It's a big day today. It's my turn to host the antenatal group afternoon tea. I get a bit to caught up in getting ready for these things, so I was trying to get on top of the housework earlier that usual. I was even hanging out washing at 8:30 – very early for me. While out at the clothes line, there was a strange noise overhead, not unlike a blow torch on crème brulee, and there it was.

A balloon.

And I looked, and there were more balloons.

How close were they? About this close:

It's the Wairarapa Balloon Fiesta at the moment. When little E is bigger, I hope to go and see them launching. For now, this is exciting enough for me. I don't think anything else would have had me looking so intently at the sky and it is such a wonderful day.

Some would say there is a moral, something along the lines of “isn't it nice to get the housework done early?”. Me, I'm just stoked that it is such a beautiful Autumn day.

It was quite a domestic Easter. I had big garden plans – putting in bulbs for spring and planting a native grasses area. It turns out that it is still too warm to plant bulbs so they are still wintering in the bottom of the fridge.

However, it is just right for doing this:

Some of the grapes I was given became jelly. Jelly isn't a very big thing in New Zealand. While reading Judy Blume books I was a tad confused over this whole peanut butter and jelly thing. I mean, don't they have jam? Mum told me that it was just the american word for jam so I'll go with that.

It's the first time I've made jelly and surprisingly it wasn't as hard as I thought. The cook book had lots of warnings about making it cloudy. However, the baby food jars are hard to get a seal on so the smaller jars need to be eaten soon.

Time for a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and some nostalgic reading.

I love reading books about quilting history and catalogs of historical quilts. In a sense these make me appreciate the importance of labels. There was one quilt that sticks in my mind. I cannot find the book any where but the label started with “It is finish, it is finish” and continued with a history of how long the quilt took and who stitched it.

There is some debate about when a quilt is finished. I remember my mum having a book called “It's Not a Quilt Until it is Quilted”. For me, I often consider something finished when the top is ready for quilting. This is probably because I don't usually handquilt. I have to admit that these quilts are not really ready for use until they are bound. I have friends who take it one step further and say that it is not finished until the label is made.

I can proudly say that the Frocks quilt is finished in every way. It even has a label that was carefully added on Thursday. This was my first attempt to use cotton flannel as a batting. I was inspired by some summer quilts I read about in Yarnstorm. While it isn't the warmest batting, it feels lovely and light and just right for the summer that is just ending. I even managed to do some basic hand quilting.