Merry Christmas

James and Eleanor have spread the reindeer food...

hung their stockings...

and been tucked into bed.

Father Christmas and hs reindeer have been...

And basked in the glow of a blazing blue tree!

There are stuill a few jobs to be done in the morning before our guests arrive, but for now I'm going to bed so I don't misss them opening their stockings.

Merry Christmas!

Quilting but not blogging

Time is just flying by at the moment! As the title says, I have been busy quilting, but haven't managed to blog any of it for a while. This top was show-going with 360 pieces in the blocks:

Tonight I got the top complete:

And started piecing this:

It's simply-pieced, because the fabric is so bold and large-scale, and I plan to have it finished tomorrow, and sandwich both tops in one session.

Listed

I only did about half the sewing I'd planned tonight, but I also edited some of the photos I took of my nephew and emailed them to my sister and did a few odd jobs online. And possibly ate a few of the Hiaghs chocolates (White chocolate lemon truffles and Lemon myrtle fondants) from that bag at the back of the photo...

I also finally get around to listing Apple Falls in my Etsy store:

It's ready to post tomorrow; via Express Post if needed :)

Printing and piecing

A few weeks ago I was sick of having real troubles with my printer not feeding properly, so I bit the bullet and bought a monstrosity! It occupies a lot of desk space. The reason for its size is that I love foundation piecing, and printing out the foundations, but am sick of being restricted to A4/letter size. This new printer is capable of printing (and scannign and copying) A3 (ledger I think?) paper. Already that has been handy to scan the double-spread of the last quilt I had published in a single go. I'm now lookng for A3/ledger size foundation sheets, but haven't had any luck so far. I love Carol Doaks foundations, so am looking for something along those lines (easy to print on and to tear out). For now, I have ordered three different A3 lightweight art pads, and will test them out, but would love to hear if anyone knows of larger foundatuion papers....

(sorry about the mess - the whole room could do with a good sort out if the current rush is ever over)

Today instead of binding the quilt I should have, I printed out at last the foundations for my next quilt (oh, the bliss of not having to lean over the desk and feed the pages in one-by one, which is horrible on my back!). Tonight I pieced 72 of these foundations - there are still 3 pieces to add to each (that's 216 seams for the evening, and asmany more left!). These will then go together in fours to form 18 blocks. Then I have another 72 QST foundations (only 5 fabrics on each of those!) to make the other 18 blocks for the quilt...

The colours look a bit dull here; they're actually a bit brighter, but the request for this quilt was warm, earthy tones, and I think I will meet that when the two blocks are combined.

Quick quilts

A friend had her baby girl just recently, and I was half-prepared; with this top complete. I sandwiched it the other night and quilted it today. I just need to finish-off a few thread-ends, trim, bind and label it. Most fo the quilt has a siwrl pattern over it, with these free-hand scallops in the outer border - the only thing i marked was the centre of each block, with a Hera marker - fasy, easy and effective!

I've decided to try and make life a little easier for myself, and make some fairly quick-to-piece baby quilts from my lovely selection of flannels. Because I like to keep flannel quilts extra soft and snuggly, they are fairly lightly quilted, too.

Ideally, I still have about 6 more quilts to make before Christmas - two might be realistic though (and I have those first two mostly cut and ready to go).

Bountiful Winter

This is a custom-made quilt I sold recently through my Etsy store. It was a challenge to finish, because with my sore finger, it's hard to hold the binding in place to sew the back down by hand - and even harder to hold the label, even to get the pins in.

The only variation requested for this one was a few extra apples. It's currently on its way to America, where it will fit right in with their snowy winters.

I actually have one ready-made winter tree currently in stock, and will be listing it in my Etsy store as soon as I get the chance.

Magic Cave

On Friday, Mummy and I took James and Eleanor to the Magic Cave. This is an Adelaide tradition, and is where Father Christmas goes to after the pageant. As well as Father Christmas, there are Nipper and Nimble; model horses from the pageant, and a small carousel, moving Christmas window scenes, and distorting mirrors, and it's decorated with Christmas trees and icicles and so on... as a child it really did seem magical.

The queue to see Father Christmas was quite long, so Mummy offered to stay there and do her crossword puzzles while I took James and Eleanor to do a few things and keep them occupied - this worked well for all of us! Before we got far, they came across the pigs in Rundle Mall, and spent a good 15 minutes climbing on them:

By the time we got back to the queue, there wasn't too much longer to wait, and Mummy read to James and Eleanor for a while - once they'd finished talking with the 'talking tree'.

We had a lovely visit with the Big Man in Red; only a brief moment of hesitation from either of them. When asked what they wanted, neither of them could name anything; which I think is lovely!

This post from a couple of years ago shows Nipper and Nimble in the pageant, and me in the Magic Cave having a ride on Nipper at about age 9.

Anniversary

Simon and I went away last weekend. It was a rare few days away from both children and sewing!

We hired this car, and drove to a lovely place in the Barossa Valley. We didn't do a lot, but did enjoy driving around! It was hot on saturday, but a brief late change came through in the afternoon. This was from our verandah.

While we were out at dinner, Simon surprised me with an eternity ring. I had done some 'research' for him, but hadn't really expected it...
 

 
This second photo shows the new ring, and just a peek at what I did to my fnger a few weeks ago - finally now healing nicely.

We took a very scenic route home through some cool and very beautiful parts of the Adelaide Hills that I hadn't even realised existed. And all within an hour or so of home...

We stopped at my parents' to collect James and Eleanor and our car, and much to his delight, James rode with me in the Z4 on the way to return it. He suggested we buy a 'Z5' so that we would all fit in it. I like his logic!

James and Eleanor trying it out before we went away:

Starburst in AP&Q

Today I had an unexpected parcel to collect. It turned out to be my quilt Starburst returning from Australian Patchwork and Quilting, and an early copy of  Vol 19 No 11, which includes the quilt as a project.

A few people have asked about getting such a large range of brights, and I will be able to put some bright scrap-packs together in the New Year, for those who don't have a big enough selection, but it just doesn't fit into my timetable before then.

A Decade

This time ten years ago, I was getting into the BMW Z3 with Daddy to drive to our wedding.

Right now I'm getting ready to go and collect the BMW Z4 with Simon, to go away for a child-free weekend for our 10th Wedding Anniversary. (Despite the jokes, I did not pack my sewing machine!)

Ten wonderful years; just a start...

Happy Anniversary, Simon
xx

New designs

While my finger was holding me up, I focused on designing the next two quilts.

This one has relatively little piecing, and is quite bold and modern in solid black and white, with the hot pink quilting designed as a feature. The quilting patterns shown here are only examples; not exactly what I have planned but close enough to give the right idea. I'm really looking forward to making this one!

This second one is much more traditional, and has a LOT of pieces! I have some rough quilting ideas for this, but have plenty of time to make a final decision.

They're now mostly cut (much more slowly and carefully than a few weeks ago!) and waiting for me to set up my massive new A3 printer to print out the required foundations.

My finger is healing slowly; I have been leaving it uncovered when I can, but even while it's covered, I've set it back a bit by bumping and knocking it on things - and that's still trying to look after it!

New love

It must be love.

These are the equivalent of about 50y of fabric!

And I sense more on the way...

Sambag shoes

Tree peek

This is a custom quilt I'm working on. It's ready to bind, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to hold the quilt well enough with my sore finger to hand-sew the binding just yet.

Tree Quilt in AP&Q

Yesterday the latest copy of Australian Patchwork and Quilting arrived in my letter box - with another of my quilts in it!

The spring version of my Seasonal Tree is featured as a project from page 32.

This one has pink blossoms in place of the apples, and warmer spring tones than the winter tree.

Desperation?

Is this desperate? I really need to get this done. I started it over the weekend!

I went to my doctor to get it checked tis morning. The non-stick dressing had stuck, but he patiently helped me soak it iff gently. It looks a mess, but he's confident it will heal well. He re-dressed it (using better stuff, and also did a much better job than the emergency doctor!) and will do it again for me on friday.

And when I got home, my first pieces of Parisville were on my doorstep! The rest is coming in a large box...

OUCH!

I've benn out of action for a few days. Late on Wednesday night I got careless with the rotary cutter and sliced off half a fingernail and a sliver of finger, and spent from 1am-6am at emergency - most of that time waiting.

This is how I left what I was doing (at least there was no damage to the fabric!) and the current state of my finger. Offending tool in plain view - blade replacement due before I start cutting again! I've been on pretty strong pain-killers, and have been either sleeping or feeling very woozy most of the time, but it's slowly getting better and I'm feeling more like myself - but if I don't keep my finger above shoulder level, or if I move it, it throbs badly, so I'm kind of useless!

Before the accident, I had added the last 2 borders to this quilt, so it's now ready to sandwich and quilt - one day!

I was cutting another flannel quilt, using slightly softer pinks this time:

I'm hoping by tomorrw I'll be up to doing a bit more; I can't afford to lose any mre time!