The Paddington Quilt is finished

Taa  Daaaa!  

I finished the Paddington Bear quilt on Monday last. It is now in the wash with some Colour Catchers.  

It is for our lovely new grandson -DGS- who lives away from us in another state.  Isn't he CUTE?

We will visit him in about 5 weeks's time. Can't wait! 

It is a large cot quilt size -it will actually work on the toddler bed when he is big enough.

The centres of the big stars and the log cabin blocks are images from Paddington Bear, and the words are of course from the luggage label he wore on his way from Peru!

I made the quilt with the quilt-as-you-go- method and used mostly fabrics from my stash.

I really love the moment when the border goes on. My DD helped me choose the blue solid for the binding, and I think it really works to frame the quilt and bring out the oranges and yellows. In this shot you can see some of the fabric for the back. In included some greens as well, because DGS's mum likes green. I couldn't make the green work on the front, but at least there is some in the back! 

Reconciliation Week

My week started at Sorry Day in Perth, with a sand mural which was made by a local indigenous artist Acacia Collard. The picture above does not show the completed work, which was awesome.

Later in the day, it was used by indigenous and non-indigenous dancers as their corroborree ground.

This week is Reconciliation Week in Australia, a time when we commemorate all the important historical milestones in the long road to recognition and reconciliation in this country for our First Nations.

Today is, rather uncomfortably, WA Day- the anniversary of the proclamation of Western Australia as a colony and possession of Britain, with all those uncomfortable associations of dispossession and distress for the people who were here on their land when white people arrived.

It is a time for reflection for those of us who care about justice.

This afternoon we went to Walyunga National Park, about 40 km from where we live, to see the river after the early winter rains. It was a glorious afternoon, and the river was lovely.  I was reminded about how much I love this place -and yet I was born in another country.

It is my hope that all who live here can come to love the land and each other.

Slow Living Diary

This month I am linking with Christine at Slow Living Essentials.

This post which asks us to consider how we are slowing down and incorporating more real life into the business of living.

Nourish 

Make and bake as much as possible from scratch. Ditch overpackaged, overprocessed convenience foods and opt for 'real' food instead. This week I found myself making three kinds of bread:

Jack Munroe was the inspiration for a soda bread made with pear and ginger and served with cheese and a veggie soup.  It is this bread which is on the bread board, and as you can see there was not much left. It was really yummo.

I also made a loaf of pumpkin bread in the bread maker -baker's yeast loaf.

The bread dough slowly rising on my bench is my sourdough.  It takes it's own sweet time to rise and is a good solid loaf when done -not so airy as a baker's yeast loaf, but I believe it is low GI as a result of all that slow rising.

I make a lot of soup in the autumn and winter, often up the old veggies in a veggie soup-before shopping for new fresher veg.  This week I made a lunch soup and had  two lunch-size serves in the freezer and one further whole meal put in the freezer for another day.

We also sprouted lentils-these are our favourite kind of sprouts. We use them in stir fries and salads.

Prepare Stockpile and preserve. Freeze extra meals or excess garden/market produce. Bottle/can, dehydrate or pickle foods to enjoy when they are not in season. Aim to reduce dependancy on store bought items especially those known to contain BPA and other suspect additives. Stocking up on dry goods when prices are low counts too.
I have olives in brine from our own tree.

We are beginning to deal with our citrus harvest.

I have a large jar of preserved lemons- which used 14 lemons!  I made some last year, and found that they were great for adding a burst of flavour to couscous or casseroles.

I will be looking for lots of ways of making best use of our citrus this year.

Reduce Cut down on household waste by re-using, re-purposing and repairing.
We have been doing quite a lot of redecorating around the house, and wherever possible making use and reusing old things in new ways. My DD stained and painted her old IKEA shelves to give her room a new look.

Where it has been necessary to let things go, they have been taken to the local op shop or posted on freecycle.

Green

I have been celebrating our lowest daily unit consumption for electricity ever  -7 units a day!


Obviously our solar panels have done their job over the summer and autumn period -along with our careful use of appliances.

So proud of this achievement.

The state government has put the price of electricity up again in the budget -any time soon it will be cost effective enough for people like me to go to battery storage along with their solar panels and we will be off-grid altogether.

Grow

We have finished the pomegranates, and I have lots of olives preserved.  Our autumn crops include mizuna, silverbeet, pumpkins, lettuce.

I planted some garlic in some styrofoam boxes DH picked up for free from the local supermarket.

We are thinking about adding a new raised garden bed in the back yard. I am wondering if a recycled 'intermediate bulk container" would be a good idea. It would be a re-use of the container, it would be easy to create another wicking bed in it, and it wouldn't look too ugly I think.

It is funny how I once was really worried that my garden would look like a junk yard if I went down this simple living path, and now what I once thought of as junk, I now think is clever and appropriate!

Create

I have made a couple of journal covers -one more successful than another. This one is quilted. I think I will make more of these now I have some experience of the pitfalls and things to remember.

I also now am the proud owner of a new-to-me overlocker. I made two sets of pyjama pants just using some sheeting I bought at an op shop, and the pattern I made by pulling apart some pants I already owned.

I am really excited about the possibilities now open to me!

Baby quilt- I am now working on the lettering for the baby quilt. It takes time to make these letters but they really 'lift" the whole thing.

Discover

I have been enjoying the vegetable recipes in Hugh's books "Everday' and "Three good things on a plate".  We try to have a pattern of having vegetarian meals at the end of the day on three or four days of the week. Hugh obviously knows and enjoys making vegetables the star of the meal, and we find them easy to cook too.

Enhance-the community

DH and I are part of a community group which works with asylum seekers in our community.

It was great to join with so many other passionate people on Palm Sunday at a peaceful rally calling for more compassionate responses from Australia.

DH helped this community group to fix some paving and shadecloth to its back yard area, and continues to work as the Treasurer.

I spoke to a couple of community groups about asylum seekers.

Enjoy

We went to the Australian String Quartet's concert called "Speechless" - and fell in love with a string quartet arrangement of Mozart's Requiem. This pared-down version really lets the music shine.

Our community choir is back practicing again -and it is a joy to sing together.

 We are enjoying the cooler mornings and the fact that we have had some good winter rains.

We spoil ourselves in the morning with coffee in front of the gas log fire!

Restoring the soul

We have been away -twice!
First time was just after Easter, and we both needed a break -DH in particular.

 My Sister-In-Law has a lovely home in Albany which she let us stay in, whilst she and her man were away.

 Of course I took my sewing machine, because the baby quilt needs work. DH read books -quite a lot! I think he was very tired after Easter and really needed a break.

 The weather was unusually sunny and quite warm for Albany. We love this coastline and it was great to be reacquainted with it.

 Sights like this restore the soul! 

Bliss! 

Happiest when scrappiest

 This is my new project -for our expected grandson. I thought I had better get started on it as the year is slipping away fast.

 The disappearing pinwheels quilt has been sidelined even though the braid border is coming along fine.

 The Dark Nightz quilt I am calling "Dancing through the night" is ready for the next stage of quilt-as-you-go, but it is taking a back seat.

 Paddington is now the star of the cutting table.

 I couldn't resist the opportunity to make scrappy stars.

 The first block -another 5 to go

It has been a very scrappy month and I am not over it yet!

So many pretty things

It has been quite a week for pretty things around here!

We had a lovely Sunday high tea, using my lovely china -some bequeathed to me by my mother in law, some found in op shops over the years.  On  the menu were cucumber sandwiches, asparagus rolls, savoury pumpkin muffins, and  iced sponge squares. All washed down with a good Earl Grey.   My DD helped create the spread!

(yes, we did also serve Gin and Tonics, darlings!)

I have settled on this fabric for a new baby quilt, featuring the culinary skills of that famous TV chef: Paddington! 

I am thinking of a simple medallion layout with the words "please look after this bear" in orange on blue fabric, and that vibrant orange in the border or binding. This is of course for our new baby due mid-year so I better get on with this as soon as my queen size scrappy gets to a point where I can leave it for a month or two.

This lovely old lady needed a new home. I gladly will take care of her. I will take her to my local sewing repair shop for a bit of TLC. She should sew fine. According to her number plate she is over 100 years old! She is in find condition, and I would have thought she was more likely be be from the 1940s or 1950s but until I have more information, this is what I know about her. 

She will have to wait though, because there was also an overlocker which also needed a new home. This is only 20 years old. I have always wanted an overlocker. She was very dusty but she works so I took her to the repair shop straight away for a good service. Hopefully I will have her back in a couple of weeks. Then the fun really will start! I hope to make even more pretty things with her special skills too. 

It's the little things which grow-quilts and vegetables!

At the beginning of the year I had a goal of becoming self sufficient in salad vegetables. There have been some successes and some failures, but we persevere.

This week I planted spinach and mizuna seeds. I also planted another 2 punnets of lettuce seedlings. We had a brief shower of rain, which cheered us all up -it has been over 100 days since we had more than 0.2mm of rain.

The quilt that I am making is using up a lot of scraps, though I am not nearly at the end of my scrap collection.

I thought I needed 156 blocks, but when I tried the quilt on the bed I thought it was skimpy. The number has now grown by another 39.

As I do this,  I find myself revisiting all the other quilts I have made so far!

This stack of blocks was the 'leader/ender" project for my Disappearing 9 patch which now is getting a braid border.
But this is now on hold, because the 'leader/ender' project is demanding some priority!

Here are the blocks sewn into strips-look how bright they are!

I guess it will be another week or so before I have enough blocks made to consider that part of the quilt done. I will be using a quilt as you go method to quilt them at home.