Sunday, August 2, 2009

One experiment, one giant leap

I've finished my little 2 1/2" checkerboard experimental quilt. 12 strips from the jelly rolls (6 of each colour combo from 2 jelly rolls of the same print) and 12 strips of calico ended up 130cm x 110cm. After going too deep with the original layout making it much too rectangular, I squared it up by laying out the pattern as 8 x 10 blocks (instead of 8 x 12 blocks). The remainder of the rectangle blocks I used for a border. It's now living with my sister as a lap quilt. She was pretty chuffed!
But she couldn't have been as thrilled as I was on Friday night when I accompanied L to an iceskating party for one of his school friends. L has a language disorder and with that comes many sensory integration issues. The last time he'd been to the ice arena he'd been completely overwhelmed with the sheer size of the place and the noise. I primed him all week about giving skating a go but not worrying if it didn't work out.
He was itching to go. He was excited to see his school friends out of school hours. He couldn't wait to get his skates on. He walked with my help across the rubber flooring to the skating place. I organised a 'chair' for him to push around. He pushed it all the way round. The other boys got bored, took their skates off and went to play in the ice pit. He followed and had a ball throwing snow balls at the other kids. The gloves he didn't want to wear were put on. They had their birthday tea. The other boys went back to the pit for some more rough ice play (as boys do!). What did L want to do? Put his skates back on and have another go on the ice. He dispensed with the 'chair'. He walked all around the rail. Then he let go. He moved to the middle. He was skating....all by himself. I'm not talking Torvill and Dean but he was moving his legs and he was doing it. And guess what else? He was singing to the songs playing in the arena. What a boy!

(Look at that little tongue sticking out.....really concentrating!)

The Sew & Sews are off to the WEA this morning for a machine quilting workshop....there's no holding us back!

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