Challenges Duly Risen To

Yesterday I completed the Artist Trading Cards and Quiltlet I presented in my previous post. They are now in the mail to Alis and Susan of the Unlimited Textiles yahoo group.

 

 

This month's swap theme on this group is Passion, for interpretation as a quiltlet and as a brooch. I feel inspired about this, and have started sketching, mentally and on paper, some beginning ideas.

Of course, I "cheated" by using this design work for my January Take it Further Challenge which was to be inspired by someone we admire. I have been far from my best this month so I think it's just about acceptable to kill two birds with one outcome in this way. February's challenge is "what I've lived long enough to remember" so these two themes will not dovetail so readily - so I can enjoy trips down Memory Lane and make forays into Passion as well.

I also downloaded instructions for the February bag project on the BQ List, which is a bit more involved than the January bag I made, but looks interesting and very attractive - indeed I think I got what Kandy would describe as a sneaky peek at the meeting of Great Western Embroiderers we both attended a couple of months ago. I will have to go and hunt through the fabric mountain to see what I can utilise this time around - there's still plenty of choice.

I have signed up to the Creative Every Day challenge as well. I guess the daily photo blog I started is contributing to this commitment as well. I'm still on my first Bayerische Sock and am ready to start the heel now. It's knitting that requires concentration and I'm resisting casting on another project for the moment so I don't get diverted from this one, but I may have to because there are certainly times I could be knitting when I don't feel up to working on this project. However, I have some handstitching coming in the swaps I've mentioned, I think, which may fulfil this function for a while without additionally diluting my project progress...

DH and I rose to the challenge of going out together more often "a deux" last night by going to see Atonement at the Bristol Showcase cinema. We'd missed it first time around, to my great regret, but the film's recent success in the Golden Globes seems to have granted it a limited second run before its imminent release as a DVD. It was wonderful: I'm so glad we got to see it on the big screen. Powerful story, fabulously shot and excellent music, too. Another good one. It did us good, even if it's meant I've spent the day in bed so far. Where will our next "date" take us?

The challenge I still have to really get my teeth into is working on the inspirations provided by our holiday in Marrakech, which is simmering away in my sub-conscious at the moment. I need to make a start on this because there was so much wonderful there. My friend Dale has put me onto a wonderful new-to-me blog, The House in Marrakesh to make me get nostalgic again - but not in an "I've lived long enough to remember" kind of way.

Oh well, time to get up, get dressed, get nose to the grindstone and get on with the day.