Yum!

How naughty of me to take a whole week to reveal that ... we were in Singapore!

We stopped into Raffles Hotel more than once for the obligatory Singapore Sling, it would have been irresponsible not to! They're the 'thing to do' and mighty delicious as well :-)

We had a great time with our friends, and we've declared that we'll be back. The girls and I shopped pretty hard, this time we didn't even nudge our baggage allowance - but of course I managed to find 7 pairs of shoes to come home with me.

In quilty news, I've finished quilting one whole border of the NI quilt, so I'm definitely on the home stretch. I'm really looking forward to finishing now ... chatter soon friends :-)

Where in the world??

I know many of you already know this answer to this one ... but play along anyways ...

Where in the world were we??

Progress, and thank you!

Thank you so much to everyone for your wonderful help with Prue's fabric search - crisis averted and she has enough now to complete her border. Once again - thank you!

I have been madly hand quilting away, and with good progress - sadly though - endless hand quilting does not make for good blog fodder, so I've neglected you all, but you know that once this project is finished, I'll be back to blogging more regularly.

Here's a little area on the quilt that I've completed out to the zig zag border.

The border area should be much faster to quilt - well, at least I'm hoping so anyway!

And this is the last of the blocks I have to quilt - one little half block - with any luck I'll have it done tonight and I can concentrate on the border. Once the blocks are finished I'll swap over to my square 'hoop' for the border - much easier! But for some reason I don't like the square one as much when I'm working on the middle of the quilt. I don't question it ... I just go with it :-)

Lots of chores to get done today, and then hopefully some stitching time this evening ... must get busy!

Fabric Hunt

Just a quick pleading post tonight: My dear friend Prue is desperately looking for a particular fabric, and I thought I'd put up a quick shout out to see if anyone can help out.

She's looking for this fabric: It's from Kaye England's Back Home Again collection. A yard would be wonderful if you can spare it, and we'll take care of all costs.

The fabric has kind of a linen look to it - if you have it, you'll know what I mean :-) Thank you so much for reading! xox

Christmas Tree Skirt

Since I don't have anything interesting of my own to report - I'm happy to tell you all about the achievements of others :-) Recently I made up another tree skirt to kit up for the shop, and today my dear friend (and quilting magician) Lizzy called to tell me that she had quilted it up for me!

Hasn't she done another spectacular job with this one? I'm entirely thrilled and can't wait to get the binding on! (If only I could take better pictures for you to see the details)

On the reverse side, her quilting really shines through - she's a feathered wreath master! Do keep your eyes peeled, I'm hoping to have this project advertised in AP&Q.

In my own news, I have now only got 7 blocks of the NI left to hand quilt, and then the border ... I'm on the home stretch! xox

Lady of the Lake Table Runner

My 'Lady of the Lake' table runner has come back to me! Australian Patchwork and Quilting have finished with the photography, and I'm thrilled to be able to put it on my table.

It looks so nice in the morning light - I wander by all the time so I can gaze at it.

My dear friend Lizzy did such a marvellous job of the quilting, she's a superstar with her longarm machine. Thank you Lizzy!

Something different ...,

Hand quilting has kept me very much occupied since I last posted, but recently I've had the need to work on a couple of different things:

A dear friend Margaret came to visit Friday week ago for a sewing afternoon. Rather than continue with my quilting, I thought I'd start on the Civil War Love Letters quilt I'd like to work on when I'm done with the NI. I made the two easiest blocks I could find, just to see if I really want to continue with the fabrics I've chosen.

These blocks are called 'Enthusiasm' and 'Virginia Military Institute'. I quite like them, and think I'll continue in this vein :-)

And on Friday last week, I quilted something that I threw together at the shop on Thursday.

It's a table runner made using the Kaliedorule - it'll be useful for demo's at the shop, and really nice if I do say so myself! Amazing things can be done with lovely border prints :-)

And this morning, I just finished quilting on this little project. It's hanging on my clothes airer, so looks a little funny.

I had a really great time quilting this one - it's the Dogwood Trail fabric and project from Moda. This is also a shop sample, and I hope there are still kits left as I type this, because they've been going so fast!

Well, that's what I've been up to recently - this afternoon I'll be getting back to the hand quilting - I'm really getting it done now!

Good ... or just okay??

I'm just getting ready to quilt this block - it's the infamous block 18. Yes, the 6" block with 229 pieces. I'm pretty pleased with how it went together ... mostly.

DH took this picture a few minutes ago with his fancy-pants camera :-)

And just for giggles, he took this macro shot ...

Not looking quite so good now is it?? *lol*