Sunday progress report.

I'm a bit stumped on the kimono quilt. Not being a quilter, I'm struggling with the sandwiching, basting and quilting stage. I have started basting, but don't think that I've done it close enough together and that the fabric will pucker when I quilt it. I was basting because I didn't have enough safety pins to pin it - now I've baught pins and will pull out the stitches and start over.

As for the handquilting, I'm rethinking that too. I did a bit of testing, and because I'm using a recycled blanket as the batting, I think that it's too thick to handstitch. So, back to contemplating how to successfully quilt it on the machine.

The next decision is how to quilt it. Do I 'stitch in the ditch'? or do something else?... If I stitch in the ditch, do I need to do it all?... If I stitch beside the seams (1/4 inch away) do I do that to all seams or can I stitch in the ditch for some of the major lines and stich beside for the smaller squares?.... I don't know - decisions decisions!!!!

As I was stumped on the quilt, I did some other stitching. I have a whole bunch of postcards that I owe, so I got in and did three. These are rusted flannel, with trees stitched in continuous line with free-machine stitch. I added a foreground to the first one, but am unsure whether I like it or not. I like the simplicity of the single line of trees, but am worried that It's too simple... More decisions. I think I'll let them sit on the design wall for a bit and make a decision next weekend.

So now it's off to finish the housework. I am partway through cooking our dinner for the week too. I've got Beef and burgandy pies (the meat is cooked, just need to make the pie shells and cook them), pasta sauce (all we need to do is heat and cook the pasta), a chicken dish for tonight (my favourite spicy lime chicken - oops, just realised I forgot the limes) and I'm not sure what else. Now that should make things easier. (Sorry no pics to drool over...)

Beach combing..

B and I have been spending quite a bit of time at the beach lately as the weather is warming up for summer. Although having said that I am now tucked up in bed with two doonas as the temperature has dropped significantly.

We plan to do some snorkelling, but the weather and wind hasn't been too kind to us for that, so instead we walk the sand and rockpools.

We found a beach this week that was just covered in shells. There were areas where you could pick up several handfulls of shells without getting any sand!. Needless to say our shell collection is really growing. I also managed to collect quiet a few sponges which will be great for painting. These are dead sponges and used to look like this...

Various sea sponges (alive)

Dried sea sponge (can you sea how this could be fun to print with?)

I can't wait to go snorkelling to see these things alive. We also found a sea urchin which was pretty cool, as I've only ever seen the dried ones in craft shops. I think that this one was a bit sick because it's spines were a lot shorter, as though it'd been tossed around the rock pool.

Purple Sea Urchin (alive)

Dried sea urchins (the one's they sell)

In textile news... I've been working on a quilt using scraps of kimono fabrics. The fabrics are mostly deconstructed kimonos with a few other japanese fabrics thrown in.

This is a picture of the quilt in its assembly stage.

This is one of the 6 blocks that make up the quilt

At the moment all of the blocks are put together and I'm tacking the layers together. For the quilting I'm thinking of hand-quilting it as some of the fabrics have a bit of 'give' and I think that they're going to stretch and give me trouble if quilting by machine. I'm also planning on doing some sashiko (japanese embroidery) on the back , creating a bit of a patchwork effect on the back as well.

Sashiko patterns

Well time to get outta bed and get on with the day. Hopefully I'll have pics of the quilt progress soon.

Oh and I should mention that the room swap worked well. I love my new 'work room' and Mum, Simmy thinks that your new bedroom is just fine!