There have been some serious technical issues here at Fairybread.  Yes the computer finally died and I'm now the owner of a MacBook Pro, which I have to say is very nice.  I had a Windows Computer before, but I have also had an iPad 1 which I've really loved and used a lot.  So, when the computer man breathed (apparent) new life into the old computer I was sort of pleased as I would save many $$ by not having to buy a new computer, but also secretly upset that I couldn't buy a new computer, if you know what I mean?



Anyway, the old computer began to go downhill again very quickly, and it was obvious that any further repair would be throwing good money after bad, so off to the Apple Store I went (very excited I was too)!

There has been a pretty steep learning curve, but I have to tell you that I have had "help".  Those of you in on the secret don't need telling, but those of you who aren't;  "help" in the world of computers does exist.  Who'd have thought?  I might be paying for it in the cost of the computer, but you know what, I'm happy to pay.  No eye rolling (well maybe out the back, but that's ok), actual answers, advice and so on. Amazing.

I won't go on about it, but I have spent a lot of time with the computer over the last few weeks I must admit, and haven't been doing much sewing, but that's nothing new for me. I'm doing a little bit of this, and a little bit of that.

 

The sashiko-ish project gets a bit of attention now and then, and I've been doing some more on the English Paper Piecing project while watching tv.

 

I have another project on the go that I started ages ago for my Mother, but didn't tell her about it to keep the pressure off.  She kept talking about what sort of cover she wanted for her bed and when I thought she was about to buy something I had to 'fess up.  So now that's on the To Do List as well.  Mum and Dad  have been OS and I told myself when she left I could have the flimsy finished in the month she was away.  I haven't touched it, and they got back this morning....

Boating with Chloe

As I live on a small island in Moreton Bay the water is an everyday part of life. To go to work, or to go anywhere you have to go on the waterbus, you can see the water from the house, and I find myself thinking and talking about the weather like my Grandfather who was a (sugar) cane farmer. A few years ago we were in a terrible situation in Australia with drought, permanent water restrictions, lifetime habits of leaving the tap running while cleaning your teeth, hosing off the driveway and watering the lawn gone forever.



Fast forward to the last 2 years where everything has changed. We are now in a La Nina weather event, and as a result it doesn't seem to have stopped raining since. Gone are the days when you could go sailing on every day off, and putting the dinghy in whenever you felt like it are over. Unless you don't mind being wet all the time that is. The wretched grass never stops growing, so that has to be mown between showers (when you could have been walking the dog), and generally speaking I'm a bit grumpy that I don't get to go boating as often as I like. What's the point of living by the sea if you can't get out there?



A week or two ago Chloe and I managed to get the dinghy in for half a day. It was a bit overcast, but still warm enough for a swim, so we took off down between the islands and stopped on the sand. Chloe turns out to be a natural in the boat - I'm wondering if she'd been boating with previous owners as she had a few homes before she came to live with me. Yes, skeletons in the closet...  She sits beside me on the seat and off we go.



She is a beagle so generally speaking she can't be trusted off the lead, but with my heart in my mouth I've let her off when we're on the sand and she's come back, so far. She has a lovely time and in this photo ran like a mad thing up the side of the island in the sand, then roared back down with her eyes closed. The sand is very fine and falls out from underneath trees and their entire root systems.



It's nice to get out of the house and onto the water, and as you can see, Chloe knows how to have a good time!

The Original

This is the original photo of the quilt that I'm making. I have this photo in my photo album but I have no idea where it came from. There is a secondary design in the half-square triangles if you look closely, but I've decided not to go with it.

I have included a few blue and cheddar triangles for a bit of a break from the red. Clare likes the cream with the blue on it, but I have to admit I've been leaning toward the dark brown the whole time.



I'm even thinking of making a smallish quilt so that I can finish it (fancy that) and try some utility quilting by hand with perle cotton. This will be new for me so a smaller project might be the best plan.

Triangles

I've actually been doing some sewing. I seem to have a 'thing' about the sewing room at the moment, so I brought the sewing machine downstairs and put it on the end of the kitchen table and did some mindless chain piecing while watching the cricket.



As I have no pattern to go by, just a photograph which is on the ipad, I'm not sure how many blocks I'll need, but I guess I'll work it out as I go along. I had a look in the stash and found these 3 big pieces of fabric, so gave them an audition for the plain blocks in between the triangles. The original quilt has dark brown which is what I'm most likely going to use, but I thought I'd try the others.



This particular dark brown fabric I bought from ebay some years ago as a large piece for backings. I used it on the back of the couch quilt which has been washed many times, and when I hang it out I always hang it back to the sun to protect the front. The back has faded terribly, so I don't know if I should use it, but this quilt won't be getting the wear. One or two of the red and cream fabrics are a bit on the thin side as I sort of started it as an experiment and have used up some fabrics I wanted to get rid of. Don't know, will think about it.

Computer is Fixed

Thank goodness my computer is fixed at last. It has been very sick for some time, getting slower and slower and doing the big freeze and occasionally giving me the Blue Screen of Death. My response? Do nothing and just use the ipad instead. I love my ipad - best thing ever invented, but for the 2% of things you can't do on it, life becomes very difficult.

I've posted the last two posts from it, but the fiddling with photos was very difficult. For that reason alone I'm happy to have the ancient laptop back. I've become very used to auto punctuation and capital letters though... I'm also a bit dissapointed because while it was at the computer man's place I had big dreams that maybe it was dead; it isn't young you know. I have frequent flyer points that I'm planning to cash in and I have enough to buy a Mac Air; so slim and sleek, light and beautiful, logical and reliable. I had it all picked out. I was quite sad when the old one was fixed, but with my job on shaky ground at the moment I should be saving the points for more useful things. Oh well, we can dream.



Here is the photo of the little quilt from Quiltmania that prompted the English Paper Piecing from my previous post. Nice isn't it?



I've also been experimenting with my Sizzix BigShot. I bought it before Christmas when it was on sale, but I haven't really used it until now. I really don't like the cutting part of a quilt. I find that I cut just enough to do some sewing, then cut a bit more and so on, even not moving on with things because I don't want to do more cutting. I've looked at these machines in magazines for a while, but after doing some research decided to buy one. In Australia it's easier to buy the Accuquilt gear, but as you can use some of the Accuquilt dies on the Sizzix I went in that direction. The Sizzix distributers here are all Scrapbookers, but I have found 2 or 3 online stores that carry some of the quilting dies. I have talked to my local store and they are happy to order whatever I want for quilting with their next order though, so that's good to know.



Anyway, I have been cutting these half square triangles from an Accuquilt die, and it's amazing how easy it is! I bought a new pair of cutting plates (extra long which will be required if I buy a long Sizzix die in the future) and put some extra sheets of paper under the die to make it thicker. I also put one sheet of paper on top of the fabric (I use the junk mail that would normally go in the bin), and have worked out that I can cut 7 layers of fabric at once. If you arrange the fabric right sides together as you want to sew it this saves time later.



There's very little waste and the rabbit ears are already cut off. The red fabric looks very fluoro in this photo - not its true colour at all. There are some things to look out for when choosing which Accuquilt die to buy as not all will fit in the BigShot machine, so if anyone's interested I will post more complete details.

Australia Day

It's Australia Day today - our national day. In Brisbane where I live there were plenty of celebrations planned, but there has been so much rain over the last few days that most of them have been cancelled. The rain has been so heavy that there has been flash flooding and releases from the big dams to prevent a repeat of the major floods of this time last year, which were due to overflow of the dam up river from the city.

This is my street yesterday. As a result most of the dirt is now at the bottom of the hill.



Anyway, it has stopped briefly, so I was able to take a quick photo in the semi-gloom of this little piece of hand sewing I've been doing. It's paper pieced which is a technique I really enjoy. The inspiration is from a little quilt in Quiltmania the 2011 Autumn edition; the issue has so many beautiful quilts in it that I want to make most of them. Lucy from Quilting With the Past has a quilt on the cover. I'll try to take a photograph of the little quilt when the sun comes out.



Chloe and I have been curled up together on the couch watching the cricket, trying not to go outside, and trying not to eat too much! I bought a Sizzix Bigshot before Christmas on special, and have been researching die. I now have a hexagon and a half square triangle, so I've been looking at the half square triangle quilts on Flickr, being inspired. I've been doodling triangles for days...

It's a New Year

Yes, it's a new year and I'm going to try and sew more this year, and blog as well. I haven't blogged since 2010 which is pretty bad, and I have to say that I haven't done a great deal of sewing since then either. But the thing is that I still think about quilting, I read quilting magazines and books, read the occasional blog, look at fabric and fabric sites online; all of which makes me feel like I've been quilting. Then when I'm forced to confront the reality ie no blog entry since Oct 2010 and no actual quilt progress, I'm always a little surprised.



Some things have happened in 14 months, not least of which was having to have my gorgeous old beagle Simon put to sleep. I have had him for over 14 years and he was always a gentle soft dog, so it was sad to see him deteriorate and I adjusted my life to look after him for as long as I could, but in the end he needed medical care that his body couldn't take. Now it's just me and Chloe, and we're doing fine. She's quite independent and seems happy being an only dog - this is a recent photo of her. She somehow seems to be looking at me in a slightly disapproving way as if to say, well, now what? Is it dinner time, walk time, sleep time, bone time? Let's get on with it!



I recently bought some fabric for the border of the double pink 4 patch that has been waiting a few years to be finished, and I've also had a little buy up at a local shop that was having a closing down sale. I normally don't go there as it is a store that does a lot of country style stitcheries and pretty quilts, but I had 15 mins to wait before a dentist appt so thought I'd calm myself by touching some fabric. It turned out that they were closing that day, and everything was heavily discounted, making the fabric still more expensive than it can be bought for on the Internet, but not too bad. The thing that drew me in was the red reproduction fabric which I had decided to buy online only the day before, so I bought what they had left which was on two bolts. I also found some Kaffes and spots, and a lovely book on the history of Dutch Quilts that was half price.



Otherwise the cloud of my ever worsening eyesight has been hanging over my head this last year or two. It seems that it is quite normal for "someone of my age", but I can't seem to get with the programme and accept it. I had new glasses again in October, but I can't handsew with them, so I have to go back and get some stronger ones again. I have always had excellent eyesight, so I'm feeling a bit shocked at how quickly they've deteriorated. I can't even read the labels in the supermarket anymore, let alone the tiny writing on ampoules at work! It's like I'm working through the stages of grief, but I really have to get over it.

If I pop up on anyone's radar I look forward to rejoining blogland and catching up with you again.