Hot days

The last few days have been hot and humid...we are hanging out for a cool change!!
Yesterday I did some quilting on another book reading quilt, put together by Bronwyn from the Guild,

one side is a little wonky but hopefully it will settle down once its binding is on.

the centre hexie for Doing the Rounds, has been pinned to the centre fabric, ready to applique

but a scary thing happened today....

BOM number two arrived!! I had better get my skates on!!

Happy sewing.

At home

I have had an early morning walk along the beach

The supervisor got a lot of attention from the boys who visited over the weekend...he was playing I am not interested here but listening all the time!!

Yesterday I went over to Portarlington in the afternoon

and did some quilting on a lovely ladies machine. it did not go smoothly, the machine did not like the cotton I took over, so it kept breaking. We changed over to another thread and then the tension went wonky...so it was a challenge.....was not happy having to unpick a row of quilting!!!

I had supervision by young Mitsy, isn't that a beautiful face!

another hexie is complete, one is out of whack, but I am not doing any unsewing!!

and today I need to do some trimming and binding on this book reading quilt.

Lots to do today so I had better get going.

Happy sewing.

Monday madness (photo heavy)

Well I have decided today is mad day as so many people have told me I am mad....must be very silly all kinds of things as I am working on tiny hexies

here is the first one finished, this is to be added to Doing the Rounds

to give you and idea of the real size, they are quarter inch hexies

the next lot getting ready, I can see I am going to have trouble getting the fussy cut hexies in the right place on the fabric!

There was some beautiful show and tell today, I only got a few

a string quilt

Lynda has made this for her grandson Paddy to celebrate his love of dirt bike riding

another string quilt in different colours.

I took a couple of photos on my way to sewing this morning

this  lady and dog were enjoying a walk along the beach, every now and then the dog would run into the water and bark and bark!

Shane, #2 son is staying a couple of nights so we went out this afternoon to have a play with our cameras

something of interest ahead!

It has been a windy stormy kind of day

lots of white caps

and photos being taken

and interesting angles being chosen!

loads of barnacles on the boat launching ramp.

the Christmas blocks quilt is together 

the backing chosen...now to make a sandwich!

Happy stitching.

Life

is slowly getting back to normal, we came home to a beautifully clean home (many thanks Robyn and Dennis) and a very happy chowdy dog

as you can see the Supervisor is relaxing after his morning walk!!

Yesterday I did a little more  on the Christmas quilt, I hope to get back to that today

this is my progress with Doing the Rounds, all sewn down, the poor hexies looked a bit worse for wear after I had wrestled them off their card!! But they have ironed up and sewed down ok. Now to start fussy cutting the next lot of hexies.

I had a brain buster this morning and decided I needed somewhere to keep the little hexie bits once I had them cut, so I combined bits of idea I had seen around

two quilted and lined pieces of fabric that I had been going to make into a zipper pouch were zig zagged together and left over binding reironed and folded to cover the join.

zip lock bags placed along the centre, stick down with double sided tape...they are slippery little customers!!

another repurposed binding bit sewn down on the inside centre to hold everything in place

and binding sewn on..all ready to hand sew later.  it is a bit floppy but will do the job I need it to do so I am pretty happy with it.

While in NZ we met Mum while she was on an outing with some of the residents from the home, a cruise ship was in over at the Mount wharf, the idea was to have a fish and chips dinner and watch the ship leave at 6pm

serious business this fish and chips!!

Not the most flattering shot of Mum...the wind got up and the oldies got cold so they went back home, we found out later the ship didn't leave until 6.45, a bit late for everyone! One of the ladies, Willa, got into trouble for feeding the seagulls, she thought it was a great thing to do, but one of the carers discouraged her (many times) saying last time she did that several oldies went home with sea gull poop in their hair!!

Mount Maunganui from a different vantage point, there is a big cruise ship at the wharf but it is a bit hard to see.

I had a good find at the local supermarket

bags to put your fruit and veg in. Itried them out this week and apart from having to have them open so the check out person can see what is in them, they work really well and no plastic bags needed! 

I am off to do some more sewing and cutting.

Happy day.

PS. Just laid out and counted circles finished, total = 169!!

Pretty happy with that!!

We are done

The house in Tauranga is as clean as it is going to get and so it is now in the hands of a repair man for a few days and then the estate agent. Here is hoping for a quick sale!! Not much sewing has been happening as by the time I have been sitting down I am too tired to do much, but a few more circles have been done

A few more to add to the collection

Saturday we drove over to Tirau to have lunch with the lovely Julie, we met at a cafe there, had lunch and a big chat and put the world to rights!! Thank you Julie for driving over to meet up with us, it was wonderful to catch up again. Julie also agreed to take some of my Mums crystal and doilies, so I packed up a box and now the bits have a new home. It is so nice to know those things will be enjoyed and not just taken to the op shop.

Hubby and a wall hanging I liked.

On Sunday, it rained all the way to Auckland today..love seeing the green countryside though

Jenny has two swan plants outside the dining room, and there are the caterpillars of the monarch butterfly on them, this one in the photo has been eating non stop since we got here. They are so interesting to watch, and grow so fast....I am sure these plants will have no leaves before too long.

It is time to turn in now....hopfully tomorrow I will get to sit and sew.

Happy stitching.

Kia Ora

Here we are back in the land of the Long White Cloud.  We checked in at the airport yesterday, to be told we had been upgraded to Business Class!!! We were fl u ing Emirates and on the airbus 380, talk about being in the lap of luxury!! We had one of those little cocoon type seats that went down flat, so hubby slept and I sat and stitched. It will be very hard to go back to our usual seating for the trip home!!
So yesterday on the plane and at Jennys place I managed to get 24 circles finished.

Today we are off to Tauranga, more house sorting and cleaning to be done.

Happy stitching.

FNWF results

I was happy to achieve what I wanted to do last night, many circles glued into place and ready to applique

All ready for the next time I get to sit and sew.

Many thanks to Cheryll for hosting FNWF, if you pop over to Gone Stitching you can see what the other Friday Nighters got up to.

Happy stitching.

FNWF

Tonight is Friday Night with Friends, where we have a virtual sit and sew with like minded friends hosted by the lovely Cheryll...who even though she is off on the high seas I am sure will be with us in spirit.

tonight I am planning to work on more circles to take with us to NZ.

this little lot need to be gathered and ironed and given a touch of glue to hold them onto the squares.

You can join in with FNWF by signing up over at Gone Stitching.

I went for a walk this morning after some motivation from Chooky

I walked down along the beach, along the opposite from usual on Swan Bay, found a geocache, but could not sign the log as I had forgotten to take a pen! 

I spied this pelican statue in a garden on my way back home

and this beautiful gum flower

and a visiting bee

and some beautiful parrots in the big gum tree next door...zoom lens and looking up = shaky photo!!

and guess who was waiting for me when I got home! (But once again did not want his photo taken!!)

I had better go and finish my chores and then I might start sewing early.

Happy FNWF.