On Having a Mind like a Stone Tumbler

As if I need any more machines or gadgets in my life, after asking for opinions about scanner/cutter machines on Facebook, I ended up buying one from Gillian Travis who thought it would be a great idea but never had time to experiment with it! I have already wasted several hours looking at what it can do on Youtube;) I think it has much potential for a variety of ideas that are trundling around in my head. In fact, I feel as if my mind is rather like one of those stone tumbling machines that churns around the clock until eventually something polished is produced some considerable time later. 

I am on the point of ordering fabric to start on something which is probably not the same something I thought I was going to work on a couple of weeks ago. I have been looking for something substantial to get my teeth into since finishing BzB but a long summer happened in between. Typically, now I have at least 3 projects that I want to work on… I have even cut out 2 blocks for the Elizabeth Hartmann Fancy Forest quilt but I am unsure as to whether I can cope with so many small pieces. I would probably be better off working on a far simpler background project for relaxation. 

Bumble bounced back from her operation to have mammary tumours removed. Far from moping around with a lampshade on for days, she ignored the comfy dog-bed that I prepared and jumped straight up onto the sofa as if her under-carriage had not just been cut open and patchworked back together. She was not totally impressed at having to wear a festival t-shirt out for a walk so the wound site would stay clean. 

Two customer quilts were completed this week using automated quilting. On the Christmas quilt I had to supervise closely so the appliquéd racoons did not get caught up with the quilting foot. The customer wanted allover snowflakes so I had to remove some buttons and bows before I started. The second quilt was a rush job for a student studying aeronautical engineering so clouds and planes seemed like a good idea. 

There are one or two things on my Perpetual To Do list that will be carried on into next week, such as attempting to make a video on couching yarns with a longarm machine and backing up my Mac, well over a year since I last bothered. I sincerely hope I get SOME purposeful sewing done by at least midweek!

Ste Marie aux Mines 2017

I flew into Strasbourg on Tuesday afternoon, found a train into the city centre then decided the easiest option was to hail a taxi to take me to my budget hotel. It was clean and convenient, in the Jewish quarter on Rue de Bitche. I tramped into the old city centre, admired the impressive cathedral and enjoyed a mini carafe of Muscat, watching the world go by from a side-street cafe. I had supper al fresco in the rain at a restaurant with red checked tablecloths and decided to have escargots - I can’t say that the snails were really a delicacy but dunking my bread into their residual herby, garlicky butter was most satisfying. 

I intended to do some sightseeing the next morning, maybe visit the European Parliament but my feet were too sore so I was happy to sit around reading a book until Regina and Maria arrived to collect me and travel on to Ste Marie aux Mines by car. 

This part of Alsace is beautiful and obviously a cross between German and French styles. It had been a mining area but now is mostly populated by elderly people - sadly many of the houses and businesses were up for sale. There were plenty of pots of red geraniums to brighten things up and it was nice to see so many traditional small shops selling bread and local produce. 

Bernina Team GB and Germany took responsibility for setting up the Bernina Q24 longarm machine and the Q20 sit-down model while Team France organised the rest of the booth. After the set-up I travelled to stay with Bernina France on a gîte in Lièpvre. This was actually a large converted farmhouse with several additional cottages to let. We were surrounded by goats, deer, cats and a magnificent cart horse. It was certainly an immersive experience, surrounded by non-English speakers, apart from Christine Escanes www.creativetextilemastery.com whom is cleverly trilingual in English, French and Spanish. My school French was extremely rusty but I did pick some up and understood more as the week went on. It was fun to do some self-catering, the only downside being that we tended to eat late and stay up drinking wine even later;)

The show was busy despite the unseasonably cold, wet weather and we attempted to communicate with all sorts of nationalities - French, Belgian, Dutch, German, Hungarian, Polish, Spanish, Portuguese, Israeli, Korean - in German, English or my dodgy French. There was much mis-use of grammar and plenty of sign language. I mostly asked the visitors, “Vous aimerez à essayer la machine?” and I had a crib sheet for needle, up, down, stitches, free-hand etc. All would be fine until they launched into rapid French with  further questions and I would have to hand over to a French speaker.

There was a terrific selection of traders, many of whom were in market place tents but I only bought small pieces of cork, pleather and natty bag fasteners for some unplanned project or other. 

I did attempt to catch the shuttle bus one day to visit some outlying exhibitions but it did not appear during heavy rain so I gave up. However, I did visit Number 3 which had superb collections by Ian Berry, Luke Haynes, Miriam Pet-Jacobs and Nancy Crow’s Dairy Barn. I was particularly struck by Ian Berry’s incredible artwork www.ianberry.org - an amalgam of photo-realism and denim. In fact, he was staying at the same gîte so we invited him to dinner and had really interesting conversations about art, textiles and the angst of artists. 

On the last night, after the frenzy of packing up, I went to stay in the same family run hotel as Regina and Maria in Tannenkirch, since they were running me back to the airport in the morning. It was at an altitude of 500m in countryside where I am sure there are probably still wolves. We had a lovely quiet last evening, enjoying local wine and Alsace specialities in a little restaurant in the village. 

The Val d”Argent area was attractive, the people were friendly, the food and drink was fantastic, the exhibitions were high calibre, and there were quilt/textile superstars to spot, so I would definitely visit the show again, either as a quilt tourist or exhibitor!

Sylvanian Families Invade My Workshop

It would seem that the habit of putting things off until the last minute could be a family trait. Freya has been meaning to sort and sell her major Sylvanian Family collection for quite some time, probably since she grew out of it around 6 years ago. In the last couple of days of her holiday, when she she should have been packing for her return to Uni, she decided to have a bit of a sort out as they were all jumbled up in boxes. They were all spread out on my workshop table, organised, groomed, tiny pieces relocated, photographed and sold off, apart from some favourites. This was a huge task as the collection was quite record-breaking. By Sunday afternoon she was ready to go so we piled her belongings into the Landy and drove her down to St Andrews to begin 2nd Year in a flat with friends.

Once the Sylvanians took over the workshop, I decided that I would just have to wait until they were all gone before I did any sewing. The only stitching I did all week was to attach binding to the student-sofa quilts. I ran a Landrover taxi/delivery service, amassing stuff for the new Uni term, gathering supplies for Fergus’ forthcoming silver Duke of Edinburgh expedition and stocking the freezer for my trip to Alsace. 

I got all sorts of major and minor jobs done, even printing 195 sheets of fiddle music that I have little hope of playing, having followed Fenella to the Senior section at the Banchory Strathspey and Reel Society. 

At least I jotted down some French phrases that may come in handy next week. I know lots of words but am not good at the verbs that make them into comprehensible sentences.  At least I can introduce my vlog with, “Voici les nouvelles de…” (Here is the news from) or instruct people to “entrainez vous les tourbillons!” (practise the swirls) 

I just have to work out how to get from the airport in Strasbourg to my hotel before being rescued by Regina in her car the following day.

All Systems Go

Hopefully the reorganising bug that I caught seems to have subsided for now after I have rummaged in the depths of my pantry and even hoovered ancient cobwebs. The thing about my clear-outs is that it eventually makes way for more vintage finds and handy gadgets. I should really start my own junk shop… 

BzB arrived back from FOQ so Freya and I inspected BzB for loose thread and fluff before it got sent to MQX. We made a very tentative attempt to block it to remove a slight bulge in the middle bottom that I noticed at FOQ after it had been flipped to show off its backside a few times. Realistically, it is impossible to block a quilt that should not get wet in case its colours run so all we could do was measure, pin and dampen the binding. As a thank you for her patience, I made Freya a cushion from a woolly jumper that I had accidentally washed too hot. I had to empty 2 silly triangular feather cushions to make a sensible square inner-pad so it looked like I had been plucking chooks for the pot outside my workshop!

Much to Freya’s chagrin, I determined that “we” would conquer the setup of Bernina Qmatic - she was just there for moral support while I figured out what to connect. It was hugely exciting to switch it all on for the first time and see if it worked. Fortunately, it was all systems go with lots to learn. It is quite different to the APQS Quilt Path. It is like switching between Windows and Mac - both equally powerful but different to operate. The Art and Stitch software looks challenging but it will enable me to have a go at proper digitising. I will have to schedule learning time for the new system and software. I spent an entire day just testing out the basic features and stitched out a few designs.

As a reward for all of Freya’s help this week I decided to use the large Qmatic sample from FOQ to make a couple of throws for her student flat. It was simply a quilt sandwich with lots of example stitch-outs so I added wavy cross-hatching to fill up the gaps. There was a spare piece that I cut off and Bumble seems to have decided that she would like to use it while she is in the workshop, mostly sleeping, because she does not find quilting the least bit interesting.

The only actual sewing I did all week was some mundane mending! I was all set to work on some ideas for future quilts, knowing that I had efficiently filed a document on my laptop. However, despite a lengthy search I discovered that it had completely disappeared. I was lucky that at least some of the ideas were in scribble form in my notebook. As usual, I am not short of ideas but I need to decide which ones might actually work;) 

Meanwhile I have a packed week ahead to get ready for my trip to France, sending Freya back to Uni, and organising the other 2 kids during my absence.