Holy spitballs, how did it get to be February?

I feel very naughty, Gentle Readers, for having neglected you for so long, but, yanno, life...

I've been extremely busy with Instragram, and have had much more success in luring the innocent and unworldly into following my doings, such as they have been...

Let's see... I took a complete copy of my Lovely Ma's photo archive after she died, and I've been slowly culling all the duplicated photos - clever though she was with some things, she never quite grasped the concept of 'don't need to copy things more than once', so some pictures appear four, five, six, seven times... it's a bit tedious, but I've been posting some of the better ones of her Quilts on Instragram (photos, that is) - the quilts are fabulous but the photos are just crap.  I think it was because she was so impatient with the digital camera, she never quite gave it enough time to focus, and nearly every photo is blurry...

Scrap Quilt, Nanga 2004

Although this one makes me a liar, of course... Like most of Mum's quilts, I think this one went to Tonee, her very good friend from the Telfer days, but I'm not really sure.  It's good that there's no shortage in our house or I'd be hunting them down.

I wanted to post a picture of my all-time favourite, Sarah Johnson, which was made very much in the traditional colours, (not usually my favourite), but I can't find one that does it justice - it's all hand-quilted, with needle-turn applique and it's on our bed all the time:

In other news, I've made some animals, and things are so disorganised I haven't even set up the 2015 Crafting folder... here's some pics I dragged over from the phone:

Liberty-Belle, the Birthday Bilby

Hi, I'm Jumpy

I'm a secret Bilby

And I've just made a Miss Muffet bag for my lovely friend Grace to give her Mother, not quite traditional because she wanted it padded and no inside compartments, so I cheated again and used quilted calico inside the lining - so easy - but I'm very happy with the way it came out, and I love the colour combination (such good taste my friends have):

The very lovely Alison from Cotton_Factory (my go-to fabric store these days) has asked for the pattern details - I feel like a bit of a cheat, this pattern has been around for at least 200 years (remember Lucy Locket who lost her pocket?), but hey!  I'm willing!  I'll post it here as a tutorial if anybody is interested.

Finally, I've signed up for three (OMG what was I thinking) craft swaps - the #igpincushionswap, the #nerdscraftitbetter swap (both due in May), and a #payitforward one which has some random date, to be determine by the Swap Commander-In-Chief.

And now, Gentle Readers, having watched three episodes of Season 4 of Breaking Bad (OMG How Good Is It!!), investigated 37 pincushion patterns, eaten dinner, put the groceries away, shifted 972 photos from my phone to my PC, played 8 games of scrabble on my tablet, liked 37,372, 459 photos on Instagram and done precisely zero craft since I got home at 5.45, I must away to bed.  

Ciao!

Fiddle me sticks...

Sunday 29 March 2009; I bought a new laptop.  Sunday 29th June 2014;  I bought a new laptop.  They tend to last me 5 years, which is pretty good, considering.  This one is lighter, a slightly wider screen but not so high, 750Gb HDD (yeah, like who cares?) and I've already done all the moving of stuff, which is the biggest PITA* when getting a new laptop.  

In other news, life.  The house looks like a bomb has been dropped, the shoe count in my bathroom is going up, the pile of discarded coats on the dining table is growing, the spurt of good quality home cooking is slowly tapering off & tonight for dinner we had a pre-cooked chicken & oven fries, with soft porn sweet corn being our fresh vegie of choice.

The guest room is devolving into chaos - the Murphy Bed that Mr Golightly made is up, leaving loads of empty floor space, just waiting to be filled up with... the old dirty linen basket (finally found a skinnier but taller one for the corner), five suitcases, (don't ask me why I didn't put them away when I wasn't working, OK?) four rolls of fabric (one red damask belonging to my lovely MIL to re-cover her wing chair [that's a whole 'nother story...], one roll of Atrium Blue for curtains, two piles of blue damask for curtains which are just waiting for me to get the message) and a pile of boxes that normally live in the wardrobe & which hold things like seasonal jumpers & polar fleece & winter PJ's... it's a bit depressing, actually.

The only place that's really tidy is the sewing room - and I think that's only staying tidy because it wouldn't take much for it to become absolutely unworkable, as it's such a small space.  I took a photo the other day which I posted on Instagram - check me out (IsabellaGolightly26), showing how full the shelves are looking... don't ask me how to put it in here - the phone is switched off (OMG!  The phone is switched off!!) & I'm not getting up to switch it back on... and I have no idea how to add a picture from Instragram in here.

And the lovely Mr Golightly is watching his team win their game from last Friday (again).  

Life.  So exciting.

Ciao!

Morecombe, Mumbai, Malden

Well, hello there!  I love seeing the list of cities and countries that pop up down the bottom of my blog - it's actual proof that there is life on other planets... 

I've been busy doing the usual frack, working, driving, sleeping... and yet more sleeping.  I've booked in for a sleep study on Tuesday, after seeing the specialist.  Lovely man, probably the nicest doctor I've ever dealt with.  You know sometimes they can be arrogant pricks?  Not this one.  He took a comprehensive history of my sleeping habits, the increasing need to sleep at weird and wonderful times, and the constant tiredness.  Words like 'snoring', 'loud vigorous snoring' and 'snorting' were discussed, along with the couple of times in my life when I've woken up feeling completely paralysed - it's a weird feeling - apparently you're actually not awake, you just think you are.  

Anyway, the word 'narcolepsy' was eventually raised, along with the doctor's eyebrows, especially when he heard about me having to have sleep in the carpark before starting work (lucky for me it's an underground carpark) because I've barely been able to keep my eyes open on the drive in...

I try to go to be in bed by 10.00pm most nights, and the alarm used to go off at 0530, and I'd be out the door by 0630.  Now, I can't even wake up till about 0620, and sometimes I go back to sleep and wake up at 0700, meaning I don't get to work until 0900.  It sucks. 

In other exciting news, I made a 1600 Quilt - using the very beautiful Lumiere De Noel fabrics from moda - one of my favourites.  I've left it at My Lovely Ma's, because I'm avoiding the 20 year long tradition of Festival of the Boot at The Boxes, and I'm going back to Perth for another long weekend, leaving Poor Mr Golightly behind.    Mixed blessings, hey?

And now, Gentle Readers, it's time for bed.  Buona notte!

Questions, questions

So, Gentle Readers, the very lovely and erudite AJ, aka Peppermint Penguin, has raised the thorny question about what I'm going to do when I finish this course, and, for that matter, when the course actually finishes.  It's a bit complicated, so if your eyes glaze over when people start talking about the multi-verse theory, or the parallel universe theory, it's time to go & get a cup of tea.

The Upholstery course I'm doing has the same content as a first year Apprenticeship course.  I'm not actually an Apprentice.  You have to sign away your life, a kidney, your first born and several year's wages to be one of those, (I believe the Guvnmnt has just offered up a $5500 bonus for those hard working souls who actually finish one, finally recognising that unless we train more plumbers and electricians, our toilets are going to go fizzpop and our lights will back up [or something])... and I don't have that much time.  So, this course goes for six months, or one academic semester, three days a week, and at the end of it, I will have learnt the same as an Apprentice who has turned up one day a week for a year.  And perhaps even more, but that's a whole 'nother topic.





Then, (and this is where it gets complicated...) I can either sign up to do Third Year next year [that's 2012), one day a week for the whole year, and then, in 2013, I can do Second Year, which is one day a week for six months (got that?), or, next semester, I can do second year (ditto), and then, in 2012, I can do the previously mentioned Third Year.    My preferred option would be to do Second Year next semester, and then Third Year in 2012, but of course, many things depend on this actually happening.


What are these things, I hear you say?  Well, seeing as you asked so nicely... Firstly, I have to find a job of some kind for four days a week so I can ease Mr Golightly's mind about the impending-ness of Debtor's Prison [probability?  zero]... but also I want to work using the skills I have so painfully just acquired - why wouldn't I?    So, the options are:


A) Work four days a week in Upholstery
B) Work four days a week in IT, doing some contract work until the end of 2012...
C) Work four days at week at the August Institution,
D) Start my own business 
E) Win the Lottery.


Obviously Option E) is really my first choice, but it's at the bottom because I don't want you to think I've completely lost touch with reality, Gentle Readers.


So, of course I either need to find somebody to take me on, preferably for four days a week, or two somebodies to take me on, two days or a week, or some combination that makes four... and because I have to notify the August Institution of my intentions by the end of May, that means I have to extract the digit PDQ.  Ouch.  Reality bites.


The other option, Starting my Own Business, sits there largely ignored. All those lovely souls who've offered up their old & lumpy furniture for me to work on have the absolutely right intent, but I think the outlay for the basic equipment to start myself off in business would be about 10,000 shekels.  I could probably sell the other kidney to raise it, but you did note, I trust, that this was not high on the list of options.


There is another option, which has been bandied around by the Three Musketeers at School (Nat, Caro and myself), which is to go into business together... any thoughts on that?  I have never worked for myself.  Mr Golightly has many, many sad and bitter thoughts to share on this topic (some other time, honest), and I'm wondering if (l'orrore) I might be [shudder] a bit too old to venture into self-employment?  I can't believe I just said that.


Anyway, that's where it's at.  And now, I'm off to have dinner and some quality televsion (joke).  Ciao!