I've felt really bad about not blogging lately. Am I a bad blogger? I kept thinking I needed to take pictures, although I've been putting it off because the light has been so bad lately. Then I thought today - just take some pics - because low light pictures and a blog entry are better than a heap of good intentions right?
Do you remember me getting this
fabric recently? Well I was inspired to buy it after seeing this on the
Seamzine Blog. I made a circle scarf as soon as I'd received my fabric order and had pre washed it.


A note for those who've not used and prewashed flannel before: I'd read on other blogs about serging or zig zagging the raw edges before washing. I'd not bothered with this thinking; it can't be that bad? Well having washed it with the voile both got tangled up pretty bad. Nothing I couldn't sort with my sewing scissors, but the flannel edges really did shred during the wash process, so it may well be worth going to the extra effort of sorting those edges before you wash your flannel. Just saying.
The flannel is so lovely and snuggly for scarves I had to order some more for some Christmas stockings goodies. I got this flannel from
Fabricpalooza.

This lovely fabric isn't the only goodies by mail I've been getting lately - some I can't share with you because of Christmas (wink wink). This treat was just for me though.
I ordered these from
HidenSeek as I've been admiring this art work for some time now. You can just see in the picture the beautiful decorated envelope that my goodies arrived in. They were even tied up with red paper ribbon - so cute!

They also reminded me of this feature on children's programme Blue Peter, that I saw many many years ago, about this man who'd lived abroad and sent illustrated cards and letters to his grand children and how the letters had been saved and were being made into a book. This story really stuck with me over the years. Imagine my delight and surprise yesterday when my other half took me to lunch and we nipped into the Oxfam Bookshop in a nearby town and this book was on display! It was the book they'd featured on Blue Peter all those years ago! My other half treated me to it - he said I just *had* to get it and well...I wasn't going to argue with him!

And finally I cut the fabric, sewed the top and even basted this lap quilt (actually it's the baby quilt pattern by
Oh,Fransson. I thought it would make a pretty lap quilt for my mum to snuggle up under as she feels the cold. I want to make it without her seeing any work in progress. I'd have quilted it but I've decided to go down the machine quilting route and I'm waiting for my new walking foot to arrive. I keep hearing these are a 'must' for machine quilting - that might explain my lack of success with other large quilted projects in the past. I haven't decided on the binding yet. I'm loving the mix of fabric ranges. It would make a pretty darling baby quilt too.