This, that and the other

Hello all :) My silence has been a screen for lots of activity of the stitching kind which I'd love to share with you but can't just yet. Hopefully you'll think it's worth the wait when I can reveal all! In the meantime there has been a little sewing activity that I can share with you :) You might remember that I started the Kaffe Fassett Not So Lone Star quilt last year. Not a great deal of progress was made on it last year as frankly I was nowhere near skilled enough to tackle it. After a really productive year I feel much more capable of tackling all those diamonds and to prove the point I have finished the first of eight giant diamonds! This photo doesn't really show the scale of this block but each side is around 30". I'm hoping that if I do a row a week I might get round to finishing this top in 2012....won't hold my breath though.

This year I've really tried to stretch my hand sewing skills. I'm naturally very impatient and I have always associated hand sewing with long term and by definition slow projects so have tended to give it a wide berth. Well, no longer! I've seen so many inspirational hand projects in flickr/blogland recently that I just couldn't resist joining in. So, last night while I waited for my templates to arrive from Katy I thought I'd practice with some hexies. It would appear that hexies are hugely addicitive, much to Mum's amusement! I think I'm quite a way off being as mad about them as Mum but I can see their appeal more now than I ever have. Here's my first flower.

I've taken them to heart so much so that I've given them a home in my pouch that I made with my fabrics from Karen. All neatly packed away so I can grab them if I need them :)

Talking of Karen, a little while ago I commissioned her to make some quilt labels for us and today they arrived! How cool are they? Karen has made the screen for these so I can order more when we run out, I can't wait to use them :) I'm sure that if you fancied some for yourself, Karen would be more than happy to consider another commission.

And finally, I received a fabulous package of Heather Ross charms from Susan that I won in her recent giveaway! How cool is that?! Thanks Susan, you rock! My mind is already whirring with ideas of how to use them with the rest of my Heather Ross stash. Those plans will be on ice for a while as I have a million and one other things I need to do first but it's lovely to have such pretty thoughts :)

Catch you all soon x