Back from the beach. Sorting the sewing!

Posted on 16/11/2022 by Jan

We’ve been home for a few days now after having a week at the beach and visiting DS in Wagga for a few days. This time I took some embroidery with me. I enjoyed sitting outside on the verandah in the afternoons listening to the ocean.

I haven’t embroidered for years and I would like to get back to it and improve skills. This pattern was from a class with video instruction from Clever Poppy that she ran recently.

We’ve had lots of rain here and flooding in town on Monday. We are fine as we live on top of a hill and it seems to be going down quickly here. Other places in the region have been badly affected and I’m so glad we cancelled our big holiday to avoid the flooding.

I’ve started going through all my sewing projects, WIPs, UFOs and scrap stashes and making a list of everything that needs finishing. There’s a lot! I found quilt tops, sewing projects and patterns I had forgotten about and finally found my misplaced Splendid Sampler blocks. I’m bagging everything up from each project into clear bags so I can easily see what I have and putting them on the open shelves instead of in drawers so they don’t get forgotten.

I’m feeling as though I’d like some more routines back in my week. I listened to a TED talk recently about stages of retirement and we’ve been enjoying the first ‘holiday – freedom’ stage a lot. I’m just feeling now like I’d like to have a bit more organisation in my week. I’m not tired from working anymore and I have more energy to do things. Not sure where I’m going with it but thats my thoughts lately. I also want to get back to more regular blogging.

We have a big few weeks coming up with birthdays, my in-laws 65th wedding anniversary and our 40th anniversary. I love this time of year with the lead up to Christmas – lots to do and this year will be our first Christmas with family since Covid started so it will be great to get back to normal I hope. Covid changed so much – did it affect your end- of year get-togethers? Do you feel like life’s returning back to ‘normal’? I’m getting my covid booster vaccination this morning as its on the rise again here, then time to catch up on blog reading.

Floods, snow, decluttering & new Tilda fabric.

Posted on 03/11/2022 by Jan

What an interesting week we are having here! It’s been raining for days and we have lots of flooding in town and across the state. We had planned to travel to see DS today but the roads are closed so we have cancelled. There are some backroads but the last thing we need to do is get stuck somewhere and not be able to get home.

Yesterday, as well the flooding we had snow! It was quite heavy falls just outside of town. I’ve never seen snow in November here before. It’s usually hot and sunny but it’s been quite cold.

But it’s been a good week for sewing and decluttering! I have been working on my overflowing 5″ square scrap bins – mostly children’s prints. I’ve just been joining squares ready to be made into eye spy quilts later. I started with making strips for the disappearing nine-patches

… but after a lot of sewing I just wanted to get them done faster so made the rest into 4 patch blocks…

It all fits neatly back in the drawers now and when I want to make an eye spy quilt it will be much quicker to join a few of these larger blocks.

I also had some beautiful Tilda fabrics delivered this week. I just love Tilda fabrics and so I decided to treat myself and join the Tilda club so I get a project each two months. While I may not get them done straight away it will be nice to have them in my stash for when I want a change from sewing quilt tops.

Here’s my first month of the Tilda club – its just gorgeous!

I also bought a Chic Escape fat quarter bundle and some dots & plains for a paper piecing quilt top I want to make.

and a Hometown fat-eights bundle for a wall hanging project

I hadn’t planned on doing Bonnies mystery quilt this year as were to be travelling but now that I’m not and after seeing the beautiful colours she has chosen I’m in! I am going to use batiks and have ordered them this morning. I’m quite excited to be doing it again! Are you doing Bonnies mystery this year? What are your thoughts on the colour choices?

I’ve also been decluttering old work ‘stuff’ with five large garbage bags of old files & paperwork shredded this week. After a lot of thought I’ve decided to let my professional registration go and I’ve now given up on the idea of perhaps doing some occasional work in retirement. After seven months I’m feeling so much healthier but I’m also realising that I am still quite burned out and seeing how much of a toll work took on my health. It’s time to just stop and smell the roses.

“Smell the roses. Smell the coffee.

Whatever it is that makes you happy.”

Rita Moreno

Cancelled Holidays & back in the sewing room.

Posted on 22/10/2022 by Jan

We cancelled our holiday plans earlier this week due to all the flooding thats happening at the moment. Our first week away was to be spent at Echuca on the Murray River as we had not visited that area before. Right now its in record flood and clearly it’s not the place for tourists. Theres also been flooding in Tasmania and with more rain predicted for the next 6-8 weeks we decided it was better to cancel and we’ll wait until next year to do another trip.

My back is much better so I’ve been able to get back to my sewing the last few days. I completed another Summer in the Country block – Geese Pond

I started working on another block and then just like that, I felt like I need a break from it, I still like it but I’m tired of working on it. So I changed the block to finish it up quickly…

… then I joined up a heap of triangle scraps to make another block quickly

… played around on the design wall for a while …

… and then packed it all away for later.

My sewing room is quite a mess! I really need to do some serious stash busting and get some projects quilted and finished. I keep 5″ blocks in these two drawers, mostly kids prints, & they are stuffed completely full so I decided to make some more children’s blocks as they are fun and easy.

I use a disappearing nine patch pattern, put a picture block in the corners and bright colours around it and then cut.

… and these blocks will end up in eye-spy quilts.

On the decluttering front I’ve done all but one cupboard in the kitchen and got rid of a lot of excess stuff. It’s good to open the cupboard now and not feel its all going to fall out. Next big job is cleaning out the pantry/storeroom.

Right now it’s raining heavily again so its back to sewing machine for the afternoon. Apparently it’s going to rain most of the summer – our third El Nino summer downunder. How is the weather where you are is it different to the usual season?

Linking up with:

Quilting Patchwork Applique

Oh Scrap

Small Quilts & Dolls Quilts