it’s that time of year

It’s just eight weeks from tomorrow!

I know it’s getting close because of what's coming off my sewing machine:

First I made this apron (on behalf of DD) for a “Secret Santa Swap” at Caring Hearts Community Quilters. DD was given the panel (called “A Christmas Gathering”) but there’s no way she has time to sit at the sewing machine with two very active under-threes! I’m sorry some of it is missing but this is as much as WM took! I love this so much I’d like to keep it for myself! So would DD (who was conveniently wearing a red tee-shirt when modelling)!

 Secondly, this book which I started last year and never finished -- a gift for the Grandsons who both love books. Older Grandson will love identifying the animals and Younger Grandson needs cloth books because he still puts everything in his mouth and his teeth damage cardboard books!

 This has nothing to do with Christmas but I am so glad to finally have it finished!

First the inside view with its two generous pockets. My teacher, Kerry, and I designed this bag as we went along.

It had to fit this panel (designed by Kerry, embroidered by me) and will be used to carry my sewing/embroidery supplies.

It may look small the way I’m holding it but in fact it is 38cm (15 inches) wide, 35.5cm (14 inches) tall and 18cm (7 inches) deep.

It is actually a very deep purple colour as shown on the sunlit (right) side of the bag, not the royal blue shown on your left!

Goodbye to the green eco-bag from the local supermarket that used to carry my sewing supplies!

What about you -- are you crafting gifts for Christmas?

still here – still crafting and researching

Well, I may be a bit quiet on the blog front but my computer time has been swallowed up by a resurgence in my interest in researching my family history. Anc*try is always adding new databases but recently they have added the London Electoral Register and I’ve been searching for where my family members were living. In Australia, home ownership is the norm so it’s strange to find people living in the same few rooms for upwards of twenty years – but that’s the nature of the place and time, I guess.

Anyway, I have also been sewing – I have almost finished a quilt top that started out as a scrappy coin quilt but has turned into something a little different. I have learnt a bit making this “flimsy” but I’ll post about that when I complete the top.

As for knitting, I was shopping at the Big Box Store for fabric but "just happened to wander through the yarn department. A ball of Moda Vera Noemi caught my eye. It was a little more expensive that I would normally pay for an acrylic/nylon blend but the long colour repeats got my attention so I bought one ball and cast on for a simple garter stitch shawl – letting the bouclé type yarn do all the work. I soon realised that one ball (273 yards) wasn’t going to go very far so added another five balls to my collection: one in the original colour way (“turquoise mix”) and two each of “purple mix” and “red mix”. I started the second ball of yarn at the opposite end so the colours change more logically.

I’m reasonably happy with the result but have cast on a second shawl (using the “purple mix”) using needles three sizes larger (6:00mm US 10) and like the drape better.