New Potting Shed

We bought a second hand potting shed from the garden centre up the road and had to find somewhere for it to live.  The area behind the wall is a goat shed and it was quite a job to remove years of ivy.

We were short of time because the builder, Brendon wanted to come and lay a slab quite quickly.

The shed was a faded old brown colour and needed painting and so we chose Cuprinole slate grey for the outside and Seagrass for the inside.  I forgot to take a before photograph but it took a very long time to paint!

The shed came with shelves which I also painted slate grey and as soon as it was finished it was filled with my old potting shed things.

Sewing Space

In order not to go mad I had to claim a space for myself to sew and to have all of my things around me.  We will be in this position for many months until we can renovate Bijans workshop and I will have a great new space.  I decided to move everything down to the end of the cottage and I even have a comfy chair and two tables, so plenty of space. 

I do have so much stuff though and there is more upstairs in a cubboard.

I do live in terror of the cats climbing up and the whole lots falling on top of them. Its like having small children!

I love my all of my many books!

I went to one of those £1 shops and bought these great plastic boxes with lids and have really sorted out all of those thousands of items I seem to need.  I love the fact that I can now see what I have.  These cheap boxes are great because they have handles.

Our New Lounge

We are quite cluttered in the barn as I have brought so many pieces of furniture and things.  We are going to have a lot more stuff once the house sells.  I am trying to keep a bit of space in the lounge where we can sit and relax.  It is a long way from when I used to run textile workshops and Open Studio here.  It is amazing how many people have walked this space over the last 9 years.

Barn Separation

We have erected a fence between our house and the barn so that the properties are now separate.  we are later going to replace the fence with a wall which we can soften with plants and which will be more permanent.  We have left one panel out as we are still moving backwards and forwards between the two properties while we sort everything out.

We moved into the barn two weeks ago so that our cats could settle in and we could put the house on the market. The cats are loving the space as there are so many new places to climb and explore. I have just had to run and pull one out of the toilet as they love water and we forgot to close the toilet seat!

As the barn faces south I eventually want to make the area outside the barn a gravel garden.

Hexagon Bug - 6

I wanted to make sure that the background fabric was covered and to add some more interest to the quilt border, so made some extra  blue hexagons.  On two of the sides I only needed one hexagon to fill the space and on the other two sides I needed two.

I am still not satisfied with the border and want to add some more pieces.  This might take a while!

Hexagon Bug - 5

When I reached the point where I needed to go around the corner, I realised that my design would not intersect and I had to redesign the side edges so that they would fit.

It took me quite  while to make all of the pieces and I had to add an extra large hexagon flower to two of the sides to make the design work.

Once I laid the border over the quilt centre I realise that I need to add some more pieces inside so that the edges of the background will be covered. 

Hexigans Bug - 4

I decided that I would make a border around the edge of the quilt and liked this arrangement.

Feeling Yuk But Making Changes

It is a while since I have felt so sick with some sort of cold/ flue.  It has knocked me for six and has taken my good nature along with my energy.  Even hand sewing has been a challenge so I am very frustrated.

In the meantime there have been great changes outside our house.  My husband Bijan and I live in an old farmhouse just outside of Newbury in Berkshire and we renovated a 300 year old barn when we arrived here 9 1/2 years ago.  I used to teach textile workshops in the barn and attached cottage with my sister Sonia.  It all became too much for various reasons and so after a long journey of deciding what to do, we are in the process of splitting our property in two.  We hope to live in the barn half and sell the farmhouse off.  This week the builders have built the farmhouse a new drive through the walled garden. I was sorry we had to do this but I am pleased with the result.   I just need some energy to go and sort out the plants.