Saturday 30 June 2012

post for second colour mix (sorry!)

fruit salad with pepper
Fruit salad with pepper mix

Mixing it up again


Yes folks, our favourite Gap Quilter is making me post for her again....


The time is here, second quarter round up at Rhondas!  Everyone with finishes, head on over and start linking up.    

Meantime, Rhonda has organised a whole week of tutorials by lots of talented bloggers to give us more work to do inspire us to keep on making.  Here's what we have coming up.
              

                July 2nd           Nita from Our Patchwork Lives will be showing us how to do some Quilted Postcards 

                July 3rd            Janelle from Echinops & Aster  is sharing how to make a Table Top Ironing Board     
                                         
                July 4th           Chrissy from Sew Lux Fabric & Gifts does some handy Orphan Block Placemats

                July 5th                 T.B.A.
                                           
                July 6th            Connie from  Quilting by the River will show us String Sleeping Bags   
                                
                July 7th            Kat from Domestic Kat will demonstrate how to make Skirt Bags 


So, you have from 1st to the 7th to link up your second quarter finishes to be entered into the prize draws, and dont forget,  have your 3rd quarter "I will finish" Lists ready to link the following week!

And just to make this post a bit prettier, I'm going to enter these two mixes into Cindy's Kona Solids competition!
                

fluffy mix 1
pina coladas and mojitos 
fluffy mix 2
fruit salad with pepper

Sunday 24 June 2012

Sunday sewing space

So, my man advised against it (something along the lines of "you cant, seriously, its a cupboard, it'd be depressing") but I've joined in anyway and participated in lovely Lotti's Sunday Sewing Space.  Well.... its just so nice to be asked, you know?  And to be fair to the man, we had just been reading the posts from Leila and Ayumi...  
So, pop over to Lawson and Lotti for todays Sunday Swearing Sewing Space and have a nosy - grab a cuppa first so you can stay there for a proper visit too, Lotti is lovely :-)



Lawson and Lotti

Thursday 21 June 2012

Sofa, so good...

Thank you to everyone who has kept a check on me the last couple of weeks since London.  There's no getting away from it, it really did wipe me out completely.  Each time I though I was feeling back to normal I'd have an afternoon or evening of doing stuff, then need a whole day to recover.  I've been thru almost as many 24hr bugs as days where I ventured out of the house...  And lets not speak of the days I've lost "post housework"...  I make no secret of my hoover hatred...
Anyway.  I'm still only getting wee bits done at a time, in between a lot of being stuck on the sofa (not quite as depressing as staying in bed).  However, not posting anything for so long, I've managed to build up some nice pictures to finally fill a post with so here goes!

If we go back to London and that event you're all sick to death of hearing about ;-) I was only there for the Saturday.  I had English Paper Piecing class in the morning and Embroidery in the afternoon.  After the excitement and hilarity of Friday, I was already knackered on Saturday morning...  oops.  So, English Paper Piecing class I only managed to cut out my paper shapes and baste about 4 of them...  but it gave me something nice to do between sofa naps back home, so here is what I should have done in class...



The afternoons Embroidery class, the one I'd been looking forward to most of all, the one so many of my new friends were all doing, the one taught by Aneela Hooey, for me looked like this.



Yeah.  That is me.  (Yep, that's as much of me as you will EVER see on this blog!!!)  Yep.  Bit gutted about that, but there you go.  That's fairly normal for me.  Since I didn't get to show off use it in class, here are some gratuitous photos of the embroidery kit that I made myself especially to use in class, that I missed.  (still bit gutted bout it...)


There are a couple of things I'd tweak if I make another, but it works, its useful, and that's fine for now.  Here is a photo of it at my outdoor embroidery station.  See those dead branches?  A friend stuck them in a plant pot for me and on a (very very rare) day when its not windy and its not cold and its not raining (okay so its happened twice, for an hour or two, this year...) I sit there and my thread and my scissors and stuff all dangles off the branches!  But the roll is a bit cooler and its indoor suitability means it gets WAY more use...  



Machine binding clearly is NOT my thing....



And finally, these are a bit of a teaser as to things to come in future blog posts.  Or in other words, I am doing stuff it just takes me for-ev-er.



Monday 18 June 2012

Gap Quilter in the cupboard or Narcoleptic in the Gap?

2012 Finish-A-Long


Well Hi Y'all!  Isn't this a bit of fun!  I'm doing a post for my gal Rhonda, since she cant be arsed has a whole lot on her plate.  I've nabbed the fun bit, the bit you allll wanna see, the bit where we remind ourselves of all the wonderful prizes that are up for grabs in this, the Second Quarter of Rhonda's Finish-a-Long!

Yes, its that time again, another quarter has passed, we are HALF WAY THROUGH 2012!  For those who have been diligently working through their proposed WIP's and UFO's, the time is almost here to join Rhonda's Post Second Quarter Linky Party and link up all your magnificent successes.  The Linky Party will be live at Rhonda's on June 30th, and will run for 7 days.

As if the smug satisfaction of having completed projects wasn't enough, each finish post you link up is another entry into Mr Randoms draw to win a prize.  So, what can you win?  Well lets have a look....

We have a $10 Gift Certificate from Quilt n' Bee

Quilt n' Bee
Here you can find all sorts of goodies from fabric to notions, Kits, BOM's, Patterns, even quilting services.


Jennie from Clover and Violet is offering one of their gorgeous patterns and a charm pack




Aurifil are offering a thread sampler pack, and one of their thread cards - so once you're hooked on their wonderful threads you can drool over allllll the pretty pretty pretty colours it comes in...  And choose your next thread to perfectly match your next project of course.






Next up, the ladies at Sew Lux Fabrics are offering one winner a $25 gift certificate.



Just in the interest of showing you wonderful possibilities,  I've had a nosey in their shop and I could happily exchange that gift certificate for this gorgeous fat quarter bundle of Riley Blake's Chevrons....




More fabric gorgeousness comes courtesy of Swell Cloth who are offering a FQ Bundle of Denyse Schmidt's Flea Market Fancy...





The good people at the Fat Quarter Shop are offering one very lucky quilter a fabulous shopping trip to the value of a $75 gift certificate!  Woohoo!  




Many a happy hour can be spent browsing through their website, casually slinging your favourite prints into the cart...  believe me, I do it regularly...  only this time, this time you could actually click on the check out button!  This time you could have $75 to spend!

And last but by no means least, the lovely Rhonda herself is offering a Quilt Kit!!!

So.  Linky party is coming soon, so get off to your sewing cupboards rooms and get those UFO's F'd!!!

Tuesday 5 June 2012

Too tired for words.

Seriously.  Am broken...  Am taking a few days off....  Didnt meet everyone I wanted to, definitely didnt talk enough to those I did meet... Everyone so very lovely...Brit bee mates amazing beyond words...
Thank you Fat Quarterly team for a brilliant event xxx

Mental bee-ast quilt, as promised...  Lynne (OMG LYNNE FROM LILYS QUILTS!!!!) liked it!  (yes chickened out from going and saying hello to Katy Jones but I'm sure she can live without short fat nutter doing goldfish impression before saying "you're brilliant" too many times...)

Lynne and Laura with mental Beeast in London






I got to meet Jack... and had to save him from drowning in the mental beeast...

Elliecat has been makin mischief...  


Moda spotty extra wide back, wonderfully quilted by Chris @ Fathers Heart 

the blocks, left to right starting on top row  Ceri, Ceri, Fiona, Fiona, Hadley,
Hadley, Jennie, Jennie, Jo, Jo,
Jude, Jude, Judith, Judith, Laura
Laura, Laura, Susan, Susan, Terri
Terri, Trudi, Trudi, MUM!
me me me...


Last pic from the weekend....

Rhonda... how could you not be impressed with wee Jack?!  He's lovely...

and since I said it so much over the weekend I'll say it one more time...
"where's Emily?"  she's with Lucy  "Where's Lucy?"  she's with Emily...

"weren't Emily and Lucy meant to be at dinner?"  they were Sarah, they were at the other end of the table...  "S***!  Where's Emily and Lucy now?"  dunno....