Not Exactly Undercover

My accomplice and I decided to “rescue” the plants in pots that were left behind by the people who moved out of the rental property next door. It is tricky to undertake a covert operation in high summer here when it does not get dark until well after 11pm so we sneaked round with the wheelbarrow in broad daylight just after 10pm. The plants have survived their traumatic ordeal and are now being watered regularly outside my workshop  - only the Postie will have observed a change in their location.

I was parading around in my half-sewn prototype frock when 2 American visitors arrived looking for my quilt shop. I explained that I was not an actual shop, just a longarm quilting studio but I was happy to show them some quilts that I had lying around. With the help of some friends, I eventually got the sleeves inserted the right way round and decided on balance that it had been a relatively straight-forward pattern and I might even make another one. I thought it would be a good idea to add some “ethnic” accents by stamping some red motifs around the neckline which led to further embellishments elsewhere which I have not quite decided are excessive or simply not enough;)

Since the 2 customer raffle quilts got done and I had guided Lynette through the automated quilting of a huge appliquéd cot quilt, I made up my mind that I needed to start on Freya’s going-away-to-uni quilt AND run up a quilt for the kids’ Guidance Teacher who is leaving after many years at the school. Miss M will be getting a blue and white chevron quilt (in the colours of her school House) and I have already mass-cut the 168 x 7.5” squares using a giant June Tailor strip-cutting ruler. I will need to work fast to get that done within a fortnight!

Despite having cut all of the pieces out for Freya’s quilt, I discovered that I had completely forgotten the way I made the first 2 blocks and that all of my rectangles were the wrong size - thankfully they were too big and could be trimmed down. The first block was a disaster because I forgot to trim down the deliberately over-sized flying geese blocks and I had no idea how I came up with the sizes of the setting triangles so it really did not fit together very neatly. It all came back to me after a while and the pile of large blocks slowly grew. When I write up the pattern I may not recommend that anyone else uses cotton lawn or poly-cotton tartan unless they are prepared to use a large can of spray starch. I wondered whether the scrappy fabrics that I had chosen were going to make a rather ugly quilt but I remembered that the original 1930’s quilt that I love has some hideous fabrics  yet the overall sum of their parts is fantastic. I ended the weekend with 11 out of 20 blocks and noticed that there is a lot of jolly, bright orange so far. At any rate, it will brighten up a student room rather nicely and its recipient, who is inter-railing in Europe, has approved of the progress so far:)