I have been spending quite a bit of time sitting in the conservatory overseeing the cats' 'garden time' over the last three or four weeks. They only go out with one of us keeping an eye on them because we have had some terrible experiences of lost cats in the past. Even so there are times when one escapes and when I arrived home from my Tate volunteering yesterday afternoon Nui had completely disappeared. Running round the block calling for him is a good way to get to know the neighbours! It appears that the conservatory door had opened itself so they were able to get out. The girls, being girls, were sitting on the lawn when my husband realised what had happened but Nui stayed out for four to five hours until it began to rain and was beginning to get dark. We have no cat flap so it is a bit of a problem when you have more than one cat and you don't want the other cats to get out but do want the absent one to get in. All this activity meant that I did not have a chance to read the book about Margaret Mellis which I bought from the Tate bookshop but I still plan to do a post about this. Instead I spent the time updating the cats' PetLog registrations. I am very glad they are microchipped. This wasn't possible in the olden days but would have been a great help on a couple of occasions.
You will see that I now have three finished yellow bags made from the scraps of the yellow churn dashes. There is plenty of fabric for more but I fancied a change this week so I have made a blue one from the small offcuts of blue cotton that I keep in a large old-fashioned sweetie jar.
There is only one square left to do and then I shall line it with bright red/pink batik. The yellow ones have worked well especially with fancy buttons:
I think the buttons are designed for use on cardigans for small children. I just have to remember that the ones with flowers on them cost 50p each so it rather puts the price up. I originally intended to give these bags to the Put Em Ins fund-raiser at the Festival of Quilts but the St Ives Arts Club of which I am a member is going to have a craft fair at the end of September. I missed the first one last year because it was the weekend of my nephew's wedding. I showed these bags to a friend who had been to the fair and she said they would do sell so I am now working flat out to see how many I can make. It is a pretty slow technique but I think of it as the equivalent of Victorian needlepoint. I may swop to making them by machine but the hand-sewing is very portable and I will be able to take it on holiday with me. Also it is a wonderful excuse to use lots of Stef Francis http://www.stef-francis.co.uk/ variegated thread. I find their extra fine mercerised cotton is best because I am working on three thicknesses: wadding, the cotton patches and finally a layer of fine net to keep it all in place.
I do have some other bags that I can let the Put Em Ins people have so I don't feel too guilty about keeping these to sell. My main aim at the St Ives event is to try and sell some of my journal quilts and in theory I would like to make a few more, possibly similar to the ones I know people like because they are supposed to represent various features of the Penwith landscape. I fear it will all depend on how much time I have to sew over the next few weeks.
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