Meg!

 

Poor old Meg is going to have to have surgery on her back left knee joint

 

Like a lot of dogs she has developed degenerative disease in her knee joint. The Oh! Bearded One has been going backwards and forwards to the vets with her so he understands better what is going to need to be done but she goes and sees a specialist vet on Monday.

 

 

We had 2 days of whinging (Staffies are specialist whingers) after the exploratory surgery last week so what she will be like after more major surgery I dread to think!

 

It's going to be murder as her excercise is going to be curtailed and she isn't going to understand but hopefully it will be worth it as she is only 4 and has years of active life in front of her.

 

 

A fun afternoon!

 

Yesterday I took an annual leave day and went on a photo shoot with DD. I was given this photo shoot as part of my 50th birthday present along with the flying lesson I had a couple of weeks ago.

 

We went into central Manchester for it.

 

We had to take 3 outfits and they did our makeup and hair, although my hair went flat very quickly.

 

Afterwards we went to the Trafford Centre for something to eat and a potter around.

 

It was great way to spend an afternoon and we have some lovely photos to remember it by.

Hexi tutorial

 

As you are aware I am making this quilt from this book

 

I am using 5 inch Civil War repro fabric charm squares. I've bought many Moda charm packs to give lots of variety. Once I've used what I need for this quilt I'll have great fun making something else with the leftovers (I think there will be a lot of leftovers - lol).

 

The quilt size in the book is a large lap size but I've decided I want it to fit our king size (UK size) bed so I'm making it bigger. I started off making the first strip I made long, 22 hexies long. As I started adding the next strip I realised the quilt was going to be too big to handle easily so I am making the strips 11 hexies long and 11 wide and then I intend to hand quilt these sections before I add the sections together to make up the whole quilt.

I'm using these pre cut papers which are imported from the US. I bought mine through Hannah's Room. They are often at quilt shows and they do a good mail order service.

I thought I would show you how I make up my hexis.

 



 

There is no need to cut down the charm square but if you cut squares from FQs or yardage you only need to cut the squares 4.5 inches square. When I first started to make up hexis I used to baste through the fabric and the papers but now I use paper clips to hold the fabric in place whilst I baste the hexi  

 

I'll trim the excess fabric once all the hexis are sewn together

 

For the diamonds I am cutting the charm square in half and then cut each half down a bit.

 

I am trying not to give too much info about the actual pattern as I don't want infringe the copyright of the book.   

 

The photo isn't upside down, I'm left handed. I lay the hexis/diamonds next to each other rather than on top of each other to whip stitch them together - a tip I picked up on someone else's blog (can't remember whoses), the front looks neater and the stitches are much less visable.

Flying!

Back in October 2011 I was 50 and our group of friends and the Oh! Bearded One collectively bought me a 1 hour flying lesson and a photo shoot.

 

 

On Wednesday we got round to going for the flying lesson. We had to go to Carlisle airport which is a small local airport that was orginally built in the war to train RAF pilots

 

The plane was a Piper, a 4 seater plane. I sat on the left hand side and the Oh! Bearded One sat in the back.

 

We flew over the Lake District which was great as we know it well so it was nice to it from above as we don't normally see it from that angle. I took the controls for about 10-15 minutes. I wasn't that bothered about actually flying the plane, I was more interested in the views (I did take some video but I'm not boring you with that!)

 

Coming into land! - not by me!

 

Our flight instructor!

 

It was great fun and I would do it again.

 

I've got the photo shoot on 18th Sept.

Grandmother's choice

 

I'm taking part in Barbara Brackman's 'Grandmothers' Choice' BOW.

 

I loved last year's Civil War BOW so I was really pleased when Barbara announced that she was doing another BOW.

 

 

As British women's suffragette colours were green, purple and cream and I'm British, I'm going to use Branock & Patek's Lilac Hill but I'm only using the green, purple and cream FQs out of this FQ bundle that I bought off somebody's blog (I can't remember whose) 

 

Week 1's block

 

Today's block

 

I know I promised you flying - tomorrow I promise

Thank you

Thank you so much for your kind wishes for our 30th wedding aniversary.

 

Today I went flying, I'll be back tomorrow with the pictures.

 

30th Wedding Aniversary

Today it is our 30th Wedding Aniversary!

 

Our marriage has survived cancer (him), redundancy (him), financial pressures, moving house from our home city because of job (his), depression (me), menopause (me), 2 children, ill parents (mine & his), death of parents (his) and long working hours (both of us).

 

We still love each despite everything!!!

 

Here's to another 30!!!!

A few more!

 

I've looked through my photos from the Festival of Quilts again and found a few more quilts to show you. I took a lot of photos this year.

 

I loved this Swoon quilt, I want to make a small version of this, with probably 4 blocks.

 

This little quilt was in the minature section, enlarge it and look at the applique!

 

I'm not a huge fan of Baltimore style quilts but I loved the colour way of this one and I thought the stitching was very good!

 

This one appealed to me because I love seascapes and I loved some of the colours used.

 

Another Baltimore, beautifully executed!

 

Several blogs have shown this one and I follow the blog of the lady who made it but I can't remember for the life of me who it is, I'll amend the post when I find out.

 

I thought some of the group quilts were fun and some of the quilts in the 'British' group were great.

 

The photos don't do this quilt justice, it was very dramatic.

 

That really is it for this year's Festival of Quilts. Next year I'll be looking at others' photos as we only go every 2 years.