A finish and happy smile

This afternoon I sat back at the machine and finished the New York Trellis quilt top

Tomorrow I will trim off the spare triangle bits, my challenge will be to get it straight!!

I am also joining up with Anthea over at Hibiscus stitches where we are sharing all things EPP. 

My little contribution this time.

Happy stitching.

Back again (super photo heavy)

I have had a couple of busy days, but before the business happened I managed to sew some rows of the lattice quilt together

and was happy with my progress until I realised I had four yellow blocks in a row!!Woops!

So some serious unsewing had to happen, and of course it was on the longest row!! Not much has happened since then, the unsewing is all done, some pinning together has happened, the sewing is yet to be done. Will have to be done soon, hubby is making noises about the mess on the dining table!! :-)

Sunday I went into Geelong to do duty at the Guild Exhibition

it was raining when I went in...but I had a quick look at some of the classic cars that were on display along the waterfront

The Xmas tree is out on the water once again

at night it has coloured lights and music

a nearby pigeon kept an eye on me

I didn't know Geelong was a peace city! You learn something everyday.

this picture was next to the sign above. I thought it was beautiful. Reminds me of a paua shell.

One of the Guild members had some of her antique quilts on show 

love the butterfly

This is about the quilt below

shame it was in an op shop. But it has a loving home now.

the lady who owns these has bought them on her trips back to the US to visit family. She has a wonderful collection.

my dolls coverlet in the challenge section.

This amazing quilt is made from second hand shirts and knowing the maker it was probably all sewed by hand. Love it!

On my way back to the car, the sun had come out, the humidity was high, but I got to see some more of the cars on display

love this blue one!

Mustang!!

I was really taken with this Mini...I have not seen one this small before...only had two seats! How cute is that? JUst around the corner I could hear motor bikes, so went to have a look and there were two old Indian motorbikes doing a time trial, they sure made a noise when the riders opened up the throttle! Does anyone remember the Fastest Indian movie? I enjoyed that one.

I had better go and visit the sewing machine.

Happy sewing.

Feeling good

Last week I cut some fabric ready to make a quilt top when I was on retreat, as that didn't happen I decided to start on it today. The pattern was in the last Down Under Quilts magazine, it  is called New York Trellis.  I thought I would use fabric from my stash, so have used different colours. I started just before lunch

and laid the pieces out on the carpet, only to find the 6th row didn't fit! After much head scratching I realised I had cut all the longer pieces half an inch longer than I should have, so some unsewing happened, followed by some trimming, and then more sewing

and now I have this, the colours could have been better balanced but on the whole I am happy with it.

The Supervisor gave it a glance and went back to sleep!! Now I need to iron all the rows and begin joining.

We had a walk down to the beach this morning and on our way watched two dogs running into the water chasing a ball, we watched, a Chow is far to dignified to chase a ball!!!

the weather was slightly different today to yesterday.

We have a large group of New Holland Honey Eaters in our yard and morning and evening they are all out playing and talking, for little birds they are very loud!

I borrowed a photo from Mr Google.

I have a date with the iron!

Happy sewing.

Home days

I was supposed to be on a retreat at Gisborne this week but life had other ideas. My Mum is in hospital and so I needed to be near the phone, plus I am getting a cold...how can you get all through winter and not get anything and now it is summer the cold arrives???? Anyway my Mum is on the mend, it will take a while as she has the dreaded A flu strain but she is in the best place she can be.

Yesterday I was working on the Christmas blocks, nine quilted, three to go, then some more painting to come

Off I went past the boat launching ramp, the pelicans were waiting for the returning fishermen

I got ot the pier and decided to keep going, the aim was to get to the spit of land in the distance..it is 3km away.

made it, and this is the view looking back to St Leonards.

On the other side of the Indented Heads boat launching ramp is the camping ground and the wreck of the old paddle steamer.

When I got home I had beetroot face again, but managed the 10.21km round trip so was pretty happy with myself. Once I got home I changed shoes and went over the road and had a swim...was cold to get into but so refreshing once I got in.

Having finished a few chores now I am heading back to do some more free range quilting.

Happy sewing.

Catch up 2

The last two days have been at the Caroline Sharkey class, Freedom and Nature Scapes.

lots of little pieces of fabric, wool, sequins and some sparkly bits

the girls working away

 now there are angelina fibres

the girls are hard at work

The piece has been covered with wash away stabiliser and quilted over with tiny quilting

once that is washed out and dried it goes on the background fabric and we start adding other bits, this is Tracee's work

and Margaret's.

Other class peoples work

Love the colours in Sue's piece

this is Shirleys

here is where I was at the end of the day, butterflies and bees and ferns appliqued on...homework is all the free motion stitching to fill the empty spaces.

one happy student and teacher

and the class at the end of the day.

it was a wonderful class and Caroline is a great teacher.

We had two days of much learning and playing with fabric. Love how everyone has created something different.

Happy sewing.

Catch up 1

Life has been a bit hectic for the last week, this afternoon is catch up time!
I took the Supervisor for a walk the other day, we had some rain and the corellas were out playing on the power lines

Off we go

these corellas were swinging around in circles having a wonderful time!

The Supervisor had a paddle!

I did some gardening when we got home and came in looking like a beetroot!!

Need to work on the selfie photo!!

Saturday was Guild day and we were shown some of the quilts that members have made for the Children's Hospital

sorry for the photo quality, I had to get between peoples heads!

I like this scrappy one

this is cute

love the colours on this one

this is one of three quilts a Guild member gave Judy, the lady on the left. The owner had fallen out of love with it, so Judy cut it up and remade it into three quilts for the hospital. Looks great.

This was one of two blankets made by Margaret's sister Jenny in WA. They were both beautifully made and I am sure will be loved.

Our speaker for the meeting was Caroline Sharkey,. one busy talented lady!

This is one of her mini quilts, lots of layers of fabric and thread...

and another, there were many quilts to look at and ooh and aah over!!

this is fabric she us experimenting with, taking photos of small parts of her quilts and having them reproduced ...they looked amazing.

These very luck ladies won the special raffle prizes, a wall hanging of Byron Lighthouse and framed textile art.

You can see the crowd wanting a close look at Caroline's quilts after the talk.

Tomorrow (which actually was yesterday) I am off to do a workshop with Caroline , looking forward to that.

Happy sewing.