Right here, right now.

So here is what I am up to tonight. Quilt wall? What quilt wall? I am using masking tape and the laminate floor in the back room.

This is a patchwork quilt that I made when I was about 15 or 16. I cut every single hexagon and pieced every single one by hand. It took ages and at night I went to bed dreaming of hexagons.

At the time I didn't know anything about quilting. I'd seen a little wicker basket of hexagons at a house where I did babysitting and thought I'd like to have a go. To finish it off mum made a duvet cover out of a double flat sheet and appliqued the patchwork by hand. I have kept it all that time. It was on my bed at home, then went on the little sofa in our bedroom when we were first married and has more recently been on kiddie's bed.
And finally the time has come to quilt it properly. I really want a snuggly patchwork quilted throw to curl up under during the yucky winter months. So the duvet cover has been dismantled, chopped in half and washed. The patchwork has been repaired and the 1" (!!!) seams on the back of each patch have been trimmed to 1/4". I have just taped each layer to the floor and am starting to pin and then tack the 'sandwich' together.
The question now is - hand or machine quilting? And what pattern? Or do I go in the ditch for speed and ease? Hmm... Think I'm going to have to get the quilting books out for inspiration.

I've also been tinkering with dolls again today (surprise! surprise!). I've painted and sculpted a batch of heads to make Christmas fairies. Tomorrow I'll have a bash at making bodies for them and take some photos to show you.

In the final throws of my mega-clear out I've been flicking through my old sample sketchbooks from machine embroidery C&G. I have a book full of 'surfaces for stitch', where we played with different materials and stitch techniques. Some of these will make fantastic dolls costume pieces. I may take a few pics of pages from this and post them too. It was really exciting to unearth them. I now have that feeling of having too many ideas and not enough hours to do them which usually means I don't achieve very much at all. I flit from one thing to the next. Shout at me to stay focussed pleeeeease. :o)

Right back to the pins.

ttfn
xx

PS Did you see the Peter Kay thing last night? How fantastic was that?!?! lol