Hard disc, hatchet and 7 am in Hagley Park

You can be pretty sure that anything happening at 7 am does not involve me!  Here's a self portrait of my son Phil when he visited Christchurch last week; he was working so not a lot of spare time but as his hotel was opposite the park, he couldn't resist taking a walk.

Do you know the administrator password for your computer?  Well, I don't, and that's why I've been searching the hard drive and the internet, google and apple - everything I could think of, even ten year old books!  Actually I thought I did know, but the machine doesn't like it, does a little wiggle and won't let me install the latest upgrade, grrrrrr.......

Apart from that, things are going well; Basil is accepting his new diet after being diagnosed with thyroid problems - slight difficulty with Floyd not being on the same diet - though he goes in for a check up tomorrow and I shall ask if it would harm Floyd to eat the same food.

I am progressing, albeit slowly, with the hand quilting of my white and bright string quilt - and I have tidied my sewing room.  Found more bits and pieces that made my fingers itch to start sewing them into another top, but I'm being strong and will finish the one I've started.

The block from my class is another version of the Sew & flip technique, it's just a question of using quite large pieces.  To the basic five inch square I used a 3.75 inch square -

You can see I used the dark red for the centre strip, four of the completed blocks look like this -

The strong diagonal makes for lots of variations of setting, and the resulting half square triangles are a good size for another quilt!

I've been enjoying watching the Aussie series, "A Place to call home" which is showing here on Sunday evenings and set me looking out my old Australian magazines, the Home Journal which were given to me by a friend.  I was still in the UK at that time - I just love these covers - the first one from 1954

And this one

from a few years later, the year I arrived in New Zealand, by which time the magazine had had a make over and a big hike in cost!

So, here's another photo from the south island, taken on the way down to Christchurch with a storm approaching near Kaikoura

And the thought today - with relevance to my battles with my hard drive - "Anyone who isn't confused really doesn't understand the situation", Edward R. Murrow

Nice chatting with you, be back soon.........
June

I went South!

Maybe that's not the best title, it could mean something other than my visit to the South Island! but first a visit to the south coast, and the evening sun at Wainui beach -

I'm planning to get lots of hebes for my garden, different sizes and colours, also flaxes - natives for me, none of these whimpy exotica that need watering all summer....

My trip south, well the publicity about the award given to the Shut-in Stitchers has resulted in a couple of invitations to speak about what we do and you know how reluctant I am to do just that!! apparently Arts Access has been approached by the prison in Christchurch about setting up such a programme, they contacted me, I contacted the Christchurch Quilt guild - invitations were made and accepted, and off I flew.

Years ago I was a regular visitor to Christchurch and was fairly confident I could find my way around but my hostess knew better and I'm so grateful to her and my other 'minder' for all they did to make my visit enjoyable as well as memorable.

For any non-New Zealanders reading this, a large earthquake did enormous damage to the city in February 2011; it was a Tuesday and I was at a stitching get together with friends when the news came through and we sat glued to the television - that day and many more as the whole story unfolded.

Nothing prepared me for the reality.

Here is the Smile for Christchurch wall [you can Google it to find out more] started by a Taiwanese who spent a year collecting all the smiles to support the city,  the building behind looks less than pristine but the little gardens add a brightness to the open spaces.

This is on the day I took a bus into the city and walked around the area where they are using containers for shops;

It was a pleasantly mild day, though not the 21 degrees forecast, the coffee was good, the shops interesting, people friendly and I loved the garden areas -

I'm on the lookout for some companions for my 'goat' of the iron constitution!, maybe penguins, or something a little more outstanding -

Can you make out her amazing eyelashes?  See, flaxes, grasses minimum care - equals more time to quilt, read, eat - anything but garden........

The block to share was in a magazine years ago,

It's a tulip [we're back to gardening!] but their instructions were very complicated, so I simplified them to this

Make a pair of half square triangles, then take another square of the second colour for the flower, and

turn the half square triangles into three quarter square triangles! join, and do a small sew & flip on the bottom corners - cut to whatever size is needed.  These are made with five inch squares, but of course any size will do - if you make the tulips from many different sizes you could have your own colourful garden........

After teaching at the prison on Saturday, a group of us [tutors] had lunch and then went to a nearby chain store to take advantage of their sale - I bought 5m of batting quite reasonably and saw this sign -

It took me a while before I realised what was wrong - maybe it's a better class of fabric??

While in Chch I couldn't resist buying a couple of books, one which contains 'bad advice for good people.  Keep calm and carry on is all very well, but life just isn't that simple.  Let's own up and face facts; we're getting older, the politicians are not getting any wiser, and the world's going to hell in a handbasket.  It's time to panic."

So I'll leave you with a photo [courtesy son Phil] of a corridor in the interior of the Embassy Theatre in Wellington, and the first quotation, "When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout.", Robert A. Heinlein

Cantabrians, I take my hat off to you, thank you for everything - I shall return!

June

Spring, slide and stars

Doesn't this just say spring?  Beautiful daffodils - and an uncertain sky, photo taken by Phil a week or two ago on a trip into the Wairarapa.

And slide - well this I think is another example of a quilt in waiting,

while the view down the slide makes my stomach flip, even now!

These were taken, by Phil, of course at Island Bay in the playground - and how about the tunnel?

Almost a halloween design?

At a recent meeting of Pinestream Quilters there was an amazing display of work - this one took my eye as something far removed from quilts I make, I forgot to ask what the inspiration was.

And now, a blast from the past - another of the blocks/techniques from my Five inch squares class; the sew and flip method of making a star - I love this one -

I like the idea of using this block, dotted through the background of all dark blocks - the stars really pop.

The method is tried and true, two strips at right angles -

draw a line for the first line of stitching, then I always stitch another towards the corner - far enough away to give safe seam allowances, then cut between for the extra half square triangle.

This results in a very scrappy quilt but one that works providing there is sufficient contrast in value.

The Woven star is another block that works well with this technique -

I have been doing some actual stitching, my Mile-a-minute is a completed top - and I've chosen the backing too!

Three rows joined to the left and the backing, almost large enough on its own.

A fair amount of sewing went into this top! - and all because I wanted to use up the bits left over from when a friend cut out hexagons......

In the end I added another row so this is how it ended up -

and I still have a bag full of strings.......

I'll leave you with another sunset - taken at  Palliser Bay recently - you can't have too many sunsets! and the thought, "The great thing about getting older is that you don't lose all the other ages you've been", Madeline L'Engle

Thanks for stopping by,
June

Surfers, squares and Shut-ins

Phil put this on his Facebook page with the message that he had been out hunting sunsets on the Wainui coast the previous evening when the sun disappeared behind a big dark cloud - but the locals didn't seem to care!

Here are another two quilts made by Desdemona - well they are tops as yet but I showed them to a recent meeting, took the photos so I can give one to her.  The first one is a pattern she saw in one of the magazines we take in, it was shown as a wall hanging so she adapted it -

Very pretty and spring like, don't you think?  The second one is not yet complete, it will be larger but shows how she is prepared to try different patterns.

The block from my class I want to talk about is the square in a square, a tried and true favourite in many disguises; using five inch squares, it can come out like this

The centre square is cut at four inches, the pale one at four and a half then cut into four quarters, diagonally then I used two four inch squares, cut once on the diagonal so the straight of grain comes on the outer edge of the block - also using corners of different value can add interest to the setting.

Then I came across a rather odd technique to make a unit for use in several different blocks;  take two squares at four and a half inches and sew them together, right sides facing, round all four sides -

The instructions said to then slit one of the squares - well, I couldn't do that with any accuracy, so I cut the square diagonally into four, as you can see from the photo, pinned them together and then sewed around the outer edge.

When opened out it looks like this -

Next you need to take two four and a half inch squares, cut once each on the diagonal and join around the outside.

No, that's not a mistake - cutting off the corners of the first square I mean - can you see the faint chalk lines? well the whole purpose is to cut the whole thing in four for this unit -

That's just folded in half to show what it would look like -oops, it has to be folded again - no photo, but I'm sure you get the general idea! and as yet I've not made a quilt using this technique.........

I'm having problems with another top - remember the bright and white strippy?

I started quilting it by hand, but didn't like it - so I unpicked that quilting and tried again by machine, did four blocks and hated it! so, that was unpicked and I have now remade it into a sandwich using a different batting and am once more hand quilting it - the batting is much harder to quilt through, I think it's Warm and Natural....... I'll see how I go, funny how some quilts resist me - I shall have to take a leaf out of Ann's book [she who won the Great British Sewing Bee] and talk firmly to it!!

Today has been another glorious Spring? day, clear, calm - and bitterly cold!  very much like the day when Phil took these photos of Oriental Bay; I have shown you the ones of the old Band Rotunda taken actually on it, well here are two from the beach, the first from one side -

The same low, dark clouds are around and Petone, where I live, is over the harbour, past the point and keep going....

The setting sun and St Gerard's Monastery on top of the hill - great city I think.

Thanks for stopping by, no words of wisdom today - just, Go Team New Zealand!!!

June

Sky scrapers! and Log Cabins

How many storeys does a building need to be considered a sky scraper?.....looked at from ground level all buildings are I suppose - anyway, son Phil went into Wellington city one afternoon and had a wander around The Terrace and took photos that I think are almost blueprints for a quilt...

What do you think?  Blue, black and white.....    How about a variation?

Lovely subtle shades and just a hint of red; lots of texture and negative spaces.........

and while I'm on things 'family' remember the wool I had to knit a hat for Molly? well, doesn't she look cute in it?

So onto things really quilty - here are two quilts made by Shut-in Stitchers - I showed a gold & black one last time and here's another using similar colours but a different design made by a different person -

I have just noticed the mistake in the top right corner, funny how looking at a photo makes mistakes jump out at you!  She will unpick it tomorrow, I'm sure.  It's her first quilt and she is justifiably proud of the accuracy of her sewing.

The other one is the second top made by Desdemona [not her real name!] we collected possible fabrics for some months until she had enough -

So again, a big thank you to everyone who has contributed fabric to the programme.

I wanted to talk about log cabin quilts which are a particular favourite of mine, and to show how I got started making them.  Back in the distant past, I made this -

Yes, it's pretty faded, the outer row did have a very dark background, this was made in the seventies and the method we used was to sew by hand onto a muslin backing -

Yup, by hand onto a backing using light thread for the light fabrics..........etc.
We progressed to sewing by machine -

but this was 'quilt as you go', then it was machine but just two fabrics

Then a forerunner of my wonky hexagon log cabin, made using offcuts of Indian cotton - the dye was most unstable, fugitive I think it's called - it certainly ran............ [pardon the pun!]

Nothing subtle about the stark piece of calico in the centre!

Then there's a change of resulting design, great possibilities here -

Greek key I think this is known as......

And another variation where you start in one corner - I have shown the resulting quilt I made with this technique, called Boldly I Went!  I made the blocks in fours using a variety of sized blocks to be different worlds floating in the black.

Here's a thought to ponder, "If a pig loses its voice, is it disgruntled?", George Carlin

and back to a beautiful sunset showing Mana Island

Nice chatting with you, thanks for the feed back, take care.
June