Sunday, June 24, 2007

Busy bee

I wasn't going to blog tonight because I have aching fingers but then (a) I felt guilty becuase strangely I now feel a responsibilty to amuse you all - especialy people like Purple Missus whose I know reads at lunchtime and I imagine her sitting with her Monday sandwich with nothing to read ( like there are no other blogs out there!) (b) I realised that if I don't blog I don't get comments and then my own day is ruined by the international silence. So aches and pains aside, I shall blog.
First, On Saturday we set up a display of some of our City and Guilds work for the verifyer and hid the rest of our files under the table. This is my pathetic effort. It loosk so bare!


The aching is from too much handsewing combined with the arthritic condition. And no, there is no point telling me to be sensible because the gift quilt I have mentioned before has to be ready by 7th July. The incomplete middle section now looks like this.....




Which does give me a great sense of progress but sadly there is still a lot of work to be done on the whole thing and time is fast running out if I am to make my date with the longarm quilter.
I need more greens and have had to send scraps to Yvonne my teacher at Morceau who actually works at the quilt shop in Penrith and so will post be some co-ordinating fabric to save me a three hour round trip. But I also, with just a tiny bit of the other foundation pieces 'star-ish' blocks to do, ran out of the pink fabric. Can I find more in the UK? No... that's what you get from buying from the cheap shop that sells end of lines. Fortunely it is a Jinny Beyer design and she deliberately keeps old fabric at her shop in the states. Yeah for online shopping. And Yeah for quilting podcasts which is how I knew about her shop.
I told them I needed it fast and the package did arrive speedily. I was highly amused to see that the standard US mail package had a stamp on it marked 'Fabric Emergency- Rush Ship.'.
However, due to my stupidity ( which I am blaming on variations in computer monitor colours) I ordered the right design but wrong shade and have had to email and beg for a 'MEGA fabric emergency Rush Ship' stamp!
Also this quilt is taking far longer than I anticipated and so I am sewing leaves and petals every spare moment. Will I make it? Will I have to pull an all nighter this weekend?! Wait and see.

2 comments:

English Rose said...

sorry to hear you have aches and pains in the hands again Helen, remind me in 2 weeks and I will look out some dietary stuff for you. I think I mentioned it before but heard nothing back, but this time I'll just send it, and you can use it or chuck it out as you like. ok?
thanks for leaving a message on my blog, I shall be at the Faces of Arabia stand. Its one of the classes from our exhibition a month ago, and I shall be there with my KTAA president hat on as well as for the fun of it. hope to see you.

Nellie's Needles said...

How frustrating to have aching fingers when there's stitching to be done. I find it's easier to pull the needle through the fabric when I wear the cut-off finger from a latex glove on my thumb. I'm so used to the ease of it that I use one all the time ... even when stitching on two layers of silk.