Horses for Courses....

How time flyes, it seems like only yesterday that Kyle was getting ready for Bonchester Rideout and already it was the last ride to Denholm checking the town bounderies before next weeks big celebrations up 'the mair'. For one reason or another Kyle has had a few different steeds already this year, on Saturday he rode young Beauty (we have an old Beauty too). She is a bit too small for Kyle now really, this was a farewell ride...

Here is a short video of the horses leaving town, there were just over 220 horses...

On Sunday we loaded Beauty into the trailer and headed for Appleby Horse Fair to the largest annual gathering of Gypsies and Travellers in Europe.

Beauty is a pretty pony not your usual sober, calm cob but a little bit bouncy, a good jumper......she is now off on a new adventure to a new home....

Washing and swimming horses in the river...

It was a beautiful summers day, crowds of people and lots of horse and riders enjoying themselves...

Weather, horse, quilts

It's still very depressing weather here in the UK, especially Scotland, it's never stopped raining but we did see the sun for a little while on Wednesday. Our old farmhouse is taken a battering from the storms, the water is starting to seep into her old bones, slates are lying in the gutters up on the roof and after only 200 years a glass has broken in one of the loft skylights. We were reminded last week of how fragile life can be but also how lucky some are to walk away unscathed but sore from what could have been a fatal accident. The rain can continue to seep in for a while, my family is more precious than this old farmhouse.

Spring must be just around the corner though as today was our annual scanning of the in-by sheep, once they are shed off into there lots of barren, single, twins and triplets they will be housed in the sheep sheds until lambing time in April. I bet those sheep are so pleased to be inside after the atrocious weather.

We had a new arrival on the farm this week too, we saw her advertised on Tuesday, Kyle and his Granddad went to see and ride her on Wednesday then brought her home on Friday, very quick but bought from a friend, so hopefully all will be well.  This is Flora or Flo, a 16hh hunter type sports horse, Kyles new ride, it was a rather blustery day so the photos aren't great, many more will follow I'm sure.


I had a few quilts go home last week, here are a few done with edge to edge or pantograph quilting.
The first was pieced by a lady in who is 96 years old, it's Dresden blades from a jelly roll pieced in strips, she made a very good job of matching the colours across the quilt. Her only suggestion was that her dear daughter loves daisies, so 'Daisies' it was.

It looks wonderful doesn't it?

Anne made this lovley Chinese Coins type quilt in autumn colours, we chose a Chocolate leaves pantograph, it showed wonderful texture from the polyester wadding.

Pam also chose Chocolate leaves for this scrappy jelly roll quilt, I chose to use Metro thread in Khaki Sand, it was a good choice.

Here are a few of the quilts that went home before Christmas....

This is such a lovely quilt made for a young lady going off to University, and it's all made from fabric from the families pyjamas, isn't it such a lovely quilt to treasure when you are away from home, quilted with a surf pantograph.

Another quilted with Chocolate Leaves, it's a very popular panto, it made a lovely quilt....

This last one was destined as a Christmas gift for Kevin's Mum at Fabric Focus in Edinburgh, it's a lovely log cabin design, with a swirly pantograph or edge to edge quilt  design.

That's it, I am caught up with photos, if any were missed I'm sorry but I think it is time to move on to this year, it is February after all....

Moving right along!

It's been busy!

What am I talking about, it's still busy, it's always busy here!

Boredom, what is that? I don't think I have ever been bored in my life, I always have something to do, I always have too much to do. Some stuff is exciting and I can't wait to get on with it, other stuff is like being stuck in a traffic jam, it causes a hold up and it feels like nothing gets done. My tactic to the 'traffic jam' stuff is to just do something that is not so exciting or more time consuming so that I can 'treat' myself by moving on to the exciting stuff! Try it, it works just push on through the more mundane, it may be office work, housework, ironing or a not so precisely pieced quilt top that is in your queue to quilt, just do something to clear the 'traffic jam'.

We had a busy few days over the past week or so with the culmination of the Hawick Common Riding 2015. The Friday was a glorious day with men only riders we set Kyle off with Willow and watched at various vantage points before the horses arrived at the Mare. It was a bit disappointing, not least for the rider who fell off and hurt himself right on the course which meant that more than 3/4 of the riders didn't get to gallop the racecourse. The cost of a hired horse for the day was £180 so not to get the thrill and cheers of the gallop must hurt a little in the wallet but it's also disappointing for horse owners too, it isn't cheap to keep a horse from one year to the next, a set of shoes cost £70, never mind tack and feed.

This quilt went home to my lovely customer Anna, it has a pieced backing and although I'm not really a fan of pieced backs, it did turn out well, my fear is that the different weaves of the various fabrics may stretch and warp and indeed the backing did sag in the middle but I don't think there were any puckers....

I used a curved ruler and freemotion feathers to pull in some of the fullness, it worked really well.

 My customer always loves the quilting so I wasn't worried.

Last Friday we made an early trip over to Selkirk for their Common Riding, we were up at 4.30am and had the horses and breakfast loaded up, we left and were ready for the ride to leave the town at 7am....Selkirk is not so civilised as Hawick whose rides are mostly in the afternoons...

Kyle and Fieron ready to muster with the other riders following the Standard Bearer....

Selkirk Standard Bearer, the ride follows hin to the top of that hill way off in the distance

Fi, Riding her first 'chase' up The Toll back into town...