Love it when things go to plan, hate it when they don't.

I have been over the moon with my new cutting table (see my last post). The joy of being able to work from all sides and so not have to move the fabric. It is little things like this which bring me huge pleasure. I spent some time today cutting out bias stripes for piping on some cushions I am making for the kitchen sofas.

I bought a lot of preshrunk piping cord for this very purpose whilst we were still at Toad Hall. I assumed quite wrongly I had put it in the box with all the kitchen fabrics. (and a couple of other curtain fabrics). So the box gets pulled out from under the table to the left of my machine. It wasn't there. So then the blue Ikea bag behind it gets pulled out and emptied. Not there either. I did find some un-shrunk cotton piping cord in my drawers from way back when dinosaurs ruled the earth, varying thicknesses and I am not sure any of the lengths are long enough for the big cushions. But I boiled them to shrink them anyway.
At this point I needed to sleep. It didn't matter there was a guy on the staircase hammering down new carpet, I just had to sleep. So I did.
And I woke to find this....

 Tomorrow is another day.....
(My exhaustion was down to DH being stuck at the train station and not getting home until midnight as the RAC yet again claimed they were very busy last night. I also went to the supermarket and the butchers. I have limited energy and I had used it all)

My new cutting table.

This Ikea table top (and Ikea's funny name is Vika Gruvan, it comes in black as well) is brilliant for our uses. The only thing in this shot actually on the top is the rotary cutter, the rest has been slid under the glass.

This June Taylor mat is a little slippy on it's reverse side (OK it is a lot slippy) so I placed some double sided tape on the back to hold it in place.

The trestle legs are Ikea Artur and allow quite a bit of storage underneath. (I have 3 domestic machines and one carry case, plus 4 wooden wine boxes full of ribbons and wool etc) I might run some Velcro round the outside to hide the storage. I have the legs set at the highest setting which is a little higher than kitchen worktop height.

Ruler storage and cutting table come light box

Just thought I'd share this nifty little ruler storage idea I had. It's a plate drainer I picked up from T K Max (T J Max in the USA) but I'm sure if you keep your eyes open you could find a similar one. It had drainer written large across the front but a quick go with a sharpie pencil soon got rid of that.
And this is my cutting table. It's all from Ikea. Two of their wooden trestles (a friend tried the metal ones but they are a little wobbly for our purposes) with one of their strengthened glass table tops. I have two cutting mats on it, One is 23" X 35" and I have that sideways on at one end, it overlaps a little as the table top is 31½" wide. And then length ways on I have a 24" X 36" .

The height is adjustable but not something you can do without a helper as the glass is very heavy. I have mine set at the highest.
Then when I want a light box I remove the cutting mat and place a spot light with a low energy bulb underneath. Low energy bulbs are good because they don't generate much heat so there is less risk of fire. I tend to use the 23watt ones which give off the equivalent of 150watt of light. I generally just prop it on one of the sewing machines stored underneath but you could use a clip on one on a trestle.
I use masking tape to stop the design I'm tracing from moving about and with a small quilt I would use masking tape to hold the fabric in place. For a large quilt I use these clips which are made to hold tablecloths down outside in summer (are there really people on the same planet as me who use tablecloths in the garden?).
Pegs work as well as the glass isn't too thick.

Should Ikea give me commission? (grin)