Weekend Tidbits

Firstly, let me say a massive thank you for sharing your experiences and thoughts on the questions about alternatives to Google Reader and on tablets.  I really appreciate that you took time to let me know what you know and I will certainly be looking into them in due course.  There's no way I want to lose touch with all the blogs I follow regularly and I know that just having some of you listed in my sidebar will not mean I see everything you're up to, so this definitely something I want to sort out sooner rather than later.  If anyone else is interested in what people have had to suggest as alternatives to the loss of Google reader or their experiences on blogging from a tablet take a look at the comments on the last post.

In stitchy news, I have been finishing off the quilting and binding on this cute little panel that was donated to Bee Blessed.

I quilted it in a diagonal grid reminiscent of garden trellis and added red polka dot binding.  I still absolutely love the butterflies on the backing and hope they will make some little girl very happy!

I also stitched up a wee going away pressie for my lovely young colleague at work who has decided to take herself on an Australian adventure for a year.  With packing being kept to an absolute minimum, I didn't want to encumber her with something she won't have space for and just opted to make her a wee flex frame pouch for her sunnies.  I hope she will like it and be able to fling it in her bag when she's off to the beach in the glorious sunshine! Not that I'm jealous, much...

Just so you can see that with a 3.5" flex frame this pouch is nice and roomy even for sunglasses deeper than mine.

I did have plans to sketch the words "sunnies" on it, but let's just say my efforts were less than acceptable and I reverted back to just the applique of the sunglasses.  I love this so much that I now have a list of another 7 that will be made as gifts over the course of the next few months, including end of term teacher pressies for June.  Yay for having a plan!

Moving on from the pretty to the practical, I thought I'd share a stitchy housekeeping tip with you for defluffing your cutting mat.  When my mat starts to look like this -

I reach for my handy dandy lint roller (less than £2 from IKEA with great value refills too).   Don't just swipe the roller from left to right to defluff it.  That action is great for picking up rogue threads and trimmings, but for really shifting the wadding and fabric fluff that's gripping in there, you need to position your roller at the bottom of the fluff line (just like in the pic above) and push it up the line to the top of the mat.  Does that make sense?  No rolling involved, just a good old push and friction.

Your roller strip will look grungy after that but, hey presto, one defluffed mat in a matter of seconds.

See?  No fluff.

Give it a go, I promise it's worth a try!