Yes, you lot out there, I mean YOU.
Thank you all so very much for the wonderful support I have received in the last few days. It makes me feel that there is some point to the blogging that I enjoy so much, that the thoughts I share with you are heard even if you don’t all agree with me, and that for some of you at least, my choices are the right choices too. I am not alone.
Oops-A-Daisy by Keiki for Moda
Now, let’s get on with quilty life. Here is some fabulous fabric recently sent me by my friend Mrs R as a belated birthday gift. It’s bonkers, but beautiful! I’ve never seen a fabric before that seemed to be smiling at me, but this one does. The colours co-ordinate nicely with the colours I have used (in somewhat less intensity…) in my Heirloom Quilt*, which lives on our bed. So this piece of loud and lovely fabric is going to become my sitting-up-in-bed-with-morning-coffee pillow, backed with the same gorgeous lime green shot cotton as I used on my sofa cushions. I plan to quilt it by hand, following the outlines of all the flowers, leaves, birds and butterflies, using some of my Aurifil graduated quilting thread – either the lime green or the orange, I think. The pattern is really large, so it’s not going to be an endless job.
With reluctance, however, I have to put it aside for a while. Worldwide Friends is demanding my attention, it has been sadly neglected recently and I must churn out some more hexies, make flowers and fillers and stitch another big piece together. It has to be finished by early June to be entered into the Mackay Annual Show. No pressure then… Also on the Look At Longingly List is the Swoopy Shirt, which has achieved stasis as a fully cut out pattern, and is sitting folded tidily on the side of my work table. Somewhere between the shirt and the pillow is Claire’s Wedding Quilt, which is trying to emerge into reality from my brain, where it flaps and glitters in fully finished glory.
I admit it. I have a terminal sewing/quilting problem. The joy of making things which are both beautiful and useful is eternal. I hope to die with that joy still lively in my mind, and my hands as active as great age and arthritis allow!
*Have a look at the Chiconian Quilts page.
talltalesfromchiconia 
You are most definitely NOT alone! I fully understand too what you say about all the ideas buzzing around in your head, it’s just about finding more hours in the day and several extra hands and arms to make the ideas into reality 🙂 Love that fabric, what a stunning pillow/cushion that will be for you (one day soon)!
So many projects, so little time…. And you can’t even delegate because the vision is inside YOUR head! That cushion is trying to lure me away from Worldwide Friends. Must… resist… temptation…
What a delicious piece of yardage! May have to look into acquiring some for myself. ;- )
Meanwhile, you’ve hit upon perhaps the biggest fear of my life: not being able to continue doing what I love when I’m older than I am now.
Isn’t it fabulous! She certainly picked a winner. I’m terrified that in old age my already arthritic hands will seize up and I won’t have the fine control to cut, stitch, pin and use my sewing machine. Perhaps my head will explode from the sheer pressure of ideas build-up, and put me out of my misery! 🙂
I’m definitely less skilful than I was ten years ago, but it doesn’t stop me, and I hope it never will – just slows me down a bit, and males me simplify the projects.
But Kate, you seem to be able to take on so many projects at once that I quail for you! One at a time I can cope with, thinking out the next while hand quilting the current……
I like the idea of quilting round the design elements – something in the style of broderie Perse.
I find each project develops a personality and stands clear and individual in my mind, like telling friends apart. WWF is becoming a bit of a tyrant, but that’s totally self-inflicted, because I agreed to submit it to the quilting exhibition at the big show in June. Otherwise, I’d put it aside and do something else for a while, and then go back to it, instead of juggling so much at once.
I’m looking forward to seeing how the cushion quilting is going to make the elements puff out and become 3D, I think it’ll be fun.
ACushla Darling for the bed will fabulous! Do you need any more fabrics for the last run of hexies ….I have unearthed some suitable blues? Now there’s a visual to carry me through my day…… which includes a visit to the famer’s market then tucked up for the rest of the day with sewing machine, needle and thread……your head exploding and spattering all your ideas over the walls 🙂
Morning, my lovely! If you do have any more dark blues, I could use the variety for the bottom strip of the front, thank you.
Just think what an interesting room décor my head splatter would be, all sorts of colours, patterns and colourful drippy bits!
ACushLa Darling is going to be lovely, isn’t it…? Since the fabric smiles at me whenever I look at it, I don’t see how I can avoid waking up happy 🙂
🙂
Gorgeous fabric and colours 🙂 You’re an inspiration… finding so much joy and productive & creative busy-ness in life. Which you then translate via words, camera, keyboard and internet for our gratification.
What’s the point of joy, if you can’t share it? If anything I write encourages someone to pick up a pen, a needle, a brush or a spoon and just try, I think my work here is done!
You can’t carry on with the swoopy shirt until Rosita arrives, anyway. So that’s fine. And please PLEASE do not ever use the A word again. It is my greatest fear (that, and losing my eyesight).
Sadly, the A word is already with me, necessitating the use of strong pain relief. I have it more or less everywhere except, strangely, my elbows. And yes, I’m with you on the eyesight… We’ve had word that Rosita is on the road already, heading in our direction. It makes me think of her arriving like Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, swathed in silver lamé and holding a pose!
or holding a glass of wine at the very least. The a word is with me, too, actually, but I try not to think about it getting worse. Right hip, right knee, and little bit left hand. If it can just hold off for thirty or so years…..
Beautiful and … yes… smiling fabric. Like your idea of handquilting the flower outlines….sitting in bed with a morning coffee sounds great to me – I have to go to work now and Wednesday is always very long (from 8 am to 6 pm).
Wednesday is called ‘hump day’ here, because Monday and Tuesday are all uphill, Wednesday is the hump, or top of the hill, and Thursday and Friday are all downhill to the weekend.
We may sound a little crazy, but we have a perfect morning coffee routine: we have a coffee machine in the bedroom! Every night we take up a tray with cups, spoons, milk in a Thermos, and every morning the Husband makes me a perfect fresh cup of coffee in bed… Am I not a lucky woman?
Great to see you back in the game!
Irrepressible, undefeated, still suffering a bad case of the verbals….
Wow! Coffee in bed in the morning and those gorgeous bright colours to wake up to – no wonder you’re such a whirling dervish with your projects 😉
I have to have somewhere to put all that coffee and sugar twitchiness… I have to say, I always wake up in a good mood these days!
That fabric is absolutely stunning. A pillow will be great as it will show it off and avoid the need to cut the fabulous pattern into tiny pieces.
Exactly! It’s the perfect size for a square European pillow, and by lucky chance I have one especially for the morning coffee scenario.
The fabric is absolutely lovely!!!! The colours make me smile 🙂
Gun
And it’s smiling back at you! It would be a crime to cut it up, so a pillow it shall be.
Oh yes, that fabric is bright and beautful !
A bit like Kate’s Garden, then…!
I don’t know Kate’s garden but if it looks like that well that is a beautiful garden then !
Lots of big leaves and bright colours, butterflies and birds… One day it will be beautiful, for now, it’s a bit of a jungle!
Oh I didn’t know it was your garden you were referring too, I thought you spoke of the garden of the lady you got that bright fabric off. Your garden will be awesome, it only needs a bit of time, plants and tree’s can’t be rushed…..a garden teaches us patience….
Quite true. And cooler weather so I can work out there without getting heatstroke…
oh yes, definitely cooler weather and a soft shower of fresh rain now and again, that will help too !