Storytelling {Monday} Sunday

I had a wonderful weekend in Herefordshire with some lovely ladies. There was much crafting, coffee, cake, chocolate and chatting. What more could you want? It was back to reality with a bang on Sunday night, when I walked through the front door, so my story had to wait until today.

We moved into our house 4 years ago and being a new build, it was a vision in magnolia throughout. High time we had some colours on the walls then. My husband is not a huge fan of decorating, but he likes to do it right. This meant we couldn’t just paint the walls, but had to do the ceiling as well. The room was duly dust sheeted and work could commence.

We took down the old light fittings, which we both hated, ready to fill, sand, wash down and finally paint. The idea being to push through, no matter how long it took and get the new light fittings up, once the paint had dried. Neither of us spotted the fatal flaw in this excellent plan. Once the natural light ran out, we had no other light at all and couldn’t actually paint the ceiling. Doh!

The lounge was very cosy, with a selection of bedside lamps, that evening, but I’m very happy to have a fresh white ceiling and some new lights now. Maybe we’ll even get some paint on the walls this week.

For more tales, of anything from great adventures to everyday life, head on over to Sian’s place.

Don’t worry….

….I haven’t been shut in the understairs cupboard!* Things have gone a bit pear shaped on the decorating front and I haven’t had a chance to sort out my Month in Numbers.

I’m driving up to Herefordshire tomorrow for a DIY retreat with some lovely crafty ladies and I’m just waiting for the soup to finish cooking before I can go to bed. There won’t be a Five Things I’m Loving This Friday now, but I will have a story for you on Sunday. Have a great weekend.

*See yesterday’s post.

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday? #143

My desk really is in a sorry state this week, or should that be me without my desk. We are attempting to decorate the lounge and have been doing the oh so boring absolutely essential (apparently) prep work today.

My husband spotted a sanding sponge, while we were wandering the aisles in B&Q and thought it would be a new toy to play with very handy. He had to try it out as soon as we got back (before we had dust sheeted of course) and the result was this.

My once chocolate brown leather sofa is now magnolia speckled. Lovely. Ah well I’m sure it will all be worth it in the end. The wall behind my desk may even be a new colour next week. You never know.

If you want to see some desks where craftiness actually happens then try here. I’ll be back tomorrow with my Month in Numbers, if I haven’t been gagged with Frogtape and shut in the understairs cupboard in the meantime.

Five Things I’m Loving This Friday ~ Quilts Part 4

Some of my favourite books for patchwork and quilting this week. The links take you to Amazon, where all have the ‘Look Inside’ option, which is a great way to get a flavour of the book.

The Quilter’s Bible by Linda Clements. Probably the most useful book I’ve read on the subject of quilting. Great for beginners.

Jelly Roll Quilts by Pam and Nicky Lintott

The Gentle Art of Quilt-Making by Jane Brocket

Material Obsession by Kathy Doughty and Sarah Fielke

Simple Shapes Spectacular Quilts by Kaffe Fassett. In fact any of his books are inspirational and I have borrowed most of them from the library at some point.

Now onto another little thing that has been bugging me lately. Word Verification! I’ve never really minded it in the past, but in the last couple of weeks it has become almost impossible to decipher. It asks you to prove you’re not a robot, but I think you need to be one to reproduce the characters.

A few blogs that I visit regularly, seem to have added WV recently, when I’m sure they didn’t have it before. On a couple of occasions I have failed to leave a comment, because it keeps telling me that I’ve incorrectly guessed the letters. There are instructions here on how to remove it, but only if you want to of course.

I don’t intend to turn FTILTF into a platform for my ranting. Promise. Hope to see you next time.

What’s On Your Workdesk Wednesday? #142

Thankyou for all the well wishes for my poorly boy last week. He is all better now and back to school, along with his sister. The house always seems so quiet, the first few days after a holiday, without them. I’m left at home with the mess!

You can see the remains of my second breakfast, eaten at my desk while I had another look at how the quilt blocks go together.

The book is by Pam and Nicky Lintott and there are some wonderful quilts in it. I decided to start with this fairly straightforward design, which I think will work just as well with the bright colours I have. All the strips have been cut now. I just need to sort the remainder into pairs for the four patch blocks, so there is a good contrast.

I’m off to tackle some of that mess, before I settle down with a coffee and visit some interesting and inspirational desks.

PS If any of you WOYWWers are interested in finding out whether your work has been ‘pinned’ to the boards on Pinterest, there are simple instructions in Friday’s post on how to do it.

A Month of Sunrays ~ But Not What I Thought

When I saw that Julie had a new theme for the month on her blog, I must admit to being a little surprised at the subject. You see, to me the word ‘sunray’ didn’t immediately conjure up rays of sunshine, but something quite different.

Now I know that Julie has used her (not inconsiderable) powers of persuasion, to get her readers into various shades of purple, in the past. But narrow knife edge pleats, of the sort I remember gracing the pages of the Damart catalogues, that dropped through my Gran’s letter box periodically, when I was a child. Really?

It got me wondering if there was a more modern take on the sunray pleated skirt.  My search was rewarded with this gem of a dress and in the perfect colour too.

Dress by Rukshani Gunaratne photographed by Mariah Jelena

I intended to post this yesterday, but it took me a while to discover the designer of the dress and I didn’t want to use the photograph without crediting them. I’ll be back tomorrow with my desk as usual and the beginnings of my quilt blocks.

Five Things I’m Loving This Friday ~ Quilts Part 3

Before I post my list of five today, I just want to talk about something else for a minute. Sian linked to this article about using Pinterest, in a way which credits the originator of any given photo, idea or project. Like her, I think this is very important.

I use other people’s photos every week on FTILTF. I never pretend that they are my own and I always credit the person responsible for the picture and project by linking directly to the specific post on their blog.

I wondered if anyone had pinned any of these photos from my blog, rather than following the project link. It’s easy enough to find out. Just copy and paste your own blog url into the highlighted area.

http://pinterest.com/source/your blog url here/

I discovered that several photos had been pinned directly from my blog that were not mine, which leaves me with a dilemma. So today I am going to post a list of links without pictures, while I consider the best thing to do in future.

1. Build a Fabric Stash at Cluck Cluck Sew
2. Fabric Folding at In Color Order
3. Color Basics at Oh Fransson!
4. Supplies You {may} Need at Old Red Barn Co.
5. Calculating Quilt Measurements at Crazy Mom Quilts

It seems strange to write a blog post and not add any photos, but it’s well worth clicking through to the various blogs. The link to the Old Red Barn Co is the first of a series, that takes you right through the quilting process, very useful for a beginner.

I’m about to get in my car and head for Shropshire to see an old friend. I’m not a big fan of driving and my sense of direction is not the best, but I hope to be back here on Monday, with a post for Julie’s Month of Sunrays. Have a great weekend.