June 30th

Hello friends, I was hoping to get a post in again in June, and here I am on the last day. Whew! It has been a busy month, and I can share many of the things I've been working on in the sewing room:

Recently I shared the little applique piece I found when I was cleaning up the sewing room. I formulated a plan (which included using some of the little Ohio Star blocks I made) and created this little top:

I was super happy with how it came together - I had salvaged a forgotten project, and used a bunch of scraps up in the process. I'm still going to make more 4.5in Ohio Star blocks - I just love them!

I quilted and bound it with a favourite purple fabric - followed by a trip through the wash, I just love the crinkle it gives. Tomorrow it's going for a trip in the mail. It's destined for a new home.

Recently Camo had his birthday, and rather than have a cake, he requested that I make an apple pie. I made something like a pie - it's a tart - my first ever apple tart, and delicious!

I've continued hand quilting on the wholecloth - and moved the hoop since this picture was taken too:

And last of all today, I've made another block for the Sarah Morrell quilt - I'm thrilled with this one:

The little floral square was just a bit small for the space I needed it to fill, so I added a little frame, and I'm so happy with how it looks. I've now made 25 blocks for the quilt - there are still so many to go.

I've also been working on some secret squirrell projects, and I'll share those when I can, but for now they'll have to stay under wraps.

That's it for me today - I hope to check back in with you again really soon. Let's see how I go with that!

Fabric luck!

This week I have absolutely been counting my blessings, and those of you that follow me on Instagram will already know why. After seeing a darling fabric on the internets that would make the perfect addition to my Morrell quilt, it was devastating to learn that this fabric I coveted was several years old, and wildly popular when it was released. So tracking some down was going to prove difficult. After several days of sporadic google searching, I found a source, and I'm thrilled to say it arrived in my hot little hands this past week:

This is Regency Zarafa by Christopher Wilson Tate, and I found my piece at Chitter Chatter Fabrics in Canada. I'm sorry to tell you that I purchased the last of their yardage, but they may still have some fat quarters if you feel it's something you must have too. I can absolutely see this incorporated into some of the broderie perse blocks.

I've had some other deliveries this week too, but I've been slow to wield the camera, so I'll get back to you with those. Also stitching time has been very limited as I've been painting so many bead heads to send out. Thank you so much to all the sweet folks for trusting me with their crafty needs.

Tomorrow is my nephew's first birthday party and also his christening, and my sweet brother asked me if I could make a cake. Of course! Forgive this hasty picture, as it was an in progress shot, and the cake is boxed up now so I can't take a better one:

I battled with the buttercream icing as it was cold today, hopefully it will still taste good!

Next week I have much fewer commitments, so I'll take some extra photos for you, and also share what I'm able to work on in the sewing room. Chatter soon! xox

This past month ...

Whew! I didn't mean to let almost a whole month pass by before I posted here, but that's what happened! The first two weeks are easily explainable, my parents and I travelled to New Zealand on a RC cruise. It was just lovely, and I'll share some pictures:

We flew to Sydney the day before, so we were able to explore. There was a ship in port, but it wasn't our ride, this one was pretty fancy:

We always stay in The Rocks, so on the day we simply have to drag our bags across the road to the overseas passenger terminal. This means that there's always lots to see, and the view from the roof of our hotel is pretty spectacular:

On Wednesday 21st, was our day to board, and this is our chariot. Though this picture was taken in NZ (I think Wellington) as I forgot to take one on boarding day.

We've travelled on the Ovation before, and always love it <3

This was my room, a balcony cabin on deck 8, my parents had the room next door, so we had the balcony opened up between them, and also the adjoining door unlocked, it always makes it feel more spacious.

Day two at sea and a lovely lunch at Jamie Oliver's Italian - a tradition now, we always enjoy it so much!

I'll share a sprinkling of my many many photos, and try to recall where I took them ...

Our first stop - Picton NZ. So pretty, and I may or may not have bought a long necklace of the most lovely pearls from a darling jewellery store here. Can't prove anything ;-)

Two days later in Wellington NZ, we jumped on the gorgeous vintage hop-on hop-off tram and toured around the CBD.

The driver narrated as we travelled around, and we learned all about rebuilding efforts in the city, I have so many picutres if you're interested. And I was fascinated also by the beautiful interior of the tram, which we learned was about 100 years old.

The next day in Dunedin, also such a beautiful place. This is the train station - stunning in person. While in Dunedin, we stumbled across the most darling vintage store - Two Squirrels Vintage. I could have purchased every single thing in the store, but settled on this beautiful vintage apron and sweet little set of beads:

On our way home we travelled through Dusky Sound, Doubtful Sound and Milford Sound, all simply stunning!

And on the last sea day while heading home, we did a fascinating tour of the kitchens and a yummy brunch. We definitely never went hungry.

Before we knew it, it was time to start heading home - it was a long day travelling and I was really glad to finally be able to sink into bed. The next morning I didn't feel right, and took 'that' test, and sure enough was positive. First time ever for me. Next minute I received a message from Mum having had the same result.

The past two weeks have been spent largely resting, and with very little energy, I'm just now starting to feel like I'm getting back to some normality. In moments with energy, I've been baking - Pantry Mama's Sourdough Discard Loaves, one with rye, and one white:

I've been painting heads for my Etsy store, this is the second lot I painted for orders after I got home:

And for the last picture of the day, a little fabric delivery that arrived while I was away:

Darling fabrics that I'll be able to use in my Morrell quilt when I get back to it. And speaking of quilts, this past month I've done virtually no stitching - the only thing I've really had energy to work on since I've been home is a little hand quilting. I hope to remedy that soon, as I'd love to get a quilt made for the new grandbaby that will be here before we know it!

Well, that's been my month, apologies for the radio silence, here's hoping I have the energy to get back to my posting schedule going forward! Chatter soon xox

Christmas lead-up ...

Hi friends, I missed posting last week as I was just so busy in the lead up to Christmas. I thought I'd gotten all the have to do things finished, but when I took stock, there were still a few things on my plate, so I'll share them with you here.

If you're a long term reader you'll know that I always put together a gingerbread creation of some kind. This is my project for this year:

*I don't seem to be able to set the pictures to the largest size as they're too blurry. Must be something I did when transferring the pictures from the phone to the laptop. Anyway ...

This year I melted down butterscotch sweets to make the windows, it's a fun look. I've gone for a very traditional style gingerbread house. I drew the templates for the house up in Corel, and I can save them as PDF's if anyone would like a copy. Just pop me a note and I'll be happy to send them to you.

Next on the agenda was to decorate a cake quickly for a lovely friend's cousin’s wedding anniversary.

This was actually a very quick job - the little bouquet on top had been saved from the 25th anniversary cake, so for this 50th cake I just needed to switch the ribbon in the garland from silver to gold. It has been more than 20 years since I've made one of these cakes with the fondant icing, but luckily it all came back to me and I did a passable job. 

Also before the big day, I wanted to finish up some of the mmmCrafts ornaments for little Mary, and I managed to get this one done:

This is the French Hen from the Twelve Days of Christmas series. I wanted to revist the ones I'd already made, so I also made this one, but didn't quite get it done until a couple of days later:

This one is the Turtle Dove. All the ornaments in this series are just adorable, and I love working on them. Next will be the Colly Bird, and I'll try to make that much earlier in the year rather than waiting until it's actually December!

I made quite a number of placemats for gifts too. Some had to be passed on to other people to hand to the recipients. I hope they've been received now.

These placemats are so easy to put together, and wonderful for fabrics that you just don't want to cut up too much. I'll make some for us sometime ... I have a few things to finish first though.

And last of all for this post, I made up a couple more of the Opasampler blocks this week, one super easy, and a little more tricky.

Block 49 - Pork and Beans

Block 25 - Welcome Home

Both super fun to make, and I just love that little parrot in the window of the house. It came from one of the lovely conversational prints Wendy Caton Reed sent to me a while ago. I reserve those fabrics for the most special of projects!

In other news, I've continued to go through my fat quarters and put them in drawers. I'm about 95% done with that now, and I'm so very surprised at how many I have, and the drawers are entirely full. I really must resolve not to buy any more fabric until I've made some kind of dent in what I already have. It's entirely possible that even if I work at some stitching each day, I will never, ever run out of fabric.

I'm on holidays now until the beginning of February, so I've resolved to get a few things done before I'm back to my routine. The Opasampler blocks - I'd like to catch up on those. I'm determined to finish Camo's aviation themed top, it was started 10-15 years ago. It's time to get it done. I'd like to make another two of the charity quilts. And last of all, I'd like to paint the second bathroom area in the house. It's time for a refurbish in there. Can I get all this done? Maybe ... but at least by writing it down, I'll be inspired to give it a good try.

I hope you're all having a wonderful holiday season, and before I write again we'll have rung in the new year. So I hope you have a Happy New Year, and let's chatter again in 2024! xox

One Block!

I don't have much to share with you this evening, there hasn't been much time for stitching - and at the moment I'm painting bead heads for my sweet customers working on mmmCrafts projects. It's such a fun thing to do, and I love to see the finished ornaments people create.

But back to stitching - I've only made one block this week. I cut it out before we left for travel stitching, but never got to it. On Sunday afternoon Amy babysat the puppy so I could have some time to myself, and I was able to spend some precious time at the sewing machine. This is the result:

I love this block so much! It would be a really fun block for a whole quilt, using different corner fabrics and border strips would make such fun secondary patterns.

I'm not sure what my count for Sarah Morrell quilt blocks is now, but surely I'm in double digits?

Another fun (and slightly stressful) thing I did this past week was to decorate a cake for a friend who was celebrating a school milestone with a bunch of friends.

Norma baked the cakes and distracted the doggo while I did my thing with icing. I'm so glad she was happy with the cake, I feel like I could have done so much better - every cake is a learning experience.

I'm super hopeful that this coming week will be less hectic - I'm still adjusting to life being a puppy Mum. This week has included a trip to the emergency vet, which not only isn't great for the stress levels, but the bank balance too. My tactic now is to simply relax into the fact that it's going to be messy for a bit here, and this little (well, not so little each day) fluffball is going to take up a lot of my time for a while.

I'll be trying to get back to your messages when you leave them as soon as I can, please don't give up on me. Your notes mean so much, so I'll chatter soon! xox

If only I would remember to use my camera ...

Hello friends, I hope you've had a wonderful week!

I've had a great one - since I checked in last, Mary had her birthday party. I managed to take a happy snap of the cakes while we were setting up for the festivities:

And then got busy socialising and didn't manage to get the camera out again :-/

Almost right away after the party (as it was a long weekend) we headed off to spend some time with friends at their beach house in Aldinga. On the way down there I noticed we were heading right past Tricia's Fabrics, and managed to convince the hubster to stop in, and grabbed a couple of treasures. This picture I took just now lol:

A cute Di Ford Hall border print and a sweet French General toile. Not really what I expected to buy, but I'm super happy with them just the same. Marty actually came into the store and was helping me look around, and a sweet lady from interstate asked me how I managed to get him in the store - her husband was sitting outside in the car. We all laughed a bunch, and then we were soon back in the car and on the way again.

As is my usual form, I only managed to get one picture while we were on the beach:

We genuinely did have a great time and were sad to have to return to normal life. If I could just remember to take more pictures, I'm sure you would believe me!

And in quilty news, I haven't managed to achieve much this week. I have started working putting together a block which is just a kernel of an idea right now, I hope it will become something:

I'm thinking about some appliqued EPP pieces and some broderie perse to make it more interesting. Let's see how that goes.

And tonight I'm going to start quilting on the pink heart quilt with the crown background fabric. It's all pinned and ready to go:

I can't decide whether to use a pale pink or a cream coloured quilting thread. I think I'll try a pink first and see how I like it. I'm super happy to be getting through all the projects I have deadlines for. There are two more must do things on the list, and then I'm coasting toward getting some hand piecing ready for next month. Yay!

Okay, I'm off to answer a bunch of emails now, thank you for all your sweet notes. I'll chatter soon! xox