this brave new online world.
I've just been reading through my RSS feed of crafty, mainly quilty peeps. Goodness there are people (mainly women it has to be said) coding, building websites from scratch, porting RSS feeds from one reader to the other, using graphics apps to design quilts from scratch.
*sigh* and we crafty and librarian folks get a rep as being old fashioned ...

Favourites

I often post pictures of what I am sewing on twitter, I know I should get more into instagram but twitter is still my main stomping ground. I love seeing what it is people actually like. The two most popular pictures have both been of peeled back piecing, or folded fabric whatever you want to call it. This weekend it was my picture of the finished cathedral windows cushion cover:
This was a class from bearpaw crafts great fun!

A few months ago it was my tulip dance quilt from Southwind desings

I think I will do some more, I bought some more southwind patterns recently so when I clear my feet (hollow laughter) from all the BOMs and sew alongs on the go at the moment I will get cracking ... Watch this space!