I'm Behind

I'm behind at posting on my blog and I'm behind at reading other blogs so I thought I'd do something about it this evening.

Something else I've been behind at is walking, I hurt my leg a couple of weeks ago when I was out walking and on my way home my leg was hurting so much I had to ring Neil to come and fetch me. My leg was very red, swollen and extremely painful. I saw the doc and although he couldn't find a bite mark he was certain I'd been bitten and reacted to it. He prescribed some antibiotics, told me to take the rest of the week off work 

(this was on a Thursday) keep the leg up, and I could go back to work on the Monday. Anyway I didn't take time off work but I did try and keep the leg up as much as possible and rest and take the antibiotics which made me feel even worse. But by the Monday it really wasn't that much better, it wasn't quite as red or swollen but it was still very painful. So I went back to see the doctor as the antibiotics obviously weren't doing any good. It turned out that I'd got a shin splint, this is when the muscle comes away from the bone and when it was red and swollen it was actually bleeding internally.Thankfully it is much better now which is a really good thing as next Tuesday I'm doing the Race for Life. I'm slowly getting back into my walking routine but I haven't been to Zumba for over two weeks, I think I'll give that a little bit more time.

I have finished Freddie's jumper. 

I've started a sleeveless tunic for Eva in pretty delicate colours, she is our little dolly unlike Ellie.

Granny squares have been on the go again. I'm teaching them next month and two methods of  joining them.

I couldn't resist making a mariners compass block. Pam is teaching this next month and It's been something I wanted to make for a long time so I thought I'd make another sample for the class. I was going to make just the one block and turn it into a cushion cover but I like it so much that I'm going to make another two and turn them into a table runner.
  

Wednesday was the last meeting of Spectrum before the summer break. I have to say it was a lovely meeting and Gina made the most gorgeous chocolate cake, thank you Gina. We had to take our finished round robin pieces with us. I was the last person to work on this piece but there really wasn't anything left to do except mount it. I had two attempts at mounting it, the first time I stitched it all the way around after carefully measuring and levelling it up. Guess what, it had moved whilst I was stitching so it had to be unpicked and done again. It is now just stitched at the four corners..

Gina has given us some homework for the summer, we are going to do another round robin as we all enjoyed the first one so much. The theme is festivals/ summer, so something else to start at least I don't have to worry about finishing it.

The weather looks promising for the weekend so I hope you all get a chance to enjoy it whatever you may be doing.

Catch Up

Over the Bank Holiday weekend Neil and I visited Wicken Fen. Neither of us could understand why we hadn't been before as it's not really that far away. We had a lovely time - the weather was gorgeous the dragonflies were out and in the middle of this picture you can just make out the Red Arrows. You may need to click on it too make it large enough to see them.

We had a wander around the cottage. It's hard to believe that it was lived in up until 1975, although I can remember as a child visiting people in houses like this. I thought  the quilt was very pretty and the only bit of colour in the room.

I have been working on my Markal stick design for Spectrum. I've done half a dozen designs on paper and decided it was time to commit to fabric. Here it is in progress.

This is it finished, now I just have to be patient (not something I'm good at) and wait for it to dry. Then I can get on with the fun bit, some stitching.

There has been some baking and I was going to show you some Millionaires Shortbread but blogger seems to have eaten the picture. 

All I have left to do on Ellie's cardigan is the two sleeves so hopefully that will be finished soon.

I hope you have a good weekend and get a chance to enjoy the nice weather we have been promised.

Getting On

Yesterday was the worst day ever - everything I did or touched went wrong from the minute I got up to the minute I went to bed.

I've finished the scarf I was knitting so I started a cardigan for Ellie. I sat down to do a few rows yesterday evening, I'd done four and then realised that one of them was wrong and had to undo three. I wasn't happy.

I've added the centres to these flowers and even making something as simple as a suffolk puff went wrong yesterday. But at least it's done ready for the next Spectrum meeting and I will have managed to stay out of trouble again.

Yesterday I managed to do some work on my Markel samples. I photocopied the page so I can work on it as much as I like without ruining my original. A couple of months ago at Spectrum Gina did a mini workshop on collages which I didn't wholly embrace at the time but thought this would be the ideal opportunity to give it a go. I'm not entirely happy with the work so far but I have more copies and I plan to go out with my camera tomorrow morning looking for more inspiration.

This Australian magazine (along with others) arrived at work yesterday and I just had to have a copy. I'm so glad I did because when I had a proper look through it there is a great article on screen printing and the lady had used poppies as an image.

Something else that caught my eye was this picture of an art quilt, it fits in perfectly with our theme of black and white for Spectrum.

I have been baking, these coconut tartlets were lovely however the brownies I made yesterday morning, well all I can say is that if you threw them at someone they would have had a black eye. Hopefully today will be much better.

Keeping Busy

I've had a very busy week. At last I have managed to finish the shawl. Silly as it sounds but even though I only had two rows left to do it was finding the time to do them. There was over 700 stitches on the needle and it took about 45 minutes to do a row and it's not one of the nicest things to leave mid row. Anyway I decided Sunday was the day to finish. So when I sat down to watch the F1 I just got on with it.

I'm very pleased with it and I've decided to give it to Steph. I'm not as keen on the colour as I was when it was in a ball. It looked different then.

I also finished this scarf and I'm now half way through another one.

Last Wednesday was the monthly meeting of Spectrum and again I managed to stay out of trouble although I was told I needed a tutorial.  Gina gave us a demo using Markel sticks, this is something we had to do for our City and Guilds but it's always good to have a play and we all enjoyed it. This is my piece of paper that I worked on and I am going to develop it some more. I did do some work on fabric but I didn't like it so it went in the bin.

We are continuing with our round robin. I passed the piece I was working on, to Sue and Caterina passed this piece onto me. 

Isn't it a fabulous piece, I'm really struggling to work out what do with it. The only thing I can come up with is to decorate the flower centres............... in red.

I've Done It

Remember this? It's my piece of fabric for the round robin we are doing in Spectrum. It was such a small piece of fabric that I felt it needed to be made bigger. It took some courage to actually take the rotary cutter to it and cut up someone else's work.

But I finally managed it. I'm still tempted to add some stitching to it but I'm going to leave that to the next person.

I have been doing quite a bit of baking lately, these are Hazelnut Praline muffins that I made for the social stitchers yesterday.

For Neil's birthday I made some Millionaires' Shortbread but I wasn't happy with it. I found another recipe and made some so that we can have a taste test today, so fingers crossed.

I'm still walking in the mornings and who wouldn't when they are as beautiful as they have been. Don't the swans look graceful.

There is one nesting swan.

I finally managed to get a photo of the heron. He's just there in the middle of the picture.

Spectrum

Last Wednesday was the monthly meeting of Spectrum. We are doing a Round Robin within the group. We       

all had to produce a piece of work in black and white. The work is then going to passed on 3 times. We can use any media/style of our choice.

This is my piece which was passed onto Anne.

This is Janet's that was passed onto me. I think I'm going to concentrate on making the piece bigger rather than adding any more decoration as was my first thought.

The first of this week's baking is Apple and Sultana muffins. I made them with normal flour so I shan't be eating any but they smelt so nice when they were cooking that I wished I'd used gluten free flour. Never mind there's always next time.

I went to Zumba class last night with Nicki and my legs were aching so much afterwards that I thought they would be achey today but surprisingly they aren't. It's a good laugh and everyone has a great time while getting some some exercise. Roll on next week because there isn't any on Wednesday.

Time Out

I've had a blogging break for personal reasons and considered giving up my blog but have decided to carry on so here I am again.

I haven't been idle during my break, there has been some experimenting in the kitchen. My first ever gluten-free cake, a ginger cake. The kitchen smelt lovely whilst it was cooking so I was hopeful and I could see through the oven door that it had risen. It came out looking perfect, tasted lovely and was liked by everyone who had a piece.

On Thursday afternoon I looked after Ellie for a little while so I took her into the office to see Grandad. I think she was trying for employee of the month.

Her drawing skills were good. 

However her skills at eating do-nuts were excellent.

See no problem.

Freddie with mummy.

Yesterday after my early evening walk I made mushroom soup. It's one of my favourites and of course it was gluten free. The only disappointment was the gluten free bread roll, I'm glad I don't eat a lot of bread.

Wednesday was the monthly meeting of Spectrum and just for once I had been a good girl and done my homework. I'm glad Gina made me stick with my original design as I'm much happier with it now. If you remember my theme is Circles, which I have taken literally in this instance. The colours are representative of the hydrangeas in my garden. Or should I say that used to be in my garden I think I might have killed them off, time will tell.

This is just a working sample I've abandoned my sketchbook temporarily but I will have to go back to it. I painted some pages from my sketchbook (knew it would come in useful sometime)  cut out lots of circles using a punch and stitched them together using invisible thread. I was really pleased that the invisible thread worked in the bobbin it needed a little coaxing but I got there.

Then I strung them onto these frames with some help from Neil. It took almost two hours just to do the small one. I intend for the finished project to be hung in circles. So now I have lots more sampling to do starting with fabric for the circles, although I might not use fabric I spied a bag of Quality Street wrappers this morning and thought they might work.

Oh and yesterday evening I made a Mars Bar and Rice Krispie cake for the stitching ladies at the shop today.

Finished, Nearly Finished and Started

I have finished the table runner, and I'm very pleased with it.

It fits nicely on my table but I don't imagine I will use it as it's not really my colours. I like brighter colours and I only made it to use on Create and Craft if ever necessary.

I've not only managed to sew in all the ends on my blanket but I've also gone all the way round working the border. I'm not sure how many rows I will do at the moment I'm thinking 5 might be good.

On another good note I have started on my homework for Spectrum. I'm going to work in 3D this time, I think I might like it more if I work that way rather than in a sketchbook. I've never been happy working in sketchbooks, maybe it's my dislike of drawing.

After my previous post I've had a couple of emails about the wool I'm using for my shawl. Which goes to prove that people do read my blog but just don't leave messages. If you are one of those said people please do leave me a message. Anyway back to the wool. It came from Boo's Attic and is called Ethereal Serenity, is a lace weight (2-ply) and the colour is Jewel. The fibre content is 70% Baby Alpaca, 30% Silk and it really is a dream to knit with.

I thought I'd show you these flowers because they are so pretty. They are left from a bunch that I was given last week. Unfortunately the other roses have hung their heads in shame and are now in the composting bin.

Now I know it's some considerable time until Christmas but I have made a start on my pressie shopping. There is no way I'm going to leave it until the last minute again it was a nightmare last year, never again. So when I saw this sketchbook in Paperchase I knew Steph would love it. The only thing I have to do now is put it somewhere safe that I'll remember. It's safe for me to put it on here as she doesn't read my blog.

Where Did the Time Go?

I know I've been busy but I hadn't realised that it's nearly two weeks since I last updated my blog. I did have good intentions of doing it on Monday evening but there was a bottle of wine in the fridge with my name on it so that put paid to that idea and last night I was working so here we are today.

Last Wednesday was the Spectrum meeting and guess what, I was in trouble. No surprise there but it was my own fault, I didn't do my homework. I didn't do it because I don't like my project. I know it was my choice and I liked it at the time but I've changed my mind. Any how teacher put her foot down (understandably) and has convinced me to give it another go, so I will.

Although I haven't posted I have been busy.

I made some bunny bunting for another 'how to make' for a local magazine.   

My crochet blanket blanket is one step further to being finished. All the squares and rows are now joined and  I'm really pleased with it. The only thing is I've got hundreds of ends to sew in and then the border to do.

I've nearly finished the dresden plate table runner. I'm really pleased with the quilting.

The back looks just as good.

Last night I went home and made raspberry and white chocolate muffins for today's ladies.

On Sunday we went to see Sam, Amy and Eva. It was Amy's birthday and she was having a little family celebration. It was lovely to see them all, but especially Eva. We don't see enough of her and she is changing so fast. She is a beautiful happy little girl.