Life seems so disjointed these days, spending equal amounts of time here at home and in Adelaide.  I love having long stretches of time to myself in my sewing room, and it's just not happening.When I come home it takes me at least a day to settle in to whatever I was doing when I left, plus I have to catch up with all the stuff I neglected while I was away.  I'm just having a bit of a whinge, and bemoaning the fact that I can't switch from one thing to another as easily as I used to.  Getting older is never what you expect it to be.....

But it's school holidays, and I have the whole week at home, until I go back down for Isla's 3rd birthday. 

She is growing up so quickly, she's an absolute delight, and watching her change and mature is making me feel the passage of time. 

 Thomas is a force to be reckoned with, scooting around the place like a crab, up on one leg and one knee. He loves to pull all the onions out for some reason; maybe he'll grow up to be a chef?

I need some sewing time to balance out the feeling that I'm ancient and the world is whizzing by me, lol.  I've finished one Disappearing Nine-patch, and I'm working on another. 

I was thinking of a Bricks and Stepping Stones, but a lot of these fabrics are too light for that, so maybe it will be this sort of arrangement, bricks separated by little strips of a warm brown. 

It will be easy and quick, and I'm all for that at the moment.

It's been a tiresome day.  The temperature is up in the mid 90s again, and I"m sick of being hot.  I've been trying to wrap up my taxes, plus load all my software onto the latest laptop, and it's been a nightmare tracking down activation codes and software updates, and just dealing with Windows10 all round. I'm about to chuck it all in and go hit the sewing room, with a cup of coffee in hand.  I'll finish everything tomorrow.....

The last two weeks are a blur.  The Adelaide germs caught up with me and laid me low for about 10 days, and then I was scrambling to meet two major deadlines, still not feeling better.  One deadline is still looming, so I'm not having any fun until that is behind me.  Oh well, I feel so much better now, and I'm looking forward to tackling my chores so that I can have a bit of free time next week.

I went and picked up my sewing machine, and I'm so glad to have it back.  She purrs like a kitten, I hadn't realised how noisy she was before.  Everyone at the shop remarked on  her good condition; she has a couple of scratches, but I've tried to look after her all these years and it shows.  She doesn't have a name though, how odd.

The repair shop is Allmake Sewing Machines, and they were wonderful to deal with.  I'm a happy customer.

Check out this wall of machines in their back room!

When I can't sew, I buy.  Sad, but true.  I've been wanting to make some bright, cheerful quilts for the kids in our lives, but my stash is full of sombre, serious reproduction fabrics.  I bought a couple of bundles from a destash group on Facebook, and had an instant stash of suitable fabrics. 

 They aren't anything special, but a darn sight more cheerful than what is in my cupboards. 

I'm making a disappearing nine-patch to begin with, then I might do a Bricks and Stepping Stones.  I don't need these to be clever or original or show-stopping.  I just want some pretty quilts that the girls can drag around and play with and snuggle into.

Isla has a quilt on her bed that belonged to Shonny, and it makes me happy to tuck her in at night knowing there's another layer of meaning being added to the simple Double Irish Chain.  Shonny is quite sentimental about the family quilts now, I think losing her dad last year has changed her attitude to those things from her early life. I have some shirts of his to make into a memory quilt, and I hope she can help sew it with me. Quilts are healing to sew, as well as to wrap up in.