Thursday 31 January 2013

squishies...

Full on back at work this week so there has been little sewing, just a few stitches here and there. Musn't lose site of the deadlines for some projects.
One good thing about this week is that I have had some squishy parcels arrive in the mail. My order from Erica's arrived. Some beautiful Double Chocolat by 3 sisters. Perfect for finishing my Park Avenue Hexies..
I just need to make the two end borders with some applique designs from my Quilted Crow book. This project will be for the next holidays, I hope.
Two yards should be more than enough with some to spare for using with the extra leftover flowers - that is on the long term project list.
 when I saw this fabric I just had to have some. The hexies are quite large but so beautiful! Not sure what to use it for but one day I will work out what to do with it.
 The next squishie was some lovely fabrics sent to me by Liz (village quilters), some new flowers for my novelty garden.....
They are cut out and ready to go..
I also cut this set from some fabric that Tracey (Mistea) sent me at Christmas time and it has patiently waiting to be cut.
the last squishy was from Rosalie (Briar Rose).
Some ready made flowers in the most amazing fabrics! Wow they are gorgeous.
 thankyou so much Rosalie!



thanks to all of you girls for adding to my flower stash.
 As tomorrow is the first of February it may be time to make a list for what I would like to achieve for Feb,

  • finish the top for Down in the Dresden Garden
  • finish hexie bag
  • make a christmas item or gift for the christmas gift box
I think that may be more than enough for February especially as it's a short month.

Hopefully there will be some crafting time this weekend. 
Happy days.
Marina


Saturday 26 January 2013

Christmas Item a day late....

My Christmas Items for this month have been completed!
I just love making these decorations and have a stash of buttons to make more...


 Here's how those hexies are progressing... One side done and nearly half way through the other side of a new purse.
After too many pin pricks to my middle finger tip it's time to give them a little rest and work on my other projects.
Happy days!
marina

Monday 21 January 2013

eureka!

Today I got to spend a wonderful day in the city with Teresa from all things vintage. Teresa is down in Melbourne to burn the midnight oil watching as much tennis as she can.  After a marathon session watching Jokovic's match which ended at 2 am she still managed to meet me at Flinders Street Station on time this morning.
We wandered down to L'Uccello and took in all the loveliness there.
After that we headed off to find somewhere to have lunch. On the way we stopped at a Lincraft store, it was massive. I thought I would see if they had any purse frames and lucky for me they did. I found one that I thought would fit and as soon as I came home I rushed in to try it and Ta Da!!!!!
It got stitched in immediately.
 the holes for stitching were large enough to get the needle through so no numb thumb.. I even managed to get the stitches relatively neat...
please excuse the delinquent thread, don't know where that came from.
 Here is the outside, I am one happy chappy!
Finding the frame topped off a fantastic day.
Now the mandatory bloggy photo will have to be pilfered from Teresa's blog once she posts it.
Thanks for the visit Teresa I enjoyed it heaps!
Happy day!
marina


ps- if anyone thinks they could use the unhelpful frame I would be more than happy to send it to you, just email me and let me know. I don't think I want to even see it again!

Sunday 20 January 2013

my crafty retreat..

I have been having my own personal crafting retreat while hubs and son 2 and 3 are away for the weekend. They left friday morning and come home today so I have been Queen of the Castle. No 1 son home but he has been busy socialising and when he has been home he is not demanding and good company. He did take me to brunch yesterday morning and I had the most wonderful poached egg on salmon and spinach, did I mention the hollandaise sauce? Yummm
With all this time to myself I have been enjoying some extra crafting time and watching some dvd's. I watched The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and the last Harry Potter movie yesterday afternoon and evening while stitching on the couch stitching and cutting.
would you like to see some progress
First of all I tackled this 'thing', rather unsuccessfully I might add. As you can see from the photo the frame is a little unusual and the purse just didn't sit well at all even with Liz's suggestion which should have worked. Result-more unpicking and I have resolved to get a new frame that allows for the purse top to be inserted into the frame then stitched like the others I have done.

 then I had a play around with my dresden plates to see if they would come together as in my head. Just a rough guide but I think it is working well.

My centre progress..... only two types of flowers to go then I can applique my butterflies.
 some Swan Lake flowers that were prepped ready to go-done. Need to get some more ready too...
Some new hexies were ironed, cut and are all ready to be basted and then sewn into something special. These hexies are mostly from my scrap box. Only a small dent but then it isn't that big anyway. Lovely warm colours.

I have enjoyed my retreat-in now to get some cooking and ironing done for when the others return home.
Looking forward to a fun day tomorrow-will tell you more tomorrow.
Happy days!
marina


oops..
forgot to put the photo of these little items that will hopefully be finished in time for the 25th for the Christmas gifting box.
that's all folks..

Friday 18 January 2013

stitching with friends..

Today some lovely stitching friends came to visit for the day.
Last year when we had the meet with Michelle Ridgeway at the Patchwork teahouse Liz (the village quilters) and Rosalie (Briar Rose) kindly let me hitch a ride with them as I wasn't sure how to get there on my own. Liz also managed to take me to a few patchwork stores on the way home and I promised that I would reciprocate the lovely tour but at patchwork stores on my side of the highway. Unfortunately Tranquility where we had hoped to visit doesn't reopen till next Tuesday so we organised a sewing day instead, mum popped in to have a chat too while no 1 son grandpa sat. In the afternoon I took the girls for a visit to my local store Jemima's. They have just received about 100 new bolts of fabric, lovely! 
The girls enjoyed the visit and of course made a few purchases. I didn't come away unscathed either...
some red and whites to add to my stash and some light florals for my Once upon a time stash. A bag pattern...
 Couldn't leave this there. It is a fat eighth bundle of some gorgeous California Girl fabrics. These will be for a special project later in the year.... I fell in love with this range when I used a charm pack for a work colleagues comfort quilt.
Of course there is a mandatory bloggy meet photo....
Luckily No 1 son was home to take the pic for us.

















Rosalie gifted me a lovely scissor keep. I have made one for myself but it was a prototype so not quite perfect, now I have a lovely perfect one!

 

don't you love the leopard print scissors-quite exotic. 
thank you Liz and Rosalie for coming up for the day!

On the crafting front, I have been busy stitching the centre block for my gift quilt and am at least 2/3 done. Tonight I am hoping to have a sewing night. I would like to make up at least one of these lovelies... The 25th is getting close....

I would also like to get this together. I have unpicked it once as I had issues with stitching the frame on but after discussing it with the girls today Liz made a very logical suggestion as to how to attach the frame. Wish I had got it together while Liz was here as I am worried I won't get it once I have to actually sew it.
Will let you know if it comes together! I am very hopeful.

Hope you get some stitching time this weekend too
cheers
marina

Friday 11 January 2013

400th post.

Wow this is my 400th post.  It is always fun to reach a '0' milestone.
On Wednesday I went to see 'the Hobbit' with no3 son. It was my Christmas present that he bought me and part of the gift was that he would go with me to see the movie too. We went to Gold Class cinemas and it was wonderful. Only about 20 people in the theatre and we all had very comfy reclining sofa chairs! It's the only way to go. They will even bring you food during the movie if you so wish it.
Well I must say that I was dreading seeing the movie even though I adore Tolkien. From the shorts I was worried that it wasn't very true to the story. I resolved to not re-read the book before seeing the movie and to just accept the movie as a separate telling of the story. I am glad I did because I absolutely loved it!! Hopefully I can see it again before I go back to work. It is just amazing on the big screen and the scenery was as fabulous as it was in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. So far I feel there has been some licence with the story but I can say it out loud that I can live with it.
I picked up the book yesterday where I had stopped reading it and finished it today. It was lovely to revisit the story after quite a few years.

My book is a wonderfully tatty and well read copy that was a discontinued Library book. Bit sad really. I have often thought about buying another nice new version of the book but I feel bad about throwing this one out so I just keep this one.
Must say that not too much sewing has been getting done because I seem to get very engrossed when I read and don't want to do anything else but!
the only thing I managed to get down was to finish off a cross stitch that had been hanging around for awhile. I only had the handles to finish but was struggling with the darker cloth during the night. While 'dad sitting ' yesterday I pushed past the initial eye strain and managed to finish it off.
That's another ufo sort of finished. It will probable become a pin cushion for the gift box.

































Finishing this off has got me enthused about doing some more little cross stitching. I have tea dyed some cloth to have ready for when inspiration strikes.
Hope you all have a great weekend!
cheers
marina

Tuesday 8 January 2013

a new treasure for Tuesday treasures

It's been awhile since I have played along with Tuesday treasures.
Melody is changing this from a weekly event to a monthly event and it just so happens I have a new treasure that I can share.
Before Christmas, Hub and I were out shopping and we came upon some wooden spinner decorations that when you light the candles underneath it spins a propellor which turns the centre decoration. Sorry for my poor description but the pics will clarify, anyhow.... before Christmas they were quite expensive and we thought we should just not get one, well... on the weekend I went shopping and as I was passing the shop that had the spinners I thought I would pop in and see if they were reduced. There were only a few left and most of them were slightly damaged, mind you they were still asking a decent price. There was one that was still in the box and was reduced from over $100 to only $50 and it hadn't been out of the box yet. I just couldn't leave it there. It's only made in China but it is not a bad quality
It is a little big but it was the nicest one there. Hub was delighted that I bought it, he even commented that he loved it and to leave it out for a bit! There you go..
Now for the pics.
Here we have the tower of Christmas-ness.


the nativity with the three kings bearing gifts

the shepherds and their flocks

Angels... (on the first and second tier)

 As it is a late addition to the Christmas decorating it will stay out and be enjoyed for a little while before being put away for next Christmas.
There has been some stitching happening too, the gift quilt seems to have taken precedence over other crafting. It needs to be finished by the end of March.
I have finished all the flower centres, leaves and chain stitch border.















Now I am up to the actual flowers, not so boring.
The white on white fabric has arrived so I have enough now for the dresden backgrounds!
I was panicking about not having enough of the pink plaid from this range but thank goodness I managed to find 1/2 metre from Quilt Fabric Delights in SA. It should be in the mail tomorrow! Phew thankyou QFD. I wanted to border the blocks with the pink plaid like I did in my DITG centre block. It's coming together perfectly.
Hope everyone in Aus is in a safe place and coping with the heat.
I am loving my air conditioner heaps!
Tomorrow am off to see the Hobbit at Gold class cinemas. Lovely!
Happy Stitching!

marina


Thursday 3 January 2013

something old, something new, ....

there has been some crafting happening here and on a variety of projects. Still need to do that ufo list but now there is one less item to put on it! Gotta be happy about that...
these minis got finished thanks to the ready made binding I bought on a recent trip to L'uccello. I had been dreading making the binding, just deciding on the fabric was stressing me out but it became easy peasy!
 Finished a new block for Once upon a time...

 I love the little castle on the clouds..

the grumpy giant..

naughty Jack sliding down with the goose...

the two dresden plates have multiplied to eight-thankfully that's the amount I need for the quilt. Don't know what I have done wrong but no two are the same size? Does anyone know why or had this problem? 
Just waiting on the white fabric to applique them onto.... 
this block will be the centre for my gift quilt. I will applique butterflies in the centre instead of the writing, as I did on my down in the garden quilt.
It's all traced and ready to go..















all the christmas decorations are away and now this treasure can take it's place on the mini hanger... doesn't it look gorgeous. Thanks again Fiona X




Now just for some fun.... we had friends over new year's eve and she made this cute plate of 'prawndeer'. There is a commercial on tv here where a lady is obsessed with prawns and she makes one too. We had a great giggle.


















The mercury has risen dramatically today and we are in the mid 30's. Nowhere as bad as other places in Australia but still a hotsy one.
Hope you are all managing to stay cool if you're in the heat..
cheers
marina

Time is flying....

 Seems like my blog has become a little neglected again, this doesn't mean a lack of crafting though. Progress has been achieved on most...