Felt iPhone Cosy

The iPhone 5 is so new that there aren't many cases around for it yet. It lives in its own pocket in my bag, but I was a bit worried about it scratching. So, I made a thin felt sleeve for it, using Woolfilz felt (in light grey) from Purl Soho and some red pearl cotton. I measured the phone, added about 5mm all the way around, then sewed the two pieces together with a blanket stitch. Super easy and cute!

My plan for the afternoon was to quilt the rest of the baby quilt that's due next week (baby arrived on Tuesday and has a name, which is now on the quilt), but I ran out of thread five minutes after I started sewing. Oh, bother. I can run across the street to the department store tomorrow at lunchtime and get more...it's just that the plan was to do the quilting today.

I think the selvedge on A Walk In The Woods (which is the backing for this quilt) is absolutely adorable - don't you?

Full pictures (hopefully, including Baby!) to follow in the next few weeks.

New iPhone day!

I got an iPhone 3 for my birthday in 2008 (and blogged about it, obviously). It has been exceedingly useful over the last 4 (!) years, but has gradually slowed down and become rather grumpy. Oh, no, you didn't really want to look something up on a map or listen to that podcast, silly! It's much better to just look out the window. Ahem.

So, with the release of the newest Jobsian Fondle Slab (mini), also known as the iPhone 5, I betook myself (and the Husband) to Norwich to wait in the Shortest. AppleStore. Line. Ever. Seriously, I was second in line. And the person ahead of me disappeared into the store after 25 seconds. I waited about 10 minutes, total. And, of course, was handed a bottle of water, lest I die of dehydration. Sometimes, it's good to live in the boonies.

Here's my reservation card, in front of the store:

The happy Apple employees got me all set up and running (surprisingly painless, thank you), and half an hour later, we were ready to go!

We tried to go to Frank's Bar for lunch, but they were running their v. limited Sunday brunch menu (and were quite crowded) so we decamped to Wagamama. Mmmm...Wagamama. I had a spicy coconut soup with noodles and chicken - it was really good. John had my usual: chili chicken udon, and it blew his socks off. Spicy!!

And then, to celebrate, I took a picture on Instagram of my train arriving out of the mist this morning at Stowmarket.

The iPhone 5 verdict so far, coming from a girl with a 4-year-old iPhone 3:

- OMG it's SO fast. Like, it has loaded whatever app before I've even realised I wanted it. Zoom! (This is WiFi we're talking about. Internet speeds in rural Suffolk are...erm...rural.)
- SHINY.
- Thin! And light! And all squared off at the corners!
- The headphones are really good, and the integrated microphone works really well. I walked along talking to the Husband all the way to the station from work, and despite the road noise we could hear each other perfectly well.
- I'm not bothered about the new connector - I have no plug-in-dock thingies (except for the speaker for my extremely ancient iPod that lives at work), and the iPad and the Stepson's iPod both use the standard charger. No drama.

David Pogue says it best, really. If you have an iPhone 4, meh. If you're like me with a geriatric iPhone, you'll love it!

This was my week

I caught the mega-cold (worst one I've had in a while) that has been going around work. And missed the entire week. As one of my colleagues said, I "slept for England." And read Jilly Cooper's Jump for book group. Verdict? Meh. It should have been half the size. Half the number of characters, half the number of pages, and half the story arcs. At least it entertained me for several days on-bed. Even her author's acknowledgements at the end were 9 pages long. 9 PAGES! Someone, somewhere, please edit Jilly Cooper down to a manageable length, at which point I might consider reading another one.

Haven't actually started Downton Abbey yet - I'm looking forward to it.

Recipe: Non-Yucky Lemsip (because the medicated stuff is NASTY)

1 green-tea teabag

1/2 lemon

1 tbs honey

boiling water

-and-

1 paracetemol (taken separately)

Stir the lemon and honey around in the tea, then take the lemon out and squeeze as much juice and fruit as you can into the mug (it'll be easier after a minute in the boiling water). Works better than the medicated stuff, I think, to make you feel better and clear things up, at least temporarily. I wonder if I could fill an insulated camelbak with it and just take it around with me!

Other saviour of the week: Angry Birds. LOVE it. Even if playing for 2 hours drains my iPhone (3) battery from full to empty. Not that I've done that, in my pjs, while sipping Non-Yucky Lemsip, or anything. Nope.

The best camera...

...is the one you have with you. Apparently I'm not alone in the fact that my Casio camera's battery has given up the ghost. I inadvertently let it run down, and it now refuses to charge. Thankfully, Amazon has a zillion in stock (although I'm going to stay far away from the Casio brand one).

We were in the Abbey Gardens just before dusk, so my iPhone had the luxury of taking this picture.

Birthday recap

Last weekend, we went on another bike ride - here's a picture looking from the Stowmarket/Needham Road to the north.

There was much excitement when we went to Tesco - this bird had flown in through an open door and was looking around for a place to perch. Sorry the picture quality isn't great - we only had the point-and-shoot and not the SLR.

Two weeks ago, I got an e-newsletter from the Kate Rusby folks, announcing her upcoming tour. I was super-psyched to see that not only was she coming to Ipswich (SO much closer than Norwich and Peterborough, where we've seen her play), but that she would be there on my birthday (this past Thursday). Obv, we had to go.

In my infinite geekyness, I emailed her record company asking to have a song dedicated to me for my birthday. And she DID! Hooray!! She played 'Where Does The Time Go', which is a single that I don't have (yet), and said that it was for "Kate, or Katie, whose birthday is today, I think. Or tomorrow, or yesterday. Anyway." I felt special. Her she is, in all her blurry awesomeness.

And here we are at the intermission - John bought me a Kate Rusby mug (since I already have a KR t-shirt)

To add to the overwhelming birthday goodness, I am also the proud owner of a new and exceedingly shiny iPhone. My contract was up and I had been coveting one for yonks, so that was that. I LOVE it, with the only drawback being that the battery life is completely crap. My old Motorola Krzr would merrily go 6 or 7 days between charges, but the iPhone barely eeks out 24 hours. I've been turning off some of the push-synching when I'm not using the phone (I don't need it to tell me I have an email at 3am), and that seems to help a bit. I'm having issues with the Apple store, too - as an American, my AppleID is registered to a US address, and so Apple can't comprehend that I might have LEFT the country. Bah. The interwebs have yielded a few suggestions - we'll see what happens. Other than that, though, it's great. Being able to sync my google calendar to wherever I am is awesome, and texting on the 'keyboard' is so much easier than on my old phone.

One final birthday thing - on Wednesday night when John's buddies came round, they brought me some gorgeous birthday flowers. Thanks, guys!! They brought a bottle of really tasty wine, too (no picture, it's all gone).