Monday 29th December

Very pleasant night out last night,cheese and wine round work colleague of hubby.
Today lunch at the King's Head with Sarah C and Terry.Lots of chat and catching up.
Tonight trying to do a little sewing.Made myself a crochet hook roll.Now working on
'Abigails quilt' Hubby is back to work tomorrow.

Sunday 28th December

Meal last night was very good.Never sure with pub grub what the quality is going to be like.It was just at our local,very local about 100 yds away. Everyone seemed to have a good time and son's girlfriend's Dad was on fine form.He is a very funny guy.
Today we did a bit of retail therapy.Got up late (after the Archers) then hit a garden centre for some half price Christmas stuff. Set of lights etc. Then to our favourite designer outlet Matalan. I really needed some clothes! Sadly all my weight has gone back on again so I think I will have to do something about that in the new year.
Back home and a lovely lamb curry and then we are off out to a work colleague of hubby.

Saturday 27th December

Well that's Christmas done and dusted.Meal out tonight with MIL ,son and girlfriend and her parents looking forward to that,nice not to have to cook.

Christmas was an odd one this year as hubby was on nights.In 20 years of shift work this has never occurred before.Meant that for the most of Christmas day and all of Christmas night I was on my own.Thought I would be fine but wasn't really so won't do that again.Wasn't helped by the fact that just before Christmas I went down with a really heavy cold which laid me out for about 3 days so last minute preparations just did not happen.
Always think about people that I can't be with anymore like my mum and especially my granddaughter.
Did just about manage to get a few bits made for decorations and presents



Little mouse for Jessica



Table runner for Claire and Carlos



Snowman and Penguin for me

New Things

Been fiddling around trying a few new little things that will probably end up in my etsy or folksy shops .Really like this little blue bird.I have done a sort of robin version as well.May list later

Bad bad blogger

I know I know every time I say I am going to blog more regularly it just doesn't happen.
Anyway I have made a little banner for my table at Wemake London. Reverse applique and satin stitch.Not perfect maybe ,need a bit more practise but it looks OK. Also starting to try some new things out for my etsy and folksy shops.More of that later.

East Exhibition

By June Carroll

By Carol Dixon

Went to Braintree today ,with Margaret to go to the O2 and E.a.s.t exhibitions. Both very interesting. More pieces appealed in the East exhibition.
A couple of beautiful,what I am going to call,memory dresses by Libby Smith incorporating text embroidered on net and newspaper snippets.
Some really interesting work, as usual, by Jeanette Bright on foundlings and Mercy. One piece by Julie Topsfield that I really liked.
Some terrific textured pieces by Carol Dixon and some clever work on maps and journies by June Carroll.Annoyed with myself that I didn't take notes or enough pictures. Did give Margaret and myself time for a good chat and some ideas have been sparked off I think.
Nice lunch in the cafe attached to the museum. Weather was great ! All in all a good day.

Etsy September Challenge

Our challenge for September was to create something on the theme of 'Birds'
I had seen an article in Quilting Arts magazine on pet and animal portraits so I thought I would give it a go.I chose to do a Chaffinch as they have a fair bit of colour on them and we do get a lot of them in our garden.I adapted the method a little but started with creating a background of hand dyed fabrics by strip piecing in green including a few bits of blue to represent the sky.I then enlarged a picture of a male chaffinch and turned it into black and white using this final image to make a tracing.I used the tracing to machine the shape of the chaffinch from the back of the fabric tearing the paper away when completed. Then from the front and using the original image as reference I added fabric pieces and some machine embroidery to recreate the bird. I also used my embellishing machine to create his legs and to 'knock back'some of the background and the fabric on the bird. To finish off I added a few buttons and some hand stiching and then made a quilt sandwich using a light wadding and some calico.



To my great surprise I won the challenge this month.Thank you if you voted for me.