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I keep forgetting to post my layouts, so if you missed them over at W.C.S then here they are...
It does seem that I have forgotten Byron at the moment, but I just have had a run of fun photos of Oscar (and they are getting harder to get, so when I do I run with it!!)
The new gallery goes up on the 1st of September so be sure to head on over to check out the layouts...lots of inspiration to be found.
I thought it would be a great time to take an online basic sewing course! Sure I can sew a straight line but that's about it. And so in the quest to learn one more new thing I enrolled in:
Class has started (and is open for a year - just my sort of class LOL) and we have started with the very basics and then things will be getting a little more difficult as we move through projects.
So here is my first project with my trusty 23 years old Janome:
Let's just take another look at that 3 straight side / 1 wonky sided pin cushion:
Next up for me (yes, I have still to finish my napkins, but any day now) was a pencil case:
I will just say right up front that the zipper nearly sent me over the edge but I got there (please do not mock all you "zipper goddesses" out there!) but I was super happy in the end; felt so clever. Ha!
I have a little pile of fabric ready to go and lots of projects to work through, which I will share as I finish.
And never fear, the hexi's continue to be constructed :)
Last week Gary & I accompanied Oscar to a University open night for the Bachelor of Creative Arts (his first choice of degree all going well). As we sat in the lecture hall and listened to teachers and professors and the Dean speak about the course requirements I could not believe that the time had come for a child of mine to be heading off to Uni.
It has been over 20 years since I graduated from the University of Wollongong and now I was listening to all the great subjects and career opportunities that Oscar will be exposed to if he gets into this course.
We toured the Creative Arts building, which was one big creative hive of activity and don't even get me started on the rooms full of macs with the graphic design classes.
Oscar got excited and what has just been something on paper, now became very real. I was very excited and wished it was me. I even, jokingly, suggested we could both apply to do the degree! After we resuscitated Oscar and the horror of that scenario had passed we continued on with our tour LOL
I don't know what is going to happen...Oscar will need a good ATAR and portfolio as part of his application, but we have our fingers crossed.
All this looking back made me go and dig out a little layout celebrating the end of my 4 years of study,
Yes, I was a blonde. I had the time back then for 3 weekly touch ups!!
Now, not so much.
There is a flurry of activity in our house this weekend. The upside; lots of creativity. The downside; the crazy mess on EVERY FREAKING surface!!
We live in a very little house, not many places to spread out but we managed to fill every available surface.
You be the judge...
My work desk, making progress on my hexies,
My computer desk, hexi overflow and iphone paraphernalia ( a new toy, more on that later)
Some of the kitchen bench was covered in more hexis,
The dining room table was covered in Oscar's last minute work on his HSC art major work,
And the other part of the kitchen bench was being used as an electrician station as Oscar also worked on his HSC Design & Technology major work,
And just for good measure, the remaining kitchen bench space was taken up with the remains of snacks to keep the HSC brain ticking!!
And lastly, the coffee table is covered in clean washing just folded from the line.
If you know me, you will know that "mess" does my head in and today there was plenty of it. Oscar has just 8 days to have both his major works submitted and I would like to think that I can have that hexi quilt finished before he is done with university (hopefully he gets into the degree he wants) LOL
The rest of the weekend was spent loving on my new toy. Man, I have wanted an iphone for so long and now I have one (thank you tax return).
Big learning curve to see all it can do and trying to keep the boys away from it (what is it with boys, the more stupid the app the greater their need to download it).
And of course, like the rest of Australia I went out to vote and now we don't know what is going to happen!!
Now I have to go and try and clean up. I will have to accept that our dining room will not be ours again until the 30th (the day the major works are due) but I can reclaim the rest of the house!
And why is that you may ask? Well I have found myself another little obsession to fill all those empty hours I have (not!!).
I opened the pandora's box of hexagons and the sweet quilts that are the product of many, many hours of hand piecing hexies (as I now call them).
Seems safe enough...a few 4" square fabric scraps, a paper template, a few pins, a little basting here, a little whip stitch there.
I set up a little production line and slipped on a good DVD. No problems here, I tell you.
Look how pretty those little flowers are. And just like that you are hooked and you spend hours making templates and basting fabric, just to get your next flower fix LOL
I'm supposed to be using scraps but then a few little fat quarter packs just find their way into my shopping basket after I accidentally walked into the fabric store.
It doesn't help that I can then spend more time visiting places like this and this and this and this and so many more, all from the comfort of my own home.
Let's just say that that little red lunch box is no longer of use and I am hunting out a bigger carry bag for on the go hexies, like at the boys soccer (note: Oscar once informed me that crocheting while watching his game made me look like I was at least 100 years old and not cool. I wonder if hexi piecing will do the same for my image LOL).
Now what does trouble me is all the people who have been where I am and warning me that I might just run out of steam and get sick of those damn hexies and 5 years later, still have a bag of colourful hexies going nowhere.
Well I say never...if I completed a "random" quilt and lived to tell the tale, I will not be beaten by a "Grandmothers Flower Garden". Ha!
