Nella's 23rd Birthday

Have I set up my quilt machine?… Not quite. It’s such a palaver and I really must try next week.

I had a couple of extra days working for Singer and I went for a wee wander in Norwich, taking myself out for a cup of tea so I will claim that I was busy. 

The garage is still a disaster zone where I dumped all of my possessions and I can’t find a thing, including any jumpers for this blustery weather so it needs a big sorting session. 

Freya and Fergus both came down from Scotland for Nella’s birthday and mostly stayed with her at her house in Norwich. I spent the day with her and friends on Saturday. We ventured out for a stormy walk then had birthday cake. She licked the frosting off the candle and almost had a meltdown when she thought the vegan cream cheese I used tasted like mature cheddar but all was well as it did not taste at all weird in combination with the spiced pumpkin cake, brambles and pomegranate.

Nessie is getting putting in her place by two cats at long last. Our cats never told her off when she was a puppy. Fizz thought she was a dog anyway so did not care and Nessie could not resist trying to chase BlueCat. Both my sister’s cat and Nella’s housemate’s cat are taking no prisoners, taking swipes so that Nessie is learning to stay out of their way. She loves having people around all of the time, although she was exhausted after Nella’s birthday celebrations. 

Moving Chaos

I had a great team of friends help load up the removal van and it all fitted in - only just! My journey with a brief stop took about 8 hours but the van man got stuck in a traffic jam for hours and eventually turned up the next morning. He then discovered that the roller door was jammed shut because some stuff had shifted. We levered it it open a little with blocks of wood and a plank then my sister became “Flat Stanley”, shimmied into the van and dislodged the longarm poles. 

We quickly realised that the garage would not be suitable for long arming and storage so decided that the longarm would have to go indoors which is actually a much better solution, especially in winter. The garage is in utter chaos with all of my boxes and bags just being dumped in a bit of a heap. 

The problem with moving all of my belongings into my mum’s house is that it is already pretty full so it is like a game of very tricky Tetris trying to put everything away tidily. In reality, most of my stuff will have to stay packed up in the garage, just better organised.

I had a go at starting to set up the longarm but it was really difficult even though I have done it before. The manual is dreadful - the text makes no sense to me and the photos are awful. There is a YouTube video which is a bit better so I will watch it 25 times and might get there in the end.

I visited Nella’s new digs and had a bracing trip to Cromer for chips. She is delighted that she will be able to see me whenever rather than just a few times a year.

Nessie is happy that she has boys and cats to play with…

Are We Ready to Go?

 Just like that it was my last week at Quilt Direct. There were 2 hectic days at the start of the week while an Embroidery Mastery class was running. There was much running about fetching goodies from the warehouse for the attendees and many, many cups of tea to make. My final 2 days were spent teaching how to be confident and creative with the L890. The pupils all enjoyed exploring the techniques like gathering, flatlock and fringing. My colleagues had a whip round and gave me some money towards getting a 3D printer because I want to make an army of gnomes;) Or maybe some useful sewing notions.

We packed up the longarm and put its “brain” into a box. I have set it up before and dread doing it again but will have to just sort it out and get it back working on quilts in Norfolk.

I packed some more boxes wondering why I have so much stuff and worrying about fitting it into the van

I went out for Sunday dinner with my friend, Jo, who made the most incredible version of Nessie with a kilt and sporran. The details and skill are amazing and the head even moves. 

I can’t believe I move on Tuesday - my plan for Monday involves taking Nessie for a haircut, dismantling my bed and trying to box up whatever random items are left.

Next week’s blog will be written in Norfolk!

Rapidly Counting Down

How can it only be that I have one working week left in Devon? The time since I started packing has flown. I just want to get going now because almost everything is packed but I am trying to savour living by myself in my own space.

I reduced the price of my velvet sofa on FB Marketplace and found a buyer but they want to pick it up this weekend. I don’t have any garden chairs left then figured I could move one of the hideaway single beds downstairs to make into a temporary telly-watching spot. 

I have insisted that the Van Man hires a bigger van but I still have nightmares that my goods and chattels will not fit and will have to be left on the street.

I am at a bit of a loose end - I have no projects, can’t do any more packing, the friend I was going to visit is ill and the house 2 doors down has dug up the alley so it is a bit of a faff to get out. Maybe I will go and read a book and try not to feel guilty about that!

Barely Organised Chaos

I have made a bit of an attempt to check that the cupboards are in order at work - everyone thinks I am the only person who knows where anything is;) Most of my week was taken up with longarm tuition. After 2 years this has really taken off so it is a pity that it will have to come to a halt, although some people seem to think that I can transfer all of the skills I have accrued in 18 years and it will just take them a couple of hours to pick up…

I am so fed up with packing and worrying about all of the stuff that I need to move. I think everything that can be pre-packed is done. My garden has been emptied of pots, the pop-up greenhouse is down, and I gave the fairy-lights rose-arch to a neighbour, so it is all a bit bare. 

I have taken down the solar lights in my front yard, dusted off the spiders and packed them amongst my shoes (hopefully not the spiders.) Honestly, some of the boxes and bags are so randomly organised. Fleeces and kitchen mixers are just one example.

I plan to take next weekend off to do some socialising but I may borrow a pressure washer and spruce up outside. I am not really sure why I am bothering - the landlady brought a couple of prospective tenants round and did not comment on all of the improvements that I had done. She has even raised the rent by £150.00 per month so it’s no wonder the nice young couple did not sign the lease.

The Teacher Glare

My “Teacher Glare” never worked on my own children but I did have to employ it at the start of my 2 day ruler class this week. I started out with quite a demanding crowd but after I went into full-on teacher mode everyone got on famously;)

As well as that, it was all Go Go Go, making sure that I have got all of my customer quilts done before I leave Quilt Direct. Therefore, I also did a binding, 2 quilts and basted a stuffed cross that will become a Church wall hanging. 

Packing to move must be one of the most BORING tasks. I vacuum packed almost all of my clothes and cleared out a cupboard which was worryingly damp. I hope my fiddle has survived its 2-year sojourn in there!

Obviously, I will be leaving the cottage in a far nicer state than when I moved in so I gave the window sill 3 coats of paint which Nessie found quite unnecessary as she could not sit there to watch out for passing cats. 

I have 2 weekends left to sort out the rest of my stuff, which I am still worried will not fit into the van. Perhaps I should have given myself more time but a deadline is good. I still need to visit Mel at the seaside, go out for lunch, pressure wash the backyard and pack up the longarm…

Slow You Down!

A very Norfolk expression is “Slow you down!”-  meaning you should rush around less and chill out more.

That has NOT been me this week…

At work I bound 2 quilts, supervised 5 DIY quilts, did some one-to-one tuition, prepared for the Quilt Direct Open Day, attended the Tavistock Goosey Quilters exhibition, sold 2 machines, and carried out all of my usual side missions.

I was too worn out to do much in the evenings apart from veg out with Nessie but my Saturday was a blur of activity. I packed the non-essential kitchen items which means I obviously own a lot of non-essential stuff. I cleaned and sold my comfy armchair for £30.00 because I am paranoid that the moving van will be too small. I suppose the worst case scenario is that I can hire a self-drive van to come back before my lease ends but then I will be annoyed that I did not keep the armchair!

I defrosted and cleaned the fridge-freezer, painted the kitchen window sill, wiped the filth off the top of the kitchen cupboards - I have no idea where that comes from because I don’t cook that much, cut the grass, emptied the runner-bean pots, washed the windows, picked tomatoes, sorted the recycling, went grocery shopping, cleared out my food stores cupboard, did the laundry which then got left out in the rain, made a complete guddle of the house then rearranged the inadequate moving boxes!

I could start on packing up my bedroom but I do still have time as I wisely started packing early. Instead, I think I will settle for a drizzly dog-walk, make my packed lunch for work then lounge around until bed time:)

Packing It All In

This was a very busy week! I had quilts to do at work and a couple of staff members were away so there were more than usual phone calls, demos, admin plus a full 2-day class with umpteen cups of tea to provide.

In addition, I did 2 evenings of overtime for the Singer Helpline. Since the weather has cooled down it appears that people are dusting off their sewing machines (or not!) and hoping that we will solve all their problems.

I had a good attempt at packing up the sewing room / spare bedroom. I am trying to vacuum pack all of the quilts, bedding and blankets that I have, probably 10 times as much as a normal person. I also have a “shed-load” of craft supplies that I can’t part with but have not used in 2 years.

A friend has started rehoming some of my outdoor pots. I am glad they are going to another garden but sad to give them up. Even though I am moving soon, I am going to replace the dead marigolds in tins with pansies. I intend to wash all of the windows because I want a new tenant to receive a clean and fresh cottage.

I drove to a farm in the middle of nowhere to buy a hand trolley from a guy on FB marketplace. The typical Cornish response to me handing over £30 in notes was that it was “Ideal!” I reckon if there are 2 heavy duty trolleys on moving day it will make it a bit easier to navigate the bumpy alley. 

Moving On

I had another unusually busy week long arming which makes me happy! There was a house quilt, postage stamp squares and a Kaffe Fassett diamonds one. In addition, there was class preparation to do and sewing machine demos plus an interesting phone call where the customer was irritated by me asking what brand of thread she was using - all she could tell me was that it was “cotton”. 

So now for some Big News… I am moving to Norfolk! It all boils down to Big Family Stuff and I want to be around so I can help out. Plus Nella is there and Fergus is seriously considering leaving Glasgow to relocate to Norwich. 

All in all it was a pretty stressful week - handing in my notice, alerting my landlady, booking a van. I have loved Tavistock but in the end it was not easy to make weekend trips to visit Family from almost Cornwall. For the time being I will move in with my Mother then we will all work out whether to live together communally or close to each other but separately. 

I aim to set my longarm up and resume quilting as The Quilt Quine. I will look for a wee job and will need to get my act together to sort out a divorce settlement at last.

The move will happen in mid October and I have already started trying to get rid of my furniture on Facebook Marketplace. Initially I thought I would shift everything then I realised it would not all fit into the van so I am being ruthless (ish) and leaving my Victorian cupboards, comfy armchair, garden furniture and all of my plants in pots! 

Since I am a bit of a magpie, I have quite a lot of knick-knacks and rather a lot of vintage orange Tupperware. I think the boxes I ordered might be a bit big so I need to try and not make them too heavy.

I have started to take down pictures, fill holes and touch up the paint. The house will certainly be in a better state when I hand it back than it was when I moved in;)

Some Customer Quilts

 

I had an enjoyably busy week working on customer quilts and also making a sampler with some fun OESD e2e designs. One of the quilts only just fitted on the frame but I got through it in the end:)

Mixed Makes Week

I made all sorts of different things this week, not all of them easy or useful. At work I have made some ruffled samples to prepare for a forthcoming class. People seem to have mixed feelings about whether ruffles are IN or OUT;)

I tested out the new 790 Ultra to see if it did all that it claims to. It performed very well but I think if I had several thousand pounds to spend I would still opt for the top of the range 990 which has a camera and can do pretty much anything.

I gave 2 new Bernina x Liberty edition owners a condensed tutorial so they could go home and play with their machines.

I had a longarm DIY pupil for the day who opted for a computerised allover pattern on one of her quilts.

I rummaged in my tattie growing box to dig up some respectable spuds which I roasted in the air-fryer. There is a pint-sized red hollyhock in the back garden and lots of miniature tomatoes.

I spent a long evening making damson jam. My kitchen looked like a murder scene as I had to get all of the stones out of the small plums. Bright red juice was splattered on the tablecloth, me the floor and I am glad to report that Nessie kept out of the way. I have 5 kg of special-offer sugar left so I really hope I can forage a bumper crop of brambles!

On Sunday morning I spent a most enjoyable couple of hours doing a fused glass class with my work pal, Jo. She made a cute greenhouse and I copied the teacher’s example flower sun-catcher in blues. It was really fun to go and do something different and after it has been in the kiln I will have something to hang in my kitchen window:)