Right, lets get cracking on February!

Okay, January seemed to go well so I'm glad to get going on February's tasks. Over at Marti's 52 Quilts in 52 Weeks the lucky UFO number for February is 9.  My No. 9 project is to finally make myself a laptop bag and a sewing machine cover.

I've had a pattern I've been holding on to for some time now for a laptop bag and now its number has come up! You can find the tutorial here.

I haven't quite decided for sure yet but I'm leaning towards using these fabrics, the spots on the outside and the blue floral on the inside and for contrast on the handles and pocket edging.

I'v worked out my measurements to suit my laptop and just need to get myself a zip (which I just realised I could have bought when I was at Spotlight today - rats!

In the meantime I've been getting cracking on my other project, a sewing machine cover. I saw this lovely sewing machine block on Craftsy.com and just had to buy it.

Its from Kristy at Quiet Play and she has lovely paper pieced patterns. You might remember the blocks I made as part of the And Sew On quiltalong she hosted a while back:

So firstly I needed to pick out some fabrics and after a wander through my blue fabric drawer I pulled these out to use.

My plan is to have the machine blend from dark to light so we'll see how that goes. I've printed out my pieces and have marked them with the fabrics I want to use. I find its the only way to keep things straight when I'm foundation piecing.

Now that January is done, a new colour for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is allocated and I can only say I wasn't overly excited to find that the colour for February is.......brown. Hmmmm, not a colour that excites me much. However I do have brown scraps so I will endeavour to put together some brown crumb blocks and see how I feel about them once they're done.

I had no plans to take part in any new quiltalongs this year but, well, sometime something comes along that catches your interest and you just have to join in! I'm talking about The Splendid Sampler being jointly hosted by Pat Sloan and Jane Davidson.

Its a free 100 six inch finished block mystery quilt with different techniques. The blocks are issued twice a week and the first is available on 14th February.  I haven't done much with 6 inch blocks so thought it would be a good project to get familiar with working with the smaller size.  I've decided to use fabrics from my stash, other than the background fabric which I found today at Spotlight. Its actually a Christmas fabric on clearance but you wouldn't know it. It was only $4.50 per metre so I bought all there was as I'm sure I can use it in other projects. Its a lovely silver design on white and I think it will work perfectly with the layer cake and charm square I'm going to use to start with. Anything else I need I'm sure I can find in my fabric drawers!

I also have this layer cake.  I'm not sure all of the fabrics will work as well but its there if I need it!

So there you have it. That should keep me out of mischief this month! What are you up to this month?

Cheers,