Another new year

 A couple more days and I can hang up my 2024 official Sumo calendar. DS and his girlfriend went home today, and I've taken down the first few Christmas ornaments. We are trying to eat up the last of the holiday treats before we go back on a diet in January.  It's been a nice quiet week. The frozen Christmas dinner in a box was so easy to cook and tasted fine - not the best Christmas meal I've ever had, but certainly streaks ahead of many restaurant Christmas menus I've been subjected to at past office parties.  The lack of stress and mess was fantastic and I fully intend to order a box again for next Christmas. All's I had to do was follow the schedule for putting things in the oven, and then finish off a couple of dishes on the hob near the end.  

Crafting presents for Christmas included a new standard mat for my Brother Scan'N'Cut, and two new A1 size cutting mats for my sewing room cutting table.  These are from Ansio, a brand I hadn't heard of. But they were on sale for literally one-quarter of the price of an OLFA mat.  They are replacing an OLFA mat that is probably 15-20 years old, and another which is 9.5 years old - both of those are brittle, hard and gouged/scratched.  The Ansio mats seem fine, the A1 size is a little smaller than the OLFA A1 size but they are heavier - I think because they are a double-sided layer of self-healing material sandwiched around an inner core of something else. I've cut a few things on them and they feel fine under the rotary blade.

I finished off the pincushion and tape measure for the Ambermakes sewing panel case.

For my next project, I pulled out one of the panels I bought in Japan at the shop of designer Masako Wakayama, from her American Country 22 collection. The panel is designed to make eight separate projects, and is in her typical style of country motifs and random English words.

Unfortunately, the instructions are not only in Japanese, but are handwritten and photocopied onto A5 size paper - so they are tiny and barely legible.  I scanned the pages and enlarged them to A4 size, darkened the font a bit and printed them off.  Then I got to work with Google Translate.  It turns out that on top of all those issues, the instructions are pretty minimalist.  Mostly consisting of 'sew right sides together, turn, quilt, stitch together and add zip'.  Luckily I have made up Japanese projects before, so I am familiar with their method of sewing completely finished components which are then joined together with hand-stitching, with the zipper being added last. Also, there was a QR code on the instructions linking to a short video on her website showing the finished projects and which panel components were used for each - no tutorials but still helpful.

I started with the first project, which in retrospect is the most difficult so probably not the best choice.  This is a vanity case with a slip pocket in the lid, and loose pockets in the interior.  It took me a really long time because most of it is hand sewing, plus there was a degree of trial and error as I felt my way through the correct order of assembly which resulted in a fair amount of do-overs.  The outside is decorated with appliques cut from the panel, and the lid is another panel piece as is the handle decoration.  It was nice this week to have the time to undertake such a timeconsuming project.

For my second item, I chose a much easier project which is this drawstring four-sided bag, assembled from four panel pieces. The drawstring ends are finished with 'buttons' cut from the panel. Relatively speaking, this was a much quicker project. It's about 6.5 inches high.

Of the remaining six projects, there are a couple I probably won't make (a string of appliques on felt, and a mini wall quilt) but I've cut out the pieces for two flat zipped pouches and there are a couple of small bags I might tackle.  Nice to remember my enjoyable visit to her western-looking shop, CribQuilt, in Tokyo.

I didn't do any work on the Japanese dollshouse while we had both DS and his girlfriend with us, but before they arrived, I finished off the onsen spa area.

The spa didn't need much, just a couple of shampoo bottles and a ladle

In the changing area, I added folded yukata robes with belts, and large and small towels in the cubbies. There's a basket for used towels, some toiletries and soap on the sink, and a bonsai in the window. I think that's all it needs - it's a small area.

I've done some longarming most days, and I'm almost finished quilting the 30s Sampler quilt.  There are lots of mistakes and wobbles, but on the other hand it is a cut above what I could have done on my old setup with the Pfaff 11" throat machine. And it's been a great learning curve, to tackle a real quilt and practice all the mechanical issues of tension, threading, winding bobbins, rolling on the quilt etc. Not to mention learning some basics of using longarm rulers for quilting.

I'm halfway through the second Little Cotton Rabbits wristwarmer.  I am knitting this one straight, and apart from having to do colourwork while purling, it is so much easier. Since the colours are changing almost every row, I've been able to minimise the purl rows because I can just join on at the right side and knit a lot of the pattern rows. And my tension is more even. Teach me to try to be clever (knitting the first wristwarmer in the round).

I paid my final Trailfinders invoice for the flights to New Zealand and according to their countdown, it's just over 60 days until I travel.  Eeeep. I spent a few hours putting together my paperwork - I am old school and like to have printouts of all my confirmations, itineraries, sightseeing research etc.  After a few years of retirement travel, I think I have most things that I will want to pack otherwise. Although I'm still not sure what kind of temperatures to expect - I will be travelling in NZ's autumn but someone at DH's christmas party had been in April and they said it was hot so who knows.  I hope not, I hate hot weather.

Hope you had a good holiday period and best wishes for a happy new year in 2024.  Hope you got some good crafting pressies as well.