The Lakes of Pontchartrain

Well, I've had a busy few days with not one, bur two nights out!
Firstly, I was offered a spare ticket to go and see the excellent Be Good Tanya's at one of Manchester's best venues, Royal Northern College of Music. I've seen them several times before and they didn't disappoint.
My Favourite song !

Next was a theatre trip to see The Accrington Pals at the The Royal Exchange A harrowing tale about the recruitment of most of the men from a small northern town, to fight in WW1. Almost all were killed near The Somme in the space of 10 minutes in June 1916. The play is cleverly told from the perspective of the women left at home. It was funny, sad and thought-provoking.
So, that's my social life done for a while.

......And Not Much Sewing Was Done

Archie lays claim to a new sleeping place.

Threading for Beginners

I've got a fairly unsophisticated sewing machine, as well as age-related deteriorating eyesight. So, I have to resort to using a needle threader. No all-singing, all-dancing automatic threader for me!
The trouble with these things, though is that they break all too frequently. Well mine do.
You can usually buy them in two's or three's for around a pound.  Hobbycraft sell them like this.
Still seems expensive to me.
The wonder of eBay meant I was able to buy a bundle of them for mere pennies.
Thing is, though, I've now got 250!
If I use them at the rate of one a month, it'll still take 20 years to get through that lot.
So, I thought I would share them. If you're a Luddite, like me and could make use of some needle threaders - drop me an email and I'll pop some in the post.

Monday Morning Feeling....

.......Or it would be, except I'm having mine on Tuesday. It's back to work tomorrow, after a week off. I'm happy to report that I didn't spend any money all week, until today, that is. A trip to the Post Office, a top-up shop in Sainsbury's - that came in at a massive £2.57 and unfortunately a 40p library fine!
No petrol used whilst I've been off, no charity shops visited, all meals from store cupboard - so, a success, I think!

I haven't been bored, plenty to do that doesn't involve consumerism worship. I did, however, get treated to a night out that included dinner and a film, so I'm lucky and can't complain.

On The Straight And Narrow.

 

I went to a grammar school, where it was decided that keyboard skills should not be taught, as grammar school girls did not become typists. This was in the olden days, obviously. Instead we had domestic science - not sure that even exists anymore. We did cooking and sewing. The first year we made an apron to wear whilst cooking and the next year we made a skirt. They weren't particularly inspiring lessons and did not promote a life-long love of sewing.
I was given a second hand old and very heavy sewing machine when I was 16. This made me interested in sewing. I made lots of my own clothes, with mixed success. When I started clubbing, it was important to have a different outfit every week and being something of a punk meant I was quite creative(and outrageous), at times.
Later, I became more interested in soft furnishings - making curtains, cushions and duvet covers. I would haunt the now defunct Habitat shop, buying remnants of furnishing fabric.
Sadly life got in the way and I stopped sewing for what turned into decades.
About 15 months ago I treated myself to a rather basic machine and just over a year ago I found my interest in quilting.
My previous experience hasn't stood me in good stead, at all. So, it's been like learning from scratch. The basics, like cutting accurately and sewing in a straight line are still skills to be completely mastered. I'm getting there!
I've found it useful to make small things like the above mug mat - it's good practice. I've done some more today. However, loading more than one photo at the moment is something Blogger still won't help me with!
 

Measure Twice, Cut Once

Not much sewing, today. Lots of cutting, cutting and more cutting. 200 6" squares needed - nearly there!
I made another mug rug thingy with Bee fabric scraps, but no chance of a pic - bugger Blogger. It used to be so simple to upload photos, now it's a very time consuming task.

Saturday Sewing

I made the January block for the Bee I belong to. It's to make up a quilt from a tutorial on Fresh Lemons Quilts. I've checked and it is straight!I had quite a few scraps left so whipped up a (very) scrappy mug rug/mat/thingy. I'll pop that in the post as well.

Hope Blogger gets the photo thing fixed soon. Took ages to load these and they had to be 'as is' - editing them was only possible if I didn't want to publish also.
Apologies for the quality.