Stack of loafs

I've tried out my machine a bit more today. Only had time to test it a bit on Saturday evening since I have been working all weekend. It is a brilliant machine! I even tried the freehand quilting for the first time ever on a pot holder I've been meaning to finish for ages. It is wonky and all but it was great fun to try it out and I can well see myself quilting away on bigger things as well.

For now here is a picture of my little loafs. Great fun to make and I plan to sell a few at my hairdressers once I take my necklaces down. Wouldn't you buy one if they were all jumbled up in a nice wide bowl?

Gobsmacked...

THIS is what Santa thought I should have this year for Christmas......

 Can I just say that I love my wonderful, quite incredible husband James who organized this and that I will forever be showering him with kisses! Loves you!

Merry Christmas!

It is the night before Christmas. Everything is done, food is prepared and sitting in the fridge ready for the oven tomorrow. The house is clean and tree is dressed. Sitting with a nice cuppa and just enjoying the night.
I hope you all have a very merry and bright Christmas!

Bits and bobs..

We went to Rosie and Fredrik today for our pre Christmas dinner and pressie swap. It was fun as usual and the presents were really nice. We got some saffron buns and gingerbread mooses in a nice tin set and a gingerbread house covered and stuffed with sweets! It is all edible! Lovely

We also made these;

It was really fun and a good laugh sitting sewing, even the guys managed to sew some hearts and stars. The star is my new pincushion and the hearts I was thinking about giving to my mum and sister. I am making more as well since they were easy and fun to do. We got plenty of stuffing and material left so will make a few to hang in our tree as well.

I am still wide awake from the wonderful coffee Fredrik made to keep us going. So I might just go and sew a bit

Twinkle little star

Today was a really snowy day, a perfect day to go get our tree. We had a bit of help from my mum with getting the tree back with us since our new car is rather small and we don't have a roof rack yet. I've taken a picture of it but it came out all very very dark and fuzzy so will try and take a better one tomorrow. It is lovely our tree, big but lovely. It did fit. After a bit of pruning.

I've made a bit of progress on one of the quilts but it is slow because of everything else going on for Christmas. But got some stars with the white done and the stripes are in place. There will be an outer border as well with a pin wheel corner. I like how it looks, but wish I had a design wall to hang it on instead of laying it on the floor where it really cant stay.

Santas little helper

Yes that is what I feel like. I've made orange marmalade flavoured with vanilla and cognac, a whole lot of bisqotti, both saffron and chocolate/orange. I've also made some chocolate crispy treats and some rocky road sweets. Tomorrow I am doing some dark chocolate truffles and then I think I am set for our pre Christmas dinner with Rosie and Fredrik.  We sort of decided that we were going to make presents for each other this year. Then we decided that we also could buy some. For the home made part I'm doing foodie stuff and possibly some small purses tomorrow if there is time left and the bought part includes some cool tea strainers and a little very cool looking gadget to help you use ordinary candles in tea light candle holders.

Tomorrow is also tree day! That is my favourite thing to do before Christmas, to dress the tree. As per usual we will get a too big a tree just because we think it will fit and no there is no need to measure it, it will fit. Every year. But does it fit? Does is heck...lol

Im sorry but I cat stop laughing!

Marmalade

Today I walked into town and visited our big shopping mall Kupolen and did some Christmas shopping for US. I now only have to wait and see if the internet orders will come in time and then I am DONE! Oh, I got to make a flower basket for my mum but that's not a shore, that is just pure fun.

Besides the shopping this year I am making some Christmas presents as well. At the moment I am cooking some orange marmalade with a bit of lemon in it. A tip, don't cut lemons when you have skin cracks.... Ouch!
I am also going to make saffron biscotti and some Christmas sweets. But they are all fun so no stress there at least. If I'll have the time I will sew something as well to give away. But at the moment something cooked or baked is a better option for me. I just love baking!

Time goes by oh so quickly...

So, it is Friday.
Just two more weeks and it is Christmas. It is a lovely time of year, its even snowed. So why am I getting a cold sweat?? Could it be because I have not done my Christmas shopping yet? Or is it the fact that we are going to have Christmas dinner here at our house again that is making me quiver.  Or is it that my mum is asking me constantly if I have done HER Christmas shopping list yet?
I am ready to pull my hair out and am asking why I do this every single Christmas knowing how it was the year before! But no, this is the last time, the last straw, the bloody last drop! I AM NOT DOING THIS AGAIN!!
So please, if I mention next year that I am doing Christmas shopping for anybody else then me and Jamie, give me a wake up slap and a kick up my a... and teach me to say NO! Because at the moment I am thinking that dear old Scrooge had the right idea. Bah HUMBUG!!!

Sewing...pffff!

So much for my best laid plans of getting lots of sewing done over the weekend. On Friday I got company for the best part of the day from a friend from work which was fun though. We talked a lot and drank lots of tea and we made a vegetable pie for dinner and talked some more.

On Saturday I woke up late and the sewing just didn't happen. I was getting stuck and just didn't have my heart in it so I made a border and 4 pin wheels for the corners and started doing the striped bit. But.... just couldn't get going on it so I decided to leave it alone for a while.

So today I would get lots done you think, but today was Christmas market in Falun. I went there with my mum and we had a good look around and I bought a very nice shawl, among other things, which I am sitting with wrapped around me now keeping me nice and warm. It is always interesting to go to this market and see what nutty or fun things people come up with. I've had a stall at the market twice selling my necklaces, it was fun, a bit stressful but most of all, it was cold! I might go there again just have to decide what craft to be selling since I do tend to try so many out. Necklaces are fun to make but so is quilting.

Brrrrrr...

It is cold out there!
I just had a look and it said -20! It was a bit magical coming home tonight from work though. There were some hanging frost in the air and the cars headlights showed up as pillars of light going up in the sky in the distance because of the frost. Can't believe though how fast some people drive when there is so evidently a thin sheet of ice on the road because of the cold, you could see it glitter in the headlights but still people were blasting past.

Planning to sew

This weekend I am planning to get a lot of sewing done on the two heart quilts. I am off to buy some fabric tomorrow or on Friday and then I am just going to sew and sew and sew and have a break for the Christmas Market in Falun on Sunday. I got this vision in my head how I am going to finish the quilts off. Got to put some details down on paper though as well I think. Tricky bit is getting the size right for the other blocks. Will make some of my scraps and calculate if it is the right sizes before cutting into the nice fabric I think.

Second heart

The second heart is now done. Just got to figure out how to finish the quilts off with the smaller stars and pin wheels now. But that will be fun!

Arrrgghhhh!

How difficult can it be to find someone who actually has THIS ruler in stock!!!!!! So far I've tried 12 sites and either they don't stock that specific ruler or they are out of stock.... I would love to have it for the quilt I am making for our bed since I wanted to have a flying geese border . And also for a future quilt I want to make with different sized flying geese.

Just got to keep on looking, sigh...

Snowstorm update

Yes there has been a snowstorm, we just caught the outer edge of it but that was bad enough. Very windy with horizontal snow and drifts on the roads. To top it off the temperature is now plummeting!

Nah, seriously it's not that bad. I would say its normal winter temperatures out there, about -7 at the moment with it going down to maybe -13 tonight. Still a bit of snow being blown about but generally clearing up and giving us a bit of sunshine before the sun sets.

I am off to work soon, we are going to have a customer evening from 4 o'clock until we close with lots of low prices and bargains. We are expecting lots of people and general madness is to ensue. But at the same time it is lots of fun when there is a buzz about the shop. Actually looking forward to go to work today, have you ever heard anything like that from me???

Well it also helps that our new boss D has finally told Mr B off for behaving like a shit. So now Mr B is doing his job and not hassling everyone else what they should be doing and that they are doing it wrong, he is actually not talking a lot at all. It is such a change from how it has been at our place I still can't believe it. It is bliss as long as it stays like this. So lets keep our fingers crossed that it has finally hit home for Mr B that he cant go around being a shit without some consequences.

Weekend update

We had our good friends Rosie and Fredrik over yesterday for dinner. We sometimes cook dinner together and have a lovely time doing it and then just keep on talking until late in the night. Yesterday we made pasties with three different fillings and later on we had a English afternoon tea with home baked scones, clotted cream and strawberry jam. Oh the scones very to kill for fresh from the oven with butter melting on them.

Today we went for a long walk in the snow and had pizza with the left over pastie fillings as topping plus a bit more cheese. They turned out very yummie. For dessert I made a saffron cake with raisins.

If you want to try it out here is the recipe:
200g butter or margarine
1 sachet of saffron, 0,5 g
2 eggs
2dl sugar
1½ dl milk
4 dl flour
 raisins
2 teaspoons of baking powder
Grease a spring tin about 24 cm in diameter
Melt the butter and leave to cool a bit.
Grind the saffron in a mortar together with a sugar cube.
Whisk eggs and sugar until nice and fluffy. Add saffron, melted butter and milk. Mix the baking powder with the flower and add to the mixture add a few raisins if you like. Stir gently to mix it all together. Pour into tin and bake for about 45 minutes at 175 degrees Celsius. Dust with some icing sugar before serving

I managed to do some sewing today as well and have finished the top part of the second heart and are halfway done with the bottom part. But all the strips are sewed and ready to be cut into the right sizes.

This is how it looks like. I really like how these are turning out but then comes the hard bit, deciding on how to finish them off and figuring out the size of the blocks that will go around it. But I am looking forward to it all.  I must be insane!

Outing

Yes we went to Stockholm today for a day out and about shopping! In the end it wasn't much shopping, just a new winter hat and gloves for me and a few necessities from the English Shop. Oh also a stop in one of the food halls for some lovely dried fruit and huge raisins and just a wander to have a look at all the different food available was quite what we needed. But being tired from the weeks work we should have done this tomorrow we realised coming back and falling asleep on the train.

One finished

Here is the first heart finished. I am in the process of cutting the strips for the second one but had to quit for tonight, all too tired to be using a rotary cutter..

I am very pleased and relived  that Selma liked her heart and am now a bit anxious that Ajla will like hers too once hers is done. I have already started sewing the top bit of her heart because I wanted to see how her colour choice looked together. I likes it a lot, but will she....

Monday....

Oh how I don't like working weekends! And still I have to work every other one.. But thankfully with my new schedule I only work mornings in the weekend which leaves me with the afternoons to do what ever I please with.  Which isn't much since I am quite tired from  the week before. But now I only have 3 days to work before my long weekend off!

Not done much quilting because I've been too tired after cooking and walking and washing and everything else you have to do besides quilting but got one heart almost done. Just got half of the middle section to do and then its pressing and sewing together time! And on to the next heart. They are so much fun to do and very colourful, just the way I like it!

Heart

So far so good and things are matching up beautifully. Top part of the first Bargello heart almost complete

Apples were needed since I haven't pressed it yet and the corners roll a bit because of the small squares...

Snow anybody?

Yes it did snow but not as much as they were saying it would. Just a gentle 5-7 cm which is fine. I don't really like to drive when there has come loads and they cant keep up cleaning the roads from it.

I am wondering if I am perky enough to go upstairs and sew a bit or if I am too tired from work, long day today 7.30-18.00, to do anything else then read blogs and comments on Facebook. Hmmmm, dunno really because I don't want to sew a lot of wonky seams that I will just get annoyed by and unpick in the morning but I want to do something! Might go and have a look at what I've done so far and take piccies for you to see? Yes that is what I will do!

The more it snows a tiddly pom....

Yes it is snowing here and according to the weather forecast they are saying 15 cm of new snow this evening and tonight, combine that with hard wind and I am glad I am at home and don't need to go out driving anywhere at the moment. It will be one of the joys of tomorrow to drive to work.... if I can dig the car out of course.

At the moment I am having a little break from sewing strips together for the bargello heart. Am making a lovely smelling meat stew with carrots and parsnips. Going to make home made potatoe mash and cook some sprouts to go with it and then back to sewing!

Colours....

I went shopping fabric today with my client. I just love this bit of quilting, choosing what colours to use and all the variations you can do and just stroke and pat the fabric is nice as well..... well you know what I mean.
Anyway this is what we decided on:
This is for the older girl Selma.

And this is for the younger girl Ajla

They both wanted lilacs and black but Selma could consider gold as well and Ajla wanted white in hers as well. These are now going to be turned into Bargello Hearts and then have different borders. Ajlas will have bigger stars and stripes as a finish. Selma wanted smaller stars and pin wheels but no stripes.  I cant wait to cut into these so better be going!

Ouch!

I finished off the table runner today hand stitching the binding in place and my left index finger is now very sore! I just cannot get used to a thimble! I always feel like it is in the way and I haven't found any replacement for it so I usually do it without anything to protect my finger and now it is all red and sore. But the table runner is ready and going to its new owner tomorrow!

 This is before I started sewing the binding hence the pin marks. I really really like this pattern and might do a quilt in a variation of it someday. But not now, got too much going on anyway, not to mention work is getting a bit hectic.

Some progress

Handbag is done. Don't know if its just the fabric but it looks a bit odd... And that white so called piping is just horrible, but it is my first attempt at something like that. Didn't really know how to get that one nice and not so twisted. But there you go. First proper handbag done, with zipped inner pocket and nice zip across the top as well.

And this is a bit of progress on my mums bead spread. One star done, two more to go

I've also been for my first 'consultation' with a client..... We did decide on what kind of pattern and colours the girls wanted for their quilts. Next Tuesday we are going to look for fabric and then its just for me to get started! I got an additional request to make a a table runner like the one I made for our table but slightly longer. So from now on  I will be quite busy me thinks!

Lookie!

There is a give away button on the sidebar, if you like to enter click on it and you'll come to Sweet Bee Buzzings where Bethany is having a give away of very nice sewing AND  knitting stuff.

Leaves, apples and sunshine

Yes it was a perfect day to rake up some leaves and take our huge surplus of apples to the tip. Our biggest apple tree has gone nuts this year and is still half full of apples and still we took the car full of the fallen ones to the tip today. But am feeling all he hard work now tonight. Still, it feels good to have it done since they are predicting snow tomorrow and later on in the week.

Not much sewing going on. But I finished the handbag we started on the course pictures later on. Got to get cracking on all my other projects. My mum wants a bead spread, thankfully only for a single bed but still. But that one will be fun to do.

Old times...

I've been sussing out how to get my archived posts to show in this fancy year by year list I've seen other people have and finally figured it out! So now you can all read about me from my early days in blogging. Can't believe though I've been blogging since 2002!

I have actually been reading a few of my old posts and are quite gobbsmacked  about how I wrote then and how I write now. I was much funnier before! Now I just feel old and boring when writing.... sigh

I must be crazy

I've been asked to make two big quilts. I don't know yet how big she wants me to make them but it seems it will be blanket size. I said they cost a lot in material and that I would take an amount for making them but it wasn't a problem. Money is not an issue......

You might wonder if I agreed to make them.

I did.

On a roll again!

I couldn't stop myself so I made 2 more smaller pillowcases.

Got one more small square one to do but that will have to wait until tomorrow. I want to make one with circles but I got to find the little tutorial for them again in my blogroll!

New look

I was getting tired of the pillows we have in the sofa so i fiddled a bit and came up with these

They are not exactly the same due to a cutting error on my part but I like them all the same. Now I just have to come up with something to match for my 3 smaller pillows. I like this!

To bag or not to bag

Today was my quilting course and we did sew a bit more of the handbag. But now when we are going to join the pieces together I think the pattern is a bit silly thinking about how I have been seeing and reading about how to do other handbags. I might actually try and do it differently and if it doesn't work out I'll rip it and do it like the pattern says.

It was the last time of my quilting course as well for this time. We might start up again in November if there are enough people interested . At the moment it is only Mette and me that are interested to continue. A course for two seems a bit silly to me so hopefully there will be others as well. If you are a group you get to see lots of other projects as well and get inspired to do something new.

Now I am off to bed, got an early start tomorrow and a long shift. But it is only a week left now until we go to England and London for a long weekend!

Weekend over! Yay!

Yes I have worked this weekend but it wasn't too bad since I got to work with one of  my favorite persons to work with! It does go so much quicker if you can have a laugh or two while working doesn't it?

I have also been for a quick walk which went very well, not feeling so fatigued like I have been doing the last couple of weeks after walks and general work. The cough seems to be getting better even though it is a bit stubborn yet but much better then last week.

I haven't been sewing much at home, haven't had time or energy for it. I am going to do some buttonholes on the bag we are making at the course though so it is ready for the next step. Will show you it when I have put the pocket lids on so you can see a bit better what I am doing. It is quite a square bag but we likes is!

I also have an idea for how to finish off our new bedspread I am doing. I will use the lighter shades of brown and yellow as fillers and have a a striped border around the center piece. Just got some measurements to figure out in inches instead of cm.... You know these inches are troublesome sometimes when you are used to cm!

October

So today is first of October. It was -5 this morning and now everything has gone in the garden. I will clear it out this weekend after work. All my lovely dahlias went yesterday so they will be dug out of of the ground tomorrow. Got to remember to mark them so I know which colour they are for next year.
The last water butt can be emptied as well, there was a thin sheet of ice on it this morning when I had a look.

I like autumn in general but at the moment I'm a bit meh about everything it seems. I think it has to do with work and that I don't enjoy it as much as I did before. I even had a look at what others jobs are available this morning and there weren't much there that I could apply for. But I will probably send out letters asking for vacancies in places I would like to work. I got to do something different!

Wish me luck!

Cute as a button!

I had to try this one out and look! It is soooo cute I just want to snuggle it!

It's only about 9x4 cm big and got a very nice lining. I can see these made as Christmas presents!

I had to make it this small because my zipper was very short.. But glad I did. It is absolutely doable even though slightly fiddly when doing the corners.

I'm in love with it....!

Meh....

Do you have days when you really really REALLY are tired of your job? Well today was my turn to absolutely hate my job and wonder why I keep at it. First of all the nice flower section I had made before the weekend with the outdoor plants had been messed with during the weekend and looked really really pathetic all because the buckets with rose bouquet  were obscuring some fresh herbs! So instead of moving the buckets over a bit they decided to wreck the whole set up. I was really upset and irritated when I understood why they had done it. It was just a TAD overkill in my opinion! The day just really went downhill from there and got topped off with a super idiot of a customer throwing a tantrum because he wasn't allowed to mix different plastic bags for the super saver special offer we had on ONE kind of bags. He literately threw the boxes at me and demanded a refund indicating I was stupid when mentioning that it was just the one brand of plastic bags that were in the offer. With the new Bosses rules we have to deal with it with a smile and say yes please and just take the abuse.
It is sometimes a very hard pill to swallow but I did it with a fake smile and said yes of course I'll refund these for you. Thinking all the time you idiot you idiot....

Joy of joys working in a supermarket sometimes.

Couldn't help myself

Look what I've found at the market today!

Lovely full width 50cm pieces of fabric, 4 for a 100 kr is a bargain I can tell you. I just love the cute chickens and pigs. And I also go to know about a new fabric shop quite close by as well. Will go there one day and have a look.
It was very cold walking around the market but I got some lovely cheese, home made bread, a new soft shell coat, lovely big carrots and beetroot grown locally and I got to pick a Christmas present! Which I will have forgotten about in December anyway. Now I am going to continue hand quilt that monster of a bedspread I am making for a friend. I'll just hand quilt the middle section since it wouldn't fit in my machine to do it all so I'll do the outer borders with my sewing machine or I might actually do some hand quilting there as well. I like how it is looking at the moment. It's nothing special, just tracing the flowers in the print but I like the look of it all the same.

Local Market

We are going to a local market today. It is held in a little village just outside Borlänge called Solvarbo. I didn't think the weather would improve but it is looking a bit hopeful this morning that we at least wont have any rain. It is a very good little market with all sorts of stalls and not the usual suspects(socks,clothes and sweets) And they usually have a very good craft section where people sell what they've made.

Fingers crossed it wont rain!

Progress

Hmmm, I do not trust the weathermen any more. They said rain and lousy weather for today and nice for tomorrow but now it seems it is okish and warm today and really rainy and horrible tomorrow! So I went out in the garden today and did a bit of tidying up. I turned two veg plots over as well. It is weirdly satisfying doing that and getting rid of the weeds and mulling in some compost. Preparing for next year is always fun. Started to plan what we are going to grow next year as well.

My mum came by and kept on asking what she could do so I made her plant all the tulip bulbs I bought and rake up all the apples from the lawn and still she kept on asking what she could do next! She has a lot more energy then me and she just turned 70! Well usually I do have energy as well but this cough bug I got in Stockholm wont leave me alone. I had to quit after digging two plots simply because I was too tired, that is unheard of for me! Well I took the hint and left mum outside looking for some planks in the shed by herself and went in to take care of the swedes and beans I picked. When mum left I went upstairs and started sewing instead since gardening seemed to be out of the question.

And this is how far the bedspread has come for now.

But now I'm in a bit of a pickle. You see the fabric came from a fat quarter stack and I've almost used up all the lovely dark brown pieces and still got quite a wide border to do around the center piece so what do I do?

It is the weekend it is the weekend it is the weekend!

Well it is weekend for me at least. I do have a lovely schedule every other week when I only need to work Monday, Wednesday and Thursday. To top it off  they have promised crap weather tomorrow but good for the rest of the weekend so can do lots of sewing tomorrow and do the gardening the others days when Jamie can help me!

It is almost too perfect.....

In other news
I've left the Christmas tree rugs for a while and am making good progress on our new bedspread. Only thing is that I wont have enough dark brow fabric to finish it off. I will have to make inquiries to the shop in England where I bought the fat quarter stack and see if they still have some of them in stock and buy a few yards of it. Since it being my birthday soon I might get something else as well since the postage is a flatrate once you get over a certain amount of gods purchased which I'm quite sure I will do quite quickly...
Hmm so what will I get...

Sorted!

Thank Gods for teachers who will reassure you that No it isn't a total disaster and Just do like this and it will be fine. The nice but horribly bubbly Christmas rug is now quilted and looking very... flat actually. The other one will just stay as it is with a nice trimming after I quilt it. No point in getting in a mess about the colours, just live with them and remember for the next time you do a similar pattern what colours and patterns worked and which ones didn't. Contrast people, think contrast!

It was all frosty this morning. It seems most of my flowers coped with this first frost since it was just a light one. I haven't had time to look at my vegetables but presumably my squash has gone straight away being very fussy about temperatures . The cabbages should cope slightly better. I'll have a proper look tomorrow when it is lighter. It was already getting dark when I got home from work this evening. There is no doubt, autumn is about to come around.

Not. Pleased. At. All !

Remember I said I was doing some Christmas tree rugs? Well I am and they are not coming out like I want them to! The first one looks really nice colour wise but is so wonky  I really don't know what to do with it!

 Just look at that center star all bubbly and not AT ALL FLAT!

The other one really doesn't work because of the fabrics I chose but it is a perfectly flat and nice looking center star!

Sigh....

At least the table runner came out looking really really good after the quilting and binding was put on.

I think I will go to Falun tomorrow and show Marina what has happened to the rugs and maybe she will know how to rescue the nice one at least. I am almost crying because of the spoilt fabrics! I suppose if worse came to worse I could always rip it and start over changing some of the fabrics but that would be the very last option since it is cut on the bias.. I can see it now, an even worse wonky star...

Christmas...?

I've been playing around with a pattern I saw at the course last week. This is how it ended up. It needs quilting and binding still but it looks pretty already.

It should have been lovely!

But it was just cough cough cough all weekend. We were set for a lovely weekend away in Stockholm with Jamie and Fredrik running the Stockholm half marathon while me and Rosie cheering them on. We went down on Friday morning and by Friday evening I had a fever and really poorly stomach so went to the hotel early after a pub dinner and just got in bed and tried not to shiver too much. I had to stay in while they went out for the race. But after a nap I went out to the halfway marker and cheered them on for a bit. It was a lovely warm day and I didn't need to walk that far since the hotel was along the race route. Felt better that evening so we had a lovely late dinner at the hotel restaurant . Yesterday I really thought I was doing better but after half the day I wished for an earlier train to get back home but we took it easy so it wasn't too bad in the end. I phoned in sick this morning though since the cough is getting worse just hope it will get better soon. My new boss seems to have got the same bug since he was going home when I got hold of him this morning.

I'll leave you with a few pictures from the race. First is Fredrik going out on the second half of the race.

The second one is of Jamie (in the lime green vest) coming round from the second half towards the finish. He liked the picture because of all the different face expressions on the other runners.

Buzzing head

I got loads of ideas tonight what to be doing next. Plus my eye caught this fabric in a corner of the shelf

Excuse my drooling...
This will be turned into a handbag that Marina showed us this evening. A squareish bag with two pleated pockets on the front.

At the moment I am doing my Christmas tree mat and got to use most of my fabric I had with me. I've opted for the red/green/gold colour scheme and since this pattern will give you two I will give one to my mum for Christmas. Pictures later when I've finished sewing all the strips together.

I got pictures of my lattice bag even though it's not completed but you get the idea. Jamie acted bag holder for me

And the other side

Soon ready to take all my goodies with me to the course

Quilting course

Tomorrow I am starting my quilting course again after the summer break. Can't wait to get there and see what new and exciting things Marina has done during the summer to inspire us!

I've been making a handbag during the summer when I've had time to keep all my stuff in when going to the course and I must say my English wasn't really ready for all the technical terms in sewing instructions. I don't know how many times I've read and re read the instructions in the magazine so I would get it right and not do something silly with the lovely fabric. It's called a lattice bag and I'll take a picture tomorrow to show you how far I've come. I think all that is left to do is to topstitch around the edges and sew the handles together at the top. Oh and find a nice big button. Not a gumdrop button but a button of some kind... :)

Poin curse

Yes it is a poin curse as I told Jamie... Sometimes I wonder how my mind works. But of course it is a Coin Purse that I've made from a tutorial by Bethany. I said either there be pictures of a finished purse or there would be cursing. Well it looks alright so there are pictures but there were some cursing when it got tight to put the zipper on. But I at least managed to remember to keep the zipper unzipped before sewing it all together... I made it slightly smaller as well since the zipper I had at home was very short and I wanted to make one today and the Haberdashery shop (just love that word) is closed by now. Even though I could have used a bigger zipper I thought that was a bit of overkill when seeing how chunky it was. Maybe for something else.

A very nice black fabric with silver lines and a crisp white on white lining. Me likes!

Autumn?

Yes, it is looking that way. Temperatures are dropping and is around +7 at night with night frosts in the north of the county. Not any frosts here yet though, thankfully. I still have veg in the garden that needs a bit longer before they are ready! All spuds are out of the ground though and are drying in our storage, going to turn them tomorrow and see if they need a bit longer before putting them in boxes for winter storage in our cellar.

Not so much quilting done for a while. But the quilting course I'm going to is starting up again so will get much more done soon. I would like to make a Christmas tree rug that Marina (teacher) showed us last spring. They made that one at the course previous to the one I joined. It's a big star in all kinds of colours. I have been buying nice Christmas fabrics when I've found some with this in mind. Still can't decide though if I'm doing it red/white/green, red/green/gold or white/blue/silver.... Got to think a bit more about that. I've been getting fabric in all those colours though, just in case you know.
I still have a very pathetic stash since I've really just started collecting quilting fabric. I got loads of other fabric though in my closet! Mainly for curtains and just because the fabric was too nice to walk by without buying a meter or two. Can never have enough fabric...

Cracking cheese Gromit!

I wonder, how many types of cheese do you have in your fridge at the moment?

Me myself have, lets see, Gouda, Edam, spicy seed cheese, oil marinated soft cheese, goats cheese, greek feta cheese in 2 varieties, locally made Brie, parmesan and your bog standard squeeze tube cheese(delicious on sandwiches).

I just wondered because me and my mum went to the local market today and they had an international food market in the square so that is where I got the Gouda and goats cheese from and realized when I got home and put the new cheeses in the fridge that there already were quite a few in there!

Rain rain rain rain rain rain rain rain

Yes, it is raining.



We went to my sisters today to finish off the wallpapering in her upstairs sitting room and painting the last wall in her stairwell. We've been very busy since Monday but now it is done! Or so we thought. Sister did mention yesterday that it would be nice as well if we painted the actual staircase as well since it is in horrid yellow pine which makes me cringe and isn't my sisters favourite either by the looks of it. So tomorrow we are going back to start sanding it so we can paint it in a light grey. But I don't mind, sister pays me to do all this and she is truly generous since she doesn't have to do it all herself. I still have a few days of my holiday left so why not. Besides it is always nice to visit sister and her bf. We get very nice meals as well.... if we ask politely...

Bread

I am baking a bit of bread today. I've found a most excellent Swedish book about bread making which contains really really nice recipes. What is a bit annoying is that there are some typos in the ingridients list which makes for some very runny dough or very hard dough depending on what they've missed. First time I found out one of the recipes was a bit odd was when I had added half the stated amount of flour and the dough was made alread. You know, the stage when it's gone all nice and soft and has just the right texture and there I was trying to figure out how to put the rest of the flour in. I didnt in the end otherwise it wouldn't have been bread, it would have been brick.

Well the bread I'm making today is called Pain Polka and here it was the amount of liquid that was wrong. I didn't twig either when I read 9dl of water to only 1,4 l of flour. That is way to little flour. Oh well I compensated with adding more flour and now have 2 HUGE round breads cooling on the rail rather then 2 medium sized round bread... Ho hum, the more for Jamie to eat and I am pretty sure he won't complain one bit!

I made a note on the page about the blunder and will try it out with 4 dl of water with the 1 dl of sour cream instead of 8+1.

A Very Good Day

That is what today has been. I have finished my mums overnight bag she asked for earlier. I am making a move on a HUGE bedspread I foolishly promised to make for a friend. I cant see that I will ever manage to quilt it in my machine though. So option two is hand quilt it, which come to think of it might be worse!

Besides finishing the little bag I made  three 6 inch squares of crazy quilt. I've always wanted to try it out and see what its like. And I can tell you, it is very addictive!

Here are some pictures of them all. Jamie very kindly helped me pin the side panels on the BIG beadspread while he was watching the english football premier on telly so he got caught on camera.

The little overnightbag for mum. I made a pocket in this one as well. Me likes to make pockets I think...

And finally my little attempt at crazy quilting. It was so fun I could have used ALL my scraps up if I would have had enough fusible web.

Oh I almost forgot

This is what I have been doing today. My mum wanted me to make a small handbag for a friends grand daughter who just have turned 4 years old. All that is missing is a nice big button for the clasp. I enjoyed doing this one even though I haven't done many handbags, it is 8 inches square so maybe a good size for a little missy? I even made a little pocket inside!

Look what I've found!

Yes this is my very first quilt, still not completed because what doesn't show in this picture is how bubbly it is and not really matching up. So when I had put on the outer border I stashed it away wondering what to do with it. I pulled it out this morning when I was going through my closet where I have all my material and thought I might actually finish it. Since it being sooooo very bubbly I think I might give hand quilting a go rather then try and machine quilt it on my old machine which will probably make it worse. Maybe a wash and stretch while still damp might help crease out some of it but I am doubtful.

Garden looking good

I promised some pictures and since the sun decided to shine almost all day today even though they said it wouldnt i went out  and took some pictures.

This one is of the front side of the new deck with roses and dahlias. I love my pots this year, Zinnias in a dark pink and mums double petunias. Lovely!

This is our vegetable garden showing how well it is doing at the moment with house and new deck

We are growing runner beans along those poles since we didn't manage to fill the bed with flowers i thought it could be nice with some climbing plant and decided on runner beans and some lilac French beans that really have a nice deep lilac coloured flower. The beans themselves are deep lilac but turn green after boiling.

This is our new project along the hedge towards our street. Just a shady spot for various shade lovers. Plan is to do a little wooden pier instead of a grass walkway between the house and hedge. I got a picture in my head you see where ferns and grasses grow over the boards and there are larger bushes to make it a bit like a mini woodland. Am not sure what to do closest to the house though, it has to be something that can manage without extra water so we don't need to water close to the house

Bye bye baby... car

Yes, our Volvo decided to give up and make some loud noise and rattle since it wasn't happy. After a trip to the garage were it really got its death sentence (needs new exhaust, new hand break, and new rear breaks) we decided not to fix it since it is getting old and went hunting for a newish car. We had a little look around but I knew that i wanted a Toyota if possible as our next car. So after test driving a nice little Toyota Auris twice we decided to go ahead and buy it. Next Thursday we're collecting it and leaving our old car in, I am still amazed we got as much as we did for our sorry little car. Btw the Toyota dealers were very good and I'm impressed with their customer service. Didn't have such a good experience from the Volvo dealers and garage I might add.... I will post a picture of it when we get it.

It has been a bit of a stressful start of the week with the car surprisingly breaking. But even with that its been a good week with Jamie's parents visiting. Today we took it easy and cleaned a bit, I even washed all the windows! After a short walk this evening we picked our gooseberries, raspberries and black currants. It's just not possible to do it during the day when all the wasps are about, it is a really bad wasp year here. Just got to wait for the night frosts to come and kill a few off. But hopefully the frosts keep off for at least a month!

All the berries are now cleaned and either frozen or in the fridge waiting to be turned into jam and marmalade tomorrow. All other veg is really growing now when it's turned slightly cooler and is raining more. I am growing 5 different kind of spuds this year and they all taste really nice. The early ones are suffering from some sort of mould on the leaves though so will be eaten first and quickly. The others are keeping better but then they are winter storage ones. This year I am growing Maria and Princess which are early, Amandine which is medium late but keeps very well for winter as well and Asterix and Sava for winter keeping. Dont know if I will do the early ones again though.
Other veg that is groing well now is red and white cabbage, all my squash are setting fruit like crazy, onions are soon ready for harvest, they are really bulking up! Got to remember what kind they are and get the same ones for next year, am very impressed with the sizes I am getting. The carrots are doing well, I am weeding them out by pulling the biggest ones up for eating now. Don't know if we will get any sprouts, they look awfully tiny but I am hopefull. The swedes are starting to look like they actually are there under the soil and not just a bunch of leaves. Just picked a small 2 person portion of sugar snap peas today, they are really lovely to eat raw so the portion got slightly smaller before they got boiled and bagged away in the freezer. All my beans are looking much happier now with more and more flowers showing, I think it must be all the rain and the extra watering that Jamies dad did while trying out the best way of emptying a waterbutt by the far corner of our house using a siphon. It still works!

3 more days

Then it is vacation!!

And I can't wait! It has been very slow and boring at work and actually quite depressing. Makes you wonder what the news will be when I come back in late august....

Never mind that though. Got 4 wonderful weeks of doing whatever I want ahead! And that is something to celebrate. So if you excuse me I'm off!

Cant help myself....

I know I know, I was doing my starry bedspread but I thought I'd cut in with a quick and fun little jelly roll project, and I just love how it is coming together.. I used some Bali pops called Strawberry fields. I tried to coordinate the colours a bit when sewing them together but then for the final layout I put all squares in a big pile and just pulled them out randomly and tried to make sure they were evenly laid out. I managed to sew most of them together before going to work. I will finish it off tomorrow and decide how to quilt it.

Early bird..

One most definite thing I don't like about summer is my grass allergy. It is in full swing and I didn't have any spray at home so woke up EARLY (like 3.30) with a completely stuffed and runny nose and couldn't get back to sleep. So I got up and watched a bit of TV before heading off into Farmville land. Me a Facebook junkie? Wouldn't have thought it but yes I am hooked!

New project

So this is what I'm up to at the moment quilting wise. It is slow going though. I don't like too much repetetive work at once so I do a few stars and then have to do something else for a while as not to loose interest. I am going to edge the stars with beige fabric in maybe two different tones. And then sew them together with a strip in between. Haven't decided yet if I'm going with the white I have in the stars or if I am going to do something more colorful. Tempted to sew some flying geese as a border around it all, just have to see how the finished size will be before deciding on that.

Gardening is coming along nicely. It just needs watering and some sporadic weeding now untill harvest time. Unless I find some new project to do out there! There is always the chance of that now isn't there when you have a garden just waiting to be developed...

Bruce Forever!

Jamie has managed to get an invite to Spotify and i am bopping along to Bruce Springsteen at the moment and i do LOVE that man and his music. Wished he toured this year here in Europe but alas no. We've managed to see him in concert twice and they were brilliant just wished we had been able to get in on the Seeger sessin our but they were sold out within 1 hour here in Sweden.

I'm singing in the rain...

Yes it has been raining all day long. At times it seemed like pouring rather then raining. But I'm happy, it means I didn't get wet for no reason yesterday when I went around fertilizing everything in our garden. Hopefully it means that when the sun appears again everything will really start growing like crazy.

Other news, hmmmm not much actually, been working a lot and so has Jamie, gardening when there's a chance, not much quilting done, got few more pieces done for or bedspread though so that is coming along.

Will take some new pictures of the garden as to show how the new borders are coming along.

Presenting!

Let's all give them a very warm welcome to our garden. I give you John Cabot, Raubritter, Clair Renaissance, Emelie and Awakening!
Big huge welcoming applause now and lets hope they like it here!

They are our new roses for the new flower beds we dug around the decking. We went out to Bäsna today which is one of the better nurseries we know around here. They've always been very helpful and have a big range of plants, you can also by trees from there which is what we did last year. A little pink flowering paradise apple tree that's just coming into bloom. I was a bit worried about our garden making it through the hard winter we had. My lovely huge Aisha rose died back to where the snow had protected it, so did my elderberry . All other roses seem to have made it in one piece and are sprouting.

Potatoes are in the ground, so are carrots and onions. Bit more to do but cabbages are not big enough to go in yet and the squashes and beans aren't ready either to go in. Besides it is a bit too early still for them. We might still get frosts at night. Have been busy moving flowers from one bed to the new one. Still got a few more to move but are getting there.

Care to lounge a bit...?

Finaly got one thing sorted. Now we are looking for a table and chairs to match the new sofa. It took us ages to decide but when we saw this setup in the shop it clicked straight away that this was IT. We also have to finish off the wall in the background but that will be a doddle since the blokes who built the decking prepared it well so it is just for us to put whatever we want to the wall. Still deciding if we want small or wide striped planks.
Oh and the big green pot is going to get some grass or a bamboo planted in it. There are 2 more big pots as well but we are putting japanese maples in those. It will really look nice when everything is done. Thing is the weather hasnt been very forgiving for planting things, still quite hard frosts at night with -4 at the lowest. And that is a lot for being May. But weather forecasts say that we are getting some russian warmth now and you can relly tell it is getting warmer even though it is pouring down with rain. But rain is good! Makes everything go poof once the heat arrives as well.

Btw, have you ever noticed there arent enough hours in the day for everything you want to do and need to do? I am noticing big time at the moment.

This is the BIG To Do List that is sitting on the fridge at the moment
Got seeds to pregrow, potatoes to plant, onions to plant, dig the compost out, sow the other vegetables, move all the perenials from two flowerbeds made out of doorframes to their new bed along the decking, move strawberries to their new doorbeds, choose roses for the decking, get windowbox for herbs by the kitchen window,  find nice climbing frames for a couple of climbingroses for the decking, split some plants to give me more to bulk out beds, organize the new long flowerbed by the street that we dug last year i think various bushes and rhododenrons will do it, dig and prepare greenhouse made out of old windows, move dried wood into woodshed,.... Plus of course there is everything else to do, cleaning, laundry, doing my walking, working...., sewing is put a bit on hold, that will have to be a winter thing or a rainy day thing.

You see now how it is impossible for me to go to work today and for at least 2 months ahead? Wishful thinking..... I have to go in about 45 minutes and try not to be bored out of my mind. It is really pitiful how slow things are at work since the new refurbished shop next door opened again. Sigh...

We got a new boss as well. He seems very energetic and full of ideas. Hopefully he will last the distance and get us up and running, if not the future looks a bit bleak.

It is snowing!

News

Spring is springing!
I have been busy outside in the garden digging 2 new flowerbeds but had time to finish Jamies grandmas birthday present anyway.
And here they are, a pair of pillows for her new sofa set

I had a totally different color scheme going (pinks and pale greens) but I couldn't get it to work since I really didn't like the colours myself... I know its odd but if I dislike it I just cant make anything nice out of it so I had a change of plans and used some of the stars I'm making for our new bedspread and they turned out much better then I thought. I even ended up using one of the original pink fabrics for the flower border around the star, so it wasn't a total loss.

Also the digging of flowerbeds are progressing. Slowly but surely they are getting done. My mum came over yesterday and helped me plant all the seeds I got from James' dad so they are on the go. It is a wee bit too early to grow my beans and squash, am going to wait with them until middle of may. It has been a very cold spring and it is officially 2 weeks later the normal so everything is put a bit on hold until warmer weather appears. At least I got the potatoes pre sprouting in the utility room. Little knobs of greenery on each potato. Ahh I wish it was warmer!

 Progress at Lasts....

Sniffle

Yes once again i got a cold. And i hate it!
No energy, but still got to go to work and it is mayhem there at the moment since the big supermarket next door is closed for a refurbish and we got a truck load of new customers but no new staff!

Quilting

Yes, the blanket is now ready and I have completed my other project. A multicolored  heart in gold, red and blue. 

It is sitting waiting to be quilted together with the backing. It is a wall hanging and I will put it up in the hall since I think it will do best with a white background.

Talking about white. I do like these trendy and cool white interiors you can see so many of in glossy magazines but I don't think I could live in one. Every time I am to choose what color scheme I am to use I tend to go very colorful instead of smart and cool..... And bland I might add... I go to this quilt course on Tuesday evenings and all the others are very careful in choosing their colors. You know, pastel green and pink together or white on white with a hint of beige... Some times I actually think what the point is when you cant see the actual pattern of the quilt because everything has the same tone and color...And then there is me... I stand there and then come away with bright red and greens with black! Not to mention my last project with 12 colors of red, gold and blue. I am just like a kid in a candy store faced with the wall of fabric in all kinds of color and cant wait to put them together, ALL of them...

So what will I do next?

Decided

Unlike me I have decided almost straight away how to do something instead of ponder away and dither until the ends of time. And this is how i decided to do the quilt. All i got to do now is do the quilting and I've chosen a soft black fleece as the backing. It will be really nice and snug to have it in the sofa on those colder evenings.