Well I have skidded up to the deadline!

Let me recap for you.

At the beginning of the year I signed up to the Contemporary Quilt Group of the British Quilters Guild Journal Quilt challenge - to do one little quilt each month for a year.  How difficult could that possibly be?

Well tomorrow is the 1st of May - that means (if you haven't worked it out) that today is the last day of April - and the deadline for the first 4 quilts to be completed and uploaded!

January and February - done at a sedate pace.

March - well a wee bit more urgent!

April - lets just say I pushed it right to the wire!  Trust me - I was sewing on the binding, taking the photo and getting the quilt uploaded onto the site a in a bit of a last minute rush (don't look at the back!)

My theme is 'Memories' and as I progressed with 'Bed Time Stories' a poem from my own childhood came back to me - rather vividly!  Hunter Trials by John Betjeman.


It's a daft thing, but I can just recite this poem (though you might like to listen to the 'master' - Richard Burton  - here!)

So I free hand embroidered the first verse of the poem on to the tissue/fabric backing.

And then I used tiny snippets of painted nylon (a nasty scrap of nylon painted with green and yellow acrylic paint with texture added using a wooden roller from a cheap art shop) as ivy leaves.  The ivy to me is very symbolic of the passing of time and covers and 'buries' the memories like an old wall.



Each leaf was snipped and held in place with a dab of Pritt Stick and then free machined on.

And finally, I added the binding.


The words are beneath the ivy - stitched in a variegated thread so some stands out more against the purple background.  Again this is symbolic of the way memory fades in and out and can play tricks on you.

So, that's it - the first 4 complete.

Somewhat showing my ignorance, one thing I did not expect in my short break to Cornwall was to find the grave of Sir John Betjeman. 

But we did, in the prettiest of little churches, tucked in the rolling dunes just at the mouth of the Camel Estuary.

What a view - if my bones have to rest anywhere then this is as good a place as any I think.

The little church is in high demand as a wedding venue and the porch and door had been decorated.





 (Ps, that's Molly, best friend of Whippet X, waiting patiently outside the church.  Not sure she was so impressed with the flowers).

And inside, they were all geared up for Harvest Festival.


 And in the porch, this lovely romantic tombstone (which did not photograph so well).