Happy 21st Birthday Harri

This post is one day late because I have some sort of virus and feel like sh*t. Yesterday my darling boy was 21.Where has all the time gone! He has gone from this

To this

And this

To this

and now this.

 

 

 

Because his birthday was on a Monday, we went to London for the weekend before his birthday. Harri is a big fan of South Park and I managed to get some tickets for the Book of Mormon, the musical currently running to packed audiences in Prince of Wales theatre ( some of the time I can be organised-booked these months ago!)

 

 

 

 

We met Madlen at the theatre so it was a family affair. The Book of Mormon was as you would expect, no subtley whatsoever, very, very rude and hilariously funny. We were all laughing uproariously. The cracks came so thick and fast that I'm sure I missed quite a few. It was also very jolly and uplifting, as the cast appeared to be  enjoying themselves as much as the audience.

 

We didn't do very well on the cultural front. We trekked over to The Portland Gallery because I wanted to see the Joan Eardly exhibition, only to find it was closed at weekends. My fault entirely, as I hadn't checked. Then we trekked over to The British Museum to see the Pompeii and Heracaneum exhibition , only the queue ( I hadn't prebooked) was about 2 1/2 hours and Mr Hare doesn't do waiting around ( he wasn't very keen in the first place). So we ended up taking Harri to the Hunterian Museum at the Royal College of Surgeons. He is studying anthropology so was very interested in a lot of the exhibitions especially the primate skulls.

 

We ate a whole variety of food, not always very good but did have a splendid dinner at Granger's in Notting Hill.

 

 

 





 

 

Madlen got absolutely soaked on her way to the restaurant.

 

 

 

We'll gloss over the fact that on Sunday it took us 2 1/2 hours to get out of London. The whole of West London was gridlocked because of an accident in Hammersmith. Then Harri missed his flight from Bristol ( by 10 minutes!) and we had to take him at 04.30 on Monday morning to get the next flight. It is amazing that it is much, much cheaper to fly than take a train, even with a student railcard.

 

All in all though a lovely weekend!



Wonderful Weekend

I've just had the most wonderful weekend!  I travelled to London and stayed one night with my friend Lois and caught up on the gossip. Then, on Saturday I went here

to meet up with some of the other Kinky Bees. This was organised by the lovely Liz of Dandelion Daydreams who is as gorgeous and bubbly in real life as she is online. Quite a few of us turned up- Jo, Moira, Mary, Kate , Sue , Liz of course , Amy and Di ( who isn't a Kinky Bee but came along for fun anyway!). Then all of us, except Amy, went to the Village Haberdashery in Hampstead after we'd had a good getting to know you session in Liberty's café.

 

 

 

 

We also got to meet Annie and her new baby Harvey, her daughter Madelaine and Penny who happened to be serving in the shop. It was great to get to know everyone a little better. 

 

I also managed a visit to Tate Modern

 

 

for the Lichenstein exhibition . This was interesting because he was clearly a ground breaking artist but in the fantasy world where I could actually afford one of his paintings, I wouldn't actually particularly want one on my walls.

 

I also managed to go here

 

and managed to buy two paintings which I will reveal at a later date when I have unwrapped them. This was pure indulgence but  I justified my profligate behaviour on the basis that we've had to defer any holidays because of the roof situation, so obviously I could treat myself....

And then this evening I met my friend Jane at Usk Castle for a sculpture exhibition. Didn't much like the sculptures but the gardens are fabulous even though we viewed them in that very fine drizzle that doesn't seem like rain but you still end up very wet .

I hope that the Kinky Bees will meet up again soon, as I had a lot of fun, even though in Liz's photos on  her blog and flickr , I look like my mother- how did that happen?
  



Spring at last

Thank goodness spring finally seems to be here at last. I've had a very productive weekend. First thing Saturday morning I finished a few more of my EPP hexagons.

 

 

Then Mr Hare and I walked up the Sugarloaf for the first time this year. It was a beautiful morning, frosty first thing then a glorious sunny day. As usual I dressed too warmly and had to gradually strip off!

 

 

This is a holiday cottage that we pass on our route up the mountain . It is one of my favourites.

 

 

 

That's Mr Hare in the distance ( I photographed this on the way down). We haven't done as much walking as I would like due to the frankly awful weather so far this year. We passed lots of sheep

 

 

 

And lots of wonderful views.

 

 

 

 

 

 

England in the distance. When we got back, I tidied up the greenhouse, something I had been meaning to do for some time. Normally, by now I would have lots of seeds planted , but this year it has been too cold. I know it's time to get going though because the weeds are beginning to grow, so the soil has obviously warmed up somewhat.

 

I managed to finish another block for one of my quilts

 

 

 

 

And today I made this flag for the banners  that are going to be displayed in Boston ( Liz Dandelion posted about this site http://vancouvermodernquiltguild.ca/blog/2013/04/to-boston-with-love/)

 

 

As you can see my impro letters leave a lot to be desired, but my next one will be better!.

 

And I've organised to stay with my friend Lois on Friday before I join the other Kinky Bee-ers on Saturday in London. .Just got to book my train tickets! 





 

 

 



 

 







Random Ramblings

Nearly another month gone by and the clocks about to 'spring forward' despite the arctic weather.
I've been on annual leave for 3 weeks this month which has been wonderful and means I've had more time to think!
First up my March makes:

 

 

I made these 2 pouches to hold my EPP bits and pieces. I made one using a pattern I had bought from Elizabeth Hartman because I thought her pouches always look fantastic in her blog and on flickr. The other I made using a modified free pattern from Flossie Teacakes.  The Elizabeth Hartman pattern has lots of ideas for handles etc but the zip insertion technique is far better in Florence's  tutorial because you insert the zip first and then topsew the zip which includes both the outer and lining fabrics.  This gives a much better finished result as the lining fabric is held down and doesn't annoyingly ever get caught in the zip, which it does with the other technique. I'm pleased with them both and I just love the fabric.

 

I also managed 21 EPP blocks:

 

 

 

I've really enjoyed fussy cutting these diamonds and seeing very different end results.

 



 

 Only another 230 to go!

 

I've pieced together my scrappy trips around the world for Helena:

 

 

 

It looks really pretty in real life . Once I'd sewn it together though, I realised that the scrappy lone star that I'd made for the back, just wasn't big enough. This was also annoying so I made another larger one:

 

 

I've now got to sort out having one half star on one side and the other half star on the other side. There will still be a large area of negative space in the middle but it's not as bad as it was.

 

I've also made 3 bee blocks for Mary and I've pieced together a second top for Siblings together. I'm not going to post a picture until I've also finished the original. I haven't had all the blocks back yet.

 

The lovely Charlotte in her post of 5th March talked about how since coming home from Quiltcon she is going to make less quilts because she already has enough quilts in her house. This got me thinking... Apart from one quilt which I need to post to Siblings together ( just got to attach the label that Laura Jane kindly sent) I don't have one finished quilt in the whole house. Now why is this? I have 14 quilts in various stages of development. Half of these  I'm making for specific people as gifts, so they will disappear when they are finished.

 

 

 

 

 Another (above) is a Kaffe Fassett quilt that is one of the first quilts I attempted. I made it before I had ever quilted anything and I was so terrified of spoiling it by cocking up the quilting, that I decided to hand quilt it. That means it has been shoved in a bag never to see the light of day. I occasionally get it out and do a little more but as it is 6 ft square it is going to take forever to finish. I have not pushed forward with it either because although I absolutely love it for itself, it does not fit my decor at all.

 

 

 

 

 And this is another reason why I don't have one finished quilt in my house. My inclination when making quilts is for colour and variety, preferably with scraps. My house isn't like that- the aesthetic would be more toward the Denyse Schmidt very plain, calm quilts in solids with only one or two colours. I am planning to make one quilt like this  eventually (when I've finished the other 14!) The children have both taken the quilts I made for them away, so they're not in the house either.

I have got one quilt I intended to make specifically for my house, to hide a hideous leather sofa that Mr Hare inherited and will not part with. But, again I made it early in my quilting journey and (on advice from one of my local quilting shops !) bought the wrong wadding- a very puffy high loft polyester and then I hand basted it which took hours. As I used the only fabrics I could find at the time ( I had not yet discovered the joys of Oakshot cottons and all the other lovelies out there) and my tastes have changed. I can't face hand-quilting it and so it just languishes in another bag. 

One of the UFO's I started in a class and I don't like it , so even if I finish it it will be given away.Another I tried to make quick and dirty and it didn't work, so it will have to be recycled into scrap. A couple of the others are experiments, so I'm not sure if I will ever finish them but they will also be given away if I do.

 

I have received a lovely present this month

 

 

 

Linda sent me this gorgeous bird that she had paper pieced. It's just beautiful.

 

 

To finish my ramblings for today some gratuitous house fire pictures:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So nearly 3 months on and I still have only a leaking tarpaulin over part of the roof and we've had the coldest Winter in decades!

 

I also discovered a new to me blogger The Bitchy Stitcher . Check out the ironing board cover March 12th 2013 if you want to laugh out loud!



 

 

 

 

 



 



 

March Already

It seems like February has flown by, I suppose because it's such a short month. It is also my birthday in February which always used to fall in half term, but mercifully I am now free of those considerations. It's also slightly depressing to now be in the final year of my fifth decade! Cripes! how did that happen. Mr Hare (my toyboy because he is 6 months younger than me) loves to keep reminding me of his relative youth compared to mine. He did take me out for a special birthday dinner.

 

 

Still, I love the fact that the garden is just beginning to stir back to life. I love this particular hellebore

 



and the snowdrops

 

 

The previous owner of the garden planted lots of camelias, obviously not knowing anything about gardening. Our soil has a neutral pH and they really don't like it, plus they are all planted in full sun ( not a problem at present!) so they do suffer from sunburn.  I have to give them lots of ericaeous feed and I severely pruned this one as it looked so sick last year. This is the result- a big improvement.

 

I am now on holiday for the next 3 weeks (yay!) as I have to use up my annual allocation by the end of March. Unfortunately, because of the fire damage we won't be able to go away except for the odd shopping trip to London. I have lots of plans in my head as to what I'm going to do but I'll be lucky if I achieve a quarter of them. First and foremost, I'm determined to do some catching up with friends.

 

 One of the plans is to clear out the greenhouse and start sewing some seeds, but it is still so cold that I'm not sure I'll get any of it done. I usually plant heaps of garlic in September to harvest the following June, but last September the garden was like a bog so I haven't done it. The garlic bulbs are sitting there nagging away at me.I always buy far more seeds than I actually ever plant ( a case of my intentions always being greater than reality).

 

I am also hoping to do a lot of sewing. I have so many WIP's as I am much better at starting projects than finishing them! I think it's a sign of being easily distracted by the latest, more interesting project, rather than sticking to one thing before starting the next.

 

I did manage to do a fair bit of sewing in February ( mainly because it was too cold to do anything else!)

 

 

 

I made these for a new Bee I have joined- Care Circle at do.Good Stitches. I applied ages ago and had forgotten all about it, until I got an email from Rachel and  I'm delighted to be involved.

 

 

 

 

These were blocks for Sue Bone in the Simply Solids Bee (they are bright!)

 

 

 

 

These blocks were for Linda in the Star Block Quilting Bee (lovely Kate Spain fabric)

 

 

 

This Carpenter's star for Teresa in the Honey Bee FQR Kinky Bee ( lovely Art Gallery fabric and a new process for sewing HST's )

 

For my own sewing, I finished all the scrappy trip around the world blocks for Helena's quilt and made a start on the back.

 









 

And I experimented with these blocks for a quilt:

 

 

 

Probably somewhat foolishly, I also started sewing these EPP blocks after seeing ( and totally falling in love with ) this quilt by Rita of Red Pepper quilts MIL  http://www.redpepperquilts.com/search?updated-max=2013-02-17T12:36:00%2B11:00&max-results=8

 

 

Here are the first 3 blocks

 

 

 

The problem is , I know I'm totally insane to start this because they take forever to sew and I need to make at least 250 of them! I know I'll get distracted and they'll end up in a bag somewhere to be discovered at a later date ( this is because I have so many other projects like this haunting me but not haunting me enough to finish them).

 

Maybe I'll make 2013 the year of finishes( I wish!).

 

There seems at last to be some progress on the roof. The insurance company still haven't accepted liability but we are having a meeting next week to go through the tenders for the building work and hopefully appoint someone to get started.It has been a very cathartic experience but one that has focused us on what is important and what is not.





 



Disappearing Nine Patch Block

I have joined a new bee: Simply solids bee and somewhat foolishly (in retrospect because I didn't know we were going to have a fire and end up with no roof!) I volunteered to be Queen Bee for March. I have been agonising over what block to choose and have gone through many different blocks still uncertain what to pick. I really wanted to do the birch trees blocks from Crazy Mom Quilts but as it is a commercial pattern that had to be rejected.

I have finally decided on a very simple block-the disappearing nine patch block. This is as it says on the tin: a nine patch

The nine patches are made of 5 inch squares  and it requires 4 white patches in the order shown, one aqua patch in the middle and 4 coloured patches at the corners.These are sewn together

and then sliced up as follows exactly down the middle in both directions

 

 This produces 4 blocks which measure 7 inches square.

These 7 inch blocks are then trimmed on the white edge to 6 1/2 inches. The white edge should then measure 1 3/4 inches

Once trimmed the blocks are sewn together in the following arrangement to make a 12 1/2 inch block

 

 

 

There are many different ways to arrange this block but this one is known as the i-spy arrangement. I'm going to make the quilt top in a range of blues and greens.

I'll probably make the birch trees blocks as the back to make a double sided quilt for my niece. Although the block is simple  it is therefore essential to get the smaller blocks to line up properly. I find it easier to do this if my seams are ironed open rather than to the side.

 

I'm going skiing tomorrow with my lovely daughter (who was 24!!! onThursday). Mr Hare and I can't go away together because we can't leave the house unattended with a hole in the roof.We are still wrangling with the insurance company but that is another story altogether.