Trawling

My main task for the week was to produce the handouts and patterns for my forthcoming USA trip. I had to run up a string of bunting to check the fabric quantities, figure out how to draw a simple circular design using compasses, sew a notebook cover to ensure that the instructions worked and read through all of the other patterns to see if they made sense. I got Tania to proof read them and she thought they seemed straightforward. The photocopy shop ran off pages of pictures and text for me and I laminated the patterns so that they look like recipe cards. There are no diagrams since I can't figure out how to draw them neatly but the patterns that I have chosen are very simple so it should be easy to follow by referring to the photo. The Silent Movie Star pattern is 6 pages long as it is set out like a step by step photo-story! I have a nasty feeling that my parcel will weigh far more than 2kg so I expect that I will have to pack some of it in my suitcase. I have to leave room for some Quilt Quine "door prizes" – American quilt teachers all seem to offer tombola prizes to members of the class chosen at random. I might take tea bags and digestives to offer to my students at Elevenses instead of coffee.

I have to admit that I became rather bored sitting in front of the computer and I kept going off on online tangents, wondering whether to get a coffee pod machine for the workshop and I also ordered myself some new everyday green Doc Martens. I was very disappointed to find that the foreign manufacturers of this iconic British shoe have altered the fit so that my normal size was too big. I even went to a shoe shop in Aberdeen to try a smaller size but found that they were too tight. This means that I will have to carry on wearing my favourite green patent ones even though they are now looking very scruffy.  At the back of my mind I have always wanted to make a quilt that somehow involves Docs...

As a reward for completing my Des Moines paperwork, I pieced a very simple strippy quilt with a few flying geese that should be "absolutely the last ever yurt panel" and I intend to quilt it like 5 Bar Gate. I completed a small African wall hanging and started a mini project using the offcuts from the easy flying geese. I have now jotted down some ideas for new sewing projects. I hate not having something new lined up ready to sew. I am turning over a few ideas for potential show quilts as I haven't seriously done one for quite a while. There may be a rather different wholecloth and possibly a spinoff of Silent Movie Star that could make good use of the exciting collection of Australian fabrics. I have a few other things to fit in first such as taking the Yurt to Perth, North East Open Studio week, a big USA trip and a book draft - but at least I have a plan or two in mind so that I am not at a loose end after all that!