Block-a-day-July Day 16

I admit to feeling a bit hoha in The Palace yesterday afternoon - after two weeks of grabbing fabrics to quickly sew up my daily blocks, it felt like there were bits and pieces of this and that everywhere!!

I started by having a bit of a tidy up, putting some fabrics back in their boxes and tidying the piles of things waiting for attention (!). I came across some fabric I'd put aside for a child's pillowcase and decided it would be a good time to sew it up and move it out of the room.

One pillowcase done and dusted.

I'm happy with this one. You may remember my attempts to adapt the easy/magic/burrito style pillowcase to include an inner flap so that the pillowcase would stay on the pillow?

On a completely unrelated dive down a rabbit hole one day, I came across *this* tutorial which produces a pillowcase exactly how I wanted it.

It looks like the front is done burrito style but it's not, and it's just as quick and easy. The back is plain, cut wider (or longer, depending on which way you are looking at the pillowcase!) so you can form a flap. It's the way I was heading with my attempts, however I was still trying to incorporate the magic/burrito technique to give the front that fun look.

Anyway, that's done now and there's a couple less pieces of fabric in a pile in The Palace. That satisfied my tidying urge. The next mission was to complete the day's block. Although it was, by then, getting quite late in the day, I figured I should be able to make a block I've been wanting to do for a bit now.

This block is from the 'British Sew-a Row' recently run by a group of clever British designers to mark the Queen's Platinum Jubilee.

The minute I saw this row (there's more to it) I knew I wanted to make it, even if I didn't make the rest of the rows. It's called Raining Cats and Dogs. I thought this week was appropriate to make it since it's so wet here right now!!

It was a fun sew, and easier than it may seem. I put dinner in the oven (meat loaf and roast veges) and got most of it sewn while they were cooking. (I had started the cutting prior, though). Then I dished up the MOML's meal and sewed the last few seams. He was still eating when I came back upstairs to join him!

The talk of yesterday in our family is this photo of our crazy son. You may remember he is at the South Pole over winter. Yesterday they hit the minus 100° F mark. Of course he had to have his photo taken (in shorts) to mark the occasion!

It is night there until August (when they start twilight), but a full moon and night mode on the camera makes it look lighter than what it was. (Also all the lighting outside the buildings is red so as not to interfere with the scientific equipment.)

He told me that with the wind factored in, it was closer to -100°C!!!! Brrr.

'til next time,

happy stitches,