“Who’s he? Have we seen him before?”
“He’s married to the woman who posts the blog.”
“The vlog. We’ve established it’s a vlog.”
“Yes her. With the blond hair.”
“OK. Can you pause it a minute? OK. Tak.”

Put aside quilt. Dash into bedroom and return with reel of thread. Install self back on sofa and start to thread needle.

“OK?” says ActorLaddie. “Say when.”
“Nu. Tak… Hang on – who’s he? Is that the Russian Roulette guy?”

We are multi-tasking, ActorLaddie and I.   My tasks are 1) to try and finish the quilt I’m making for Great-Niece whilst 2) watching The Bridge. ActorLaddie’s tasks are 1) to watch The Bridge and 2) to explain to me the bits that I’ve missed because I was looking at my sewing when a key sub-title/ new character / sawn-off body part appeared.

Of course, as you can tell, we barely need the sub-titles: countless Winter evenings of Nordic Noir, with sprinkles of added Borgen, have left us all but fluent in a range of Scandinavian languages. Just like to check for any added nuances. Naturligt.

I am not, however, fluent in quilt making. Those of you who remember the Great Curtain Disaster of 2013 may also recollect that my sewing skills were severely traumatised by being made to take a particularly grim piece of hemmed tea-towel around the other classes in my Junior School. It was, I believe, policy to mock poor pieces of work from time to time pour encourager les autres.

So sewing and I do not have a comfortable relationship. But when we heard that Rezza was expecting the first of the next generation of our family, I wanted to make something special to mark the occasion, and was much taken by the ‘I Spy’ quilt FellowKnitter had made for her grandson.

It’s a quilt that you put on the floor, consisting of squares, the quilt that it, not the floor, then you put the baby on it and each one has a different picture, each square, that it, not each baby, that would be ridiculous, then you can talk about them with it, with the baby, that it, not with the quilt. OK? Would you like subtitles with that? Or perhaps a visual aid.

Something beginning with…

FellowKnitter gave generously of her fabric, allowing me to cut many a picture from her cornucopia of cottons. She now has mountains of material, each missing a 4” square. She gave even more generously of her time and skills; introducing me to the world of roller-cutters, fat-quarters and walking-feet with immense patience and encouragement.

And when, yesterday, having put in the final stitch, I rushed around to show her the finished work, she didn’t send me to the neighbours to show them how poor my work was. Instead, she called Mr FellowKnitter to come and make admiring noises, and I felt dead proud. You can tell why she was such a brilliant teacher.

The quilt is now delivered and, who knows, Great-Niece might be throwing up on it as I write this. Meanwhile, I’m off to get some wool in preparation for next week’s Bridge-fest. I have a fancy for a colourful, chunky jumper to brave those Nordic Nights. Skål!

ParkiePerks #2
A tremor adds tremelo to flute playing with no effort at all. I think it sounds etheral and will not hear otherwise.