A lack of fitness

I have now been at work for three days, and I feel like I have been run over by a series of buses. Probably three, ay?

I am ahead of a couple of things - photocopying and planning for lessons. I am behind on a major thing - a scheme for teachers to follow at year 9. It weighs on me!, and I will feel better once that issue has been addressed.

The holidays feel like three weeks ago!! So praise God we have a three day weekend starting on Friday afternoon due to Waitangi day. And then we will have to work without ceasing till the next break. I'm sure I'll get my work fitness back - after all, I do actually LIKE my job.

Back to work

First, we had a meeting in the chapel. With singing. Both songs were EXTREMELY repetitive, one took one powerpoint slide repeated ad nauseum, and the other song consisted of repeating two powerpoint slides. Note to self: its more interesting to sing if the words change a bit.

The chapel is now closed for the rest of the year due to it being an earthquake risk.

Then we had a meeting in the staffroom. For two hours, on the founding orders of the school.

Then lunch, then a department meeting for an hour, then another department meeting for another hour.

Praise God, that was the first day. I'm betting life gets a lot more interesting from now on.

Getting ahead of the schedule

When Leah said to try quilting in a straight line while free motion quilting I freaked out. I could see myself wobbling all over the place, and it was going to be All Too Hard. This year one of the things I want to do is learn to listen to my internal voice, and then either change it, act on it, or confront it in some way. When I heard all this Too Hard crap, I thought I better actually have a go before I talked myself into being too freaked out. Besides, its  quilting, and a practice sandwich to boot. What matters if it is really terrible?

Quilting on the fabric line:

You can just see a couple of the lines on here

This is the underside where I tried going in different directions

This was quilting in the ditch

This is the underside of quilting in the ditch

This was going round a pattern - I've outlined trees.

You know, for all the fuss before I started I loved doing this. I knew where to go, which is part of the trick with stippling. And I can see I will definitely use this. I don't have any stencils, so I couldn't try the stencil part, but I've always had a wish to make an amish style quilt with the elaborate feathers etc and I will need to do the stencil thing then.

What I learned: shut up and quilt!

Scale

I did these squares in a rush last night - I want to keep up with the quilt-along, but the VCC rally has been a big time commitment. I'm guessing school won't be a great help too, so I am going to have to get a lot more quick about getting to the machine and getting it done. No fluffing around on the internet for me!

Here is the little one:

And the medium

And the large

All three together:

You could dig holes in these if you felt so inclined - the whole lot were done in about 15 minutes, and they are pretty rough. But actually I felt really empowered to be choosing my scale. I have quilted large and also Very Tiny before, but I didn't feel in control of choosing. I went with what was comfortable for the pattern, and then was stuck with that for the duration of the project. I'd also not thought of using an object to keep the scale constant - I've always just eye-balled it. And as I learnt last week it's quite a lot harder to see quilting from the top of a patterned quilt, so eye-balling can be hard cos you can't see your lines very clearly.

This week I learnt I control the scale, and that I can do it. Also using an object to set the distance between lines is really very handy.

And I also discovered that even 15 mins of quilting can be quite relaxing during a very busy fun and still stressful week!

Free motion quilting #2

Better late than never! Have been making placemats for my practice bits. The sons have chosen their own material...

The top of son #1's mat

The bottom of son #1's mat

 This came out OK. I used pin basting and the stitching is good tension wise. The scale changes quite a bit, and one side is definitely a larger scale than the other. Totally invisible faults from the top.

My mat top

My mat bottom

My mat bottom close up

My mat was a pig's bottom to quilt. I tried spray basting and must have used the wrong stuff. It was just caused spray adhesive, but in my defence it had a picture of a quilt on it! The needle got covered in glue, and then the top thread couldn't flow through and it would break. A LOT. The second photo of mine shows how often it broke, and its like that all over. But I liked the fabric and it is going to get a thrashing with food and going through the machine so I perserved. All the problems are invisible from the front.

What I learned: some huge quilting problems are all but invisible under patterned fabric, so chillaxe. And don't use dodgy spray adhesive on quilts. Work on keeping a constant scale! (How timely)

Unexpected eek

Went to the concert for the car rally tonight. We have to wear necklace passes to get into the venues, and they are terrifically strict about no pass, no entry. Just as we were leaving when son #2 demanded sandwiches. Son #2 is immediately not flavour of the day!

Off we go. We get to the venue, and are just getting out of the car when son #2 (again) announces "I don't have my badge!" - turns out this translates into No Pass. So I have to go home with son #2 to get the pass (and the mandarin and water he forgot - deep breathing).

At the venue we are walking in when I realise he has the necklace but not the badge - he dropped it in the carpark. Must admit, there was a little more than deep breathing this time!

Back we go, and successfully enter for the Proms Concert, Wanganui style. Lots of people have come to this one, and we enter and stand at the back, scanning tables for the family. Behind us, up in the bleachers, there is a shriek. Then I see son #1 coming down from the bleachers to me: "Please tell me that shriek was not your Grandmother?!".

But no, of course it IS Grandma. They had gone upstairs to be able to see better, and as the first row meant the safety rails were in the way, they had gone to the second row. Grandma can't walk so good, and she had travelled round the long way so she would avoid the big step/seat to the second row. When she saw us arrive, she didn't send son #1 to get us, she tried to step forward herself, and she had forgotten she was a step up. Crash. As she has a knee replacement and another knee that isn't a great deal better, she has no ability to catch herself. She stepped into empty space, and fell on the rail and then to the floor. Thank goodness she didn't fall down out of the bleacher area.

She's at the hospital at present with Grandad, having travelled in the ambulance. Grandad has my car, and they will be home eventually.

I should point out at this stage, when there were St Johns Ambulance people round and a proper problem, both the sons worked really hard on keeping out of the way and being quiet and good. They done good. Eventually.

Riding around in style

For the next week or two I am going to be riding around in this:

Notice the photobomb by the westie!

Its a 1937 Dodge Touring Sedan. Or so I'm told!!

Quite classy eh? The out-laws have come down to take part in the Vintage Car Club Rally here in Wanganui. So we have a lot of rallying and not a lot of quilting ahead.