Way to go quilt

I’ve made this quilt a couple of times – it’s from Hot Possum.  This version is cot sized – I left out a sky panel to make it a bit smaller.  I love how the VW looks careening off the road straight at you.    I try to find quirky bits and pieces from my stash for the applique.  I didn’t have to buy anything for this quilt except backing.  I knew that duck fabric would be perfect for something one day.  

Saturn and the rockets always looks good too – the background has silver glitter and the quilting is in silver metallic thread. 

More Mulberries

Confession:  I have not eaten a mulberry from my tree yet.  Haven’t tasted the jam I’ve been making, haven’t eaten a fresh berry from the tree. 

But I did try this:

Mulberry pie, made by my friend Margaret.  It was yummy and not as sweet as I expected.  Everything is better when it’s wrapped in pastry.

Mulberries

 

The mulberries continue to ripen, and the possum doesn’t seem to be eating very many.  There are flying foxes out there every night though.  There is still plenty of fruit on the tree, and I am picking about half a kilo a day.  I don’t actually like mulberries, so I am planning to make jam to give away. 

I’ve never really made jam before, but it doesn’t seem that hard.  I had a practice last week with strawberries, and worked out the basics.  One batch was like strawberry syrup, so I used Jamsetta for the next lot and it set really well.  All the fruit floats to the top of the jar though, and I’m not sure what causes that or how to prevent it.  I’ve decided to like my jam that way- you can have chunky or not chunky from the same jar.

 

1 kilo of mulberries, 1 kilo of sugar, juice from 2 lemons looks like this at the start:

It’s pretty interesting to watch as all the juice comes out of the fruit and it starts boiling up.  The instructions say use a big, deep saucepan and you really do need it.  The fruit and sugar boils up a long way.  I was surprised by the colour that the mulberries turned – a rich deep red.  I was expecting more of a purple-y colour.  The spoon is now red, it didn’t wash out.

I need to get more jars.  I’m not running out of mulberries any time soon. 

Mysteries

I have discovered the reason that I “ran out” of fabric for this quilt when I was so sure I had bought enough to finish the whole project.  I found 10 completed blocks that were not with all the other completed blocks.  The good new is now I only have to finish 3 full size blocks and half size fill ins and it will be finished.  (Plus put all the rows together and add a border, but let’s not quibble over details.)  It would have been nice to discover them before I went out and bought more white muslin and made another 250 pink ellipses though.  I think I’ll do a simpler machine version with the leftovers so it’s not a total loss.

All of a sudden it’s spring in my back yard – despite the lack of rain for most of July, the mulberry and nectarine trees and gone crazy and started fruiting already. 

Hopefully the possums won’t eat all of them.  (I wouldn’t mind them having some, but when they take a bite out each one and then leave it I get annoyed.  And they already ate my capsicums.)

I hope I can find someone who eats mulberries, because there are an awful lot of them on the tree this year and I don’t like them.  If only the possums would co-operate and just eat mulberries.

Vintage

I can’t resist a vintage Singer - they are so solid and reliable, as well as pretty.  This one needs a bit of cleaning, and the gold is a little worn but that just means it’s had a bit of use.  It’s a knee lever machine and seems to run pretty well.  I have four old Singers now, in varying states of repair.  According to the serial number, this one was made in Clyde Bank in Scotland in 1938. 

I’ve been sewing for a long time, and buying fabric for a long time.  Luckily I have the room to store it, but I think I really need to use things up instead of just keeping them.  So I went off to my sewing room and pulled down 4 plastic crates of scraps to see what was really in there.  The answer is this:

Leftovers and abandoned projects from the last 20 (!!) years.  I used to keep every scrap of fabric, for the simple reason that it was so expensive to buy.  It still is, but I’m a bit more realistic now about what I will actually end up using and I tend to throw  little scraps out these days.

I started sorting – I have heaps of blue and not much yellow/orange fabric.  Plus country colours, blacks and multi colour stuff.  It looks much better in separate zip lock bags.  I also threw out 2 shopping bags of unusable stuff (although I did go through them a second time and pulled a few more pieces out, but after that I really did throw them out).

I went through a William Morris phase, before deciding it was all a bit too hard and putting it away for 11 years.  This is actually not as ugly as I remembered it, but I’m not planning to finish it any time soon.

After sorting out all those scraps, my plan was to use them to do some string piecing.  I ended up with this so far:

Not sure if I like this either, I think it’s too much colour and I’m not confident that it will improve.  I was keen on the red centres but now I’m not so sure.  Maybe I need to only use one or two colours in the string bit (blue/green maybe?) or have the circles in different single colours.  Dunno.

accepted

I finally heard back about the Fabric of Society challenge – accepted.  They’re probably accepting everything, but the entry form does say it’s juried, so you can’t take it for granted.  Now I get to go to Melbourne too, so I can see it hanging.  I also want to go and see the original, which is at the Queenscliffe Historical society.  I’m not sure where exactly that is, but it’s somewhere near Melbourne. 

I’d put this one away because I am so tired of looking at it and now that it’s been accepted I have to finish all the little fiddly bits, like adding tassles to ponies.  Also need to make a storage bag and work out how to get it there, I think a courier might be easier than posting. 

This cannot be comfortable:

but apparently I am wrong about that. 

Score

During yesterday’s sewing outing, the topic of sewing baskets came up.  Monica wants one, and I had told her that I could find one in a second hand shop that would be much nicer (and much better value) than a brand spanking new one. 

Finding stuff you want in second hand shops is mostly luck – you have to be there on the right day and pay attention to what’s for sale.  I almost missed these:

 

Not one, but two vintage sewing baskets!!   For $4 each!!  They were definitely coming home with me.

They’re quite large – about 30 cm across.  The insides have pretty much had it, so I am planning to take out the old linings and replace them.  I want to add pockets to the sides and a pin cushiony thing on the inside of the lid. 

I also bought a glomesh Oroton cigarette case for $3.  I don’t smoke, but this little bit of gold glomesh made me remember my mother’s handbags from the 1970’s – so slinky and shiny.  I’m going to find something else to keep in it.