Did Thursday And Friday Sparkle? Yes, Plenty!

The Wanted performing

Can't think of many days better than yesterday.  I spent the morning cooking a huge pot of chilli, ready to feed my daughter and her friends later in the day and knowing that I was going off to spend the afternoon at my LQS (no surprise for you all there then!), didn't want to have to cook later.  You see I was going out for the evening with my daughter, F, and two of her friends, MP & SA.  Weeks ago F asked if she could go to see the English band, The Wanted, in concert at the Beacon Theatre on Broadway/72nd and my response was, of course, she could on the condition that I could go too - I've loved their music since their first English hit, All Time Low, back in July 2010.

Me with F, SA & MP
Hudson River and 1 World Trade Centre

So Thursday night, the four of us went off, and I can report back to you all that it was fantastic.  The theatre itself was spectacular, Taio Cruz, supporting, was amazing and what can I say about The Wanted, well they were nothing short of fabulous.  Later, outside the stage door, the crowd lining the street was like something from the Beatles' era.  And I was there too - by now I had grabbed the opportunity and nipped across the road to Fairway market to stock up on Cotswold cheese, chicken breasts, some fabulous chocolate-covered cherries and Maltesers with peanut butter centres, well the housewife in me couldn't keep up the teenager act all night.  And then we went home, singing the songs and taking photos of ourselves along the Hudson River waterfront.  Actually, I hobbled home - yes, my right shoulder and hip are in much pain from jumping up and down for several hours and punching my arm in the air, but I wouldn't have missed it for anything - it truly was a night full of sparkle.





What other sparkle had my Thursday held in store?  Well, at my LQS, I'd enjoyed my second class with Karen Haynes, this week making use of the LQS design walls to layout my Sparkle Plenty quilt squares.  It took me 2 hours to place out all the pieces - only having 3 fabrics in contrast to my main purple fabric meant that I needed to place them carefully as repeats and adjoining the same fabric pieces would be very obvious.

I stayed an hour after class helping Karen baste a baby quilt she's making for one of the twins she's expecting.  She's just found out she's having a boy and a girl, her first babies, and I'm really thrilled for her :)

When Friday dawned, I was up and off, time to join all those squares and get the top sheet finished for my Sparkle Plenty quilt.  I had lots of trashy TV lined up to watch while I was sewing.  I started out with the first two episodes of the new Dallas - it was good to see all the old faces again; the years have been particularly kind to Sue Ellen, but best of all was hearing that theme tune again; I'm thrilled that they kept it.  I'm not sure that I'll avidly watch every episode, but it was a good dose of nostalgia in a new format.

And here is the completed quilt top.  It took six and a half hours to sew (yes, after Dallas finished, I had to suffer what for me isn't too much of a hardship watching Gordon Ramsay in various culinary programmes; Masterchef, Hell's Kitchen and Kitchen Nightmares but I drew the line at The F Word, by then even I'd had enough though I did warn you it was all trashy TV!).

Another quilt I've fallen in love with, and I'm desperate to crack on quilting it, but it'll have to wait till Sunday because tomorrow I'm off to my LQS's Bernina Day and, if I've got time, I'm going to finally pay a visit to Purl Soho as well.  Busy, busy, busy!!!

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