Out With the Old and In With the New

When we bought this house, ten years ago, we needed a small couch for our little sitting area and found the ideal one.

We loved it……but as you can see by the arms…..so did our cat Joey. Fortunately, the couch was just a cheapy, so we always said that after Joey passed away we would buy a new one.

Well, Joey passed away just over two years ago and we still had the old couch.  You see, apart from the Joey damage, we really like this simple couch.  

I came up with the grand plan that I could reupholster the damaged parts with interesting woollen fabrics and some old tapestries, à la some very creative ones on line.  The only problem is that, although the seat cushions look like they are separate, they are not.  I’ve never done any upholstery and I found this rather daunting.  As you can guess, it hasn’t happened and I have finally come to the conclusion that it won’t.

Time to go shopping.

Ta da! A very different look.  This one will make the area seem much darker and cosier.  Not what we were originally planning, but it will work.  Funnily enough, after we ordered it, we discovered that Mick’s sister has the identical one.  

Anyway, it looks very “brown” as it is, so time to see if we can accessorise it a bit, to brighten it up, or at least cosy it up.

Plan A - Using the quilt that use to be on our vintage lounge. Nah.  Still rather drab.

Plan B - using the reverse of the colourful quilt that was on the previous little couch. - Better, but still nah.

Plan C - Using Mum’s knitted rug and knitted cushion,  Better again, but not quite.

Plan D - Use the woollen quilt just like on the previous couch, with Mum’s cushion.  You know what?  I think I like that bright pop of colour best of all.  It really needs something to reduce the “brown-ness” of the couch.  We may change things up leading into winter, but for now, it will do.

Which look is your favourite?

By the way, Mick finds it rather comfortable to have a snooze on, so it is a success.

Looking Back at 2024

I can’t quite believe that we are already at the end of another year.  It is time to have a look back at what we have been up to over the last twelve months.  This is something I have done for the last few years and I do enjoy having a quick read over them and seeing how we have fared.

At the start of 2024 I made a post with my wishes for the coming year.  Let’s see how things panned out.

As usual, I set some goals for my stitching and joined in with some challenges.

Once again, I joined in with the One Monthly Goal challenge.  I missed achieving my goal for a couple of months, due to travel, but caught up by the end of the year.

A new challenge this year was the Chookshed Stitchers’ Challenge arranged by Deana.  This consisted of nominating and numbering ten projects or tasks. Deana would then select one number at random each month and we would work on that project or task.  Having only ten projects gave us a couple of extra months to make up for any time we were unable to complete the task in the nominated month.  I’m pleased to report that by using that extra couple of months I was able to meet all my goals.  I’m looking forward to joining in again next year.

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge featured again this year.  I worked on a few projects, but completed none.  

Firstly, I continued to make the split nine patches I had started in 2023.  

I also made a few crumb blocks and started a few hexy flowers.  

What ended up being a lot of fun was working on the Fishy Business Quilt blocks in rainbow colours.  Sadly, I fell off the wagon in the second half of the year, so they are an ongoing project.  I hope to make two donation quilts using these blocks.

The Rainbow Fish were such fun that I started a second version of the quilt using batik fabrics.  I’m loving how this is turning out.  Once again, it came to standstill in the second half of the year, so is ongoing.

I did manage to make quite a few donation quilts.  Some went to a local charity that supports victims of domestic violence.

One was used as a raffle prize at the church fete.

There were a couple of things that didn’t progress how I had hoped, one being the Blue Quilt.  I need to remove a couple of borders, as they were flaring, and adjust those borders. They are the checkerboard border you can see here as well as a narrow border that was added after this one.

I have become somewhat obsessed with hexy flowers since autumn, when I made a couple of random ones as part of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge.  This morphed into making the Bigs and Smalls quilt pattern by Anorina Morris.  I have stitched 111 one inch hexy flowers and 8 two inch hexy flowers.  I am currently in the process of appliquéing them to background squares.  It has surprised me how much I have enjoyed the process,  It has also meant that other projects have been put on the back burner.

I started a little stitchery when we were overseas and rather than just adding a simple border, I had a play and made a little wall hanging.  It was a bit of fun.

This year I again played along with working on something crafty for 15 minutes a day.  It really motivates me to get at least some little thing done most days.  The hexy flowers were a perfect project.

This is how I ended up:

December = 26/31

Year to Date =  336/366

Success Rate = 91.80%  That’s a little bit down on last year, but I think anything over 90% is definitely a win.

Being a bit of a nerd, I set up a spreadsheet with some goals.  This is how I went.

Complete 24 projects = 25

Quilt 12 quilts = 12  (I had hoped to achieve more here, but Monique has not been playing nicely for the last few months.  Once she is sorted, I should be able to make some good progress - and complete some more UFOs.)

Complete 12 UFOs = 9 (I had listed 24 UFOs to choose from)

Complete 12 donation projects = 10

I started 25 new projects during the year and have completed 16, so there is the start of next year’s UFO list.

I am really enjoying the social side of stitching, continuing to attend my patchwork group on a Wednesday and the U3A group on a Friday morning.  These groups mean that I get much more handwork completed these days.

Participating in the Chookshed Stitchers Zoom sewing sessions continues to be a favourite way to spend time.  It is such a lovely group of women.

Finally, visiting Baradine for sewing retreats is the best fun.  This time with a second retreat in the spring being a bonus, as well as a free motion quilting workshop at the craft shop in Coonabarabran.

What else did we get up to during the year?

Things started out on a sad note, as we farewelled our cat Joey.  He was sixteen and his time had come.

Travel is always a feature.  The main trip this year was rather unplanned and impromptu.  We decided on the Friday afternoon to go to the Isle of Man for the TT motorcycle races and had everything booked that evening and left on the Monday morning!!! I still haven’t got around to blogging about most of the trip.  I may still get to it.  I do hope so.  Anyway, we had a great time while there and in England.

We had quite a change with our caravan trips too.  After the ute started to give us grief, we made the decision to buy a small truck to pull the van.  Enter “Frank” the Fuso truck.  We are very happy with him.  He is shorter than the ute and Mick finds him surprisingly zippy for driving around town.  The vision from the cab is terrific, being so high and, best of all, there is no worries about being overweight when towing the van.  He has already done quite a few miles.

Our first trip was to Baradine for Scrub Stitchin’, when the above photo was taken.  

We then took him to Canberra in May, so that we could see the Rajah Quilt, the Ancient Egypt exhibition, both Parliament Houese and Mr Squiggle.

His next trip was to Queensland, where we visited Dalby, Bell, Gayndah, Cania Gorge and then on to Rockhampton to visit our friends.

We have also taken him to Forbes and Lake Cargelligo.

And finally, Braidwood for the Airing of the Quilts.

As usual we had quite a few days out.  Quilt shows and open gardens seemed to feature a lot.  We went to the Blue Mountains Quilt Show, the Rajah Quilt Exhibition at Canberra, the Sydney Quilt show and the Braidwood Airing of the Quilts.  We visited open gardens at Cowra, Bathurst and Crookwell.  

Meanwhile, we are also enjoying just being at home.  Mick has become really involved with his lawn bowls.  Not only is he playing twice a week, he goes down and practices on a couple of afternoons and has started taking an active role in looking after the grounds. 

I have continued to read some books, but still not as many as I would like and tried quite a few new recipes, but once again, not as many as I would like.

So that wraps up another year of retirement.  Life is definitely good.

Farewell Joey

 We had to say goodbye to our beautiful Joey on Friday.  

Joey

October 2007 - 12 January 2024

Joey had been having trouble with his teeth for a little while, and despite his advanced age of sixteen, we elected to have some removed.  Where the vet expected to find an infection, it revealed cancer in the jaw.  He picked up for a couple of days before rapidly declining.  He is now at peace and no longer in pain.

One of my first blog posts was to introduce Joey and his brother Felix. They were three weeks old when this photo was taken.  I can’t believe how tiny he was.  When we went to select one kitten we ended up with two.  Felix died from snake bite when he was three.  Joey was bitten by a snake in May 2009, at just eighteen months old, but we were able to get him to the vet in time to save him.

I love this photo of him from his first Christmas.  Just as well he didn’t try it again.

A little different to his last.  He grew into a rather large cat.

For the first seven years of his life he was a full on farm cat, being both inside and outside, as he wished.  He loved sitting with the chooks, but was also a rather efficient hunter, to the extent that he was on death row after bringing home an owl!  Luckily for him, we were just about to move back into town, after which he was a 100% inside cat.  We wondered how he would go, but he settled down to that lifestyle very well.

As soon as Mick ever lay on the couch, Joey would leave wherever he was and settle on top of him.

He was an avid sports fan, keeping Mick company whenever he was watching the footy or cricket.

Not that he didn’t like sitting on my lap as well.  He shared his love between us.

Of course, he was an excellent quilt inspector, maintaining this role, right up until the end.

He was a great help in the sewing room too.  This is one of my favourite photos.

It has been a bit quiet and sad around here for the last couple of days.  This is the first time we have been petless, having brought home our first kitten only a week after we set up house together in the mid eighties.  We won’t get another pet at this stage.  That will be a decision for further down the track.  We will see how we go.

Wrapping Up December

It is the second last day of the year and time to do a recap of the rest of December. Firstly, I will start with my stitching.

There isn't a lot to report, but I have completed a further four blocks of my Spiked Granny Rug.  This has been a great project to pick up at a moment's notice and do a little on.  I threaded in the ends this morning on yet another Zoom get together with the Chookshed Stitchers.  

It was a lovely sunny morning, so I set myself up on the little verandah outside the sewing room.  I didn't realise, but Mick snuck a couple of photos.  Joey was settled in his favourite morning spot.

Once the threads were tidied I picked up my ongoing stitchery.  I am finally starting to see some progress with this one.  I stitched most of the leaves today.  I now feel a little more enthused to finish it off.

This isn't my stitching, but my Christmas ornament from Lou arrived in the mail, just a tad late for this Christmas, thanks to the slow mail.  Isn't he a cutey.  He will be put away, ready to hang on my handmade ornament tree next year.

I will do my final report on my Fifteen Minutes a Day and make the assumption that I will work on something tomorrow.

15 Minutes/December = 27/31 - I think that is about my worst month.

15 Minutes/2023 = 341/365

Success Rate = 93.42%

That is so much better than I had expected.  The challenge really keeps me motivated and if I haven’t done anything during the day, Mick will also remind me to do my 15 minutes.  I’m looking forward to keeping this going next year.

What else did we get up to that I haven't reported?

Not very exciting, but we have had our internet connection updated so that we have fibre to the house rather than copper.  It was only connected yesterday and we can really see the improvement in speed.  

With my little goals, I actually found time to read a book.  It was a very quick and easy read.

I did make two new recipes, but forgot to take a photo of both of them.  Firstly, I found a recipe in the paper for a Pineapple and Coconut cake which used a can of crushed pineapple, juice and all.  It turned out fine, but did make a rather large cake, so ended up being a cake and a few muffins.

Secondly, I made some chicken meatballs from a new recipe for our neighbourhood Christmas party.  Some of the mix was saved and used as chicken rissoles.  They were very tasty.

There was a local hotrod display as a fund raiser at the start of the month, so we had a little look.

I joined a couple of friends for lunch at O'Connell and the village had a lot of gingerbread men decorating the fences beside the road.  They were each sponsored and were a fund raiser for the local primary school.  It was so bright and cheery.

Mick is really enjoying playing lawn bowls and has started to volunteer looking after the gardens.  As a part of that he has offered to restore and repair the fountain out the front of the clubhouse.  He is enjoying the challenge.

Some friends, knowing how Mick likes to watch the Boxing Day Test cricket match sent us a gnome for a Christmas present.  Mick loves it.  He looks so sweet and innocent here, as if he wouldn’t tell anyone to go away. Well, just try interrupting his cricket and you may get told.

Here it is, doing a fine job.

While Mick was watching the cricket I finally got out a jigsaw to work on.  This one came from the white elephant stall last year.  I knew it was a stack of quilts, but didn't realise until I got it out that they are actually Christmas quilts.  How appropriate.

Mum has never been a sporty person, but during the summer she liked nothing better than watching the test cricket and tennis and doing a large jigsaw.  When working on them, she always spread the pieces out on several trays.  Those trays now live here, so I used them for this puzzle.  I can't really remember them being used for anything other than jigsaws, so it was a nice trip down memory lane.  I don't think I realised that the two top trays actually have the same decal on them.  The roses on the beige one are hand painted.  The draught horses were always my favourites.

This is where I am up to now.  The easier parts are completed and I have to concentrate a bit more.  Hopefully, I will have it finished in the next few days.

Lots has been happening in the garden, but I will leave that for another time.

That just about wraps up December’s going ons.  Tomorrow, I will do a post looking back over the year, which I always find interesting to prepare.