Sewing catch-up

I thought I'd do a quick catch up on my main Christmas sewing - somewhat late now, of course. And I need to firstly make excuses for the truly appalling quality of the vast majority of these photos - mostly taken late at night (I really need to remember to take photos before the very last minute).

You may remember my plea for help a while back. The overwhelming majority of you suggested (and thanks so much to all those who took the time to help me out of my indecisiveness) using the curtain fabric on the back of my nephew's cot quilt. So.....not one to ignore the advice of lots of tasteful and talented people (or not very often anyway) I did just that and the end result, I think, worked really well. Since he's only 6 months old my nephew was somewhat disappointingly unenthusiastic but his parents were rather more co-operative.



And then there was the bird mobile for my niece in colours to match her bedroom curtains. Making the birds was the easy bit. And I kind of guessed that so they lay around perch-less for a good number of weeks. I selected a nice springy twig. And that lay around for a good while too. And then 3 days before Christmas I thought I'd really better take action. Each bird was sewn on (in two places with dark thread to look like little feet clutching the branch) and, feeling quite pleased, I went to collect the boys from school.

There was a rather upsetting sight when I came home. Several of the birds had breathed their last gasp and were hanging upside down and another looked extremely drunk and disorderly. I didn't think dead and dying birdies were appropriate as a present for a young child - but I solved the problem with a small spot of glue on each one's tummy. I was careful to keep the glue to a minimum because I realised there was another potential problem - and it was something I should really have been able to foresee - twigs get very brittle when they dry out....but the birds should be easy to remove and re-attach to another twig if this one ever meets with an accident.



After Christmas I had the pleasure of making a commissioned cot quilt. The colours chosen were pinks and reds and the back was appliqued with the baby's name and date of birth. I went for my usual organic cotton flannel (it looks as if Saints and Pinners may be out of white but they have several other solid flannels) on the back and stuck to simple 5 1/2" squares on front - the fabrics were all pretty busy (and chosen to be suitable for the little girl while she is a baby but also, hopefully, still appropriate as she gets bigger) and with no plains/solids in the mix, I decided it needed to be kept quite simple, plus I actually generally prefer simple to ornate quilt designs (not that I don't very much admire the skill and talent that goes into them).





Now I just need to get going with some new stuff....but you will be pleased to hear that our shower is sparkling in every nook and cranny (and I feel ridiculously pleased about it - and for once am not ashamed to walk into the bathroon)! Here's to some small pleasures for you too!