Quilting is something I’ve alwayswanted to do, but something that seemed way out of my league of crafts. Everything I’ve ever read about quilting makes it seem like the most precise art known to humankind — something that can only be achieved with a set square, a laser measuring device and the most dedicated devotion to detail. I have none of these things. Well, I could probably rustle up a set square from somewhere, but I have problems with measuring, problems with cutting, problems with precisions — he perfectionist part takes over to the point that when Al tried to talk me through drawing a line in a calm and rational way I have to ask him to stop before I have an anxiety attack. It’s far, far easier for the internal improviser to take over and say “hey! Draw a wiggly line and call it art!”

This is why I just went for it, and started without either a plan or a clue. Squares were cut at random, then sewed together at random. Even the fabrics were chosen randomly from a selection I already had, although there was a minor brainwave in the fabric shop when I remembered that they all shared browns, yellows and greens in common, so I got another couple of fabrics to tie in some other colours (a smattering of light blue, a humungous chunk of Very Bright Yellow) without having to buy too much more. Throwing the cake toppers into the mix, if you will. Who knows what might happen?

Now I’ve put the top together, and actually read a bit about quilting, I can see where a plan would have been useful, particularly in addressing some of the imbalances in the overall item — there’s a little too much yellow here, and that green is perhaps a little too green in normal light (what is it with fabric shops and bad lighting?). But if I’d had to plan, Perfectionist Sarah would have kicked in and I’d have been too put off by the daunting task of planning to actually get round to making anything: I’d have the Best Plan Ever, but never anything to show for it. Next time, I’ll have some sort of plan beforehand, but try to keep in mind that, actually, the randomising and thinking-as-i-go aspect was quite fun to play with.

The next part is the most terrifying for me: the actual quilting. I gave in and bought a walking foot and guide for my machine, because I’m fairly sure that any machine that seems to be allergic to its own bobbins might throw a little bit of a tantrum trying to go through three layers using a normal foot. I have wadding, picked at random in the fabric shop because I didn’t know what I was buying, and now seems to be ridiculously thin. I made a trip to the library which, though small, is pretty heavily stocked with textile craft books thanks to the, ah, more genteel demographic of the area I live in, and now have a couple of books that I look at in horror, trying to digest terms like “layer sandwich”. I’m still no further forward on how binding magically appears. Do I just cut it? If so, how, and does it matter if my straight line looks like a worm freestyling at a disco or should I hire someone who isn’t allergic to accuracy to do it for me?

At the moment, with the top pieced and hanging over the sofa and the wadding still safely wrapped in its bag, I feel really quite scared about moving on, but also excited. Yes, it’s completely squint in places, and I only learnt some technical ideas and time-savers from books when I was already well into the construction, but it has been forever since I’ve had a project I’ve enjoyed so much. Bizarrely, it has had a positive effect on my working day — I’m self-employed, I work from home, so work tended to creep into evenings when it was easier to work without interruption, but now I aim to be all wrapped up by evening so that I can work on my quilt (don’t worry, the work’s still getting done, just during the day!). Most nights I’m squirreled away at the kitchen table by 8pm, sewing.

I’m just scared I’m going to ruin it.

Some days it’s best to just give up and spend the afternoon sitting in the kitchen listening to the radio and covering balloons in tissue paper.

Can we clarify: posting a photo before giving up and just going to bed counts as fully-fledged blogging, yes?

Sitting in front of a blank file titled “NaNoWriMo2009.docx” wondering where all the words that flooded my head for the past month have gone, it suddenly seems like a brilliant plan to take part in NaBloPoMo as well. This reminds me a lot of being in Uni, when it suddenly seemed like a good idea to scrub the flat from top to bottom the day before an exam, but if it gets me doing two things I want to do more of (writing and blogging), and seeing as no-one’s going to mark the results — although they may taunt me for the rest of my natural life if I fail at either — I’ll run with it. I’m tempted to make myself take a photo a day throughout November as well, and blog that, too. Hell, why not go the whole hog and run a marathon every day in November, Sarah?

November is my planned month of endless health. Technically you can’t plan these things, but it’s surely due, after spending the whole of October with various viruses. Virus begets virus, it turns out. Over the course of the month I’ve done possible ‘flu, stinking cold, tonsilitis, laryngitis, to the point that the doctor has now given me antibiotics just in case there’s something killable in there. If I was well enough to leave the house for even half of the days in the month, I’d be surprised, and when I did go out I managed to get myself attacked in Waitrose (Waitrose! Maybe you expect to get kicked by random strangers while standing in the bakery aisle of Lidl, but Waitrose?!), meaning the whole of the month of October can safely be filed under A for “Atrocious”.

But November? November, you’re going to be wonderful. Together we’ll write a book, a blog, take photographs, catch up and get ahead with work projects, leave the house on a daily basis (okay, we can work on getting to the top of the street without dying again before we start on the daily marathons), catch no germs and be okay.

C’mon November: let’s get started.

I set myself a little project this morning, and the result is this series of little still lives featuring the details of my day and my home (there are more photos on Flickr). Some of the images are stranger than others — who takes a photo of a bottle of balsamic vinegar or a doorhandle? — but the answers give bizarre little insights into who I am and how I live: I add balsamic to everything (except maybe porridge) and I think the old doorhandles are the favourite part of my new flat, other than the bathroom and kitchen windows (light!) and shower curtain. You probably have to have lived without a shower rail for three months to truly appreciate the power of a square of clear plastic.

Later, I headed outside and grabbed a few of the little details from my walk and the area of Edinburgh that I live in, much to the bemusement of every school-age person in the city. I can tell I’m getting old because the orange number 8 below? It was stuck to a communal bin. And I took a photo of it just to horrify the schoolgirl who had been staring at me and my camera for the previous few minutes. She’ll probably need counselling to get over the sheer horror of it all.

You’d be surprised about what’s new to me. I spent my teens hidden away, sleeping, and my time at university was spent almost exclusively switching between uni work, paid work and a state of cognitive suspension that meant all I could do was press the F5 key over and over and over and over…

So when I was looking for something to fill a bit of time now that the degree is done – pause here for the small party that happens in my brain every time I realise that – it made sense to concentrate on the new. To both identify the things I want to do that I’ve never done, and to grab those things that I’d never even considered but that would be fun, interesting or will one day make an interesting story to tell when I’m tucked into my rocking chair.

And because no project is complete(d) without a goal, and as I am the Queen of Ordered Lists and unattainable targets, I figured I’d start small – so 1000 new things it is! There is no time limit, but I accept that it’s in my best interests to do some of them now rather than waiting until I’m 80, not least because I need the impetus to add variety and structure to my life over the next few post-uni months

Some basic rules. I like rules.

1. For the purposes of the list, the definition of new is new to me. I’m not out to make history here. You’ll probably have done at least some of these things already (perhaps all, in which case I ask you: do you ever sleep?) but if I haven’t then it totally counts as new.
2. I can’t include anything that I can’t mentally define as “a thing”. The sort of activity that you might mention to a good friend on the phone or when you bump into them in the street. For example, five minutes ago I sent an email that I’ve never sent before while eating a cereal I’ve never had before! That’s two new things at once! But neither of these count, not least because they don’t meet the friend-mentioning criteria — not even I’d start a conversation with “yesterday I sent an email about image resizing for printing”. I hope.
3. I won’t include things that are new but that make me crumple a little inside. On Monday my purse was stolen, something that had never happened to me before, but because I don’t want to add it to the list and I don’t want to reference it repeatedly, it won’t be included in the list. Is this blurring the truth somewhat? Most likely. But I choose not to make it a bigger part of my life than it already is.
4. If I’m not sure if something is list-worthy or not, I’ll ask someone I can trust to be adjudicator. Their decision is final, unless by asking I realise I vehemently disagree with them, and then my decision is final.
5. Part of the project is to blog as much as I can, but I very likely won’t blog everything, and there may be some things I just can’t blog about (state secrets, criminal escapades, work stuff, etc.). In which case I’ll post horribly modified entries that make the story sound way more interesting that it actually is, like it’s a Facebook status update.

I’ve already started with some items I’ll blog about later (four or five so far — one needs to go into adjudication), but I’m very open to any ideas for things to do, no matter how small or big. I’ll try anything, so have a think — what do you do that I’ve probably never done?

I’m slightly smitten with this idea for making gift boxes out of old cereal boxes.  
Instructable by Blightdesign, via Zero Waste Blog, via Al.