A quick mention...

Elizabeth is giving away a fab padded heart over on her blog - as much as I'd like to encourage you all to stay away and NOT sign up to her giveaway so I have a greater chance of winning, I can't really do that, so do be sure to go check it out!

Cross stitch Monday

No sign of the birds this week (actually, it's a fortnight's worth of update as I didn't post my cross-stitch last week - I had actual sewing to show because of the snow days) as I have been finishing up this heart - decided I'd like to have it finished before Valentine's Day so I could enjoy it seasonally. And yes, I'm putting off going back to the birds. But next cross-stitch back out of the box will be the birds. Of course, I have several things that want binding (though it's not attached yet, so it may be a little while) and the winter blue & white mini quilt wants loads of beads, so that may be the bulk of the hand-work this week.

I did actually pop into my local haberdashery shop today, but as what I bought was 3 metres of bondaweb (I should really buy it by the box - I go through that stuff like my kids go through cereal) and two spools of orange thread (which means I can send my Ostrich off to Anne later this week - woo hoo), I thought I'd spare you the photo.

Bento Boxes

There has been quite a bit of discussion on one of my yahoo groups (BQL - British Quilting List) - about Bento Box quilt blocks (aka quarter log cabin), and being me, I have been itching to make some. But I don't really need more blocks or more unfinished projects, so I was resisting. Today, however, it occurred to me that I need to have several 12" blocks to send to Margaret along with my centre for the Spring Fling Round Robin 3 (in lieu of postage payment), so I could satisfy my urge to piece without actually creating more blocks for myself. Almost. I grabbed my shoebox full of 2.5" strips and went to work - I created 12 (four shown above left), 12" blocks suitable for use in boy quilts for Project Linus (this is what Margaret will be using her blocks for) and have also started on some girl ones - admittedly, I only needed to produce two 12" blocks, but I know she'll be happy of extras - and she does a lot of work hostessing this swap and others, so I thought a little extra wouldn't go amiss.


I also made four (or rather, they will be four once the quarters are joined) for myself from some strips I forgot I had - they came in with my Christmas Booty Quilt from Toni as part of the packaging and though I love these retro prints, there weren't really enough to do much with - in fact, I have added 4 strips of an Amy Butler fabric which is not the same range, but just about matches enough to work. This piece, I will keep for myself, I think - unless an occasion comes up which demands it, of course.


While doing all this (and several loads of laundry, which seems to be my main function in life most of the time!) I also managed to pin baste the brown pineapple quilt - hoorah! - the last of my Janaury goals can be struck off the list - not bad, considering I didn't make the trip out to get the batting until the 31st of January. Of course, my mother arrives Wednesday and then it's half-term the week after, so my free time for sewing in February is going to rapidly diminish. Might be able to squeeze one or two things in, but frankly, it's a good thing I got a lot of them done in early February.

A few bits

Not much to show today as I was at school this morning helping in the library and then at work this afternoon, so no sewing today (still, can't complain - it's been a very productive working week). But these bits of loveliness arrived the post yesterday - a padded heart from Annette for the Textile Challenges swap and two ATCs back from the swap with Cyber Fyber - these came from Kaite (who is in the Exquisite Corpse with me) and Paula. And now, to bed!

A little spare time

Not much, as I was busy baking a cake this morning, but while it was in the oven, I did manage to get these two quilted - they are only 12" square, so it didn't take long. Both are done with hearts with the background filled in around the hearts - on the red one (left) I did the hearts and the fill both as I went along; on the right hand one, I did columns of hearts on a string first, then went back and filled. I think both methods work ok, frankly. Not sure why hearts - I guess because it's February and everything seems Valentine-y at the moment.





And here is the triptych piece - it wasn't done today, but I did finish stitching the binding and sleeves last night, so it's ready to show properly. I hope the new owner (can't think who my swap partner is - will have to look it up again) likes them.

Back to school...

Finished up the dresser runner today in another unexpected bit of time at home - mostly on Wednesday mornings I've been going swimming with some friends, but we didn't go today for various reasons, so I snatched a little more sewing time before heading to work (school back today, which means work today for me, though I spent most of it outside in the snow, first at lunchtime with big kids and then in the nursery with little kids. Fun was had by all.) So I finished this first - only took about half an hour as it was in rows already. It's not that big - the squares are only 4", so the overall size is about 20"x60" or so. It will cover the full depth of the dresser, but will hang over the sides at each end.

And then, as I still had an hour or so, I pulled out this baby quilt which I'd handily pinned earlier, and did a quick allover double loop meander on it. Not very inspired, but it works. And the quilt blocks are great for a baby quilt - an instance of a set of swap blocks that really works. Even the one block with a rather light navy blue doesn't look too out of place...

Snow Day, Mark 2

Another snow day today - back to normal tomorrow, though. But in the meantime, I spent a good part of the day sewing (though we did go out to collect a friend of Sarah's and get some donuts from Krispy Kreme - these two things are often connected, as Jess lives just up the road from the Krispy Kreme shop) and the kids mucked about outside playing snow games, having snowball fights and so on. But by the end of the day, they were getting a bit fractious, so it's good they'll be back to school tomorrow.

Today I worked on two different projects, both involving Japanese taupe type fabrics - both authentic taupes and some fabrics which aren't really, but look it, which is good enough for me. On the left is my dresser runner, whichI have been in the process of making for a long time, but which had kind of stalled. Today I finished the last dozen or so blocks and started putting them together - here, they are in twos and threes, so it's getting there. Might get it finished tomorrow morning.

On the right is the February challenge for BQL - sort of. I used the same sort of string pieced triangle blocks but have made mine smaller and put them together in a different kind of configuration. And yes, there are two, I know. Originally, I had planned to put them together differently and make a larger hanging, but as I was playing around with them, I decided I liked this arrangement better. Even if it did mean two. One I shall keep for myself, the other will be made up as a present for someone, so it won't go to waste. Not that they are quilted yet, of course, but at 12" square, that shouldn't take long.

Snow Day = Sew Day

As those of you who live in the UK will be aware, we had some serious snow (for London) today and school was therefore closed. This was thrilling to the kids (and fun for the grownups, too) and it also meant that although I did have a brief (but at an hour and half, not quite brief enough - brr) trip to the park this morning, I got to spend most of the day at home, indoors. I didn't even have to deal with three children demanding things, as after we were at the park, my girls went to a neighbour's house - their friend Dasha, who is in the same year of school as Sarah, but at a different (private) school. The three of them had a great time, building a snow fort in the back garden (a suggestion from Dasha's mother, who used to do it as a kid - in Russia, so there was admittedly a bit more snow!) , watching movies, and various other things. Tania fed them both lunch and supper, so I had a lovely quiet afternoon with Alex - who played on the computer for much of the time as there was no competition... Needless to say, I sewed.

I did some work this morning - quilted the winter mini quilt. There was a suggestion that I use silver thread, and I'm sure that would look great, but I almost always have trouble with metallics when doing FMQ, plus I wanted to quilt it TODAY and didn't have any silver - and with the weather, well, it just wasn't going to happen. I have quilted it in white, with lots of swirls, both top and bottom, and it works fine. I am going to finish binding it (it looks a bit wonky above - that's because the binding isn't yet sewn down on the back - I just pinned it back to show the piece better - that, plus it's laid out artfully in the snow on my patio, so it's not sitting flat), then I think add a load of beads in blue and white (and perhaps silver, if I have any).

This afternoon, I quilted the triptych panels - it may be hard to tell from the photo but I quilted them very close side by side, and the quilting pattern overlaps from the edge of the side panels into the edge of the centre. The quilting design in the side panels is the same as the centre, but with a different orientation - i.e. sideways rather than up and down. Once again, the binding is only pinned back, rather than sewed down.

If you are interested in our weather, there are lots of photos over on my family blog and flickr album...

Oh, and although it's not stopped snowing, school is also closed tomorrow, so I have more time to look forward to - not bad considering I normally get nothing done on Monday at all, and not a lot more than that on a Tuesday.

Pyjama Day

Geoff went off early this morning to Spain (for work) so the kids and I decided to have a do-nothing day - or rather, they did nothing (meaning watching telly & playing on the computer - though Olivia & Sarah did get bored at one point and decided to make a Roman chariot out of a shoebox) and I did lots.


This afternoon, I did the above piece, which is for the Four Seasons Quilt Swap 5: Monochrome. You can probably guess that the person I am sending to specified blue and winter... We are allowed to add white and/or black to the one colour; I have obviously gone for white. I will trim the piece square after I quilt it - no point doing it before that. I think I will quilt it in white, but not quite sure just how, yet.





This morning, I did two sets of postcards - one for the "Z is for" swap - I chose zig zags and decided to make the piece as a single unit and then divide it into four - here it is (above) both as a single piece and then as four. This is the last of the alphabet swaps I will be doing - I joined when they were on G, and although I was very tempted to go back and catch up with the beginning of the alphabet when it cycles around again (and had originally intended to) I have now decided not to, as I am moving away from swapping quite so many cards and only joining in swaps which particularly interest me.


These other four cards at left fall into the latter category - I have never done a shaker card before, so when I saw the swap come up I decided I'd give it a try - and as I have a small collection of Valentine's themed cards, which I have displayed in my postcard holder at the moment, a few more will make a nice addition...

Saturday stuff

Had a trip to one of my LQS this morning (see below for booty) - and also to pick up a few more presents for my birthday boy (6 on Thursday - tough to believe) and this afternoon I spent some time sewing, thank goodness. Finished piecing the top for the Triptych piece for the Flickr group - I think I will quilt all three sections at the same time, so that the quilting is continuous, but I will then cut them apart and bind them separately. The central panel is 12" square, the other two are 8x12. Simple, but it works.


I also did this little ATC to start the February challenge on Textile Challenges - we were to grab an ATC base, and the first five ingredients we saw and make an ATC. I grabbed a piece of purple fabric, a dryer sheet & Markal paint stick (I counted that as one, as the paintsticks and dryer sheets were sitting together waiting for me to colour some), the orange flower, some flower brads (used the purple one) and a skein of thick purple thread. The back is orange and purple as well, but that didn't have to count as one of the five things. We weren't supposed to take more than 15 minutes (i.e. it's an exercise in not over-thinking things), though I admit to taking closer to 20 - for one thing, the hand-stitching took a while as the thread was very thick and hard to pull through the base. Also, I had to iron the dryer sheet dry (between paper) one I'd paint-sticked it.


And the main work today, I can't show, as it's my Exquisite Corpse - pretty much finished my head, though I have yet to attach the words to the section - need to double check how many as well as have a think about which ones (we are supposed to put some words on each section so it forms a sentence at the end. It's something like - hang on, I'll check - ok, it's "The adjective/ noun adverb/ verb the /adjective /noun") - so I will need to put "The [adjective]" in my square somewhere. Which is good, as I know what adjective. Whew.

These postcards arrived yesterday - they are the results of the painted bondaweb swap - four very different cards, but all nice. They are mine (upper left), Wil's (UR), Tracy's (LL) and Celia's (LR).

I also received my monthly fabric fix - purple theme this month, which is handy, as I happened to notice the other day I had very little purple.

And then there's the booty from the LQS - the batting for the pineapple quilt - which I still can't baste because having basted two baby quilts the other day, I don't have enough safety pins until at least one of them is quilted. But at least I have the batting now. I also picked up the orange fabric to send to Anne for the celtic knotwork on the Ostrich, though I forgot the thread - however, I should be able to get something at my local haberdashery department. I also got a metre of mustard yellow polka-dot fabric, which fulfills two different needs (plus it was in the sale section), a green fat quarter for my FQ swap partner and a replacement 8.5" square ruler as mine has a broken corner - it broke some time ago, and I superglued it back together. It's now broken again and frankly, doesn't seem to want to hold with superglue any more, so I decided I should just buy a new one. It's my favourite size, so it gets a lot of use. Also picked up two patterns in the sale bin (50p each) - one for pincushions and other bits shaped like buttons, the other for penguin Christmas ornaments. Successful shopping, despite the thread!

Words fail me...

So, here's the ultimate in "look what I got today" type posts - these three amazing pieces are my "mini quilt" home from the Cyber Fyber exhibition. In round 2 of the ALQS, Lynda drew my name as partner (yes, that's one of the perks of being the hostess - picking who will make you a quilt) and was originally supposed to make me a nice little art quilt, somewhere in the 20" square region. She contacted me shortly after we started ALQS2 to ask if I'd like to have the quilt she was planning to make for Susan Lenz's Cyber Fyber exhbition - of course, I said yes - it's lovely to own a quilt which has been exhibited. At that point, it was still planned to be a small piece, in the 20" square region. However. As happens with art, the piece(s) had a mind of its own and grew - grew to be three pieces, each of them 24x30". Other than the concern for where in my house (which, unfortunately for me is not a country mansion with its own long gallery or anything like that!) I would hang them, I didn't mind at all. And seeing them in person, well, let's just say, finding space was certainly a non-issue - it would be done! As it happens, I thought they would look rather nice in the newly painted stairwell in my hallway, and I was right. They could do with a little more light (though it's not nearly as dark as it appears in the photos below), but on the whole, they look really good there, and you can see the texture to good effect, as you can get very close. [If you are interested in the technique, Lynda explains a bit about it here - where she talks about a practice piece made in a similar way.]

I took the pieces outside (reasonable light today) to photograph, so here they are together on my patio - in the right order. And some detail shots below - the left photo from the bottom middle of the lefthand piece, the right photo from the top right-hand corner of the far right piece.

And finally, here are some photos of them in the stairwell - lesson learned today - it's bloody hard to photograph a stairwell (actually, I already knew this, as I had tried to photograph the carpet before to show my mother, and failed miserably). As I said above, the light is not as bad as it seems in this photo, though it's not perfect.

So. What a nice end to the ALQS2 swap for me (as some of you know, it has been a bit fraught in places) and what a lovely addition to my decor.

Thank you so much, Lynda - I really, really love them.

Been tagged

A lot of times, I don't bother to respond to being tagged, but as I have nothing much to show today (a little more work was done on the Triptych piece, but it's still really not very interesting and anyway, it's upstairs and I'm too lazy to go photograph it) I thought I'd go ahead. It also helps that this is an easy tag which doesn't require me to list 7 things or 8 things or 16 things or anything else requiring thought. The challenge here is to upload the 6th photo in the 6th folder in your picture folder. For me, the 6th folder was the one called "screensaver", which as you can probably guess, is where the pics are that make up the slideshow on my screensaver. We're supposed to share the story behind the photo - I'm gonna go out on a limb and assume most of you can work it out yourselves, at least approximately. This is Hallowe'en 2006, we were in the US visiting, and my kids were about to acquire more sweets than they'd ever seen in the history of ever. It was a gorgeous, warm, lovely evening, and because Hallowe'en is so much bigger in the US than in the UK, I let them do quite a few houses, so there was a LOT of stuff gathered up. We took it back to the UK with us, and I think there was still some left at Christmas. Or close!

I'm not going to tag anyone, but if you want to play along, go for it. And thanks to Lisa for the tag - it was fun.

Ostrich News

Been meaning to share this for a few days but keep forgetting to do it when I'm blogging - but I have a delightful piece of wonderfulness to share, so I thought I should probably share it. When I showed this originally, I commented that I thought perhaps it wanted something in the big blank spaces - like a load of orange celtic knotwork or something - well, Anne agreed with me about that, and in fact, offered - nay, virtually begged - to do the knotwork herself. Now, I may be many things, and not all of them complimentary, but I like to think that a Huge Crazy Fool is NOT one of them, so of course I said yes please!

There are any number of people I would be delighted to have work on one of my quilts (so if you want to make an offer, please don't hold back, LOL) but to have Anne's applique on one is right at the top of the list - it will definitely be better looking than any celtic knotwork I could do myself. So, when I get a chance to get the required fabric and thread, I will be sending it all her direction for her to work on at her leisure - and it can certainly be a leisurely project as this top has been sitting around for quite a while already.

It will be great to have this top really finished and ready for quilting - and doubly great to have that knotwork there, as it's something I've been thinking it might need for quite a while - and triply great to have Anne do it, not just because of the quality of her work, but because she and I have been virtual friends for a while now, so owning a piece she's worked on as well will make me feel all warm and happy. Of course, not having met her in person, I suppose it's possible she's an axe murderer* but would an axe murderer really go to all the trouble to design & stitch umpteen million miles of celtic knotwork for someone else? Seems unlikely...

Which brings me to something I've said before and will no doubt say again - aren't bloggers lovely people?

* (some of you will perhaps recognise this reference to a meeting between Hedgehog and Anne, last year, shortly before I met up with Hedgehog in London)

Mt Fuji

Having remembered to buy the dark brown thread amidst my mad pawing through the sale bin yesterday, I was able to finish the Japanese Block of the Month block today. Woo hoo. Maybe I will take an evening next week to trace out the shapes for the next block. I'd really like to get this done and there are only 4 more blocks to go.

I also started working on something for a Triptych themed piece for the 6-12" mini-quilt swap on Flickr - it's three pieces (obviously) which go together in some fashion, due at the end of February. But it's mostly squares and triangles at the moment and not very interesting, so I haven't photographed it. Maybe later this week (though I don't foresee much sewing time until Saturday, as I am going swimming with friends tomorrow morning and to my little quilt group (for the first time in months) on Thursday. And having coffe with friends on Friday. Such is the life!

Back to the birds...

Gots lots of fun stuff to show today - at the top, a gift from Myra, a bit of a surprise. I sent her a cross stitch pattern and maybe something else, can't remember, and she sent this - a cross stitch pattern (which I knew she was sending) and the other bits, which were unexpected - a great project pouch with a zip - handy for holding stuff when taking it places (like a cross-stitch being worked on!), some brads, rings, thread & motifs - all highly useful.

Also received my goodies from I'm a Ginger Monkey's Fat Quarter Swap - my partner is Silvana, and I haven't yet sent her package off (mailing date is 14 Feb, so I'm not really being a slacker, even though I feel slightly guilty for receiving before I send) - but look at the lovely stuff she's sent me - the required 2 FQs of the swap, and then a load of lovely bits - buttons, etc - some floss, all wrapped in a paper napkin which will go straight in the interesting paper drawer and tied with a bit of ribbon. And a nice card, too. Thanks again, Silvana!

And as if that weren't enough, I treated myself to a rummage through the sale bins in my local haberdashery department (which also carries quite a bit of general crafting stuff these days) - I came away with ribbon, brads, paper, an interesting large punch and even remembered to get the two colours of floss I wanted and the dark brown thread so I can work on the Japanese applique tomorrow.

And finally, as it's Monday, an update on cross-stitch progress. I did dig the birds back out and have done two new boxes - well, one and a half, really. I'm not feeling very inspired by the birds at the moment, but as I'd like to finish it, I decided that if I finish a box, I can spend the next few nights working on something different - I want to get at least one box done each week, sometimes two. There aren't that many left to do, so it would be a shame not to finish it.

But I'm also working on something I have a greater desire to do, in parallel, to help keep me from getting too frustrated with the birds. At the moment, it's this little heart pattern, which has only four colours in it - I've started with one of the two colours I had in my floss box - the other two being among today's purchases. When I finish the current bird box, I'll work a little more on this. I'd quite like to finish it before the 14th, as it's somewhat seasonal!

Some finishing up...

First off, this thrilling photo of my Exquisite Corpse project. Now, before Arlee panics, I will warn you that this is the ONLY photo you will see of my work on this project - either my piece or other people's pieces - until the entire thing is finished - not even sneak peeks from now on. What is an Exquisite Corpse, I hear you ask? Well, you can check out the blog here, to see the previous rounds which have been done, but in a nutshell, it's like a round robin, except you don't see what the previous person has done. The first person does the head & shoulders, the next the upper torso, etc. Once I do my head, I will cover all but a half inch of my work and the next person will take it from there, do her (or his) section and then cover all but their bottom half inch. We are working in 7 inch squares, and there are 5 people in a group. This round, we are all doing body or body type images, whereas in previous rounds, there has been more variety. I think this will be a really interesting textile/fibre project and I'm pleased to be taking part, even if it means I can't blog it!



So, following on from yesterday, here's what I did today - half a Japanese block of the month - there is a good deal more buildings, etc to fill in at the bottom, but I have absolutely no dark brown thread, not even a dark medium, so I need to pick some up tomorrow before proceeding. Luckily, most of the houses, etc have nice straight lines, so the applique should go quickly once I have the right thread. So then I decided to quickly finish off one of the almost finished projects from my unfinished section - I added a border to this little flying geese quilt, which will now go on the pile of finished tops waiting to be quilted.

I have added a "List of Shame" (tongue in cheek) to my sidebar to help me monitor my progress in moving those things from section to section and off the list entirely - we'll see how that goes!

So, now what?

Now that I've named and shamed all my outstanding projects, what's next, you may ask. Well, I'm not going to set out to finish all of them - or even most of them - this year or anything unrealistic like that. But what I would like to do is this:

• Finish several of the larger quilts. The brown pineapple is the first larger piece on the list; then maybe the two single bed sized ones for the girls.
• Finish 4 or 5 baby quilts. Two I have pinned up already, so that's a good start. I'll need at least two this year anyway - and that's just the babies I know about already.
• Finish the little flying geese quilt, the multicoloured string quilt and the two quilts for the girls - even if they don't get quilted - to completed top stage. It's silly to have them so close without being done!
• Move as many groups of blocks as possible to the finished top stage - this might not be possible with all the birthday blocks and the Japanese lanterns, but there are at least 5 or 6 sets of blocks which will go together into baby quilts or small lap quilts with a minimum of effort - then at least they aren't hanging around as block sets.
• Not add more sets of blocks which don't get completed - except for the new birthday block swap (which finishes for me in June, so I won't stress if I don't do anything with those blocks for a while - besides, they may be hard to find something to do with, straight away) - this doesn't mean I won't make more block sets, which I might - or I might win on the block lotto again - but I plan to do something with them relatively quickly - like within a few months of getting them - at least moving them to the finished top stage.
• Finish at least two more of the Japanese block of the month blocks by the end of the year. In fact, I am going to start on the one which is already cut out and ready to applique today - not sure how far I will get as I may have to stop to buy the right colour thread for some of the pieces, but tomorrow I have to go to New Malden anyway, which is where my local haberdashery is, so it's a good time to see if I need anything in the way of thread before that!
• Finish at least one cat per month on the sawtooth cats.
• Don't start any more BIG quilts. This shouldn't be too hard a resolution to keep, as I am tending towards smaller works lately anyway, but I am going to resist the temptation entirely. I won't promise I won't start any new tops at all, but I am going to keep them all under 60" square, so that they at least stand a chance of getting quilted someday. And frankly, I shouldn't think I'll start many even at baby quilt or lap size as I have so many sets of blocks I could use for that size quilt now. Obviously, there will be mini quilts started this year, as I have signed up for several mini swaps already, but the nice thing about mini quilts is that they do get finished.

I think all of these things are realistic goals - many of them involve only NOT doing stuff, which at least I know I'll have the time for. Of course, there will be lots of work done this year (I hope) - a lot of which won't involve these quilt tops or blocks at all - there will be a few sets of postcards (though not so many this year), some ATCs, some miscellaneous swapping of various objects, some mini quilts, my house front swap, the Exquisite Corpse and so on. There will also be blocks made for others (birthday block swap, block lotto, African & Dear Jane swaps). But what I'd like to do is control the chaos and get it down to a point where I know that first of all, I like all the blocks and tops I have hanging around and that second of all, there's a reasonable chance the pieces will someday be finished.

Not giving things away - part 4 (last part!)

OK, we're getting near the end now. This last set of stuff is stuff which is partly done or nearly done or a little bit done or... Some of it is very near completion (by which I mean, a completed top), some much less so.



1. Rainbow Olivia quilt. A nesting robin quilt, again from Scrap Quilting Forum. You can't really see this in the photo, but I started with a row of stars (you can see that better here) and the idea was then to do a row in each colour, using whatever the instruction was for that month - so we have a row of red blocks, then orange is curves and circles, yellow was a piano key border, I think, green was crazy piecing, aqua was nine patches, blue was basket blocks, purple was fans, and pink - well, pink hasn't quite ever happened. Just one more row to go, but, it stalled. It's been stalled for a long time now. Like since summer 2007. Really should do a pink row, shouldn't I! Maybe I'll aim to get it done for her birthday (October).

2. Scottie Dog quilt. The Scottie Dogs were from the block lotto - my first win, in June 2006. This quilt is again, almost done. The problem is, it's too narrow. So I need to put a strip of black down each side. You'd think this would be easy, right? It should be. Heck, I'm going to go off right now and add it to my list of February goals. (Not quilting it, just getting those black strips on). I intended this as a bed quilt for Sarah - perhaps I'll try to aim for her birthday (Sept) or Christmas for this one. It really shouldn't be this stalled!



3. This little quilt made from flying geese (from a swap) is almost a completed top - just needs a border around it with the material used along the side of the geese. Another thing which really has no excuse for not being more finished.

4. String blocks - these are the ones from all the strings I had, which I am keeping for myself. I used some for a quilt for my friend Cathi as a housewarming gift, I sent quite a few to Lisa, but these are mine. There are two more seams needed to make this into a top, then it needs quilting.



5. Japanese block of the month. We won't go into which year this block of the month was supposed to be for (apparently, it ran from May-November of 2005). There were nine blocks, then fabric to join them together - the actual blocks are circular designs - you can sort of tell that here. I love the ones I've done (machine applique) but they are time consuming, and I tend to get sidetracked. Actually, it's not the applique part I find the most time-consuming, but the preparation of the pieces. That said, I do have the pieces for block 5 ready to go - I should start it.



6 & 7. Summer Beach House quiltlet. An idea, started it, haven't got around to working on it more. It's in the back of my mind. Also, a bag of pieces cut to make batik goshen stars with taupe backgrounds. Not sure I will ever get to this. I made some for a block lotto ages ago (Sept 2006), really liked the colourway and so cut some more for myself. But...

8. Sawtooth cats. This quilt is supposed going to be for my mother's spare room. If I ever finish it. There are 20 cats, of which I have done 8, one is partly assembled, and I have another one downstairs waiting for me to do the hand-piecing part of it. I like this quilt, but somehow, I lose interest easily. Probably because I have to think about it.

And finally, these two sets of blocks aren't really unfinished in the same way - both of these are ongoing private swaps which are still in progress. But I thought I should show them.

The African blocks (12") are a swap with Karol-Ann, and we have just switched to six inch blocks (after I took this photo, I found one more 12" block which had escaped) to give some other options. I'm not sure if this is one quilt or two, but at some point it will become at least one!



The Dear Jane blocks are a private swap with Cathi - these are 6" blocks, so although we have done a good handful, we can accomodate quite a few more before stopping.

And that's it. It's enough - more than enough - I know. But I'm sure it's not any more than a number of you out there have lurking around. Go on, confess, how many tops do you have tucked away waiting to be quilted? This isn't really the same as the number of projects I am working on at once, of course - although I usually have a handful of things going on at the same time, that's not usually more than 5 or 6 different things (not all quilts) - most of these projects (especially the block sets and finished tops) just sit there waiting - they aren't actively being worked on!

OK, enough blogging. Maybe tomorrow what I show will involve actual work, rather than lack of work, like today's posts - although I did pin baste two quilts today, which has to count for something!