Introducing...me!

Well, here we are - my own little corner of the internet to play with!  I am not new to blogging but I am new to quilting and sewing so this is going to be my place to (hopefully) share my WIPs, UFOs and completed projects with the world.  While I love the process, the most exciting thing for me at the moment is potential completed projects!

Himself is in bed with a migraine, the cats are all quiet (for how long, no one knows) and I have spent my lazy Sunday looking at quilt blogs, quilt patterns and fabrics online.  The trouble is - where do I start?  I am not a long-time sewer and I am not very confident with my skills but I know the only way to improve and gain confidence is to try.

Here are a few things I would like to do:

• Baby quilt for a friend (pink themed);
• Love Birds applique quilt;
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar quilt;
• Dr. Seuss quilt; and
• Quilt for mum

That's just to start with but I am having so much trouble getting started.  I don't have a stash of fabric to run to (yet), and I am still discovering some local quilting & fabric stores apart from Spotlight or Lincraft (terribly limited selection in my local Lincraft, I am seriously unimpressed by it)...yet I can't justify spending a fortune on fabrics online (or IRL, to be honest) unless I know that I have a plan and I know I have the skill to complete the project.  Right now, I am hoping I can start small or easy and just build from there.

Another thing I would very much like to do, and I hope I can enlist the help of some quilt-bloggers in the future, is to join a bee online - I am reluctant to do so just yet though because I don't know if it would be fair to the other participants who would then have to contend with a true novice such as myself...unless there is a bee just for beginners?  All the ones I have come across seem to be for quite advanced quilters.

My mum was diagnosed with bowel cancer in May this year and I would dearly love to make a quilt for her to take to her chemo treatments (or just to snuggle up with at home if she prefers), so that is another project in mind...but I do want it to be something beautiful and something I can be really proud of - I know mum would be thrilled with my first quilt, but she deserves a beautiful, beautifully made quilt - it might take me a while to get there!

Apart from sewing / quilting, I do knit and crochet but with four cats (two still kittens), that is proving rather more challenging than fabric work - they still "help" but it is less of a disaster so far with fabric (that's only if I ignore the cat fur that clings to everything, which I do).