Post Christmas

Hello and I hope that Christmas went well and that you had all you wished for.  It is nice to have the break and it's that I look forward to after the build up and the pressure that goes with it.

The car has been repaired and returned to me on Friday, a much better state than when I left it after the accident.  Apart from the slight difference in shade of red  on the bonnet to the rest of the car (being a difficult colour than most to match) it looks really good.  Pleased to get it back after driving in the small hire car.

My daughter Sarah went back home to Bristol the day after Boxing Day and it was lovely to have her staying with us.  We were hoping to stop in Bristol or Bath after leaving her at the Royal Infirmary where she works, but seeing how bad the traffic was and how manic the shops looked in Bristol City centre we decided to give it a miss and head for home taking things at a leisurely pace.  The sales were certainly in full swing!

We also caught up with other relatives, my brother-in-law and his wife.   Alex and family came to see us, during the Xmas break, but with going back to work tomorrow David and I took time out today for him to work on his railway and for me to get sewing again.

As Christmas is over and my sister has her present I can now show what I made her.  A Union Jack cushion from the trimmings of the quilt I made for her birthday back in September

I had a rectangular cushion pattern not a square one, so took a bit of working out to get the proportions of the strips correct, but really pleased how it turned out and Wendy was thrilled with it too.

Alex's girls have played with my door handle cat that "guards" the door to my sewing room.  It had this for some time and asked some time ago if they wanted one, so I made them one each.  Sophie has a stripey one

Isobel has the spotty one

 And here are all three together

I had a little bit of time this week to make a postcard for the last birthday girl this year, Rosemary, who requested Earth.  Being a bit stuck on this one I opted for Earthy tones with a brown background with other earthy fabrics in strips on top, held down with plain brown and variegated brown thread in fancy machine stitches and couched embroidery thread.  I edged with brown metallic thread couched in variegated thread to give a bit of sparkle.  I hope it does speak "earth" to her.

Today I have been working on another hanging back.  The last one to hold calico pieces.  I tried out a block some time ago from a book by Karin Hellaby of Quilters Haven called Pineapple Plus
 so used this as the bag front and bordered it in purple.

 The photo above showed how the block was this morning, I quilted using some fancy machine stitches to take the plainness of the cream fabric.

And above is the completed bag.  So all four bags that I've made have helped towards organising my wardrobe store.

Looking forward to postcard swaps in the coming year, I have signed up to another birthday swap which next year doesn't have the recipient's theme, so the cards they get will be a complete surprise.  I won't take part in as many swaps next year as I did this.  However I did take a bit of time to get my postcard making box organised with pelmet Vilene and fusible web cut to size and printing off "Postcard" and return address labels using T-shirt Transfer Paper.  I have had the transfer paper for a long time (probably more than 10 years) and found to my horror I'm down to the last sheet in the pack - dear me! I'm shocked that I'll have to buy more ;o) !

This is probably the last post for 2012, so wishing the very best for 2013

HAPPY NEW YEAR!