I've been surfing again......

and came across another fantastic blog - Linda Kemshall's.  Linda is half of Linda and Laura Kemshall, Design Matters.  I first came across this mother and daughter team while watching and reading Quilting Arts magazine and TV shows.  They hail from England and work with a large variety of techniques.  Their latest purchase is a huge printing machine that actually prints direct onto fabric by the yard!!  How cool is that?

Anyway I suggest if you love art, design, techniques, colour, pattern, quilting, mixed media, etc, then go and have a look at their blog.  I'm very tempted to sign up for an on-line course or their Design Matters TV shows - may have to use some of the $ I found in my Christmas stocking.

I have also put it in my reading list in the right hand column.  Enjoy.

My Christmas gift to myself

Ever since my boys were quite young (when they were believers of Father Christmas!!) I have bought myself a gift to put under the tree.  One year DS1 was very upset because Father Christmas hadn't bought me a present and he said 'but you are a very good mum!!!

This year is no exception - 'except' that I spent a tad more than I usually do.  This is what I bought myself!  I have always wanted one and while at a retreat a few months ago one of the other retreatees mentioned that she was going to advertise her Treadle Machine.  As I know this person and know she would have looked after it I jumped right in and said I would be interested.

I got my DS3, whose car is bigger than mine, to go with me and naturally loved it from the first look.  Now it is in my house.  But the question is 'How do I wrap it and put it under the tree!'

Isn't she a little beauty!!

Ps. I hope no-one is listening, but a week or so ago I did spend a bit more - I purchased two vintage quilt tops, but I'll show these at a later date - have to work out how to photograph them without taking them outside in the bright sunlight.  One is circa 1870-90 and the other is circa early 1900s.  Can't wait to show you these, I love them.

Ricky Timms is coming to Australia

Quilter, Singer, Musician, Writer, TV Star is coming to Australia in September 2012.  The Australian Machine Quilters Assoc is having a one-day seminar at their Quilt Festival in Adelaide and if you want to attend you need to go over to their website here, and get the details. I'm going to register - just love his work and also have some CDs of his show with Alex Anderson.  Anyone want to join me - maybe share a room???

I won!!!!

Ocassionally when I see a give-away on someone's blog and if it is something I would like I enter.  Once or twice over the years I have won something.  This time over at Dye Candy, Chris was giving away a copy of one of the latest Jennifer Chiaverini's books - The Wedding Quilt.  I have all the others up to this one and had it on my Christmas Wish List.  I just received an email from Chris to say I WON!!!  How good is that!  Please go over and look at her blog - she has some fantastic things there, especially love her jewellery and of course her dyed fabrics.

My apology

if I have made it harder for you to comment on my blog.  BUT, I have had to put in an extra step - I will be viewing postings before allowing them to be published.

Reason being over the last couple of weeks I have had some spam postings come in and luckily I have been able to delete them before they were up for too long.  I have a spam checker but these guys/gals are clever, so for the near future you will see a message that says I need to approve before posting goes public.

Again, my apologies but it is a necessary step that I have to take - don't want any of my readers to be caught up in the 'net' as well.

Link for lovers of the history of quilting

Doing some surfing the other day (as one does when one should be sewing!!!) and came across this fantastic site - The Quilt Index.  It's a resource and reference tool that gleans its information from very large and varied resources, such as museums, private collections, etc. The information on this site is mind-boggling.  They have a blog also and you can read it here. When checking out the blog scroll down to a posting on 1 Dec 2011 and have a look at the Embroidered Quilt by The Ilingelihle Women’s Project, in South Africa. Absolutely stunning.

Some of the quilts on this site are not old, but are significant in that they are reflective in their interpretation of life in different counties and societies today.

I will definitely be checking this site regularly.

Battings tested

A fellow quilter here in Aust, Linda Steele, has written an excellent article on the comparison on quilting with different battings.  You can read about it on her blog here with some surprising results especially with the thread that she used for the examples.  I generally use a cotton batting, but will now think of changing to a wool/poly mix.  Thanks Linda for taking the time to do this.