Archie The Wonder Dog

Many of you will know a lovely quilter called Salley who always leaves the most wonderful comments on my blog (and others).  Salley doesn't yet have a blog (I'm working on it!) so she doesn't have any followers she can ask for a small favour and I thought I'd ask on her behalf! Jackie at Canton Village Quilt Works is running a pets on quilts competition on Facebook and it would be lovely if those of you who have a Facebook account would go and vote for Salley's cat, Polo.  Salley told me that she employs Polo to do her basting but I think it's more that Polo deigns to help.  After all, we all know you can't make cats do anything they don't want to! Here's a photo of Polo helping.  Or maybe she's supervising... Please vote for me! The links for the competition are here and here .  I'm not sure which link is the best to use (but I think it's the first - please be patient as I imagine the photos may take a while to load) as I do

I'd love to be able to tell you that I've been hard at work since I last blogged but I haven't!  I have made some progress though... Firstly, though, I want to apologise for all the photos - it's not going to get light today (it's tanking down) so they're not the brightest photos in the world! I've quilted sixteen of the Stained QAL blocks.  I went with the wavy lines in the end and I'm really pleased with the texture of the blocks.  The heavy quilting (perhaps combined with a double layer of wadding) has pulled the blocks in so they're going to be 11.5" finished rather than the planned 12" but that's not a problem, it ends up measuring what it ends up measuring. Four blocks from the front:   and the back: I'm trying to do a couple of blocks a day.  Sometimes I manage more, more often I manage none but I've only got eight left to quilt so I hope to be trimming them next week. The main thing I've b

I've finally managed to muster enough energy to stop staring at the pile of Stained QAL blocks on my sewing table and do something with them... I cut 48 squares of wadding and used 505 basting spray for the first time: A not very interesting pile of squares of wadding And then sorted out the blocks and stuck them to the wadding.  I learnt my lesson about the after-effects of spray basting (tight chest and very sore, itchy hands) and, instead of spraying them in my sewing room in front of a wide-open window, I decamped to the conservatory... I briefly considered donning g loves but decided that would be a step too far - I just washed my hands at regular intervals and then three times when I ' d finished! ...where I could stand in front of the open door.  I just brought through one set of squares at a time so I could get out of the room every few minutes and allow the fumes/smell to dissipate and keeping the door through to the house closed meant the smell didn