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30 January 2012

happy scrap quilt block swap

well - I think I've temporarily lost my wonky house block mojo !! I only did one this weekend but hopefully I'll get it back soon now that I've done a few other blocks that I needed to get out of the way.

I signed up for a few swaps and bees at flickr at the end of last year - the happy scrap quilt block swap was one of them and blocks need to be posted by 10 February so thought I'd better get them done - I was originally going to do four but then I thought I'd do 16 (plus one for the co-ordinator) so I pulled the fabrics last night and then cut them out and sewed today - the block we had to do is called an arrow block - quite quick and easy to do - 6 1/2" finished blocks.



I think they've turned out ok and I'll do more to make a lap quilt after I receive the swapped blocks.  Its amazing how arranging the blocks with the arrows pointing out changes the whole look !


last night I also decided to make a blog button for the Long Distance Quilting Bee and then as soon as I had a few arrow blocks done this morning I also made one for the Happy Scrap Quilt Block Swap  - the others I'm in already had buttons available - and I ♥ a little button bling (can you tell !)

my fat quarter shop blogger's choice bundle by Amy Ellis was waiting at the post office today - yay - some gorgeous fabrics there including a few Patricia Bravo Art Gallery :)


back to work tomorrow and hopefully my wonky house block muse will return real soon :)

hope you got some fabulous sewing in over the weekend !

29 January 2012

sunday sewing

I did set out to get a few wonky blocks done this weekend though at this stage I've only got one done ! but I did spent a couple of hours fighting with my internet connection last night - very frustrating - but its up and running again today :) so just a quick post then back to the sewing machine !!

I did a wonky beach hut block yesterday - and again - lots of piecing so a bit time consuming - but its turned out mostly like I imagined :) I did try to do wavy water and used a small zig zag but when I went to press it the fabrics started coming apart so maybe my stitches were too small - anyway, I cut it off and just went a bit wonky instead :)

this morning I decided to clean up the wonky mess on my table so I could get a couple of other blocks done that need to be mailed soon.


I had made an asian inspired block for Carol in the January Long Distance Quilting Bee earlier in the month but when I read her requirements again (after I'd finished) I realised that she had requested saffron as the main colour and of course I used purple :) so I sent her a photo of the finished block and she was happy (or so she said !!) and then when I was getting the fabrics organised for the wonky blocks I found that I'd pulled a very saffron fabric for those - so I decided to do another block for Carol today which I really like and I'll send them both - they are my japanese garden blocks - but lol I left out the pathways in the first one :)

and here's pippi - just after she was yelled at for chasing the kangaroos last night - I nearly had a nice shot of a mum with a joey in her pouch until missy spotted them :) I'm fairly sure by that look on her face that she isn't the least bit concerned !

ok - now back to the machine - hope you're getting some fabulous sewing in :)

26 January 2012

happy australia day

I had kangaroos in the front yard this morning so I thought what a great aussie day treat ! mum and her little one :)  I'm fairly sure they're the same ones that have been visiting a bit lately - but just not in my actual front yard !



I worked at our australia day celebrations this morning which I've done for eleven years straight now - but I've managed to listen to triple j's hottest 100 all afternoon - ball park music came in at #38 with all I want is you which is one of my favourite songs - yay.

happy australia day everyone :)

25 January 2012

quilts for amy and anabel


Last year Sarah Fielke from The Last Piece put out a call for blocks to make a quilt for Amy from Mrs. Schmenkman Quilts following the loss of her husband Dan and also one for her daughter Anabel.

I made a block for both quilts - blogged here.



Sarah has put the blocks together ready to be quilted and has posted a photo of anabel's quilt on her blog - which has been there for 2 weeks and I can't believe I've missed it !

The quilt looks so fabulous on her design wall - take a look here - its amazing to see all the blocks done by different people all together :)

22 January 2012

wonky house blocks

yay - finally made a start on the wonky blocks for the wonky house block swap :)

a few weeks ago I drew up some rough sketches of what I thought they should kinda look like...quite easy really (lol)



and yesterday I pulled some fabric in brights - of course I've added more since !


and I made a start - then had visitors (people not the wildlife !) but finished this one last night - I chose the stars fabric then discovered I didn't have very much so its quite heavily pieced :) but I do like the windows - I think the white strip makes it look like the lights are on with the curtains a little bit open - don't you think !


then today I finished three more...now I don't want to be too picky but I think the window of this one should have been up on the left hand side :) but I do love the dog in the doorway !


so onto the third block - and I discovered I'm hopeless at angles - wish I had taken more interest in geometry at school ! when I added the fabric to the right of the pathway it ended up going the wrong angle so I added a flower bed to the edge of the pathway which fixed it !


and the final one for today - I thought I'd use some teapot fabric but couldn't find anything suitable for the background - after three attempts and lots of unpicking I decided to go plain :)


I'm lovin' the wonky house blocks - they're such fun (sorry about the long post though :)

20 January 2012

december blogger's block of the month

I've made the december blogger's block of the month blocks over the past two nights but haven't finished them off.

this was the original fabric choice for the blocks...


I wasn't sure about the placement of the yellow checkerboard so I decided to move them around...



and as there were three blocks I thought I'd try another way...


I'm leaning towards this last one but I'll leave them on the design wall for a while longer !

I need to make a start on my wonky house blocks this weekend as I've got less than a month to make 12 so I've decided to ban myself from the computer for the weekend !  I'll be back on Sunday night - hopefully with a few wonky house blocks to show :)

before I go I thought I'd share a photo of some early morning visitors...they were just outside the front fence when I was getting the camera organised but something spooked them and I had to wait until they were settled a few paddocks over !


hope you all have a great weekend and get some sewing in :)

17 January 2012

new camera

Buying a digital SLR has been on my wishlist for a few years now - I own a Canon SLR and still remember the day I bought a new zoom lens for it - but alas with no film its now in a box !

I love to take nature and landscape photos as well as photos of my craft and while I love my little sony I just can't get up close and personal to the birds and other nature that visit and the photos pixellate when trying to crop them for detail.

When I bought my laptop the same shop had the Canon 600D (with twin lens) on sale at a very good price - it arrived yesterday but when I got home discovered I had to charge the battery for 2 hours before I could use it! It comes with an 18 - 55mm lens and a 55 - 250mm lens - shown below with 55 - 250 lens.


This morning I was lucky enough to be visited by a group of pink and grey galahs - so I kept pippi inside and sat on the front verandah putting the canon to work :)  I took 30 photos in 8 minutes so I'm going to have heaps of fun with this little baby - here's a few galahs sitting on the fence :)


and this is one of the galahs cropped from the photo above - can't believe the detail - I think I'm in love ♥


15 January 2012

Blogger's Choice competition

I had a heap of things I was going to do today but this morning I read a blog post by Kristy over at HandmadeRetro about Laura of Quokka Quilts having a fat quarter shop blogger's choice competition which closes today so just had to join in !   This is my pick for a fat quarter bundle (extremely hard to do with such a huge fabric choice over at the Fat Quarter Shop!) and can you tell I love Patricia Bravo !



1. Bespoken Dreams Woven, 2. Bespoken Orchid Jacquard, 3. Oval Elements Chartreuse, 4. Crazy Daisy Fuchsia Multi Wave, 5. LouLouThi Pink Limes Hugs and Kisses, 6. Girls World Vibe Magenta Carrie, 7. Kaffe Classics Cantaloupe Aboriginal Dot, 8. Hyperreal Garden Cashmere Illusion, 9. Primativa Plum Falling Leaves, 10. Bespoken Topaz Beaded Gems, 11. Primativa Plum Diamond Delight, 12. Ruby Cotton Lime Dot, 13. Pure Elements Verve Violet Solid, 14. Pure Elements Burnt Orange Solid, 15. Kona Cotton Cerise

and I was just saying in my post yesterday how much I love the fat quarter shop blogger's choice bundles !

Ok, hours later - I must get some housework and the January long distance quilting bee block done !

14 January 2012

do.good stitches

I did the January blocks for the do.good stitches Care Circle today - we're making 12.5" square starflower blocks in red and aqua and used a tutorial from Modify Tradition - really cute block and since I did the Blogger's Uber-Fest blocks I've discovered I love  half square triangles :)

I've just bought a few half yards of red and also a red and aqua bundle for my stash as I'm doing a blog hop with Madame Samm in April (was to be February hence the red!) so that was handy when I found out the starflowers needed to be red and aqua.



The aqua in the first photo is from a Half Moon Modern fat eighth bundle that arrived this week and the red is Pimatex Basics Red Lovely Circles.  The aqua in the photo above is Aneela Hoey's Little Apples that was in one of the Blogger's Choice FQ bundles from the Fat Quarter Shop - the red in this photo I had in my stash so can't quite remember !

I'm really loving the Blogger's Choice Fat Quarter Club at FQS - I've discovered some fabulous fabrics and new designers - Pat Bravo being one - I'm using two of her fabrics for the Modern BOM at Sew Mama Sew and it probably would have taken me longer to discover her if I wasn't in the FQ club!  It's also handy to get 15 fat quarters each month especially now that I'm doing a few swaps and bees.

13 January 2012

2011 project mosaic

I've been wanting to make a photo mosaic so I thought I'd try it out today and made a mosaic of some of the projects I did in 2011 (just need to get those tops quilted!)


1. cushions 2.wallhanging 3. makeup bag 4. table runner 5. box of chocolates quilt top 6. mug rugs 7. square one quilt top 8. mini wild thing quilt top 9. chook pincushion 10. wonky blocks quit top 11. slash and stack quilt top 12. sewing machine mat 13. the ghastlies projects 14. postage stamp quilt top 15. blogger's uber-fest quilt top 16. potholders

10 January 2012

string blocks finished

my string blocks for the mini scrap block swap are done and posted - they were fun blocks to do.

Unfortunately my sd card didn't come back to life so I've had to order another one - in the meantime I'm using a very old card that holds 7 photos - yes that's right - 7 photos !

so here are my finished blocks all together.

09 January 2012

happy new year

happy new year to everyone...

I'm now online at home - yes that's right - I've finally got an internet service and a new computer so I can blog and google and everything else internet right from my living room or anywhere else I would like to be - YAY !!

As I live out of town and have quite a few hills surrounding me its been a bit of a drama trying to get onto the internet but I've now got a wireless service which works so its very exciting :)

I bought a computer on the weekend and today decided to download some photos from my camera directly to my computer so I could do my first post for the year but alas my memory card in my camera didn't like it and is now not working and my card reader is at work but hopefully I'll be able to get my memory card to work in that.

I'm back to work tomorrow (I've been on leave since christmas) so I'll be able to transfer all my info from my work computer to this one and then there'll be no stopping me :)

Hope everyone had a fabulous christmas and new year - mine was very quiet and relaxing but not a great deal of sewing was done - some string blocks and I made a cover for my diary but I have designed most of my houses for the wonky blocks swap - the time just seemed to disappear !

The scrappy string blocks are due to be posted tomorrow - I'll try and get a few more done tonight and hopefully I can borrow a camera to take photos before I post them off.