AJ's Antics

Progress on anything around here is so slow it is backwards! A few stitches here and there, pull it out, feel guilty cause there are other more pressing deadlines to meet, put it away again. I've been looking through our holiday photos and making our long awaited photo book while it was on special. Not sure I'll meet the January 2015 deadline I was hoping for on London and Paris....I'll be lucky to get just this one done! 

Finally managed to get the 4-Wheel-drive dirty last weekend! We had a great time camping and making fires for marshmallows. I did a few rows on the rainbow ripple but it can be tricky to see the stitches in the light of the campfire. And the smoke! It still smells a bit!  I've since added a new colour and only have one more to complete the rainbow before I can start the repeats!   Joining in here for the WIP Wednesday 

IVF surgery, medical complications,emergency department, morphine, baby boy turning 5, party prep mostly directed to and dispersed among family as I was too ill, 28 kids at the park, packing boxes, moving house, staying on top of things at work, family visiting, quilting deadlines, winter illness, more birthdays.....life got pretty busy there for a while! Who am I kidding it is still super busy and non-stop action. We've moved house New Neighbours The view from the front balcony It is a bigger and better designed house. There are still things in boxes, but we are functioning and loving it.  My sweet baby turned 5! I'm not sure I'm ready to send him to school next year....although he is more than ready! The Aunties out did themselves. It totally fitted the brief  - a number 5 racetrack with a bridge and a red lollipop stop sign I have more to share from his party but that is a whole other 'pinterest' post!  Sorry if you follow In I...

I'm a sucker for half square triangles and I'm a sucker for....'everyone else is doing it' So because I can and the timing was right I joined in the Sew-a-long hosted by Gnome Angel I picked out some favourite Central Park fabrics and got chopping I'll be back to show you more progress!

I was showing a colleague some of  the quilts I have made in the past a few months back and didn't think much else of it til she approached me asking if I make quilts for others. I have done a few in the past here, here , here , here and here . But this one is going to be different. It will be a memory quilt with photo blocks of the 13 grandchildren this lovely lady has. I started drawing up a plan....and then sashed the photos. Decided the photos were bigger than the picture that I had in my head and needed bigger fabric blocks to go with them. Re-drafted the blocks and fabrics cuts....bigger cuts means less of them right? The photo on the top left has the squares attached to it...the others are just layout on the wall. I'm liking it so far and I quick text with a positive response means I'm on the right track!  Yeah! Now to get it done by the deadline! Joining in with Little White Dove for the Aussie WIP link up! What have you been making ...

I swap with Swap-bot! Something a bit different for this Work in Progress post!  Just to prove that I do still quilt....sometimes... in small doses! These cute little houses are on the cutting mat for the block swap above. They'll be finished by Friday and in the mail. Looking forward to seeing what I get back in the post And I'm still working on the ripple....half way there! Catch you next week!

Ever been so involved in a  project that you can't think of anything else? Nope me neither.....I so have Crafters ADD! I went looking through a pile of fabric to find the material I know I have for making a knights outfit for Aden...and look what I found!  An almost finished quilt top! So what is a girl to do but sit down and finish off the last 4 blocks! The tutorial for these blocks can be found here . Please don't look at the date! Most of the blocks are together now....I'm stopping to rest my shoulder. But hopefully I can join the last few together tomorrow.... and find that knight fabric..... I'm  counting it as progress in my 'Kick the Bucket 2014' challenge. You can read about it here . 

This ripple blanket has been put on hold with the arrival of my new wool for a new ripple blanket!  This wool is beautiful and so soft. I got started straight away. I like the dark colour (royal) to start with but the dark wool is trickier to find the stitches with. I got there in the end and I'm steaming along. The colour choices are fabulous and I'm loving how it is coming together!  Only 1 more colour to add before I can start the colours again. So.... technically it is not Wednesday but Little White Dove left the link open....so why not!

These taste as yummy as they look! There a number of versions floating around in Pinterest. I used this one here .  I have quite a few more sweet treats to try...especially with an upcoming birthday to plan for!  This is project number11 in my totally pinspired challenge. I'm still waaaaay behind. 

I have the plan. I have the fabric. I have the pattern. I have the time. I have the motivation. Just waiting for the photos to come back from the printer...then I can get started! I've not started a new quilt in a while....I do have plenty of half started ones though!

A few weeks off  from the fun part of life while I got on with the boring part, but report cards (all 166 of them!) are done and out of the way and I'm counting down to a few weeks 'holiday'. Where I try and jam in as much as I can and actually to very little 'holidaying' at all! To give my mind, eyes and hands a rest from the computer screen and keyboard, I'd often swap over to this. I'm growing rather fond of it. If you've been observant when comparing my last few blog post you'll see that I have actually started it all over again. Not happy with the way the edges were turning out and realising that I hadn't been reading the pattern properly made me start over. I couldn't live with the mistakes. I know I'd be thinking about them every time  I looked at it. Wanting a clean start I picked a new colour and started over but, with a few less repeats this time. When laying it on our bed it looked like too much was hanging over each side...

You might be getting a little bored of this 3 weeks in a row...but well that is all I have time for at the moment...a stolen few minutes here and there.  I did promise you something different over the weekend....but well I'm not going to beat myself up about not getting to it. 4.5 hours getting Aden's toys, clothes, books and whole room back in order was a priority....it was getting to 'trash heap' levels. So I've started adding a 3rd colour. A lovely red. But here is what I have learnt this week.....always always always triple check your pattern! It took me until row 8 to go back and look again at the tutorial I'm following for this blanket and what did I find...I've been doing the ends wrong the WHOLE time. I was going to frog it (again) but well.... I want this finished not perfect. I can handle one end being a little wonky. I'll just make sure that end is at the bottom of the bed! I'm still not sure I've got it 100%...