Tada, it's finished! I shouldn't really be amazed, as it's only 'throw' sized (about 60" x 70"), but it still seems like quite a feat for five days. See the front (blowing in the wind) here and the back here. Like all projects, it seems, I ran hot and cold with this quilt. At times, I loved the patterns, but sometimes I thought it was all just too much. Now that it's finished, I'm pretty happy with it.

A lot of the fabrics are Mary Engelbreit, which is slightly surprising to me. I never really liked her style until maybe a year ago. It just doesn't feel like 'me,' but the patterns I used for this seem just right. The black and white leaf print I used for the border actually isn't Mary Engelbreit (I think it looks like it should be, though), but some 'random' print from the black and white section.

All told, I think the quilt (fabric, batting, binding) cost around $30, which I'm impressed by. With knitting projects, a jumper can often wind up being more expensive to make than it would be to buy, but I'm fairly certain I couldn't find a quilt like this for under thirty bucks (I'm not sure I could find a quilt like this, period). Seasonal sales at Mill End certainly helped keep the price low.

Other details? I used a thin cotton batting and machine quilted in a zig-zag pattern. It's not perfect, but it's close enough that I'm proud of it -- surprisingly, I didn't have to rip out quilting at any point! I bound it with red bias tape and then threw it in the washer; a few minutes later my mom wondered out loud if I had washed the binding before attaching it and whether it might bleed onto the quilt. Eep! It didn't though, much to my relief. Whew!

One last Booty on the quilt picture. He really does like it.

Phew. I've been fuming and pressing the little 'Upload File' button in MT for hours now, to no avail. (Usually I upload images just by dragging them into the server's folder on my desktop, but that only works from home.) I finally did the sensible thing and looked at the source and blah, blah, blah -- pictures!

Booty loves this quilt. Sure, he loves all blankets (especially those he's not supposed to be on), but think he really likes this one. It must be because he matches so well.

Well, the quilt has been quilted and bound (several hours sat on my bottom in front of the television -- it was tough. Booty was happy to keep me company -- on top of the quilt.) and is now in the washing machine. I'm nervous. I probably won't lift the lid to discover a heap of wet, loose threads, but you never know. All fingers and toes crossed. Once it's washed and dried, I'll take a few good photos of it, I promise -- no blurs and very few cats.

Here's a dog:

Jamal the Dog is eleven years old now, which is getting on for a dog his size. He's got a titanium knee in one of his hind legs and takes three different sorts of pills each morning, but he's still a happy dog. Greying nose and all.

Phew, I'm dreading lookng at my bank statements when I get back to the UK. Prices seem so good here, but it's easy for them to all pile up. Anyway, today I discovered Paper Source.

Oh, I'd heard people go on about Paper Source before, but I thought, 'Meh, how good can it be? It's just paper.' But when we passed the one in Uptown, I thought I ought to stop in and see what all the fuss was about. And what a cool store! I was really excited about all the kits, although I'm usually all for gathering up the bits and pieces on one's own. I was fairly restrained, I think.

The yarn didn't come from Paper Source, of course, but from a smallish (yet very well stocked!) yarn shop near Lake Harriet. I really like the feel of this bamboo yarn, and I think it looks nice with the papery goods. What else? The quilt is nearing completion, believe it or not! I've been quilting it on the machine, after all, which is going well, even if it is hard work. Only a few more lines to quilt, and then on to the hand binding. . . all the hand binding. . .

At least Booty coordinates with this quilt. Everytime I've visited my parents since moving to the UK, I've made a quilt -- or at least a quilt top. After all, who can go a week or longer without some crafty project? A quilt is good because I can buy all the fabric while I'm here, and I only need a sewing machine and thread (and scissors and a cutting mat, etc) to get on with it. I just have to make sure to leave room for it in my suitcase on the way back.

I picked these colours (black and white, yellow and red) because I've been seeing them around the internets a lot lately. This is the perfect example of a colour combination I would have turned my nose up at if I hadn't seen you crafty ladies making it work so wonderfully.

The top of this quilt is sort of, kind of, very loosely based on a design I saw flicking through a Denyse Schmidt book. I can't bring myself to make the sort of wonky, wobbly lines she did, but my stripes have varied widths, and I'm really excited to see how it will turn out. I've already got the three main stripey panels patched together for the front -- I just have to sew them together and add the border. Depending on what fabric is left over, I've got a simpler design in mind for the back, and then I just have to decide whether I want to try quilting on the machine or by hand (ugh to both).

So, I had this idea the other day for a drawstring lunch bag. I've been longing for a bento box for ages now, but I just haven't seen quite the right one. I usually bring an apple or an orange or something just too big to squeeze into a flat-ish container, so I need something more versatile. And I thought, hey, I know, I'm sewing things the whole time, and lots of those things are bags -- I can make a lunch bag!

My original plan was to get a couple of round, stackable plastic containers with lids, which would sit at the bottom of the bag. There would be an internal drawsting section, and above that I could put in my orange, etc. This plan required waiting until I had said containers, the measurements of which would determine the size of my bag. But who can wait when there's a Project a-brewin'? I'm going to look for suitable containers when I'm in America, and I can always hand sew the internal drawstring section into place.

I'm really pleased with the details of this:

The ties (which can double as a handle) were inspired by the ends of Heather's headband -- I hope she doesn't mind! The front of the ties is green-turquoise dupion silk (in my dream world, I'd have an endless supply of this in every colour), and the back is a sort of light grey-purple cotton which I dyed with a cabbage (I do all sorts of strange things when you're not looking). Untie the ties and see the drawstring:

I used get really annoyed that all my drawstring tops wouldn't close all the way, and then I discovered the 'trick' of using a casing a centimetre/inch/etc from the top. Has everybody been doing this the whole time and I never noticed? I always feel silly for saying, 'Hey, look at this clever new thing I've discovered!' only to have people reply, 'Um, we've always done it that way.'

What's inside?

My lunch! Everything's tucked away and ready to go. I got a little carried away with the idea of crafty lunch items and had to make this:

A sandwich wrapper. The first two corners velcro together, and the others tie. If it were slightly smaller and had a layer of batting inside, it'd be perfect for protecting those apples and oranges from getting battered. I wrapped my sandwich in tin foil before wrapping it again in this, but I like the idea of lining the fabric case with some sort of water-proof, wipe-off synthetic.

And that's my new lunch bag. Other info: the print is Kaffe Fassett for Rowan, the bottom is crocheted with Rowan Calmer (held double), and it's lined with a stretch Jersey (totally not awesome to work with, but I love the finished product). I'm off to America tomorrow, so expect pictures of dogs and cats (well, one dog and one cat)!

Note to self: People are bored by the places you used to live. How about. . . . roses?

Here's a recipe for a nice weekend: Take one day's worth of work that needs to get done (so you can frolic with your friends on Tuesday); do half of the hours on Saturday morning, shower and get dressed, go to Piccadilly and watch jets fly in formation overhead (airshow nearby?) and shop at Uniqlo, which you've only just discovered but are now totally a fan of. Finish the remaining work hours on Sunday morning before heading off to the seaside with your beau (and packed lunches). Find a nice rose garden:

This is in Chalkwell Park, which I don't think I've ever walked around before. I'm so glad we found it when we did -- it was beyond 'in bloom', and the scent was amazing (less amazing if you had allergies). Finally, a reason to have lugged my camera around with me!

I'd really like to have a garden. Somebody (I can't remember who -- was it you?) was writing the other day about their urban vegetable patch, and it's really stuck in my head. Terraced houses here often have a miniature front garden wedged between the pavement and the house front, and many of them seem to be planted with weeds and wheelie bins. I walk by several such gardens on my way to the train in the morning, and I like to think what I'd do with them.

There's a house next to our building that looks just this side of condemned: the plaster on the side is cracked and falling off, there are broken windows, and you can often hear a phone off the hook as you walk by. The residents do, however, have a very polite and tidy grey cat which blinks at me when I walk by (she's usually perched on the outside window sill, waiting to be let in), so they must simply have confusing priorities (cat brushed and collared, check; house structurally sound, erm. . . ).

Anyway, now that summer's here (nearly), their little front garden has been in bloom, mainly with roses and bleeding hearts. I can't quite imagine the owners have planted these bushes, but at least they haven't been actively demolishing them.

(That's still from the Chalkwell rose garden, not next door.) If I lived in that house, after I'd installed a mechanism to keep the roof from falling down on me, I'd rip out half the garden and plant it with edible things -- beans and peas and some nice herbs. I'd leave the other half as it is, aside from some heavy weeding, because the fat roses and tiny bleeding hearts are the cheeriest thing about that place.

Also, I'd let the little grey cat inside and give it a pat.

So, I haven't got much to share. I've been very busy, making things both craft and book related (and craftbook related -- mainly craftbook related, actually), but none of them are finished yet. So, lest you forget about twelve22 due to lack of posts, I bring you this look back to pre-archive days in an episode titled "Places I Used to Live When I Was at University, Except Not the Dorms, Because Those Were Boring Times."

Let's start with my room when I was studying in Edinburgh:

Okay, so it wasn't so much a room as a corner. Well, not a corner, but a section of floor and wall from which I used furniture to build a boundary. I shared a room with five other girls, and our room was the smallest (per capita) and therefore the messiest in the entire house. Besides my bed, I had two pieces of furniture: this dresser and a little table. I'm not sure how I survived with such a mini nook, but I managed to have some of the best times of my life in Scotland, despite my tiny quarters.

After returning to the States, I took up residence in the upper floor of a house, shared with two other girls. At least I had my own room:

Oh no! Now everybody will know that I secretly like Wings and Queen! (I don't actually support LFC, on account of not caring about football -- I just like Liverpool.) So, it was my own room, but it was still very small. I kept holed up in there most of the time, while the housemates twittered around doing whatever they did.

Because my bedroom was next to the kitchen, I was the first to know when mice moved in that autumn. I would wake up in the middle of the night, from a deep sleep, to hear tiny mouse nibbles on whatever they'd found in my bin. Despite my protests, the roommates put out mousetraps and killed three of the little guys before the landlords responded to one of my many calls asking them to fill the holes the mice were coming through (I threatened to withhold rent, they fixed the holes, the mice stopped coming in.). I did manage to catch one little mouse, who I kept for a couple of weeks before releasing her on a warm day.

Right, so after the mouse house, I moved to a studio apartment on the other side of campus:

I still have quite fond memories of this place, despite the decay of the building and the horrifying centipedes (I shudder just thinking about them -- they were THIS BIG). I finally had space to stretch my arms and spin around in. . . should I have wanted to. The photo is of the little dining room off of the little kitchen. It didn't stay a dining room for too long, as my craft obsession quickly filled every surface. But this photo reminds me of the things I liked about my college town. The nice co-op, quiet neighbourhoods, easy bicycling, lazy sunny days. Rob liked the giant Best Buy and the book store that stayed open late into the night. Would you believe I live in London, and I actually miss this old place from time to time?

Hooray, I made a new bag!

I actually made this as a gift (no, not for you), and now I can't decide if it's too girly for its intended recipient. These things tend to get away from me; just a bit of lace here, and a flower there, and suddenly everybody is turning up their noses. This one is pretty restrained, but it still might be too much for some people.

The exterior fabric is a Cath Kidston design I picked up on sale months and months ago. It's lined with white linen that my mom sent me -- this isn't what I had in mind for it (this only used a small bit, of course), but the texture was just right. It's 'interfaced' with some fleecy white material (I don't have any white felt). I'm liking the feel of padding a bag instead of using standard iron-on interfacing. It gives the bag a bit of structure without making it stiff, and mainly, it gives some 'oomph' and volume to the fabric.

I made this bag with a zip, which is fairly unusual for me. Zips and I are natural enemies. I've figured out little tricks here and there, and this one went in with no problem. But I'm still a bit wary. I'm keeping my eye on you, zips.

Obligatory action shot. It's just right for tucking under your arm like this, or it can dangle daintily from your hand as you prance around in your new summer dress. Bonus boobs in that photo. And see how pointy my elbow is. . . . okay, stop looking at me now.

Phew, it feels good to actually finish a substantial project (without it going horribly wrong along the way!).

. . . really? They must be thinking of some other London, I'm sure of it. Although, looking outside, it does look pretty sunny. I may have to venture out later.

I was thinking the other day how lovely it would be to be in Portugal right now, lazing by the pool (or the sea -- I'm not picky). But perhaps if it's like this in England, it's boiling hot in Faro. Ack! I just checked weather.com, and it says Faro is partly cloudy and 70F. Everything I thought I knew is wrong.

Apologies for the sub-par photo:

Ira: 'Either I've really grown or horses are coming a lot smaller these days.'

For about the last week, I've been opening the birds' door before I open the shades (which is my excuse for the blurry photo) and then leaving it open while I eat my cereal and check my e-mail. Ira quickly warmed up to the idea of having an adventure, and he now flies straight for the open door and sits in the doorway to look around.

The first couple of times he left the cage, I wasn't quite sure he had meant to, but he managed to get himself back in without any trouble. Now, I watch him as he sits in the doorway, practically with a glint in his eye, ready to fly out but trying to decide where to go. The last couple of days, he's flown straight for the corner of my desk, which is nice, because I can pretend he's coming to see me. He then has a bit of a look around and flies back home.

He did this a few times today, and wound up on the cabinet with the horses when Frankie though he'd try escaping too. Frankie inched out of the doorway and took off. . . right to the ground. As you may remember, Frankie can't fly because he continually bites off the feathers of his left wing. I had to scoop him up (he wasn't very happy about that) and deposit him back in their house, while Ira made friends with the horses.

Here's a little thing I made. It's not extra mini, but it's crocheted with embroidery floss. I just made it up as I went, and I really like it, though I'm not sure what I'll do with it now. I thought about using it as a top for a pincushion (over fabric, of course), because I need a new pincushion, but I'm not sure it's what I'm after. Maybe I'll just hang it from something and look at it now and then.

In other news, I ran my Race for Life on Sunday, and it went fairly well. I'd done almost all my training on a treadmill, with only a couple of poor runs on actual ground. I wasn't actually sure I'd be able to run the entire way (I've never been particularly fit, you have to understand), but I did it! Huzzah. Thank you to everybody who donated to my fundraising; I'm really pleased with that aspect of the 'project,' along with the whole running thing.

Finally, some pictures of my new craft room! Not everything has been moved in yet -- namely, all the letterpress equipment. That will go back into the cabinet with the glass doors (which I have yet to fit fabric behind to match the other one), and the actual press will go on the lower bookshelf in the corner. Because this room has a fitted closet (half of it is shelves!), the cabinets are fairly bare at the moment, but I'm sure they'll fill up eventually. It's really nice to not have my fabric crammed into one spot, but laid out and visible on the closet shelves.

Oh, dear -- look at droopy old Mr. Pothos Plant. He had a good swig of water this morning, but he was very thirsty, so it's taking a while to have an effect. Whoops! On one hand, it's really nice to have a room with a door for the birds. On the other, though, the room is so tall and echo-y (click here for a crappy photo of the full height of the vaulted ceiling) that the birds seem louder than ever. Oh well.

Sometimes I think my 'style' is really all over the place. I'm drawn to soft aquas and pinks, which are influenced by Country Living, but I also like the bright colours of Rowan prints, and I'm drawn to bold, modern Scandinavian styles. So I'm really pleased that (to me), the craft room seems to all fit together. I think I got really lucky with the Ikea fabric I've used to close off the cabinets. It's light and white, but incorporates some of my favourite colours. The fabric hanging off the back of my chair, by the way, is a half-finished quilt top that I love. Nobody else likes it -- I've only got tight smiles in reaction to it -- but I think it's lovely, if a bit overpowering in its bright patterny-ness.

Fearless with combining patterns, I am. Well, in places. Somehow, I just think these patterns all 'work' together -- maybe it's the different scales. The weirdy ridged cone lamp belongs to the leaseholder of the flat. I'd have never picked it out, but it's strange and glowy, in a nice way.

One last photo. I always try to take photos of things in the mirror of my little medicine cabinet, but they hardly ever turn out. I roughly focussed the camera and set it on the desk to take this, and I really like it. The picture of the mouse in the corner was cut from a magazine. He's eating some berries. Nice little mouse.

P.S. -- Rob and I went to the Grand Designs show yesterday (I had a free ticket from the magazine, and the Excel centre is just down the road from us). It was more or less a bust -- WAY too many people for it to be enjoyable -- but we did walk right by Kevin McCloud. Now there's a clever bunny (not so clever as Rob, though).

Mew Mew the Cat died on Wednesday. It's slightly incomprehensible to me, because she's been around since 1987. She wasn't so much a cat as she was an institution. Or, she was a cat, but she was the cat. She defines the word feline for me. She was graceful and independent, gentle and stubborn, sweet and grumpy. She always seemed happy to see me come into the room, and would trill 'Mrrrr-ruhp' if she was startled by my presence while she was napping.

Mew Mew was our first cat, and our only female cat. She was so much more protective of her family than our male cats, and she quickly established a reputation amongst extended family and friends. She would take swipes at passers-by and once 'trapped' a house-sitting cousin in the laundry room! Mew Mew was also a fierce mouser when we lived in a newly-built house, which makes it all the more amazing that she calmly herded my pet hamster towards my parents when he once escaped (though, I've been thinking about it, and I wonder how the hamster got down two flights of stairs. . . ).

Though I doubt Mew Mew was alone in her likes and dislikes, they definitely differed from our other cats. Mew Mew's favourite toys were peanuts in the shell; just the rattle they made when you shook them could get her running. I grew up stepping on peanuts when I slipped on my shoes. If you were reclining at any degree, Mew Mew's favourite spot for lounging was at chest-level. As she got comfortable, she'd stretch out with her head under your chin and a paw placed gently on your shoulder. Mew Mew loved the blanket caves made by crooked human knees, and her excitement at finding one was plain. Usually she'd sneak in and come back out a second later, but last summer, when I was home visiting, she curled up against me and slept for a while in her blanket cave.

Mew Mew was stubborn beyond belief when she wanted the milk from your cereal right now -- it didn't matter to her that you weren't done eating. She was obsessed with running water from the tap, and would not be deterred by scolding or being physically removed from the kitchen counter. But she had to put up with a lot, being a little girl's cat for many years. There are photos of her dressed up in my baby dolls' clothes, and she was often trapped under a laundry basket as I played pet shop. 'Hmm, should we get this cat?' I would still choose Mew Mew, if I could, and I like to think she'd choose me too.

Now that I've had to say good bye to one of my closest childhood friends, I've made a new rule. Booty is absolutely, most definitely not allowed to die for another sixty or seventy years.