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I only managed one small customer quilt this week as I was busy doing other jobs, including stock taking many varieties of calico…

It was a bank holiday weekend! I have been helping Jo to jazz up her back yard and we started on painting the walls and fence which always takes far more paint than you can imagine. I watered down the pale lilac masonry paint to get a base on the roughcast walls. There should be a law against those, particularly ones done in black granite. I am hoping that Jo might be able to find a sprayer ...

After driving from Norfolk last Sunday, I attended the welcome reception for Nicholas Ball’s retreaters prior to their week at Quilt Direct. They worked on their improv fish all week, ending up making them twice the normal size in their enthusiasm. 

As well as making sure the retreaters were fed, watered and happy I had a customer quilt and lots of teaching. There was a day of 1:1 overlocker, another day of 1:1 Bernini Aurora and 770QE, a B990 zoom session, then my new Friday job. 

My evenings were also busy – Nicholas came round for tea, we ...

I was in Norfolk last week to attend my dad‘s funeral. He died rather unexpectedly, but it was not a shock since he was 89 frail and had dementia. 

The funeral was actually quite a happy affair with many friends and family travelling from all over the country to honour his life. There were some great photos on the slideshow and many anecdotes about how he would buy livestock from a man in the pub or decide to dig a really deep well in the garden and about his times as a deep sea diver. 

All three of my ...

After a long Bank Holiday weekend it is easy to get confused about what day of the week it is. Nella is still staying and I only worked for 2 days before going to Cardiff on a 2 day training course for a new job working remotely on Fridays. I will be answering emails for the Singer sewing machine helpline and trouble-shooting problems. Singer and Bernina are actually part of one UK distribution company so it is not that weird for me to have a side hustle involving a different brand. 

I brought home a “heavy duty” model to familiarise ...

I had quite a varied week at work with some teaching, some quilting and making a movie about a new Accuquilt die with Karen. 

Nella came to stay and we had a super 4 day weekend. Plenty of chocolate was consumed, we went to see Mel in Looe and visited Lydford Gorge with its stunning White Lady waterfall. 

The sun came out at last so I could cut my grass. I was glad of an assistant to put my pop-up budget greenhouse from Lidl together. I was sorely tempted to purchase a hanging egg chair from Tesco but common sense ...

I am hopeful that with an extra hour of light in the evening I will feel more inspired to do more. Every night this week I came home from work, went for a dog-walk, cooked, washed up, watched maybe an hour of telly then bed – on repeat! I continually come up with excuses as to why I am not doing more with my evenings – not enough light, not enough space, not enough motivation;) 

If the weather improves I will put up my pop-up greenhouse and plant some seeds. Before too long I will probably be complaining how long it takes ...

I have been enjoying lovely spring weather this weekend and got stuck into some serious garden tidying. I borrowed a more powerful pressure washer and got rid of the winter slime. It was a messy job but worth it. I had to stop when the old flaky paint looked like it might wash off the walls. I repainted the front of my shed which had gone green and most of the fence which is pretty rotten. After mowing the grass and buying Nessie a new basketball, I felt very satisfied. I even cut down a sycamore tree that was growing ...

My Grandad was a joiner by trade.  For years he hand-built railway wagons in Glasgow. When he retired he had a small selection of hand tools that fitted into an enamel bread bin and he made household things that were built to last. There is still a parcel box outside one of our old houses in Norfolk that was constructed in 1980.  He made a sturdy child’s chair, a doll’s house like a Scottish Butt and Ben Cottage, and a dolly bed. 

My sister has recently rediscovered the dolly bed and has commissioned me to make some bedding ...

I had such a busy week that I actually forgot that I had a long weekend. At first I wondered what I was going to do with it. Perhaps I should’ve planned to go away. I had two intense days of long arm quilting mastery teaching which went very well. I also gave a talk to the local Quilt group and everybody stayed awake so that’s always a good sign. It was great to see some of my quilts again which just live in a suitcase. I have been driving around with them all week because I can ...

 On the whole I am content with my new life but much of the past week was a bit “Meh”. There was one sunny day but I spent it at work. It feels like it would be nice to get out in the garden again and tidy up but it it is all still too wet. At least some daffodils in a pot are trumpeting their heads off. 

I went on a road trip to the seaside and had very good fish and chips but did not come home with any fun purchases. I know I don’t need anything ...

Don’t tell my guests but I removed some stuffing from one of the guest room pillows to finish stuffing all 291 puffs. Some may be under stuffed and some may be too plump. It is tempting to make them nice and fat but then they are impossible to join together. I suppose if I was going to be exact I would have to use some “drug dealer” scales but I went for what size of fluff ball could fit into my closed fist. The next thing will be to put them together in blocks of 9 to distribute the ...

Some of the 2 day classes at QD do not have the serve-yourself tea and coffee table so I become a high-speed waitress, running about with cups of tea and plates of cake. I suppose it is good practise for the day when I open a beach cafe with a very limited menu. 

Later in the week I got some of my video equipment charged up and made a wee movie of my colleague, Karen, doing an Accuquilt demo for Ellen’s quilt group in Glasgow. I had great fun doing that and editing out the bit where she got ...

Considering that I am a person who owns more than just a few cameras and a smart phone that can take photos, I have absolutely no pictures to document my week. It was a busy one too. I had class prep to do at work and a DIY quilter. 

Matt Wilding came to run one of his heart-shaped bag making workshops and he stayed with me. He was a model guest – we even went out for posh fish and chips. Nessie  loved having someone else in the house but I have become very used to my own space so even ...

I have survived a long, wet January. I am thankful that I did not have several feet of Scottish snow, icy temperatures and probably power cuts but it seemed like every time I stepped out of my door I got very wet. It made a lovely change to wander into town on Nessie’s 6th birthday to see a spring-like display of crocuses. 

I had a different week at work – due to a last minute cancellation, I was able to be a pupil in the 4-day intensive B990 training course. There are interesting crossovers between the B990 and the computerised ...

I only worked a 3 day week so I could have 2 days off with Freya. She was working her job from home with Nessie’s help and it was so nice to have some company. She took Nessie for midday walks and cooked something delicious most evenings. We made a successful vegan apple cake and even delicious vegan Scottish tablet. 

It was great to have help to do some jobs that I had been putting off like hanging up some string lights (which have only come on once so far) and repotting some house plants. We had a blustery ...

Customer Quilt

This week I have been entertaining my 2 lovely girls, Freya and Nella. There has been a lot of washing up but plenty of helpers to deal with it. I made some genuine Scottish tablet which turned out perfectly but you can feel your teeth rotting!

I had another go at working out the best way of constructing a puff quilt and have decided that French seams are the answer. 

At work I reconstructed a table runner for B990 using Q-Matic. I also tried using its own built in jumbo stitches to embellish the project which I found ...

Do I miss proper snow? – certainly not;) There has been severe winter weather in Aberdeenshire since New Year’s Day and I can imagine how wet it will be in my workshop when that all melts. We had a mere sprinkling of snow in Tavistock and rather icy roads for a few days. A gritter lorry actually tipped over on the edge of Dartmoor, which is ironic. We had a red storm warning at the end of the week but it really landed in Southern Cornwall. In bed in my stone cottage I hardly noticed it ...

When I first moved to Devon and asked what would happen when the roads became icy, a local person told me it happens extremely rarely. Well, I had planned a last day of the holidays trip to the seaside and woke up to snow on the ground and rooftops. It is not nearly as much as in Aberdeenshire but I think Devon Council only owns one gritting lorry so the roads are not treated to the extent that they are in Scotland. It actually makes me more nervous to drive here on ice than it did when I lived in ...

If I was going to continue with last week‘s theme on Christmas hosting I might mention that it’s annoying to arrive somewhere and find there is no food in the house and nowhere to sleep. Fortunately I found a mattress and some bedding and made myself a little nest up on a landing. 

It is very frustrating to realise how much of my stuff is still here in Aberdeenshire but I don’t have room for it in Devon. 

I am trying to work out how I am going to fit a couple of boxes, 2 adult children ...

I like to think that I am a very good hostess and when people come to stay, they have clean bedding and towels and there is plenty of food in the house. I made the long drive up to Glasgow and stayed with one of my children who will remain nameless as this is not trip advisor Nella and I had a couple of lovely days together, but it was very much like staying in student digs. The area is not very salubrious and Nessie was having to pick her way between poo vomit and fast food on the patch ...