A To Do List

Here is what I need to accomplish in the next few weeks:

1. Find time to visit Allison in Oakville and learn how to bind my first quilt.
2. Get a sewing table (my ideal table is one that folds because I don't have room for anything else).
3. Start using my sewing machine (spend some time practicing with it).
4. Finish Mish Mash.
5. Start Garden Walk quilt.
6. Plan 2006 knitted Christmas gifts.

Allison is lobbying for a cardigan for Christmas. I'll decide if she deserves one after our trip to Cape Breton to visit our parents. We are taking the train from Toronto to Truro and we fly back from Halifax.

I'm looking forward to the train trip. Sure it takes longer than flying, but I have always enjoyed train travel. Perhaps I have romantized it. There is something soothing about train travel. There is no gridlock, it is more comfortable than the bus. And you have limited options when you don't have a driver's license.

Allison has not taken the train to Nova Scotia before. I did when I was too young to really remember. Maybe that is my oldest memory a mental picture of the beds in the sleeper cabin I shared with my parents. I would have been 3 years old (maybe...).

We have a sleeper car from Montreal to Truro. It cost an extra $10 each to get a deluxe double room (it has a shower in the private washroom). I have started to think about what I'm taking with me for the train trip (travel scrabble, books to read, a knitting project-probably socks). Because we are flying back, I don't want to take too much stuff. We leave on May 20th so there is plenty of time to plan. Here is a photo of my sewing machine that my sister is storing for me at her place, so I don't have lug one from Toronto when I come to visit her to work on sewing projects together.

More later.

L

Eyes bigger than skills

When I first bought the pattern for Yellow Brick Road (my first quilt), my eyes were bigger than my skill set (and they still are). I was going to make the king size. It quickly became apparent that was too big for not only my first quilt but also for my first sewing project. I downsized to the lap quilt. It is still huge (it is much larger than any lap I've seen).


I have finished hand quilting it and am now wait for my binding lesson from my sister to completely finish it (just in time for summer). Then I can focus on the baby blanket that I'll make for a co-worker (I have until June to give it to her). All I need to do is cut the fabric and sew it (I'm not putting batting in and it self binds). Then I can complete Mish Mash.

Sunday is the MS Society's Super City Walk for MS. Allison and Len (my brother-in-law) have joined my work team. It will be fun. This will be the third year I will have participated. The first year it poured. My umbrella broke as we were finishing. Last year the weather was amazing. I'm afraid to check the weather forecast for this Sunday.

After the walk I'll go home and make Trish's birthday cake. It is her birthday on Sunday.

More Later.

L

Lost and hopefully found

When my parents moved, I lost my sewing room. Okay it was my mother's sewing room. But it was were I made a mess cutting fabric and sewing (and ripping out and re-sewing). It was also where I stored my fabric stash and quilting equipment. Now it is all at my house, slowly taking over.

I now have a sewing machine at home (my mother's old Singer) and a machine in Oakville at my sister's (it is the New Home machine my father bought at Value Village for $20). Both machines are in great condition (my mom bought her Janome when she started quilting seriously). It's not like I'm going to do anything fancy any time soon.

What I'm missing is a table to put the sewing machine on to use it. This has not been a problem because I had told myself that I'm not working on any new projects until I have finished my first quilt. Last night I finished quilting it. I now need to bind it and it is done. So now I have to find a table. Oh the difficulties...

I guess I need to find a knitting project to get me through. There are worse things in life.

More later.

L

Creative? Who me?

People are funny. Some assume because I knit (and now quilt) that I'm creative. Nothing could be further from the truth. All I do is follow the pattern. The only time I change the pattern is when I cannot find the material called for in the pattern.

My problem is with colour. I lack any sense of what colour compliments another. My mother gave me a colour wheel for my birthday and I'm still lost. I have a lot of black, blue and green in my wardrobe (green is relatively new). Is there a name for fear of colour? There must be. Maybe some day I'll get around to looking it up.

On my second quilt (Mish Mash) I spent hours planning the layout. When I found combinations that I liked I took photos to record my choices. If that were not neurotic enough, I also made voice memos recording my layout decisions.

I think I'm being more neurotic this time because looking at my first quilt I see so many different choices I could have made. I really like the quilt and the layout, but I'm still thinking about what I could have done differently (which is not the same as should have).

Allison is also making the same quilt. Except being a girly-girl she was drawn to pinks, while mine is predominantly blue. I will be interesting to see the differences and similarities when they are completed.

Here is a corner from my Mish Mash.

More later.

L

Introduction

Is it possible to be a slacker with OCD? This is a question that I have been asking myself. I have refolded t-shirts because I didn't like the way someone else folded them (they were mine, it's not like I do this at Roots or the Gap). Is it mild OCD (is there such a thing), or was I just trying to avoid other household tasks? I'm too lazy to research OCD. Something to think about...

My sister and I were recently orphaned when our parents moved to Cape Breton from Niagara Falls. We're not really orphans, but it is fun to play the guilt game with my parents (after years of being on the receiving end).

One of the purposes of this blog to keep my mother up to date about Allison (my sister) and my developing quilting skills. Another to continue to entertain my father with my lack of quilting skills. My mother started quilting a few years ago. Allison and I both started in the past 6 months. I am currently hand quilting the border of my first quilt. Then Allison is going to show me how to bind it. That will involve a trip from Toronto to Oakville (and since I don't have to go to Niagara Falls every other weekend, I have plenty of time to visit Oakville). This is Trotsky on my first quilt.











More later.

L