It was Anzac day yesterday, and we'd planned to make our own little dawn ceremony out at the old air-base near Pirie. Matt had expressed an interest in coming too, so at 5.25 am we went out to pick him up from Bowman's park. It was still very dark and I could see Matt's torch bobbing down the track and the flash of Macca's white ruff. He was very excited to be going with us, and I hoped he'd behave himself later. (The dog, that is.) 
Our brother Doug and SIL Bev had already left and were waiting for us at the base, near this massive engine from an old plane that serves as a memorial.We set up Keryn's laptop which contained the appropriate recordings and waited in the dim light until the clouds announced the dawn. 
Then we played The Last Post and stood in silence for two mins, each thinking our own thoughts. Keryn and I remembered Dad, and Mum's stories about the war and no doubt Doug was thinking of his time in Vietnam and the mates who didn't come back. Then he began to recite the Ode of Remembrance, and we all joined in:
They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old,
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
Lest We Forget.
Reveille was played and the sun turned the clouds into fiery bands of rose and gold as the haunting notes of the bugle lingered in the air.
It was incredibly moving and I was so glad that Matt came because it meant a lot to him too. None of my boys ever knew our father, who died when we were children ourselves, but he's very real to them all the same. Matt has read the logbook of his flying hours more than once and heard our stories so many times that I'm sure he feels he knows him too.
And dear Macca, who was very busy and bouncy beforehand, stood through our little ceremony like a statue, head up and staring into the distance as if he too understood what we were feeling. I was very proud of him.
When I came home I wrote this...Old Airbase, Anzac Day.
At dawn the airfield stretches out unseen,
dim and grey with the ghosts of long-dead men.
The hangers gone, machines all turned to rust
and skeletons of planes dumped in the fields.
From the darkness comes a lonely plover's cry
and in the east the clouds begin to pale.
Faint in the wind I hear the roar of planes
and sweeping over me I sense
the shadow of their wings.
This was tremendous fun, and I was more confident knowing it was just for us and the mistakes weren't on a customer quilt. I suppose because we're designers we kept thinking "Oh, that's an ugly shape" and being picky, but if you just keep going it all gets swallowed up and looks great in the whole. 
After all those non-colour photos, here is the project that's using all the triangles.Quite a few Christmases ago , Keryn gave me a "Pensylvania Dutch" kit, consisting of many, many 2 1/2" strips of red, green, yellow and blue.
This was a photo that Keryn took, and wouldn't you know it, I had my eyes shut so I've been cropped out. And Elisa ( the lovely in the second photo) informed us on Friday that it was exactly a year till the wedding. Better start looking after the nails and worrying about what to wear!
I need to spend a few hours reacquainting myself with the blocks in progress, or I'm going to make mistakes, so I turned to one of the old completed sets of album blocks. This is the variation I mentioned and was based on a very tattered ebay quilt from many years ago. It was in such bad shape I don't even think it could still exist, so I feel like I'm preserving it. I've sewed all the brown triangles to turn the blocks on point, and later today I'll start on the pieced sashing. I know exactly where I'm going with this, so I don't have to agonise about choices.
I used to use pencil, but I've learnt that a pen makes me think about exactly what marks I'm making. I used to worry about mistakes, but now I just draw over the top of them. It's like machine quilting, there is no substitute for Practice, Practice, Practice! 
I use photos at night, because I don't want to share my bed with dogs, no matter how cute, but I like to draw from life even better.
This is a page of Jessie drawings, nothing finished, nothing perfect, but invaluable in learning about her anatomy and the poses she naturally falls into.
Cut the 4 1/8" squares twice on the diagonal. Cut two of the cream 2 1/2" squares once on the diagonal.
Make the centre nine patch and press the seams like this.
(Forgot to take a picture of this step, so here's one I didn't prepare ealier) Sew the quarter square triangles to TWO of the rectangles. When I first made this block I efficiently sewed them to all four and then had to unpick two. Just warning you. Press the seams towards the dark material.
Sew the remaining triangles to the dark squares and add the half square triangles to make corners for the block. You can make four of these.
I used to trim the corners of these triangles, but now I just make sure I always line up the 90 degree corners and sew downwards. The extra fabric at the point just hangs over and is trimmed off later.
When I sew the other side the dark fabric is on top and I'm still sewing from the 90 degree corner.
Some people don't like pressing these triangles because of the bias edge. Just don't go near it; press from the top of the corner right along the seam - the rest of the fabric doesn't even need to be ironed.
Sew the other corners and join (forgot pictures of that too, sorry) 
Here is the pressing scheme I use, this all lays nice and flat and unlumpy.
The block finishes at about 11 1/4" . It always looks clean and sharp, and there's so many variations I just love it. 
We're thinking of making a sitcom called "Everyone Loves Curtis", but on the other hand it could also be titled "Curtis Loves Everyone". Aw.
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These blocks (there are six of them)were made from the scrap drawer as an ongoing project which has been forgotten for a while. But I adore the scrap look and might resurrect them now.
This is a smaller variation and I went through a stage of obsession with this pattern. I was working and the whole family had to be out the door by 7.30 in the morning, at the very latest. I began getting up at 5, just so I could have an hour or so of piecing time every morning. Without that sewing time I would have been very grumpy, because sometimes I was far too tired to machine sew at night and often fell asleep over my handpiecing.
this set to use up pink and blues...
and this set from another ebay quilt.
My early morning sewing sessions were great for feeding the pieces through the machine and building the blocks, but I felt too rushed when it came to setting them, so I'd just start another set. And they're still here, all those years later. But as I keep telling people, they don't eat much.
