My little helper

I have the best little quilting apprentice in the world. I call him my inspector and he will quickly tell me if I am doing anything wrong...

He watches my machine quilting...

He shows me how to lay the quilt flat on the floor properly...

and he checks that i'm basting it correctly...

How did I ever get by without my little helper??

Back to normality with a bump

Hubby and I decided to have a last minute break to Turkey to enjoy the sunshine and have a good relax. It was wonderful and I could not recommend it enough to anyone. The people there are lovely and the hotel we stayed at was so luxurious. Neither of us tend to do beach holidays, but this time we loved every second of it and a week was no where near long enough.

Max was very glad to see us when we got home, but I think a week of playing with his buddy Megan tired him out. We didn't hear a peep from him in the back of the car on the way back from the hotel and he stayed like this for the morning (close enough to my suitcase to make sure we weren't going away again without him)

On the day we got home, I asked hubby if we could go to our local department store and have a look at sewing machines as mine was really not doing everything I wanted and I would like a new one for Christmas. I had been eyeing up the Singer 160 Anniversary machine which is only on sale in the UK in John Lewis but I took one look at it and realised it was wrong for me. It is a beautiful machine, but too big and not enough features that I would want to use. The lovely sales assistant spent a long time chatting through options and I decided that I still wanted a Janome. She did me a special deal and 20 minutes later it was strapped to the back of my bike heading home before hubby could change his mind...

It does make my old Janome look tiny, but already it is performing wonderfully. I love how it sews and as I have stuck with Janome nothing feels too different. I will have to play with it a lot before I feel very confident on it, but already I love it.

Now all it needs is a name...

The best day of the year

Last Thursday I went to the Festival of Quilts at the NEC in Birmingham. I woke up more excited than I do on Christmas Day!!! It was a fantastic day and the exhibitors had some beautiful items. As usual my shopping bag was way too full. I think I have managed to stock up for another year (well maybe for part of another year =) )

Photos of the quilt show to come later ...

What a wonderful start to the weekend

I found out this morning that I have won Rosalie Quinlan's giveaway of her Scandinavian Rose pattern!



I LOVE Rosalie's patterns and have done 3 of her stitcheries in the last 6 months so this makes me a very happy girl.


Max and I are having a quilting weekend while hubby is away being active in the countryside =)

I think I will have a big grin for the rest of the day =)

Have a lovely weekend everyone

Still here and busy =)

Needless to say with a 4 month old puppy our house is chaos at the moment. We can barely turn our backs without Max getting into mischief, but he is so adorable that it is impossible to be cross for long. He is a diva when the camera comes out and I only normally manage to get a flash of his black and white fur. This is one of the few photos where he was lying still- I think a spider caught his attention and distracted him.

We have decided to update our computer system in our house, as we now spend all our time downstairs (Max is strictly a downstairs dog) so we are in the midst of changing round and setting up =(. I hate changing systems so it will be interesting to see how we get on.

The sewing machine has been surprisingly busy though, with three quilt tops and a couple of stitcheries finished. These are the photos from my phone-more to follow when I can connect up my camera to the computer properly.

I made this quilt for a friends baby and loved it so much I decided I needed one for myself. This is my one half sewn. It is now waiting for basting and quilting.

For last month's sew-in Sunday on Connected Threadz I dived into my stash and pulled out a pile of Christmas fabrics. These have been in there since I first started quilting and I have held out cutting into them, but I bit the bullet and cut away. I'm really pleased with this and can't wait until we can get it out at Christmas. (apologies for the rubbish photo)

I am also attempting to make quilts for my family's Christmas presents this year (it seemed like such a good idea in January) so those are now going to be my focus projects. I have decided that I don't work well flitting between all of my fabric stash, so I must finish a project before I start on the next. It is working and I am managing to clear my stash out successfully. Let's see if I can be as strong when i'm at the Festival of Quilts next month.

A wonderful start to the weekend =)

I went home at lunchtime to give our monster his lunch and a run-a-round in the garden and a wonderful package was waiting on my doorstep.
Last week I had ordered some patterns from Patchwork Orange in Australia and it arrived today-YAY!

I love these patterns as they are sooo girly, and I though my niece might like the fairy on a swing stitchery.

These will go into my suitcase for our holiday to Cornwall. Our poor car won't know what has happened with the weight of all of my sewing equipment as I am also going to a day's quilting course while away with my mother-in-law and sister-in-law. I can't wait as it is my first ever course.

The weather is gorgeous here, so I will make sure to enjoy every second out in the garden.

Tomorrow we have puppy class number 2 (hopefully not as disasterous as class number 1) which will be much nicer in the sunshine.

Enjoy your weekends everyone =)

Making a house a home

As we have now lived in our little house for over a year it was really overdue for me to start making some pretties for my walls. It is nice having the quilts about, but I wanted something to brighten up our cream (and very plain) walls in our living room.
I fell in love with this kit from Euro Japan Links at the Knitting and Stitching Show last year and it has been in my pile of things to do for ages because I was really scared of the applique.

Hubby went out for a day and I set to work on this. Although it did take a long while, I loved every minute of working on it and am quite tempted to buy another to make for my parents.

In last month's issue of cross stitcher I saw this cross stitch and knew I had to make it. It hangs above our coat hooks and is the first thing you see when you come in our front door. I love it and was so happy with it.

In very old news, I completed this little stitchery which I had started 2 years ago. All it needed was a few french knots and framing. It sits in a little nook in our spare bedroom, which can only been seen from the bed.

We have family coming to stay this weekend and hopefully we will get to take Max out on his first walk. Fingers crossed the sun stays out and some of the mud in our swamp of a garden can dry out =)

Enjoy!!