picnic pork chop quilt.

It's finished!

Just in time for summer. *snort* The plan is that this will live next to the back door so when the Chook and her friends need something to eat their snacks on or something to build a den with she won't drag the good ones out of the living room! The solid green is Kona Pond and it's a lovely seafoam shade - really pretty but not too pale for outside use. The patterned charms were part of a charm pack swap back in May on the ORB Flickr group. The Pork Chop reference is what Sooz hoped her Mother had tied round her neck so that people would play along in her swap!! She musta had a whole Lady Gaga dress it was so popular!

The backing is from Jennifer Paganelli's "Bellbottoms" range and is a sort of check (there's a better photo below). Of course, the whole quilt turned out bigger than I expected so my 3m wasn't enough so I had to piece it. Doh!

Binding is a brilliant Kona Colourworks stripe and, again, I didn't have enough! So a tiny bit of the leftovers from the Lucky Birds quilt made up the difference.

And since I also plan to use it in the park and at the beach? I remembered rock pockets!! No more weighting corners with trainers and flasks and handbags. Go me!

the deets:

The patterm is some kinda 9 patch affair I saw on Flickr.

The fabrics are lotsa charms from all my ORB buddies, Kona Pond, backing is Jennifer Paganelli Bellbottoms.

Finished size is 67in square.

Onwards to the Old Red Barn quilt group round 9! More on that tomorrow!

is this cheating?

I picked this up in the New Look sale yesterday for £3!! Really, how could anyone resist - I can barely buy a fat quarter for that!

But now I need to not fib when people ask "is that one of yours?" when they know I sew. And it would be SO easy to let them think I really am that clever! Oh morals and honesty. *shakes fist* You pesky values! Maybe they won't ask and just assume I'm that good? *grins*

(note; I originally had the Planet of the Apes final words in there at the end but I read like a loony - it is only a bag!)

mid(ish) week mundanities

Must take another photo for these!

My general mood? Is fairly chipper! I've been cooking tea all this week and *gasp* actually enjoying it! Spouse has been doing split night shift things and it's been a treat knowing exactly when he'll be home!

What am I wearing? favourite boyfriend jeans and my new "this is my zombie killing t-shirt" t-shirt. *g*

What have I been watching? new series of Glee and not much else.

What am I reading? Sherrilyn Kenyon's "Dark Hunter" series again and "Percy Jackson & the Lightning Thief" out loud to Chook.

What have I been listening to? my last 3 iPod downloads? "Do it like a dude" by Jessie J, "Limit to your love" by James Blake, "animal" by Neon Trees. Eclectic as ever!

What have I been creating? I'm three quarters of the way through quilting the pork chop picnic quilt, yay!

Saying goodbye to 2010

I love these mosaics of quilts made in a year! I wasn't as prolific as 2009, I think, but I DID make 2 proper bed sized quilts. And as the piecing level increases they are definitely taking longer to pull together.

1. jelly-filled holly-blossom, 2. counterfeit change, 3. not pushing up daisies yet!, 4. ORBC lucky charms, 5. asterisk quilt, 6. the Godzilla shoo-fly quilt, 7. world cup watchers - DQS9, 8. Jamie-Lee quilt - round 4 ORB quilt group, 9. love hexagons quilt, 10. Freddie's pinwheels., 11. quilt hanger - a la P.S. I Quilt., 12. dqs8 - Gnorman the Gnome's house.

I made my very last Scraptastic Virtual Bee blocks, too. Wonky stars for Susan - they really are the best fun to make.

They're actually late December blocks. I'm a bit annoyed with myself because I *always* had my blocks posted before the designated month ended (well - except that one month where I posted on the 1st but that was a weekend no-post-on-a-Sunday thing) and here I've fallen at the last hurdle. Never mind, eh? And this means I have NO commitments now! Quite a nice feeling, actually, and I think I've decided to not try for entry into the 10th Doll Quilt Swap. I've done the last 2 and they are a riot but I think I need some no pressure sewing for a while. I can see me in about 6 weeks joining random swaps just because!

paint jobs and picnics.

Stinky Eric came home today!! He's been at the paintshop since September being made all shiny and lovely. Here he is before he went. Pretty Stinky I think you'll agree (although if you click the Stinky Eric tab? You'll see some REAL rot!)

And here he is today! Yes, we've had more snow *yawn* We're all so over it!

He's a very pretty old Ford colour (Silver Fox) that Spouse also had Harry Snotter the Anglia painted.

And I finally got round to basting my pork chop picnic quilt! I HATEHATEHATE basting. 

I was part of a Flickr swap for charm packs last summer (the second Pork Chop swap - long story!) and wanted to make a picnic quilt to keep at the back door so Chook can drag it outside when she needs and doesn't use one of my pretty white quilts! That very pretty seafoam green is Kona Pond (like Amy Pond, the Doctor's assistant!) and I'm hoping to quilt some of it tomorrow. It was hard not using white or a really pale solid!

prams, big girls and lost treasures found.

We've been having a clear out of the loft which has necessitated wearing some big girl pants and *gasp* clearing out the Chookie's baby stuff. You know, the stuff you keep incase you have another kid. Which, to be fair, we did plan on when it all went up there! The pushchair went to a charity shop today, the cot is to follow tomorrow but my Mum wanted the pram. Just in case. *g* I'd forgotten what a pretty pram it was. And, of course, Chook wheeled it round to Mum's house. Which was a bit weird considering the last time it saw the light of day she was IN it.

 I've spent a good hour looking through old discs for about the only photo I have of her IN the damn thing and I can't find it. This is the wee Pooh-eared lamb in the pushchair section when she's about 4 months old.

 I have no idea where that other photo is (she's looking very cute with a polar bear Depute-Dawg hat on!) but I did find this!!

This is my Mum and Chook when she's *counts on fingers* about 5 hours old. Her first visitor. Now, when Chook was a month old, the spouse - in his infinite wisdom - decided he wanted the computer to run faster for his gaming and he and a friend installed some new bits into our computer. And accidentally wiped the whole thing. Including all the first months baby photos. *facepalm* Which is why I am now such a dedicated photo saver - in multiple formats! Anyways, most of the important pics had been e-mailed to various people who sympathetically mailed them back to us. All except this one and the very first photo of Chook on her own in her hospital crib goldfish bowl. They had both been home printed but we had no original electronic copies. I had already given Mum this one and scanned it back into my computer. Where it promptly got lost. And I just found it!!! It is terrible quality (remember it's a scan of a sketchily printed 1MP camera shot!) but I have found it, nonetheless. Mum's copy has faded almost to nothing so I'm a very happy girl tonight. Happy days.

P.S. Back up those photos, dearhearts!!

Happy New Year!

A very happy new year to you all! Only 5 days late. Oops. In my defence, I've been in bed since Sunday with the flu (bleurgh) or at least a virus with flu-like symptoms. But I'm on the mend now, full of snot and bogies and have rediscovered my appetite. Yay!

So, before I forget I thought I'd record this year's handmade Christmas gifts. Not many at all (couldn't be bothered) but some variety at least.

Firstly, junk jars for my 2 good friends Sue and Biff and my Aunt and Uncle. With personalised fimo pin toppers.

(Biff has a ginger tom cat and bakes)

(Sue has a daft spaniel and loves daffodills)

My Mum was the recipient of a wee heart I sat and handstitched one evening. It was most enjoyable to make. I made her a massive mug rug, too, from Cath Kidston fabrics but I forgot to take a picture. Doh!

And speaking of mug rugs, my brother and his wife were also gifted one each with a matching mug. Their living room is grey/white/red so I tried to keep to that theme (not easy when I'd picked him a blue mug!!)

Aunty Vixen's mug is a blackboard one that you can write messages on!

And Funky Gee is known as the coolest member of our family. 'Nuff said!

I was valiantly trying to finish (start!!) a final quilt of 2010 but the flu (Chook had it from last Friday!) put paid to that. It's ready for basting and is finally using my Pork Chop charms (I can't be bothered looking for that swap post *blows nose*) and is MUCH bigger than anticipated. I only just had enough batting! So photos when I get round to stickin' it to the floor. Hope you're all hale and hearty and not snotty!