I've been busy.  Not always in an enjoyable way but busy none the less.  3 days of the last 7 have been spent hanging around Southampton while the Renault garage tried to fix the problem with my car.  It seems that it takes a day to decide that they need a part and then another day to fix it!!  Initially there was a noise in the steering column so after the required 2 days it was fixed only to discover that the parking sensors were messed up by the mechanic installing the new bit in the steering!  So now I am waiting for the car sensors to be fixed!  I drew a line at having it back in for a 4th time.  I have a life and sitting in Southampton all day doing little except flexing my credit card is not how I want to spend it!!!

I've been learning how to use my new quilting programme called EQ6.  It's a great way to design quilts and it prints out fabric requirements, block pieces and you can even create the stencils for quilting with.  Like all programmes it takes time and effort to get to grips with it but I have worked my way through the first lesson and designed a quilt.  It isn't fantastic and the choice of colours leave lots to be desired but I am quite pleased with it.  Very traditional but at least it is part of the learning curve.  Fun to play around with anyway! 

It has been tough this week as I took all the wonderful donations in Dick's memory to Professor Ottensmeier on Friday.  I had no real anticipation as to how hard that visit would be and it left me feeling very sad .  Christian was thrilled that people had been so generous andI know that Dick would have been as pleased as punch to have helped him with his "ground-breaking new discoveries".  It was a sad thing to say goodbye.  He was a key part of our lives for over 2 years and he and Dick became firm friends, beyond the confines of the disease and its treatment.  It is appropriate that we both move on in our own ways but neverthless it was a tough day.

My plans for having my kitchen re-developed have really taken shape.  The work begins on 8th September and the first thing to happen is that the wall between the dining room and kitchen will come down.  I dread the mess and upheaval but I am battling with doors which are hanging off their hinges and Dick was very encouraging about having the work done, so I have paid the deposit, made a million and one choices about design and colour and so on and have the builder arriving this week to sort things out.

This week looks fun.  I am visiting a friend for a couple of days including a visit to Champneys!  Then I have a workshop in London for my new Bernina sewing machine so all in all  some fun things to do.  Hope your week is fun too!

Just a little something I ran up this evening.  Had the fabric, had the handles, needed a pressie so put it all together and what do you get?

I used some very heavy duty stiffening in the bag called Timtex.  But horror of horrors, I now discover that it has been discontinued!  Typical!  But the nearest thing to it is something called Flexi-Firm Ultra Heavyweight Fusible Interlining.  You can get it here.  This bag is so stiff that it stands up beautifully on its own without a trace of sag.  Just what a flower bag calls for really!

We heard today that Tom is now BA (Hons) and we are over the moon.  It has been a particularly difficult time for Tom.  He gave up his job to be with his father and the deterioration in Dick's condition meant that writing a dissertation for a tutor in Swansea was very hard for him.  We have encouraged, cajoled and just plain nagged the poor lad to complete the darned thing and he submitted it last week, just before the deadline.  We are thrilled that he has now got his degree and know that his father would have been bursting with pride.  Both of his sons have got their degrees and are able to get on with their lives.

It's been a pretty emotional sort of a day really!

It became like the elephant in the quilting room.  It needed to be finished but it needed me to spread the thing out on a large surface and leave it there and with all the events of the last 10 months, leaving a quilt somewhere for a period of time was not going to cut it!  Anyway, long story short - I have ressurected it and started to join my pieces together and like most things that have been put away and have become the silent bogie in your creative life, it was nowhere near as difficult to get going again as I had thought.

Here is one third of the quilt stitched together and waiting for its two brothers to join it.  Kaffe (notice the use of first names!) thought it should be called a Birthday Cake quilt because it looked bright and edible.  Not sure about that.  I'm not even sure where it will go or what I will do with it.  I think it will be fairly big when it is done and it was intended for me to use but in actual fact it will probably fit a single bed as it will measure 95" x 62" which might just be a tad large to lug around and to wrap myself in on winter evenings.

Nevertheless I love it.  I think what I love the best is that I am quilting and piecing and getting back into the swing of it all and that I am seeing the different effects that can be produced through choosing and using fabrics creatively.

Talking of choosing fabrics, I had a totally 21st century technology moment yesterday.  My friend, Paul, is in California on business.  He happened to mention that he would be in the San Diego area this week when I saw him on Saturday and like any good quilter I immediately thought about the Sowing Sisters quilting shop.  This is a wonderful shop, the like of which we don't have in UK, partly because leasing a shop is so expensive that most quilting shops are fairly small as far as floor area goes, but also because the light which they have in California is totally different and consequently the fabrics look different than they do in UK.

Anyhoo............I had a phone call from Paul last night.  He was about to pass by Carlsbad, the home of Sowing Sisters and did I want some fabric?  What a silly question!  With fabric costing in dollars what we pay in pounds, of course I did!  So I called the shop and using another website (they don't do on-line shopping) I was able to choose and order some fabric.  Amy Butler fabric to be precise from the new Midwest Modern range.  My credit card was used in anger and I then texted Paul the directions to the shop and an hour later (actually 11 pm UK time!) I had a call to say he was in possession of a parcel of fabric and what a fantastic shop it was!  I am so pleased and think I shall love the fabric I have bought.  You don't need much to make a quilt and so a little should go a long way.  Here are a few of the pieces which I just adored and chose.

Lovely stuff and could make some gorgeous bags as well as quilts.  I can't wait to see it and decide how to use it.

This little quilt top is something I have pieced over the last few days.  I love the gentle colours and patterns and am now looking forward to quilting it.  I am going to use my new machine (OOOOh!) to do the quilting and I hope it all comes out OK.

This is the first quilt I have made where I have worked out the pattern entirely by myself and done all the calculations.  Nothing very ground-breaking here but something that will lift my confidence to try something a little more taxing.  I love the soft and gentle colours and although it isn't very big it would be nice as a lap quilt or even a wall-hanging.

For the scrapbookers among us, you might be interested to know that the border is an Anna Griffin print.  Seems very familiar to some scrapping papers I have had in the past!

I am hoping to get back into the swing of quilting properly.  But of course summer is NOT the time to be lugging quilts around with batting/wadding in them or sitting with them on your lap quilting! Heho!

I must get back into some sensible eating this week.  We had a wonderful lunch out today with our great friends Jules and Ross.  The boys and I had a great time and we ate enough for a small rugby team.  I think I feel a visit to the gym coming on!

It seems to me that the simple question that needs an answer is this:  How much money will I get each month?

Oh my Lordy that is far too difficult a question to answer.  I can be told how much I will get per annum.  (Great when it is paid for a period of 91 days)  I am given calculations:  "A minus D+F" but without brackets, as any mathematician will tell you, the answer could be any one of several!

But the icing on the cake is that when you ring the number on the letter to discuss the matter and try to work out what you will be getting to pay those ever-increasing bills, you are told that you cannot talk to anyone in pensions directly.  Oh no!  They take your number and tell you that you will be rung in the next 10 days.  10 DAYS!  No matter that you may be walking the dog, doing your shopping or visiting the doctor at the time they ring!  10 days is what the man said and so wait I must for 10 more days to sort the problem out.

(Mind you, I thought it was sorted last week!  Oh blissful day when that thought was in my mind!  But deeper investigation revealed that their dates were wrong and I was having to point them in the right direction!  So now I await a further telephone call to sort out the problem.)

Tom and I have spent ages doing calculations.  We are not daft.  (I taught Maths for many years and Tom has a good grasp of the subject - well good enough to get a B at GCSE!) but we are struggling.  Pity the poor widow of 19 years old who is alone and has a crying baby for company.  The wives of servicemen deserve better.

So now what is life like?  Sometimes there is a sense of freedom.  Not from Dick of course but from the need to be constantly worrying about medications, hospital appointments and other such stuff. A lot of the time there is just the routine of keeping life moving on but sometimes, just once or twice in a day, there is a feeling of overwhelming sadness.  Sometimes accompanied by a good wail, sometimes not. Grief is a strange thing.  We are all affected differently and having nursed someone through a terminal illness does prepare you in some way.  You can at least think about what life will be like when you are on your own. But the dealing with life on your own is taxing

I am finding the presence of his things very demanding.  I know some people take a long time before they are able to deal with the possessions of someone who has died.  I want to do it fairly soon.  While we have a few things which are very personal and very special - watches, cufflinks, photographs, etc etc, much of the stuff is not important to us.  That doesn't mean that we don't recognise that it was important to Dick but rather I am reminded of the question, "Just how many things do you need to have, to remember someone?"  The answer in my case is actually, none at all.  His memory is vivid and clear and precious and although these things will be nice to have as momentoes, for me they are just momentoes.  The important things about Dick will be with me forever.

I am uploading some photos of the garden.  You may remember I posted some a while ago and I thought an update would be a positive thing to do.  Dick loved the garden especially once it had the beds re-designed.  He would have loved it now.  This rose was given to me last year by some friends and it is looking fab.

And just look at these peonies.  Blousy, show-offs that they are.  Dick adored them.

However.............the electrics on the top floor blew and along with it blew the motherboard on my computer!  Yes it was surge-protected.  No, it didn't protect it.  Has it caused problems?  You bet!

I have had to replace the computer and have all the data extracted from the old computer.  Thank goodness it was able to be extracted - photographs, letters etc etc.  I am "in discussion" with the Insurance Company and hope that I shall be able to get some money back.  Otherwise, I am feeling very very sick about the whole thing.

However, on a positive note:

• I have set up my PC on my own
• I have managed to get all the data back in the right places
• I am still here and communicating.

Quite a triumph in a bit of a roundabout way!