Top Assembled

This morning I assembled the last row of the mystery quilt:

This is the row right through the middle; the longest row with seven blocks, eight sashing units, and the triangles for each corner.

Once it was assembled, it didn't take long to sew the last two seams to get the whole top together. And here it is:

In time for the final "On Ringo Lake" link-up. I'll add the link here when Bonnie publishes the link-up on Monday her time. Here it is! Would you believe there are people who have already got full-size versions quilted and bound?

Thirty-Two

This is week 32 of my temperature-based year quilt. This week has been a bit all over the place:

And as you can see, none of this is actually sewn together, as I have been spending a lot of time on assembling the Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt. Which, as of this evening, is in 21 pieces (only 3 times as many as this rosette!).

Here are the top temperatures each day this week, and the colours they determined:

5/01/2018     34.0    red
4/01/2018     27.4    orange
3/01/2018     22.7    yellow
2/01/2018     19.7    green
1/01/2018     26.1    orange
31/12/2017   25.6    orange
30/12/2017   17.5    green

Tomorrow is going to be our first nasty day of the summer. I'm in two minds - do I want it to get to 40 so I can make a purple hexagon? Or do I want the cool change to arrive early?

Linked to Sarah's Weekly Weather Report.

That's Enough

Today I started actually assembling the mystery quilt:

I'm working from two corners towards the middle. I'm finding it quite slow going. I got to the stage where I had two rows of blocks on each end (which uses up 8 of my 25 blocks), when something went wrong as I assembled the next sashing row. As I was pressing it ready to sew it to the previous row, I discovered this:

The quick-unpick is pointing to one of three seams I needed to undo because I had the sashing piece facing the wrong way. I think that it was a sign I had done enough for the day.

Almost

Today's mystery quilt progress:

Sewing all the sashing pieces together.

Rather than make the setting triangles the way Bonnie did, I decided to use one fabric for all of them. Working out how to cut them was a bit of a maths challenge, until I remembered that somewhere in my sewing room was a Westalee Setting Triangles ruler which belongs to Ballaarat Quilters. I found it after a bit of a hunt. It was much easier than trying to cut these shapes with a combination of metric and imperial rulers in smaller sizes than required.

After that step, I thought I was ready to start assembling the quilt. However I checked all the numbers again and discovered I need to make 4 more sashing strips. That's a shame, as they were probably the unit I had the most trouble with in this mystery.

I laid out as much as would fit on my ironing board, just to get a feel for how this quilt will look:

It is a bit confusing because of the pink dotty cover on the ironing board, but I think I like it.

Tomorrow I'm planning to start assembling this quilt.

Firsts

First day of the year.

First block assembled:

Still not the final reveal, but this morning Bonnie posted the block construction. By the end of the day I had 13 of my 25 blocks assembled.

First snake I've seen in this part of the world:

Pretty sure it was dead. It didn't move, anyway. It still gave me a fright, though! Anyone know what it is? There is a snake identification page on Facebook. I'm waiting for them to approve my membership so that I can ask them for an ID. I'll add the ID here once I know for sure.

***Added later: Snake identified as a lowland copperhead, Austrelaps superbus.  Highly venomous, but very shy.***

And those bees from yesterday? It has been a frustrating day of popping them in various box arrangements only to have them fly out again each time. At the moment the queen and a small number of bees are in a box, and the rest of the swarm are on the outside of that box. We will just have to leave them to sort themselves out, as they haven't been happy with anything we have tried.

Year's End

Today was a quiet day. I spent a bit of it on the treadle machine, joining units for the current mystery quilt. Bonnie surprised me by adding another clue this morning, on top of yesterday's which I had only cut out but not sewn. Anyway, I am all up to date now. I wouldn't be surprised if there is another clue, possibly even the reveal, tomorrow.

Just as I finished sewing, one of our beehives swarmed. That was unexpected, as this hive has only been here since spring, after being captured in Geelong. They seemed happy last time they were looked at, and they had lots of space for growth and honey storage in their current hive.

Fortunately they settled quite low to the ground, in a small blackwood:

While a box was being prepared to catch them in, they moved to a young eucalypt a few metres away:

Still within reach, fortunately. If they had settled in one of our large trees we would have no hope of retrieving them.

New box:

Snip the branch the bees are hanging from, and drop them into the box:

Once they are all in, put the lid on, and wait to see if they will stay in.

In fact they don't seem to want to stay in that box.

Here's how they looked a couple of hours later:

Bees all over the outside of the box, rather than being inside setting up home. The second box on the right was to see if they might just prefer a different one. (The black and white thing in the top right is a magpie taking off).

It is now another 90 minutes or so later, and they are still on the outside of the box. But the sun is setting and it is too late to try anything more with them tonight. We'll see where they are in the morning.

Happy new year, everyone!

Thirty-One

This is the 31st week of my temperature-based year quilt:

And here are the temperatures that determined the hexagon colour for each day:

29/12/2017    27.2    orange
28/12/2017    30.8    red
27/12/2017    33.6    red
26/12/2017    29.6    orange
25/12/2017    20.1    yellow
24/12/2017    20.3    yellow
23/12/2017    28.4    orange

Linked to Sarah's Weekly Weather Report.  Check out Sarah's beautiful snow photos.