August 3

My goodness, time has flashed by since I dropped in here, and while I was looking through photos to share I realised I've worked on quite a few things!

Though I was a little adrift when we first got home from our holiday, it didn't take long for me to spend time in the sewing room. I finished the placemat pattern I had been working on, and got it into my Etsy store. I love these placemats, and I'll be working on some more soon:

And once they were done, I pulled a project from the archives - my version of the Rajah Quilt. I had gotten stuck as I didn't want to do the final applique border, and I put it aside for Seven. Years. I switched out a border that I wasn't happy with, and decided to add a border print instead. This has been a year of deciding not to follow patterns to the letter, and it has made me really happy. Here's the final quilt top, I'm so thrilled with it:

And then it was time to finish up another project I've been working on - I put the quilt top together of my Fancy Four Patch Challenge. I'm super happy with this too:

And I chose a border for it too - I haven't stitched it on yet, but it will be a fun project for a weekend.

On another note, did I mention that when Mum and I were in Paris, we made a special trip to a gorgeous dollhouse store in one of the covered passages? I was looking for inspiration, and some little bits and pieces for a project that I knew would be upcoming.

You see, I bought a dollhouse from a lovely friend to rehab for my darling granddaughters. It's a real fixer upper, and it needs SO MUCH work, but I'm just the person for the job. Here it is (please forgive the screenshot from my phone):

I've been working all new windows and doors which will be much larger. The walls will need to be replaced, and hubby and I have decided that the orientation will be changed. The front will no longer be opening, it will be open at the back, and we'll add electrics too. 

I think I'm inspired to make this dollhouse for the girls as Amy had a lovely dollhouse made by her great-grandfather when she was little, and it was absolutely treasured. Unfortunately it didn't stand the test of time and is no longer around, but we can recreate something like it for our sweet girls. And we'll have fun working on it (and playing with it) too.

I've already been practicing painting techniques on inexpensive items from dollar stores, and learning how to build the most basic of things so I can make some of the furniture. Here are my most recent efforts:

And I had the best luck recently when a lady in the next suburb was selling her old dollhouse project along with all the furniture and electrics. I felt like I won the lottery when I saw what I was getting for my $50 investment. The furniture in the photo, and so many other items too. I won't overwhelm you with them all, as really this is chiefly a quilting journal ... but I'm sure there are many of you that would have a little dollhouse nostalgia too ...

A few of the pieces need some minor repairs, but I'll have fun with that also. See the little dollhouse in the photo - a dollhouse for in a dollhouse ... how fun!

Anyway, it's getting late here now, so I'll sign off. I'll make no promises about checking in promptly, as I don't seem to be able to keep up my end of that bargain. Hope you're all doing well, chatter soon! xox

June 17

My goodness, I'm so sorry, I have to confess that I kind of forgot about my blog as I've slipped away from the regular posting schedule I had going on there for a while. 

If you follow along on my Instagram you'll know that I have been keeping busy, so I'll quickly share one of my recent finishes which has traversed the globe and now resides in France.

I do have some additional pictures, but I haven't transferred them from my phone to my laptop yet, so I'll get back to you with those (assuming I don't forget again of course).

This little quilt was the result of the Doll Quilt Exchange I participated in earlier in the year. Laure in France and I admired each others work and decided to do an additional trade. This is what I made, and I'm so pleased it arrived safely, and Laure loves it.

I'm also in the middle of a big sewing room clean up at the moment, so I'm anxious to get busy with that while the inspiration is with me - sometimes the inspiration doesn't stick around long. So chatter soon friends. Thank you for sticking with me! xox

April 29

Hello friends, thank you for bearing with me while I was on hiatus for a little while. It was for the most exciting of reasons - my Mum and I went on a wonderful three and a half week trip to Europe.

We started out with a river cruise which was 'Paris to the Swiss Alps', though we did it in reverse. Then spent some time in Paris before taking the Eurostar up to Belgium and returned home from there. I'm going to throw some photos up here for today, and then come back later and go into more detail.

It was such an amazing time, and we're still coming down to earth to be honest. There was so much to see, and still so much we didn't fit in, so I see another trip some time in our future. Enjoy my selection of photos:

These were all taken in Paris/Versaille/Giverny - other countries etc for another day! Chatter soon lovely friends xox

March 18

Hello friends, I have been lazy about posting, life is tremendously busy at the moment. I wanted to let you know that I haven't forgotten about you though, so here is a little placeholder until I have some free time.

In stolen moments I've been working on the Fancy Four Patch challenge by lovely Taryn of Repro Quilt Lover fame. (Note: I don't see the challenge on her website, but you'll see it all over Instagram!)

These are my latest blocks, and I'm beyond thrilled with them:

(Please forgive the excess white space between the photos, I formatted the pictures for Instagram and am not particularly tech savvy lol)

I absolutely love digging around in my scrap stash for fabrics that work well in the blocks. Hopefully there will be a good many more in my future. I'm not sure what happened to this week's blocks, I must have missed them being posted. Sewing time will be very limited for a couple of weeks - but I promise I'll fill you all in later on xox

February 8

Hello friends, I've just been over here living life, and then this morning I realised that I'd completely fogotten about blogging. So according to this little page here, January didn't happen for me. Of course I've been a busy bee - I don't remember exactly what I've been doing, but things are moving around in the sewing room, and that's a good thing!

Let me update you with a few things:

I got my 2026 doll quilt exchange in the mail, and it's currently winging it's way across the globe to it's new owner. I cannot wait until it arrives!

This was a really fun quilt to make - I hit the scrap drawers really hard. You can see the Jane Austen background fabric there again, and you'll be seeing it again and again as I still have a lot of it! If you're interested, you can see the lovely quilts that people are making over on Instagram with the hashtag #dollquiltswap2026

And another challenge I'll dip in and out of is being hosted by Larissa from mmmCrafts. You can do either the 12 Days of Christmas, or the Merry Humbug challenge, and maybe some people are doing both? I'm working through the 12 Days already for the grandies and some friends, so I elected to do last month's Merry Humbug project, Mr Scrooge:

Ohhh this was fun! Really lovely handwork while watching the Australian Open tennis. One of the  hardest things for me with these projects is deciding what colour palette to use. I wonder if Mr Scrooge himself would have chosen to wear a lovely pink robe ...

This month the challenge is to make Santa, so I'll get busy on that at some point. Ohhh, and don't forget if you're working on these challenges and are anxious about painting the sweet faces, I have them available in my Etsy store for purchase.

And another challenge I accepted ... Repro Quilt Lover Taryn is hosting the Fancy Four Patch challenge. I'm up to date so far with two weeks having been released, I know I won't be able to keep that up though with upcoming travels etc. But here is week two: (I have to hunt further to find what I did with the week one image lol)

Last week I made another block for the Sarah Morrell quilt. This a project I've been on go-slow mode with. Maybe I've found a little of my mojo with it though?

The centre section was hand pieced and the outer section was foundation pieced. A few of the points are less than perfect, but I'm happy enough to let them just slide on by.

I've started another block, and hopefully I'll get it finished during the next week.

My sourdough starter is still kicking along and doing well. I don't remember what I talked about last time, but since I've reactivated the starter, I've learned that I have better success with baking in a loaf tin rather than a dutch oven. This is a recent loaf:

I've been baking about twice a week, and the rest of the time my starter lives in the fridge. I use about 50g of rye flour in each loaf and the balance is regular bread flour. Camo and I love it, Marty not so much - he's a white bread from the supermarket guy.

Last of all for today, here is the puzzle that Amy and I completed during the holiday break:

It was REALLY fun! It's a Jane Austen World puzzle, and it was so much fun looking at all the characters and buildings while we were putting it together. It had to get put away eventually as the small people wanted to play with it all the time, but I think I'm going to put it together again sometime this year. I enjoyed it that much!

Anyway, that's a little of what I've been up to recently, thank you for being patient while I mindlessly bobbled around here - hopefully I can remember to check in with you all a little more often. Ohhh, and Happy New Year!

On the eve of Christmas Eve

It's getting late here - the night before Christmas Eve - I'm quite worn out as it's been such a busy day. Pretty much all the days in the lead up to the 25th are hectic and there are few minutes spare. I decided I really must grab the laptop and do a little writing or it'll be another week before I think of it again.

I'll try and go in order of things that are in my phone ... first up, now that they've been gifted, I can share some of the things I made for the gift bags for my lovely quilting friends:

Keyrings made from one of the mmmCrafts 12 days ornaments patterns. I embroidered both sides of these hearts, and they could still be used as ornaments really.

And some bag straps, or phone wrist straps. These were a really fun make. I don't have one left for myself, but I'll fix that in the holidays!

For my birthday my sweet girl Amy found another piece of Masons Vista for my collection. She always knows the very best things to get for me. This ginger jar is just perfect, I love it!

These are this years 12 Days ornaments for the girls and for some friends that live in the USA. In photo order, 3 - French Hen (for our friends), 5 - Gold Ring (for Mary), 2 - Turtle Dove (for Hazel). I love working on these ornaments and simply cannot wait until I get to work on some of the people!

I was thrilled to reach my goal of 300 days of hand quilting during the year. I crossed that line last week, and I don't think I've sat at the hoop since. I'll rectify that after Christmas day.

Because I'm on holidays now, I fired up my sourdough starter again. When I put it on hiatus some time back, I dried and froze some of the starter so it would be easy to get going should I want to. It was ready to bake with again quite quickly, and I made some dinner rolls.

If I make these again I'll try and do better with the shaping, but I'm learning all the time. I didn't have much bread flour which is why I tried these rolls first, and when I got more bread flour I made sourdough and baked it in a loaf tin. No picture I'm afraid, it was eaten so fast. Next time fingers crossed I'll get a picture.

And last of all for today, this afternoon I finished this year's gingerbread house. I'm pretty happy with it!

I used a pattern from Ellen Designs. Her templates are wonderful, and her gingerbread creations are just spectacular. I hope I'll be able to create at her level some day!

So I can hit the send button while it's still Wednesday evening, I'm going to finish up this post ... but first, please allow me to wish you Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays. I hope you have a wonderful festive season, and here's to wonderful things in this coming year! xox