More squishie post and another secret...

Another nice day for post today, and since I can't talk much about what I did today, quilting wise (I quilted the piece for my Twisted Mystery 2 - but I can't show photos or say anything that will give the game away) I thought I'd show you the goodies.

A quick word on the quilting - you guys are never gonna believe this, but I managed to sew through my finger AGAIN! I've never done this before and then twice in a month, honestly. This time it was a different finger, and I did it on the longarm while trying to baste the batting down across the top of the piece (see, the batting was all puffy and I was trying to keep it poked down under the needle while basting and...you can see where this is going, right?) Lana was there, with a customer dropping off quilts - both were seriously impressed that I managed to restrain myself from further comment than an extremely loud "OW!" and a note to Lana to buy more plasters (we use them a lot - not so much for needle incidents, but there are some really sharp pins used to attach the backing to the canvas on the rollers (we call them The Pins of Death for a good reason) and you don't want to risk bleeding on a customer quilt - or your own, for that matter).

Where was I? Oh yeah, quilting. Well, without giving anything away, on this quilt I did some stitch in the ditch around some sections in the centre, then did parallel lines either horizontally or vertically across the elements I ditched around. The background I filled in with a rectangular meander. I think it came out fairly well, though I had some trouble with the lines in places - mostly due to hand-dyed or batik type fabrics, I think - and the back tension isn't quite what I would like, ideally, but it's not too bad, and frankly, they aren't going to hang the back up facing out anyway. So I am not going to obsess. Now I just have a billion and seven ends to bury, and I'm sorted. Oh, and I have to bind it. But no rush, it's not due until mid-March.

Right, back to the goodies. First thing is the batiks above - I ordered them from Teresa a little while back, and here they are. And they are lovely. As are most batiks... So next thing I'll probably do, whenever I get a chance to sew (busy weekend with Alex's birthday party on Saturday and another one to attend on Sunday) is finish the batik framed four patches. Or at least work on them some more. I do have to wash the fabrics first, but that won't take long. Now if only the shipment I ordered from Big Horn Quilts would arrive (not their fault - they mailed it on the 13th of January - I'm hoping it got stopped in customs and I will shortly be required to go pay duty on it as that's far preferable to it going completely missing).

The other thing I got was some fabric postcards - I actually received three, but one was the Valentine's one I sent myself so I didn't put up a picture of that as they've been blogged before (I always send a copy of my cards when I do a group of them to myself - partly this is so I have a proper record of what I make, but it's also to see how things travel through the post - it doesn't cost much, and I like having a franked one...).


These two are from Margaret (bottom) and Judi - and are both really lovely. The yarn Judi has used around the edges is great and survived really well in the post. She obviously has a lot of nice stitches on her machine, as all the circles are made from different decorative stitches.


Margaret's card has a meander in gold metallatic thread and some little beads on it and looks much more dynamic (though in a soft and subtle way) in person than in this photo. But both are great additions to the theme of January cheer and certainly help me keep cheery...