A spot of quilting....

I've been doing a spot of quilting..........

.

Just simple squiggle stitching, but so useful as a 'filler' stitch and so good to do while listening to my ipod.
I have marked the outer borders with a curvy line to now sew some free form 'feathers'. The blue pen washes out with water.

Am now wondering if I need to do just a little more quilting in the blank squares......

 The fabrics and wadding have not been washed as yet, because I want a vaguely vintage look to the quilt.  When the binding is on I will wash it in the machine on a 60 degree wash and this will shrink everything slightly.

Butter yellow quilt.

 It always starts off innocently enough, I fall in love with some fabric, in this case Moda's  Lily & Will in a butter yellow colourway and my favourite plain fabric - Kona 'snow' from Simply Solids.........

 I just cut a few tiny slices of fabric to make some 3/4" squares.....

 Just a few more bits of fabric added here and there......

And before I know it - I've got enough for a small quilt top

 Add a 3/4" wide border, then a slightly wider border to do some fancy quilting in....

 Better get on with it then, hadn't I?

At last......

I've made* a loaf of bread that looked and tasted like 'real' bread and not something that I could have built a house with!

After spending a weekend with some very dear friends and scoffed their very successful bread machine bread, I bought the same brand of machine as theirs (£75, from John Lewis) and some ingredients from Sainsbury's. This morning we woke up to the most delicious smell coming from the kitchen.......

 I cannot believe how easy it was too - the most difficult thing was measuring out all the ingredients (which reminds me,  I must find a quarter of a teaspoon measure from somewhere.) I made the multi seeded white loaf.  My friend did warn me that JL don't supply the recipe book - which seems uncharacteristically petty of them. I had to search online for it as oddly they don't even give a hint where to find it in the instructions or on their website.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm fresh bread;

and fresh coffee;

  My one critism is that it tastes just slightly sweet - I might do just a little bit of tweeking.

* Strictly speaking, the machine made the loaf, not me - and that's probably why it's edible!

Grandmothers Flower Garden

Making hexagons is quite a soothing occupation and great for doing in the evening or when catching up with programmes recorded on Sky+!

Cutting out all the foundation papers is a tedious job that needs some concentration to cut on the lines accurately.

Using a Jelly Roll strip is rather wasteful, but I do love the fabrics, so necessary.

I need to cut out an awful lot of hexagons

Pinning the foundation papers on to the fabrics

each hexagon needs tacking - this takes ages!

One layout suggestion - not sure about that plain grey fabric though....

Chic Girl says she prefers this layout and since this little quilt will probably end up at her house, I'll go with the Grandmothers Flower Garden layout.

Hand stitching the 'flowers' together.

A close up of one 'flower'.

Easy to hand stitch these together while watching TV.

But no good doing any stitching if I need to pay close attention!

Brittany Holiday - Carnac & St Malo

We stayed in an appartment in this rather beautiful Chateau in Carnac: Shame it didn't serve any food

Some of the standing stones at Carnac:

 Because it was summer most of the stones are closed off to the public to protect the flora and fauna, so for some groups of stones, such as the ones above,  we were not able to get very close. If we go back between October and March the public are allowed to walk among all of them for the grand sum of €5 each! However so many stones were accessible all year round we didn't feel disappointed at all.

 There were so many stones spread over such a large area. we had to drive between some of the groups.

We thought this one looked like someone from the Muppets - Beaker, maybe?   Some stones were huge:

At St Malo we stayed at a hotel right next to the ocean - and boy it was breezy, but we had a good view from our rooms balcony: 

Lovely restaurant in St Malo - used solely by locals, not a tourist in sight, we really had to use our Franglais in here:

Another lovely restaurant in St Malo:

where I had Fruits De Mere - nom nom nom:














And my dessert: Iles Flottant, I don't think I've ever seen such a huge pudding, good job it was as light as a feather!!:

P.S. - Found an amazing (huge) needlework shop on the outskirts of Rennes: 'Ecolaines' , with patchwork, dressmaking, craft and upholstery fabrics, books, magazines, embroidery threads and equipment, lampshade making stuff, ribbons, lace,  braids and trimmings, wool and Bernina sewing machines. A fantastic place that I would love to go back to next time we go to Brittany and spend more time browsing and buying.  They have two shops, one at 35132 Vezin le Coquet, Rennes and one at 25 Rue des Marechales, Route de Lorient. Worth seeking them out if you are in the area, although you will need to use your French as very little English was spoken.