A blog about nothing much, really.

The dollar is so good at the moment, and I very much want to buy myself lots more fabric, but I've already spent way too much today, without even having sewn any more.

All up, about $200, with $80 of that being the lappy charger that works but falls out whenever I move it, and another $50 being the vistaprint order that I really shouldn't have, but which, if it gets here before Friday week, will totally be worth it.

The rest was little random bits that, annoyingly, add up fast. Food for the cats, lunch and tea for me, some socks, a book, shampoo and a cute little bag: it's annoying how easy it is to spend money on things other than fabric and rebuilding an engine.

The main reason no sewing got done today was that my only real chance to get into town was with Casey, Maddy and one of Maddy's friends when they went in for a picnic at the lakes. They dropped me off at Centro after we'd been to Anvil and the post office, and I blew money and walked to Poppy's while the weather was nice. They stayed at the lakes till the weather turned, and by the time we were home it was after 3, and time to waste money on not-fabric-internets, before heading to work to earn at least some of it back.

How very dull. Some days are I suppose.

Whoops.

A multi-end power cable that fit the laptop cost me eighty freaking dollars!!! I can get a proper one on eBay for $17... But I really couldn't cope without a lappy for 3 weeks. And once I'd spent that, the seal was broken, and I spent money at Kmart, and the book store, and the Reject Shop. And then I came home, and there was an email form vistaprint, on the same day that my new business card/quilt tags got here, and well, I planned on only spending $40, but then I accidentally pressed the "with return labels for only $7 more", and then it added another $5 to my postage, and then I was cross, so I unsubscribed from their mailing list so it doesn't happen again. But not before getting us some completely awesome Lower South East Ladettes business cards (to go with the shirts we really should get around to getting made), a Kooky Couture banner (for if we end up doing this market thing) and stamp that's not gunna be relevant to anyone but me and Casey, which I hope gets here before Birchip next weekend, because we will LOL. and then go around stamping people with it.

A success, and a mayday call...

Worryingly, and for no apparent reason, my laptop appears to not be charging. I don't think I can deal with it dying as well as my car :( Hopefully it is just a problem with the power cable, and even more hopefully it's just a problem with the bit that goes from the board to the box, cause I can get another one of them for about $8. if it's the next bit along, I might have to get one of those interchangeable ones. I doubt it's a problem with the battery since that's still showing as being present and charging down. Hopefully it's not a problem with the plug input, or it will have to go stay with Helen and Steven for a bit.

Anyway. Over the weekend i had held a faint hope that maybe I could do 2 quilts in the 2 days I had off. As of last night it wasn't going well, with machine tension troubles, Paul Hogan and a major redesign holding me up. I got the two tops done, but it was 3am, and I wasn't as far along as I thought I needed to be.

Tonight... well, no, I didn't get them finished. But still, in about 36 hours (since I didn't start till after lunch yesterday) I think I did okay...

...since if you look closely you'll see that the one behind it is the top side of the other, because they've actually been fully quilted (something you cant see in those photos)

That's not a particularly good picture either, it being a blowup of the above photo, but at least it proves I'm not making it up. I have done essentially FOUR quilt tops, and quilted them together, in 2 days.

Now they're not that big - 98x118cm and 106x115cm, but still. I have done it all but the binding, which I have made for the pink one and rolled it into a nice bundle and all, but I'm tired adn it seems like a good place to stop, since I'm not actually sure what to bind the other one with. I was originally gunna use the blue, but I think it would look a bit odd from the back. I've cut 9cm wide strips of what I have left of the 2 greens, which comes out to about 3.5m of the light one and 2.1m of the dark one. I'd pu them together to do a pieced border, but I've no idea how. 

That's tomorrow's problem anyway. Tonight's problem, as of just now, is maintaining power to the lappy. The little box is cooling down, so I'm figuring it's not getting power either, since it's usually a good little hand warmer. So, if I can find it's original power plug, which had an American end (since I imported it) I can steal the adapter form the divx player (also imported) and use that till I can get into anvil to buy another cable. Byebye $8, and thankyou for not being a huge expense..

Done for the night...

It would seem that, just because you can do the first quilt top in two hours...

...Doesn't mean you can do the second quilt top in 2 hours.

Especially when you change your design after you've sewn half of it, and then get a bit distracted by the Commonwealth Games on one channel and Crocodile Dundee on the other, and you're flicking between the two in the adverts, and it's hard to leave the lounge to go and sew.

Still, that's 2 quilt tops in one day, AND I didn't get started till about 4 this afternoon AND my machine's tension dial appears to have shat itself. Normal tension is at 5, I'm currently at 3.5 which is tight enough that the stitches aren't loose but not so tight that it bunches horrifically, but it's still bunching up a little. I have oiled, changed needles, screwed and unscrewed, cleaned the bobbin case, put the cotton on the other way (I'm getting desperate okay?) but still nothing. Where it's at now is bearable - you just need to leave a bit more space between the string piecing so that you can ease out the stitching. It does have an advantage though - it made unpicking (which I did a lot of at the design changing point in the pink top) a lot easier.

You can see the size difference with the overhang in each picture - the pink one ended up about 8cm wider but 4cm shorter. I like the blue and green one better since the difference between the fabrics is a lot more visible, and also the corners of the pink quilt are just sorted randomly because no matter what I did, I couldn't quite make it right. I would get 3 that matched, and then one would be really wrong, so I figured if they were all off I can call it random. I'll be doing the other side tomorrow, and I'm gunna make a point of using bigger pieces on the pink one, so hopefully the fabric patterns wont be so overwhelmed.

But that's tomorrow.

I seem to have ended up on the couch again...

It's a public holiday here in South Australia, and for all that Helen was talking about going for a shop over in Victoria, it's quite nice to have a day at home.

The family have gone off somewhere (possibly to Nan's) so it's just me and the cats, who have of course decided to go to sleep right where I lay out my fabrics to string piece. I took this as a sign to have a late lunch, and I just saw Nick D'Arcy NOT place in the finals for the 200m Butterfly.

I'm thinking he'll go punch someone.

Anyway, so far I've done all the extra quilting on Dad's cover, but couldn't actually assemble it because I've lost the snap-clip tape I was planning on sewing onto the bottom so I didn't have to do buttonholes. Helen's been using the little ones you set with a hammer, and I should find out how much they are as an alternative. The tape is about $12 a metre, so I'm not wanting to have to go buy more of it. I've got some quilt covers I chopped up for the fabric that might still have the clips on them, and I could probably just sew them on, but again, it would need finding.

I've finished my late lunch now, so I suppose it's time to get back to it. I'm doing the top of blue and green one first. Or I will be if the cats have moved.

Blog from the couch

Daylight savings screwed me over and I planned to just come home and have an early night. Damn Commonwealth Games have trapped me on the couch.

And seriously, an 80,000 seat stadium? The MCG has a 100,018 seat capacity (how do I know this? the first Grand Final had an attendance of 100,016 and the newspaper wanted to know what kept the missing 2 from attending)

OhMyGodTheBollywoodyGoodnessIsStarting!!!!!!

Damn Clocks...work, big

Because of daylight savings, I have stayed up until 3.30 finishing Janelle's bag. And I thought 2.30 was bad when I looked at the clock. This means it's 8 1/2 hours till I need to start work. Where I will spend the whole time telling myself that I have Monday and Tuesday off, and isn't that great.

I've got a vain hope that I can do the two quilts I cut at Helen's today in those 2 days, but I will settle for one of them.

CRAFTERNOON!

Mum, Dad and Maddy have pissed off to Melbourne for the weekend, so I'm on my lonesome till Casey finishes work in a couple of hours. The cats have been fed, Bazza has been fed, Facebook and the rest of the interwebs have been checked. So now it's hair washing time before CRAFTERNOON!

Yay...woooh...huzzah...yippee... et cetera, et cetera, et cetera...

No massive plans, mainly cutting for some upcoming baby/mini quilts. Will be aiming more for the 100x120cm size than the 80x100cm size, since I think that that's a bit more practical in the long run, and I've cut back a bit on my dreams for non-gender-specific fabrics. One is blue and green. One is pink and orange. I'll also be continuing with the same design as the honeycomb quilt - the squares on one side and the crazy on the other. I have 4 yards of fabrics for each quilt.

And yes, they are the same fabrics in different colours. The boys quilt will be big squares of the blue with 4-patch squares of the 2 middle greens, and the back will be the middle greens being wonky with the bottom fabric as the main bit. Binding will probably be the blue, but that's a ways off. Girls quilt I'm not sure what will go where, since the fabrics a lot more similar than the big difference between the blue and the one with the red. There will probably be a vote of some kind.

These fabrics were all from fabric.com, who put a little sticker on the fabric telling you what it is and how much they sent. That's probably the only really nice thing they do, except for be cheap. These fabrics were all $5 per yard before postage, which probably translates to around $50 per quilt when you include postage, and exchange rates, and batting.

Single sided quilts would be a lot cheaper. But probably quite a bit more boring.

Also, since this is all single manufacturer, I don't need to pre-wash. And that means I don't need to iron. And that's worth about $20 in itself. It certainly saves me over an hour of standing at the kitchen bench, and I earn $18p/h at woolies, so that works.

Anyway, hair washing. With someone else's shampoo, since I have run out. Bummer.

FML reheated

I have picked fabrics. I have come up with design ideas.I have new blades for my rotary cutter. Things are going well.

I have run out of shampoo. I haven't made much progress on Janelle's bag. The cats keep sitting on the big bit of batting that I bought on special from Spotlight but now have nowhere to put because the whole cleaning thing was a big fat fail, and I'm worried that because of this it'll get all dirty and catty and then I'll get guilty about the fact that it's inside the quilts I've made and then I wont be able to sell them.

Also, I've been in here for an hour now, but I forgot to turn on the electric blanket when I came into the room. And so even though I'm ready for bed now, my bed isn't ready for me.

Thoughts on a blowfly...

What I think now: The first blowfly of the season! Hurrah! Byebye nasty weather! One month into spring and from now on it should just keep getting warmer and better! Yay Blowfly!

What I will think in two months time: AARGHJUSTDIEALREADYYABASTARDS.

What Babycat is thinking: buzzy thing... new buzzy thing... look it's a buzzy thing... wanna catch the buzzy thing... if I climb the curtains I can catch the buzzy thing... mum, look, a buzzy thing... look out buzzy thing, here I come... (leaps onto curtain, falls off. repeats)