What I did ( and bought) today.

Viewers of legal TV programmes will no doubt think that we lawyers swan around plush offices, litigating ( sucessfully of course) against evil multi-national corporations, righting mis-carriages of justice and having sex on the desks . Life is somewhat different.

On Tuesday a courier arrived at eight pm with my brief for yesterday. I was pleased to see that it was a simple ( albeitbeit very badly paid) five minute job. In essence my 16 year old male client may be the father of a child born to another 16 year old but there are several other contenders for that honour. So, DNA tests are needed before we can even talk about when and how he gets to see his (putative) daughter. Simple.

I drive an hour and a half to Lancaster where the court is housed in a dingy seventies block perched over a multi-story car park. My opponent is from my own chambers. He arrives and we agree at twenty to ten ( the matter is listed at ten) that we just need a standard DNA direction and relist the matter. I meet the monosylabic, multi-pierced client and explain the legal situation to him. He asks if he can go out for a cigarette. His father asks where the nearest McDonalds is.

It transpires that although I hoped to get on first as we would be very quick, there is an earlier matter in the list which involves a video link to the Royal Courts of Justice in London. Or it would if it were working and if the litigants in person had turned up on time. I repair to the staff cafe and drink builder's tea while I wait for my opponent who then tells me he needs more time as he is 'taking instructions on a fundamental issue'. Given the information in the papers and his demeanour I extrapolate that my client is about to be accused of rape. I decide to wait and see before I tell him this. I eat a bagel. I am then told that 'there is no longer a fundamental issue, but DNA is required'. I extrapolate that wild allegations have been made and advice has been taken as to the complete no-chance of proving them. We order another tea and start to draft the order we agreed an hour and a half ago.

The man who made the builders tea then burns a slice of toast and the fire alarm goes off. We are all evacuated and I end up hovering about in the drizzle on the pavement talking to the Judge ( who I know from his time as a barrister). He tells us that if we are agreed we will approve the order in his office not the court room so we need not be worried about the malfuctioning video link machinery. So, after the fire engine have arrived and two hefty men have hefted an equally hefty extractor fan in to the court and out again we draft our order and give it to the usher. It comes back signed without us even going in. I tell my client who shrugs. His father asks if I will pay his petrol for today. ( I will not.) Then - at half past twelve!- I get to drive an hour and a half home again.

Or, maybe take a little detour........First, to Lancaster market to the haberdashery stall for this selection of ('chocolate') buttons.....

....then to the cook shop for cookie cutters to make mince pies and this one shaped like a helicopter becuase it is the perfect shape for the applique shape I need to put into my water quilt ( explanation of that in a later post!) ....

....then onto the motorway and a side trip to Sticky Fingers in Chorley for nice-things-just-because.

Although how good is this material for my parched earth piece?

Then home. By then I knew that I was free tomorrow so paperwork could wait while I pieced a top for my sister. She is 34 but wheedled so much her husband gave in and said she could have a Paddington Quilt on the bed which she promptly requested for her Christmas present. I got the simple top done oK but then encountered tension problems whlie quliting so had to stop and call out a machine servicng man who is coming on my day off next week.

Yeah, just like it is on Boston Legal!

Water quilt

I am conscious that I didn't live up to my promise of blogging you through my city and guilds course so let me make ammends. Later in the course we have to complete five items, one of which is a wall hanging. Of course, being me, I have jumped ahead and decided to do it early so I thought I'd blog each step.


The motivation is that Trentham Gardens Quilt show' s special category in April is water. As soon as I saw that I had some vague ideas which have been percolating and are fast coming to the boil now. (I don't drink coffee - do drinks that percolate also boil?!) So I have decided to do all th design folder I also need to do for City and Guilds. I shall probably do it all in the wrong order but I'll get there in the end!


I'll show you sketches later but for now let me just say that I need to make a panel (or possibly two) that represents parched earth in a drought. This being my inspiration:

So how to represent this in fabrics? I need to make samples of different options before choosing one. Also, one of the five pieces needs to be 'mainly applique' which may as well be this one as other elements will need to be appliqued too. So, here are some samples. Which one do you vote for?

Reverse applique by machine with very narrow gaps.

Reverse applique by hand with wider gaps.

Onlay applique with raw edges

Onlay applique over freezer paper templates.

I have a favourite but I'd like your views.

Quilty paintings

Officially I am working right now but you've got to do something while your papers print out off email so, ( for reasons I will share in the next post) I just googled for images for 'parched earth' and accidentally came across the art of Gail Altschuler whose paintings make for great quilt inspiration. Check her out! Unsuprisingly when I checked her biography I found that she originates from South Africa. I seem inevitabely drawn to all things from that country!

Broadband consumer tale

I am sorry to do it to you again but I have had another consumer experience. My parents are on a very slow dial up and accordingly ring us frequently and get us to do internet research for them. I keep telling then to get broadband but being on a limited budget they are rightly concerned about cost. So today Mum asks me to use my internet to research some deals for her. No problem.

I check her number on several sites and no one seems to provide broadband to her address ( which is 1.5 miles from a town with a population of 14,756). Talktalk however has a free broadband deal packaged with phone calls which is very cheap and which we use. It is not availble for her but they can at least get broadband to her for £15 per month. The web site says they are trying to get the free deal available to more areas and to ring for more information.

( you can see where this is is going now can't you!)

I Ring. I give the number and postcode of my parents's house and explain. I am told that if I check the number on the site I will be able to find out if broadband is available and, if it is not, there is a number to call to find out when it will be available.
"I know. I rang it. I am talking to you on it."
"No, There's another number."
"Fine. Can you tell me what it is please?"
"It's on the website."
"Where?"
" I don't have time to look for it I have other calls waiting. Its on the website."

I hang up. Try to find another number. Can't. Ring back. Get put on hold. Get cut off.

I ring again. I get a Scottish person. I have to give the number and postcode. I explain what I need. The woman is trying to be helpful, but doesn't know and will have to put me through to a supervisor who holds the schedule for the unbundling of exchanges. Fine. I go on hold.

Twenty five minutes later I get an Anerican man who says,
"Phone number." (Note- he says it. He doesn't ask for it. There is no questioning tone or indeed questioning word. He is rude. I decide to play back.
"Sorry?"
"Phone number."
"I don't understand."
"Phone number."
"Oh, you are wondering if you could please take my phone number?"
"Yes. Phone number."
I give it. I give the postcode. I explain the story and tell him I need the date the exchange will be unbundled, please.
"Right. Wait a second while I check your account."
"I don't have an account. I've just said, I am ringing to try and set one up."
" Just a second. You're right. You don't have an account."

I confess. I get snotty. I tell him he is the third person I have spoken to that I was on hold for 25 mins and could he possibly just answer the question. He seems to wake up then and read his 'Dealing with Difficult Customers handbook' and in a very over-patient voice says,
"Well I am a new advisor and so I need all the information to assist you m'aam but I am really wanting to help you whatever the problems you have had before. I am going to do my best to give you very good service from now on. So, can I take the number again?"
He is lucky he is not within slapping distance.

I demand a supervisor and explain again. I go on hold.

Eventually I get Ray in 'Retentions'. What we are retaining, I know not. The account I do not have? Water? Whatever, Ray knows his stuff. Turns out if you go to www.samknows.com you can check all the phone exchanges to see what providers work from which exchanges. Its brilliant. The only one for Penrith is Sky. To get Sky broadband you need to get Sky TV. Mum and Dad don't, can't afford it and don't want it anyway.

I ring Mum and tell her to move house. Oh, and I get her permission to email her MP on her behalf and ask whether anyone is doing anything to ensure that people in towns of not totally inconsiderable size can get broadband. It's ridiculous!

Quilting books (yup more!)

Do you ever find that you have a great idea for a quilt but because you don't have time to make it right away you read more and see more and suddenly that quick quilt has got much grander?

Yesterday morning I was doodling a quilt I have had in mind for a while - a star based quilt inspired by the Paul Simon Song Under African Skies I was thinking Ohio stars with African fabrics and other nice simple square based ones. And then last night I read this book

and today between clients I browsed this book

and now I am planning irregular Mariners compass stars with a background of subtle but swirly flying geese as the sky. This may well be a good thing as the design in my head is way better now... and surely, as someone who has never actualy made a Ohio star yet I am not getting carried away am I? I mean the instructions don't look that hard.....!

But speaking of books, if you are UK based you gotta love the US$ exchange rate at the moment. I have been after this book for a while

because it is by the same author as this book which is just great. Beautiful quality pictures. I often browse it while I am drying my hair because it lives on the shelf next to the mirror I sit on floor to use and the book will stay open on the floor!

However the Threads of Faith book is only available second hand at a pretty high price - I keep scouring Abebooks and Amazon but have not found it for less than about £35. (For those not using UK currency by way of comparators a paperback novel here is about £7 or £8)

On a whim,I just went on Amazon.com. Now normally the postage makes that a pointless exercise - might as well use the UK site. I But, I got the book for $33.09 which makes it just under £15 . Bargain. Plus it even comes from a bookstore I visited when in New York some years ago so I can even imagine it being taken from the shelf and wrapped up just for me. Plus, I also found that they have this book new for £25 including postage and it isn't even available yet in the UK.

Downside is waiting several weeks for it to arrive but, hey, I might have some of those stars done by then!

Developing a style

Great quilting minds often think alike. I have been piecing a commsion quilt today - lots of foundation pieced log cabins and flowers from Susan Briscoes book. Enjoyable, what the client ordered and in fact my design.... but somehow not 'me'. I was reflecting just this week on how I do not feel I have yet found my own style in quilting. I have made over 20 quilts in the last twenty months and the ones I like most are the ones which tend towards improvisational techniques but I do not think that I have yet found what would be termed my 'voice' in creative writing circles. Its somthing I want to focus on in 2008 now I have acquired at least a rudimentary knowledge of quiling techniques.

As I was musing on this two other blog entried cropped up this weekend. Jennifer on her 21st October post (Ok I am a bit behind) left a link to a quilter I had never before heard of but whose work clearly has a very distinctive 'voice'. She is Jane Burch Cochran and you can see her here.

Then today Brenda challnges readers to join her in her judging course homework to list 10 quilters whose style you would instantly recognise.

I have to say that the most recognisable things about my quilts from the last couple of months at the moment is that they are all half finished....!

Important and stupid stuff

Important stuff

The grand reveal of the twelveby12 Dandelion quilts has begun. Blogger is refusing to let me post photos now but I revealed earlier and so you can see mine with the acompanying tale at http://twelveby12.blogspot.com/2007/10/where-does-all-yellow-go.html . Don't forget to check out all the other quilts.

Stupid stuff

A parcel arrived today from The Court of Appeal in London. Turned out to be a DVD for part-time Judges about the mentoring scheme. The covering letter said that there was both film and text on the disc so if you had a computer you could see both. If you only had a DVD player but no computer you could see the film and not the text, but the text was available for download 'from the following website: www....etc'

Is it just me?!

Update on last venting post

I rang back. Had to go through the automated process again. Twice. But once was my fault becuase I tried to buck the system by inserting number commands too quickly and ended up with French instructions. Spoke to a human who told me there was a technical issue. I KNOW!!!. She began to take endless details including my phone number and said they would ring back in the next two days. She got as far as half of the product key when the line went dead. Did she ring back for the rest of it? Did she ******.

Adobe Photoshop Elements refused my serial number three times but took it on the fourth attempt. Adobe Flash player will not install at all. EQ 5 reloaded no problem at all (and thank you Rio Designs for including a note of the serial number on the invoice for easy access). I am about to reload the camera programme and I have lost the disc for the printer driver so will have to download on line- keep fingers crossed!

Finally thanks to Dennis who has just shouted to say that he has cooked for me!!

Venting

I had hoped to be blogging about my trip to Bath. I have taken photos of quilts shops and needlework exhibitions at the Abbey and the like. Sadly, that is not what this blog is to be about

The morning I turned on the laptop and for the next hour went round some crazy set up loop with the laptop steadfastly refusing to boot up. It is apparently missing its 'hive file'. Whatever that is. ( I can tell you that I am developing hives due to stress but I am sure that is not what it is referring to.)

En route to Man United's football ground to lecture for an hour, I took it to a computer shop. They didn't know what a hive file was either but offered to let me book the laptop in a week on Tuesday. I did no more than look at the technician and he offered to print some instructions off to enable me to self-remedy what he diagnosed as a Windows problem. ('It just happens sometimes').

The version which might possibly have saved my data didn't work and so the laptop is now up and running but I have been sent back to the factory settings. Not eveything was backed up so all the photos I downloaded last night have gone as has other bits and bobs. Most annoying though is the lack of programmes.

Adobe Acobat downloaded fine. Norton Security webiste told me I had to uninstall my non-existant programme before I could reload it. However, they have a nifty little chat facility where someone tells you what to do. He gave me a link to get my 2007 version that I have paid for., Rather suspciously I seem to have a 2004 version with a free option for 90 days upgrade to more recent virus protection. Why 90 days when I have already paid for a years subscription in 2007? I think I will fight that battle another day.

Then to reload the Micrsoft Office works suite. In goes the infomatoin for Internet registration. Won't do it. I expected that because I have been through this before and because the product key has been used already they need to speak to you to check that you are not inappropriatley using a friend's disc. So I go to the telephone option as instructed. The toll free number doens't work. It has too many digits so I suspect is a US number. The other option works and defaults me to an automated service. It requires me to enter the 16 digits of the ID number on the installation wizzard. There are only 12. I sit there yelling "Help." "Assistance?" "Customer Service!" until eventually the machine lets me have a person. The person is a polite Indian man who is now very puzzled because I should have 16 digits. In fact I have an numerical ID deficit. ( This may explain a lot in life!) I have to ring back in half an hour when he has spoken to the technicians.

I have a shedful of work I cannot do without a copy of Word. I am not a happy bunny!! I will update you.

More on why I married him

Continung the conversation from last night, I have just told Dennis that the first five visitors to the Cottonpatch shop each day get a free gift of a magnet and pointed out that as it only opens at 10am we have a real chance of actually being the first visitors without making a special effort to do that.

"Really?" He said. "Each vistor gets one?"

Now I am good at reading his mind ( usually), so I surmised that what he was really saying was, " Well if its one per visitor, lets go in separately and get one each and even though it is bound to be a quilty magnet that I don't want, you can have it because you love quilty things." See, that's just the kind of guy he is.

So I replied, "Yes. One each. Its good isn't it. Even though we don't have a metallic door on our fridge to actually put a magnet on...."

He frowned, thought, and then his shoulders sagged. "Oh. " he said. "I thought you said a Magnum *."

Don't worry folks. I will ensure he gets one anyway as a detour reward!

(* as you can see a Magnum is a brand of icecream here. Not sure if it travels under that name.)

On why I married him

The long running debate between me and myself as to whether to drive or train it to Birmingham today is, last night, easily solved when I realise I was simply too dog tired to drive for five hours on a motorway in one day. I give up watching an extremely boring episode of Michael Palin's tour of Eastern Europe and go to log onto Qjump . I find a way of doing the journey on trains that provide a first class carriage with minimal changes, so the snob in me is happy. Right. Lap top off, into the bath then to bed. Decision made.

Except.... it was still calling me. Those two walls of potential- Christmas- present -quilting-books just as you walk in the door, the low rack under the window full of neat Japanese and country style Australain magazines. Two whole rooms of fabric to touch. Come to me, it sang like the sirens that used to lure sailors onto the rocks. Come to me with my beautiful alluring products.

Sigh.

An idea occurs.

I get out of the bath, shrug on a dressing gown and go and interupt Dennis who is watching some obscure footie match on Interactive Freeview TV. " You know how the quilt shop is kind of in the middle of the bottom of Birmingham?" (It doesn't do to be too precise with my lovely, but directionally challenged husband) "And you know how it is so tempting because I am going to the bottom right tomorrow anyway? And you know how we are getting up early to go to Bath on Saturday for the week and that the M5 motorway kind of goes not that far from the bottom left of Birmingham...."

He mutes the TV. "How long a diversion?"

"Only half an hour. Each way. And say an hour in the shop. Max."

He shrugs. "OK."

I am saved. I turn to stumble off to bed when he says, "Hang on I want to show you this bit of Michael Palin I recorded."

Readers, I confess to being ungrateful. I confess to being unwilling to swap my two hour diversion from his holiday time for just a minute or two from my time. I am cranky, I am tired, and Palin was boring. I think of Japanese magazines. "Go on then."

He shows me an aerial shot of Palin climbing up stairs onto the upper floor of a Soviet era satelite spy installation. It is dull ( both in colour and content). Dennis pauses it just as Palin's feet get to a smudgy landing. "There. Look!" He points at some green and brown tiles. "Its just like your quilt." He rewinds it. Plays it again. "Only yours is a better pattern."

Need scraps will travel

Yesterday I decided to start to reduce my scrap stash by cutting lots of 4 inch squares for a scrap quilt - an easy, take-along wherever I go hand sewing project I thought. I spent all afternoon cutting and achieved 150 or so squares. This did not seem to reduce the scraps in the slightest ( perhaps because I stuck to the 'rule' of no more than 2 squares from each fabric.) The pattern calls for 960 squares.

Now, the sensible thing is to just (a) break my self imposed rule and (b) make the thing smaller. Or, the other option wouls be to go and buy some scraps... :)

I have been in e-mail conversation today with my frend Lesley and told her inter alia (I'm a lawyer - gotta do that Latin thing from time to time) that I was only 25 mins drive from the Cottonpatch when I go to speak at the NEC for an hour on Wednesday but that a side trip to to the shop meant I needed the car which meant about 4.5 hrs driving instead of a train trip. Plus I get to go to three quilt shops whilst on holiday next week anyway....

Five minutes after I sent that I found on my - reasonably tidy at the moment- desk, AA routefinder directions from the NEC to the shop printed out on 10th October last year - presumably when I did the conference and side trip then. I have no idea how they got onto my desk but Lesley took it as a sign that I had to go - the quilting angel is, so she says, on my shoulder.

Only just now the post arrived and in it... the mail order catalogue for the very same shop. Another sign that I should go and buy charm packs or a sign that I could just mail order them. I am confused.

At least I now have good reading as an alternative to the two lever arch files of legal papers I have to read on the train to London I am catching at 3.30!

Ever felt an idiot?

On Thursday I set off at 6.15pm to drive to my parent's house, an easy hour and a half straight up motorways. I had picked up a last minute brief for Carlisle County Court at 10 am the next morning and was taking advantage to stop off in Penrith en route and to deliver some stuff Mum wanted for our collaborative quilt.

Just south of Lancaster, I was in the middle lane at 60 pmh, in the dark and rain, overtaking a lorry. There were several cars in front of me. Just as I drove into that momentary blind spot when you get the sudden heavy blast of spray from the lorry, I realised that a car had sped up the fast lane to my right at at least 90 pmh and was about to hit a car, which has pulled out of my lane. I saw him slam on his brakes, then I got that blast of spray and could only just make out his lights seemingly going sideways and realised that there was going to be a pile up. In fact he must have managed to swerve - or skid?- through the gaps and end up on the hardshoulder and there was no collision at all.

Even so it was a shock. A mile or so later I then had to drive through a set of roadworks with cones with the lorry still close to me. I don't particularly like that, as you will remember my car got smashed up last year due to a lorry clipping the cone on a motorway and causing me to swerve then skid. I was a little nervey so I decided to pull off at the next services and take a breather. I parked, turned the engine off, burst into tears and realised I was afraid to get back on the motorway in the dark. I felt really silly - I am such a confident driver, but I was really scared.

So, at the ripe old age of 37, I rang my long suffering parents to come and get me! Mum prescribed a hot drink and a Mars Bar for shock while I waited - only I could hardly walk to the cafe becuase my legs were shaking. I was only 1 mile from a junction so after some sugar I made it to a pub off the motorway and they drove 50 mins or so to meet me. I agreed that I needed to drive again very soon so Dad sat with me and Mum drove in front of me so I would have some slow brakelights ahead of me over the rather high isolated partof the journey known as Shap where the weather often gets quite bad.

So off we set and Mum misses the turning for the M6 North. I, gripping the steering wheel tightly, just follow her like we still have the umblicial cord thing going on and we have then no alternative but to go South to Preston. This is a detour of some 35 miles which requires me to drive not just past the scene of the accident that didn't even happen but also through the roadworks again - twice!!!

Meanwhile I have the helpful company of Dad who keeps leaning forward right over the dash board and making me jump - turns out he was trying to read the little map that comes up when I don't put a destination into the Sat Nav, only he didn't have his glasses on. He then starts rummaging in my dash board and eats the dried fruit I have in there. I am going through cones clinging to the steering wheel so hard I actually give myself cramp and he's holding the bag out and saying, 'Do you want a tootie frootie?'

We get to Shap and there is fog. I am muttering "Oh,oh oh, Fog. I can't see. I don't like this" and all I get in repsonse is, "Fog? Your generation has never seen real fog. This is just a bit of mist. In my day we had real peasoupers...."

At least the aversion therapy worked and when I saw the lights of Penrith I left Mum behind and did the last bit all by myself ( big, brave girl.) and we finally got there at 10.30pm! I did another half hour in the morning up to Carlisle without batting an eyelid - at least until I got there and found that in fact the case was listed at 2pm and I could have come up on the day in daylight after all!


(Purple Missus - that story was for you in particular!)

Oh and the other reason I feel an idiot is that I have, finally, almost cut out all the pieces for a quilt kit I was given for Christmas last year. Only almost, because I turned my ruler around and cut three strips at 4.5 inches not 5 and now I am 30 cm short of fabric and have to find some more. The most likey opportunity is when I am working next week near the shop that sold the kit , which is located - guess where - yup. South on the M6 motorway.

Stashes

Ever tried to convince your partner that every quilter has a stash the size of yours - in fact probably even bigger - and that you are not sufereing from some compulsive disorder that requires urgent inpatient treatment?

If so go to this link, which I stumbled on today to see photos of people's stashes. Now, all those people, they can't all be ill can they?

(Dennis, I know you are reading this - take note as well how tidy mine is in all those baskets in comparison!)

In fact, that page is a part of the site for the Priority Alzheimer's Quilts which are auctioned on line each month for Alzhiemer's research funds. They are only required to be 9 x 12 inches. I had heard of that project some time ago but was reminded of it reading Kirstin La Flamme's blog - her little quilt realised the most funds this month! (Of course its not a competition but still its validation and we all need that!)

So what say we all have a go and make a little quilt for this charity? If you do join in leave a comment here with a post to your blog where you show your quilt in the future so we can track them all.

Sock basting

I am a proponent of spray basting for quilts. Pin backing to carpet, shwoosh of spray, pat down wadding, shwoosh of spray, pat down top. How easy is that?! I do pin the very edges just because I am careful not to spray the carpet with basting spray too, but that only takes 5 mins. As such I have never used the Micro Stitch product which is a gun that send plastic tacks through your quilt.

However, just now as I scrabbled around to find two matching trainer socks to take to the gym I suddenly thought - is this not the ideal laundry product? Keep the gun by the laundry bin. Tag your socks as to take them off and untag them after they are washed and just before you put them on. No more lone socks.

I would be classed as a genuis for my fantastic ideas, were it not that it was only during the typing of the last paragaph that I remembered - I am going to the gym today for aqua aerobics..... but on another day I will need socks.....!!

The meaning of art quilts

Today I finished my first quilt for the Twelveby12 group challenge. I can't show it to you becuase we are having a grand reveal on the blog on 1st Nov - be sure to check us out! However, I will say that it has got me all philosphical.

This is the first quilt I have made which is about something as opposed to just looking pretty. I wouldn't say it tells a story exactly but it does represent a thought - a kind of life musing- triggered by the process of thinking about dandelions which was the set theme. My question is - does it matter if no one else can get to the same thought just by looking at my quilt? Or indeed, does it matter if they come to another interpretation all together?

Personally, I am more concerned that the embellishments don't fall off than I am about imparting some great nuggets of wisdom. But I'd like your views on whether clarity of message is a part of making an art quilt 'successful' .

It growded like topsy

As regular readers will well know, I am on a concerted effort to finish up some works in progress. I pulled a wallhanging, which I had made in a group session at Douglas Valley Quilters, out of my cupboard yesterday and stuck it up on the design wall, partly to give me somthing nice to look at and partly so I could consider how to quilt it. At just 23 x 24 inches it would be a nice quick done-in-an-evening job.

I left the room. I re-entered the room. I thought, "You know, that wallhanging would actually make a fantastic center for a bed sized quilt."

Which is how come (a) my spare room ended up looking like this ( it was worse much worse - or better, depending on your view point!- at one stage

(b)I never get to the end of my WiP list and (c) my mug of green tea ended up all over the carpet - I set it down on the floor (I never learn!) and completely covered it with green fabric... one tug of the fabric to see how it looked next to the brown and.. splish splash!!

Non-quilting gloating

My husband has seen all 42 matches in the Rugby World cup so far ( and a few Welsh league and local club matches in the same period!). Me? Mostly I have taken advantage of undisturbed time with my machine. But today, at the quarter-final stage, was when it started to get interesting as far as I was concerned and I did manage the last fifteen minutes of the two matches. I am aware, given I have some many faithful readers from down under that I should be magnaminous but, heck, you wouldn't be in my shoes would you?!

England 12 Australia 10 (Ha!)

and then the bonus ( given that Denis the Kiwi Hoover was sitting on my sofa, pretending to be neutral in the above match but was making very antipodean comments!)

France 20 New Zealand 18 (Ha again!)

I think I will save needleturning those Japanese flowers for the semis next weekend!!

Work in progress

In my blogging absense I have been holed up in the Novotel in Leeds, teaching law by day and making log cabins for a commission quilt by evening. I took a photo of the little sewing area I constructed - machine on the dressing table, TV to the right with an ironing board acting as a return table below it and a chair holding my plastic box of strips to the left. I took my own extension bale and ott-light... I am sure the maid wondered what I was up to! Sadly I am too inept to work out how to download the photo from my phone.

I can show you the work in progess spread over my floor though. (Floor and not design board because I am foundation piecing and the paper backing does not stick to the board. )I was sent this material, along with some silks to match the colours to......
...the request being for a variation of my Leaf Peeper quilt, which my client bought from Quilts UKAnd these are the blocks so far. Obviously the 'odd flower out' in the cream blocks is not staying in its current position but will go at the corners of the outer line of log cabins with its mates not yet made.

The colours are so different from those I would normally choose - very muted and no brown in sight. But, as I had to buy so much fabric to get the variety of strips, there will be lots left over so I guess I will have a chance to see if I can do something less tradtional with them!

More finished quilts

Continuing with my finishing up Project this weekend I tied and bound White Women Can Quilt - this one is 52 x 72 inches

And then I did the borders, machine applique, quilting and binding on When Ricky met Magie (42 x 52 inches) It is so called for the combination of Ricky Tims convergence technique for the sunset panels and fabrics from Magie Relph's African Fabric shop. Originally it was to be bigger but it refused point blank to accept another border and so it is the way it is!

Oh and to reply to English Rose's comment on a previous post - needles can be taken on to aircraft - apparently they are too slim to be picked up on the security scan - and if you think about it are not dissimilar to a brooch backing. You need special thread cutters though.

Things going wrong...

Marble cake is the easiest thing to make. It also gets great praise from the two obsessively Rugby World Cup watching men parked in my lounge for the duration. However, it does not work if you casually whack the oven on to preheat and forget to turn it down to 200 degrees when you actually put the cake in.

This singed volcano like mess - burned and stuck to the tin on the outside, still fluid on the inside - was inspected by my husband's friend (officially named Denis with one 'n' but, behind his back, called 'the human hoover'). His verdict? "Whats wrong with the solid bit?"

The middle bit was duly excised from the liquid portion, iced and presented looking like something a kindergarten child made with a blindfold on . He gobbled the whole lot ( which was at least 3/4 of the intended cake and proclaimed it delicious. He did venture the opinion that looks did not matter but as we were watching some rather gorgeous Fijians thrash a pasty looking Wales at the time, I had to disagree!

That was after my hairdryer packed in. I suppose all hairdryers, when they pack in, must logically pack in while someone's hair is still half wet.... but did it have to be when all my neighbours who might have loaned me one were out and when I was in a rush to go for brunch with Dennis ( mine - see the two 'n's) because a carefully times fry up at a (not so) greasy spoon was all he had time for, what with the 8 matches on this weekend?

The local hairdresser kindly loaned me one and then we made a quick dash to Boots for a replacement. You gotta love the way they try to sell you a hairdryer. We compared no less than twelve models all sold on science. Last time I bought one, hairdryers produced cold, warm and hot air. Now they offer ceramic technology and ionic conditioning. Trouble is, they all do, so even if I knew what they were talking about, it doesn't help me choose. In the end I chose the one one with a rectractable cord and folding handle for ease of packing when travelling. But I was oh so ( not) tempted by the brand that sold two identical dryers in different boxes. The only difference with the second box was that it included a 'FREE!' ceramic hairstraighter. Oh, and it cost £10 more than the other box.

Odds and sods

I am conscious that I am not being a consciencious blogger at the moment but I have three excuses for the last few days:

(a) I am undergoing training to be a collaborative lawyer which is a whole new way of practicing family law and so I have my head stuck in participation agreements and the like.

(b) I was away at the weekend at Mum's and my Morceau quilting class. Mum and I began to design our embroidered quilt ( actually having declared her total lack of design capacity Mum pretty much picked out what we were going to do amd I agreed and drew it for her!) and then I came home with instructions to come up with all the embroidery designs for the centre portion and I spent 6 hours flat yesterday working on just that! We went shopping together and started very well with exceedingly well priced solid black fabric which I then got a further 20% off and a few skeins of DMC embroidery silk. We then slid a little by deciding that several borders had to be in order-only dupion silk at £14 per meter... but the colours ( which Mum mostly picked) are black, gold, magenta and purple ( for grapes on a grapevine border she wants) and will look, I think, deliciously rich and, well, rather clerical, as is appropriate for a quilt based on an exhibition of sacred texts.

(c) I am on a massive finishing up session to get at least some of my WIPs finished before half term in October so I can justify taking a whole new set of uncut-into fabrics on holiday and making a quilt in a week down in Bath. This is a simple wallhanging for Christmas I have just completed - started on the plane and in baggage reclaim at Manchester a few weeks ago.

And I have quilted the quilt pieced mostly when I was in Tunisia. This is for my Gran for Christmas.... the Gran who rang tonight to declare that she wasn't doing Christmas presents this year. She was makng a charity donation instead and didn't want to be given anything for herself..... Tough!!! Its nothing innovative but I like the colours and it was easy to handpiece whilst on the go.

Sad news

Most of you will be familiar with the work of Laurel Burch , famed for her felines and mystical horses amongst other works, and have probably at least coveted one of her bags if not bought one.

Sadly I stumbled on a blog today notifying of her recent death. Condolences can be left at her website. I did not know that she had suffered very badly from a rare bone disease. For me it makes her art so much more beautiful that it came out of such adversity.

Abataka

I have a new book. (Yes, another).

This is a catalogue of quilts by Mary Fisher who is a UN goodwill amabassor to Africa on their AIDS project. The quilts are accompanied by short bits of her writings about her African experiences. Sections showing her sculptures and her textiles are accompanied by extracts from her speeches. Her quilts feature printing with woodblocks or lino cuts and often have words from her speeches incorporated. the book is very well produced and I was not charged extra for international postage. It is available from http://www.maryfisher.com/abataka.htm

Sacred

Last nights activity was much less macabre than the day-before's; I called in at the British Library to see their Sacred exhibition. Unimpressed for the first few moments looking at pages of old books with old calligraphy I turned and saw some illuminated pages of a Hebrew Bible and that quilty bit of my brain went 'DING!'. For a while now I have been persuading my Mum to work with me on a quilt - she is a talented embroiderer, albeit not someone who enjoys doing her own designs. So, when she finally agreed, the task was on me to design something. All the embroidery books I looked at seem to be flower focuses which is not my taste but I am now geared up to design using images from the catalogue. I am now just wondering what the recreation of our ( seemingly traditional) show judges will be to the replication of a 18th centrury depiction of a scene from revelation containing a seven headed serpent sweeping bodies into the burning abyss! Actualy maybe last night was not all that much less macabre.....

Taking embellishment one step too far

The great thing about working n London is that there is always something you can do in the evening after work. Yesterday I went to the Wellcome Trust building on Euston Road just down from my hotel. You may know the name as a medical institution but they also have three galleries with displays linking medicine and art. One was a sample of the many many vaugely medically related things Henry ( I think that's his name!) Wellcome collected, from torture chairs to Japanese sex aids, to anatomical models to glass medicine bottles. Another is about the heart with everything from Egyptian papyrus pictured of the heart to a pickled human heart removed in a transplant operation. There is even a film made of a heart operation very bizzarely narrated with a voice over of a Billy Graham sermon. The third related to five aspects of medicnine today. That included obsesity which promtly made m walk very briskly to buy M&S blueberries for my supper!

Of course, I am now well trained in using displays like this for quilting inspiration but what I learned most from this trip is that you can take embellishment too far. Three things I saw were:

1. Pictures of the heart drawn by a psychiatric patient in Germany who used to stick pencils up his nose until it bled then used the blood as ink. ( He drew well though!)

2. A chinese shop sign from which hung a kind of beaded curtain made of human teeth.

3. Tables with human sillhouettes on them. Turns out they were made by removing all the veins and arteries in a human body, laying them out in their right places on a block of wood then varnishing them down.

Members of my twelve my twelve group should be very grateful that it is a long time until I have to set a challenge theme and so there is a good chance I will have forgotton these influences by then!

Quick update

I am just back from the Great Northern Quilt show Harrogate. I called in at Pennypot Patchwork on the way - a new shop to me. This time the show seemed small and quiet and did not really justify the day and a half I set aside for it - but I had to stay as I was collecting my quilt at the end.

I stayed at the Premier Travel Inn near Leeds - Bradford airport and was mulling over the wisdom of this - would I have been better getting up really early and driving over just for the day and having the cash to spend? The dilemma was solved when I realised that I had been allocated a room near doors that slammed and that the other otherside of the wall on which my headboard rested were several extremely squeaky steps. Not a major problem, but enough to genuinely keep me awake for half an hour or so at night and then wake me up at just before seven in the morning as early leavers departed.

Premier Travel Inn still has their' good night sleep' guarantee ( although they don't advertise it so much these days). If you don't get one, you get your money back. I didn't, so I did and then I made the lady from The Shuttle who was selling fabric at £5 per meter very happy the next day!

But no photos of my haul becuase I have already stashed it all away without thinking. I have now ( several months too late says my husband) reaslied that I am at the stage where I have to focus on stash reduction and WIPs for a while. So no more serious shopping ( except for a little planned splurge at Midsomer Quilting in October because that's my favourite shop and the holiday would not be the same without a little trip there) until Easter next year... when I go to Midsomer Quilting again and then just after there is the Trentham Gardens show. Oh, and except for the Nantwich sale in January when fabric is so cheap you'd be mad not to stock up on backings at least...

But now to London for the week to work so I may go off radar for a while!

Quilting CV

We have taken on two new pupil barristers in my chambers and I have been reading their CV's. They are frightening. Whe I got my first trainee job it was sufficient to have good A levels and a decent chance of getting a good degree with an intention to go on to law schoool. Now they have all their accademic and professional qualifications already. Plus they have done things like learn conversational Java when on a solo motorbike journey across Indionesia, or work in a death penalty center in Oklahoma. They have done interneships in Strasbourg and one of them has even been the scretary general of some UN student group - I mean it wasn't quite Kofi Anan's job but was still pretty impressive. ( I have not made any of that up).

It made me depressed at my inadeqacies so I decided to review my skill set and give you my quilting CV:

I have undertaking the following roles for at least twenty months:

Small business support officer
Responsiblity for assisting sole traders and small partnerships in the fabric retail industry to maximise their trading profits. Worked with not only UK traders but also with dealers in the US.

International communicators director
Responsibilty for writing, producing and disseminating a focused textile related journal with a potential readership of several milion in an international forum

Production engineer
Responsibilty for managing over fifteen ongoing design and manufacture projects each requiring detailed attention to pre-production design, mechanical and mathematical calculations, the maitenance of machinery and the end fabrication processes.

Spacial organisation faciltator
Responsibilty for the ergonomics, health and saftey of the storage and production areas to include financial planning and manual construction of fabric containment units

HR/ Family Liason officer
Responsiblity for negotiating allocated time allowances, compromise agreements and time-loss compensation agreements with non-quilting sectors within the home organisation

Budget supervisor
Responsibilty for creative budget planning, the establishment of specific textile-dedicated allowances and the rationalisation of non-textile budget areas to allow for sector expansion.


What have you been doing with your life?!

Blog help needed

I thought I was being clever by writing a couple of posts when I had time and saving one as a draft to post tonight. However, when I do that it posts it to the date I wrote it first and not today, which means if you are reading this is is now two posts below and so not obvious to anyone who logs straight onto the blog and is not notified via bloglines that there is a new post.

So now I have had to post anyway to alert you to the old post (are you following this becuase I feel I am slightly losing the plot myself!) but also to ask: am I missing something obvious on blogger? Can I save a draft and date it on a later posting date?

Twelveby12

Ia m very excited that I have been included in a by invitation online art quilting group Twelveby12 - so named for the size of quilts we are going to be making bi -monthlly. We now have a new blog on which you can follow our progress - come and have a look! There is a list on the site of the members and links to their blogs which are well worth following. I'll try and remember to let you know when actual quilts are made and posted.

My friend Chris

One of the best things about quilting for me has been the making of so many new friends all around the world. I always wanted to be in an old fashoned Amercian quiting bee. Well, we don't hand quilt and we don't eat grits, but the 'girls' in my City and Guilds class have recently started meeting occasionally in each others home's to gossip and sew together.


Last time it was just Kristina and myself but we had such good fun. This is her in her inside studio. ( She has another outbuilding with dying space downstairs and long room for her quilting frame and othercrafts upstairs and is about to build a dedicated studio in the loft space of a new double garage, lucky cow!). I am just fascinated with other people's sewing spaces, aren't you?


Here am I in another corner of the same room holding up one of her C&G samples that I wanted to keep because they were all Africany and beautiful.

And this is a photo of her patchwork turkey that she sent me a photo of unasked for, so she obviously wants me to show it off! And a very nice turkey doorstop it is too.

One seam flying geese tutorial

Having spent a week in Tunisa making geese the hard way, by hand with half square truangles, I came home and discovered this super quick technique. I found it demonstrated by Ricky Tims on The Quilt Show and by co-incidence founs it again the next day flicking through a book called Quick Quilts in a Weekend. Ricky learned it from someone else so I am guessing it's no secret. It was new to me though so I am also guessing it might be new to some of you. It produces three dimensional geese with little pockets.



1. From your background fabric cut two squares each three inches square.



2. From your goose fabric cut a rectangle three by five and a half inches.



3. Place a square right side up.



4. Fold the rectangle to align the short sides with the wrong sides together. Place ontop of the square with the aligned short sides at the bottom of the square. The fold at the top will come slightly short of the top of the square.



5. Set the other square on top right side down.



6. Sew a quarter inch seam along the right side taking care to keep the fold at the top as you work.



7. Press open the top square



8. Pull out the goose and press down. Hey presto!!

Whats on your wall?

I find it almost impossible to concentrate soley on one project at a time. Leaving aside the WIPs in boxes, this is my design wall tonight.

First we have samples of different forms of applique for my City and Guilds. We have all decided to make them in co-ordinating blocks so that after the course they can go in a quilt.

Then there is a block which is the start of my next challenge quilt with Lesley - we are doing a kind of wonky round robin. We each are to swap one block then build it up a bit - not necessarily with a border, but in any way we choose and hand it back, build on it and so on until the owner of the original block deems it finished.

Down at the bottom is another sample that I just had to make after reading about the technique in Quilters Newsletter. I read it at 11.30 ish at night, got up and made it at 7 am! Having made it I have decided do do somthing similar in the borders of this, which is a Ricky Tims convergence with a Brixton twist! The little flying geese are Ricky's method of three dimensional geese - I'll post instructions tomorrow - they are easy peasy and so fun. Random pieces on a board but a complete quilt in my head at the moment!

What's on your board?

Shoes, sisters, sticks and silliness

It is hard to understand how sisters can be so different. I like smart things. These are the slippers Ii was wearing when my sister arrived last night. ( Handmade and imported by me from Morrocco.)

These are Jen's shoes:

They are Crocs. (Look like plastic boats to me). Crocs have holes in them apparently ( What's that all about?) and Mark, Jen's husband managed to buy then for her just as she came home from a health and saftey talk at work where they were banned from wearing shoes with holes in. She is a nurse and the logic is that there is a danger of getting needlestick injury if the needle is dropped on a foot and goes through the hole.

The rule is still in place despite the fact that the A&E staff apparently spent quite some time throwing hypodermic syringes at a pair of crocs and failed totally to get any of them to land the the holes. So the solution was to fill the holes with these plastic animal 'gems'. (Gems to me means diamonds and sapphires).She works on a Children's ward so I guess she can get away with it. They look rindiculous to me but perhaps I am out of synch with foot fashion. Is there a market , do you think, for plastic quilt blocks to cover holes in our shoes in case we drop a Jeans needle into them?

New printer for fabric

Both of our Canon printers packed in recently so my mission for today was to buy a new all in one printer- and possibly a cheap one just for documents. My primary requirement was one that would print well on fabric and had an easy facility to enlarge on the copier. Having no idea where to start I googled sites about fabric printing and most people seemed to be saying Epsom or HP worked fine. Of course, because printers seem to be made for two months then discontinued, the precise models recommended were not really helpful.

So I then factored in the time consideration. PC world here have a facilty where you can choose and order on line to get web prices, then go and collect from the local store to avoid a delivery fee/ wait. As the store is 2.2 miles away this is a good option. Den's view was - get the best if you are going to be quilting with it ( gotta love this guy!) so I just started at the top end of the list, ruled out those with faxes becuase we have one and narrowed it down to the top range Epsom or HP.

As the spec details didn't cover exactly what I needed to know I rang Epsom. After listening to a lot of advertising I get to ask if the model in question enlarges.
"It does via the PC but I don't think it does on the stand alone facility."
"You don't think? Does it or does it not - can you find out?"
"It does via the PC"
You know when you just can't be bothered carrying on? So I try the second question?
Does this printer take fabric sheets?
"None of ours do."
"That can't be right. there are lots of web sites with people telling me that they actually recommend some of your printers."
"Oh well, yes it will be alright but as a company we don't say that."
"Fine. I think I'll buy a HP then."
Stunned silence.

I ring HP. I ring a local number but get someone with such a deep south US accent he is hard to understand. I already know that this printer enlarges. So, does it take fabric sheets OK and in particular are the new inks this printer uses OK because I had seen one review saying that a particular brand of HP ink only has 50% durability?
"What do you want to do with it?"
"Print on fabric sheets."
"Ummm...."
"For quilting...."
"Ummmm...."
"Its very common in the US. there are several sites recommending HP - some of them do it as a business so I know some HP printers are fine but this is a new printer ink, so I want to check."
"You are running a business?"
"No. I want to know if this ink prints OK on fabric.
"Ummmm. There might be somthing on the website."
"On which page?"
"Ummmm..."
"Look, if you don't know, could you just say so?"
"Can you ring the business support centre on Monday?"

In fact, if you go to the HP website and search for quilting rather than fabric ( which is what I tried first) there is a whole how to page with lots of links to projects and they even produce the fabric-paper!

So I bought the HP Photosmart C5180 and off I go to the store.

Now, for economy reasons we did wonder whether it would be a good idea to buy a cheapy black and white printer too for documents. So I was trying to puzzle out which brand did more pages per cartridge and compare the costs of cartirdges ( impossible task by the way) when a helpful lad called Gary arrived.
"Have you thought about a laser printer? I've got one and this one is only £40."
"How much is the toner?"
"£75"
"How much??"
"Ah but you get longer out of it than an ink cartridge?"
"How, much longer?"
"Oh you won't need to change it until it runs out."

I decline to buy a second one. I am given the receipt for the goods I ordered on online which gives a bar code to be scanned in at the till and should include the half price cartridges I added in store and which Gary added to my internet order. The sales assistant scans the bar code. £161 and pence.
"Is that right?" he asks.
"I don't know, I didn't add everything up - does it include the batteries and CD's I put in the trolley?"

He peers at the computerised screen. It doesn't have a itemised list. He stabbes a finger at the touch screen and it says, "This will cancel this order. Do you wish to proceed?"
He proceeds.
"Oh dear," he says. I can't find it now." He is totally non-plussed
"What if you just scan in all the items in the trolley?"
"But you might have discount."
"I do, but we could put that in manually."
"Can you just wait to one side while I serve the rest of the queue."

I grab a passing girl and explain. She comes back with Gary.
"Don't you want it all anymore?"
"Yes. I very much want it, its just that your colleague can't work the till."
"But Janine said you were cancelling the order."

God help me but I am beginning to understand people who take semi-automatics in to shops!

Design wall

With all my travels I forgot to show you the design wall that was the final part of my dining room-to-studio- project. It was another collaboration with Dad - I specified, he re-designed, he built, he drove it down on his trailer on a special trip after we discovered it was too big for either of our cars (and we don't drive Fiat Puntos!) and I paid for it!

This is the back view of it in his garage. I will photo it in situ soon.

It is foam board in a pine frame, made in two panels each 6 feet by 2.5 feet. The panels bolt togther to give a larger work space but unbolt for easier carrying out to the garage where it will live in storage when not in use. ( In theory - so far it hasn't left the house!) It is covered with needlepunch wadding stapled to the frame.

It has a tiny little red spot on it which I assumed was a bug that met its end in a kamikazi dive into the board. Turned out Dad got a bit close to the staple gun.....

Blog alteration

Quick note - I have altered this bog so that you don't need a google account to comment. I returned home to find a new reader had found the blog, was reading it all the way through and had bothered to send me email comments on it all because she couldn't do it on the blog, not having a google account for her own. (Julie, you are wonderful!) I hadn't realised that I had excluded anyone that way. So, if you have previously been excluded from commenting (a) I am sorry and (b) come on in, all (non - spammers) are welcome!

Back from Tunisia

Ok, call me stupid but I have just returned from Tunisia and, when I booked, I actually believed the average weather charts which said it would be around 34 degrees. It was in fact around 44 - 45 degrees which for me is way too hot to do anything than lie in the shade or dip in the pool. In fact by mid afternoon it was too hot even for that. Fortunately it turned out that in the air-conditioned lounge there was a quilting demonstration each day........
.... so you have no design wall - why not trail threads over someone else's sofa back?! There was one woman from Stafford who kept sidling past having a good look and who is now on her way to her local craft shop because she now knows what to do with the FQ's she kept looking at ('such lovely colours'). The waiters are still trying to figure out what I was doing with a towel and a travel iron on their glass coffee table. And of course, once I got on a roll, I couldn't stop.. here I am at Monsatir airport...


... and again at baggage reclaim in Manchester on a Christmas quilt by now because the flying geese top (sans borders which still need to be bought) got finished on the plane!Because we had booked leg room seats, I had to put my box up in the overhead compartment for landing, but kept some squares and my needle and thread down. For those who constantly ask me how I manage to get so much done I can tell you that one can handsew five and a half seven inch fourpatches in the time between the seat belt signs going on and the plane arriving on stand!

This is a picture of a picture on the landing of our hotel ....( really I told you we did nothing sensible you could take pictures off! Ok we went to the Marina a few times to eat but it was too dark then for piccies!)... because even Dennis said it would make a good quilt. ( I think he is getting the quilting equivalent of Stockholm syndrome).

One final tale - we were in the swimming pool and we over heard some rather small but loud south ('sarth') Londonders trying to work out what 4 feet nine was in meters, presumably in relation to the pool depth markings. Dennis and I just looked at each other becuase (a) he is Mr Calculator Head and is known for blurting out impossible calculations at will without even realising he has done it and (b) because I am a mental arthimatic dunce.

"No, come on," he said, "Even you can do that now. That's a quilting calcualtion. Go on, try."

Now bear in mind that in order to do anything in my head I have to do Carol Vordeman like contortions and break it down into easy stages (Countdown - its a TV programme you don't mind missing if you are not British and don't get that reference!)

So I go, "OK. there's thirty nine inches in a meter. Twelve inches are a foot, so three feet is a meter plus cutting space. So six feet is two meters and that's loads more than four feet nine so the answer is two meters, that's plenty."

I think Dennis finally understands how every time I make a quilt my stash actually grows a bit!