The travel virus

 Having done a fair bit of research on what to see in Hong Kong when I stop there on the way to New Zealand next year, I realised that I could really do with an extra day. So I phoned up Trailfinders to move my departure flight forward a day. I'm going late in the season, looking to travel on a Monday and it's still three months away so I wasn't anticipating much more than perhaps a penalty charge of a few hundred pounds.  But nope, the Monday flight is almost full already and the only seats left would be an extra £770 - which is not only the cost of another flight somewhere, but way more than an extra day in Hong Kong is worth to me.

It almost feels like COVID has spawned another virus - the travel bug.  Many of the travel vloggers I watch on Youtube are reporting over-tourism, in some cases such as Kyoto in Japan it is causing real problems for public safety and public transport. And the Facebook travel groups I'm in tell a similar tale of being turned away from museums and trains, or not being able to find accommodation, because travellers didn't book months ahead for popular destinations.  The days of 'winging it' like I did with a backpack in Europe 40 years ago seem to be over - unless you are travelling off the beaten track or really out of season. I wonder if COVID opened people's eyes to the reality that life is short and unpredictable, and maybe slaving over a desk for the next 20 years isn't really what they want to do with the time they have. Or perhaps just being shut into the house under lockdown, or restricted on travelling out of your own country, built up  a demand which has now burst the dams of national borders. It's also pretty easy to go almost anywhere now, if you have the money. It is no longer exotic to go to Thailand, or Bali, or even the Galapagos.  And much as I enjoy going to new places and seeing the famous sights, it does feel a bit like you are just a hamster in the queue for the local sightseeing treadmill.  Which makes it a lot safer for me as a mature solo traveller: as long as I'm sensible and hang on to my passport and credit card, I should be fine. But still, is it really travelling in the old-fashioned sense of the word?

Anyway, enough of my first-world wittering.  My eight or so blog readers want to see the crafts :)

I finished embroidering the big centre block at long last for my Aunt Grace Blue Ribbon quilt kit from Paducah.  Most of the blocks are done now - I need to add some applique leaves to the flower blocks, and I need to replace the lower left star background because the provided fabric is too low contrast for the middle star.  In fact, I'm very surprised at how much fabric I have left over - they have supplied long quarters of everything, even when there were only a few squares to cut out of a specific print.

leftover fabric

I do not find the asymetric layout of this quilt very satisfying.  Given that I have so much fabric left over, I am tempted to add some nine patch blocks down the right hand side of the quilt to provide some visual balance. I'll have to have a play. I've got plenty of prints left, it will be the background fabric quantity that will be the limiting factor.

With the centre panel embroidery out of the way, I could start work on a cross stitch Robin xmas ornament on linen, which I bought on the Cross Stitch Guild weekend last year.  I love the look of cross stitch on linen, but I hate doing it.  Even wearing the strong headset magnifiers, I still stitch into the wrong hole between the floppy linen threads and constantly have to unpick. I also got into a muddle with two virtually indistinguishable shades of brown, and have to had to devolve to doing one complete row of the robin at a time, rather than try to do an area of one colour. Hopefully I will get it done in time to hang on the Christmas tree.

I'm still making tiny things for the Chinese dollshouse kit.  I thought this was a Japanese house but having just made a mini Chinese lyre and stand, and looking at some of the other details, now I'm thinking it may actually be a Chinese house.

I managed to track down a video on Youtube of someone who made the same house kit- only far more perfectly than I am managing. Her glue seems nothing short of miraculous, instantly grabbing in defiance of the laws of physics. The video is strangely hypnotic - the soundtrack helps and the fact that there is no talking, with most of the action being done by disembodied tweezers.  Also she(he?) is building things out of order compared to the instructions, but I suppose that's due to being very experienced. The instructions have you build all the bits first, and then start on the actual house construction.

I have finally started practicing on my new-to-me Simply Sixteen Handiquilter machine.  I'm trying to do a bit every day to build up some experience.  On the second day, I tried using longarm quilting rulers for the first time - scary to start with but I'm getting used to them now.  The machine came with a small selection of rulers (arcs, clamshell, a straight edge) and having watched some videos by Angela Walters and others, I have now ordered a couple more from the Handiquilter dealer which will be Christmas presents for me from family. I'm approaching the end of the sample fabric top that the dealer loaded when he installed the machine. After that, I'm tempted to just load up the charity quilt top I made with the Little Quilts panels and have at it with rulers.  Most of the tops waiting for quilting are not suitable for an all-over design so being able to do ruler work on them would be helpful. It will also get me used to winding bobbins, advancing the quilt etc.  I've only hit my head on the slanting ceiling once so far.