Mum's Birthday Pressie

    It's hard to believe that mum turns 85 next Monday. If you met her you'd think she was much younger, she is as sharp as a pin & still very independent. As happens every year i racked my brain to think of the right present. I asked a facebook quilt group for suggestions & one clever lady suggested a bag for mum's walker, if she has one. She does, not because she's doddery, but because she has hammer toes, the result of hand-me-down shoes. As one of 9 children, & the youngest of 5 girls growing up through the depression, it's not surprising. 

    Unfortunately mum lives 1000 kms from me, so I couldn't pop in for a visit to measure up the walker, I asked my nephew to take some pics while he was visiting & I had to wing it. He tells me mum isn't using the walker so I'm hoping this will encourage her! With this in mind I decided not to go with something pretty, but something cute, oh & the walker is red which immediately meant red, black & white to me. I hope she likes it.

  

It's 10" square, I used lightweight pellon to give it some body & some medium weight interfacing in the base. The pocket is for her keys so they are easy to find.  I sewed on red webbing to tie the bag to the walker.

I sent mum a photo album a couple of years ago with family pics in & I'm printing some more to send.

Clare's Craft Challenge #2

This finish came down to the wire as I was waiting for a nice warm day to paint the chair. I did get it undercoated a couple of weeks ago, but the weather since has been cold with a lot of wet. Anyhoo yesterday was lovely & I got the 2 top coats on. Today I covered the cushion, yes I could have done that anytime but.........:-)

Here are the two challenge photos that Clare sent me:

Here's what I started with:

So here is my tah-dah, all done & I'm very pleased with it. I would have used the darker blue if I'd have any, but I'm on another challenge of using what I have, & this is the darkest blue I had in a sample pot. The blue flower is actually quite close to the blue grey, it looks brighter in the pic.

& yes even under the cushion is finished. :-)

It also kick started a lot of furniture painting because I have a stall at a car boot sale early in November, so this is my chance to hopefully clear a lot of excess stuff from the garage. I have a dream that one day I'll be able to park at least one car in the garage.

I will blog some furniture pics in the next week or so. Right now I have been nominated by my friend Abby:
http://quiltiverse.com/2014/10/its-my-turn-at-the-around-the-world-blog-hop/
to take part in the Around the World Blog Hop, so I have another post to write. If you would like to be nominated please let me know in a comment.

Don't forget to pop over to Clare's blog:
http://clarescraftroom.blogspot.com.au/
to check out the other challenge projects, I'm on my way now!