Spring is coming....

How do I know?  Instead of green, green, green, some colour is starting to showing in my garden. 

My Fresias are up but still green. 

Not a lot of colour yet, but this is a start.

After 12 years a labour of love is finished!!

It is 12 years since I first started my hexagon quilt - Nell's Garden.  Finally it is finished and on my bed!

Nell's Garden

 I've called it 'Nell's Garden' in memory of a dear Aunt who taught me to sew, knit and embroider when I was a little girl.  She loved her garden and she also loved making hexagons.  Auntie Nell had them all over her house - even the curtains in her spare bedroom were made from hexagons!  Most special of all I was allowed to take the papers out!!  How good was that?  When she knew her time was coming she gave me her cardboard shapes - a whole shoe box full - my uncle who worked for a Greeting Card company had them specifically cut on the guillotines at work using some of the excess greeting card paper.  They measure 7/8", not sure why they are this size.

When I started to cut out the material I chose to fussy cut the centres of the flowers to represent something that is found outside or in the garden.  You can see from the following two pictures some of the centres.

 For the border I chose a brick red to 'fence' her garden and make it safe for all the kids who used to play there.  You can also see that I quilted (by hand) around each hexagon.  That is why it has taken so long to finish.

It truly was a labour of love.

Have you heard about

'Quilt @ Winter School'?  The wonderful Glenys who organises Fibre Arts in Ballarat each year and other week long fibre arts retreats/schools has put together a fabulous 'Quilt @ the Winter School' for next year - 2013.  There is a great selection of tutors AND the best thing is you work with the one tutor for the week, so you can complete your project, not take it home half-done and then put it away for another day.  How many times have you done that and then forgotten about it?

Plus, there is NO cooking or housework for a whole week (5 days).  To find out more click here or above - the link will take you to her website and all the information is there.  While there have a peek at some of the other schools she has organised - there is even one in Darwin!

In case any of you are interested(?) I have booked into the class with Carolyn Sharkey.  So I'm on the hunt for some fabulous photos and images that I can work with.  I will post some pics when I have the photos.

Please go and have a look at Glenys' site and really really think about joining the rest of us.

A relaxing week at Hall's Gap

A fortnight ago I spent 5 days relaxing, sewing and chatting (not in that order) at a retreat in Hall's Gap, in the Grampian Ranges north of Melbourne.  There were 14 of us altogether. 

Most of us only get together once a year for this special time as we come from all over Victoria and Mt. Gambier in Sth Australia.  It's a fabulous time and the Retreat where we stay backs onto the National Park, and we get a lot of wildlife coming around - this inquisitive Roo thought he was going to join us for morning tea!!!!

I was very pleased with myself as I was able to complete 12 blocks of the pattern 'Patriots in Petticoats', a pattern from Common Threads Quilting.  I adore this pattern as the setting is very different from a lot of other reproduction quilt patterns.

There are 16 blocks of this size (12") plus a larger one in the middle and a border of log cabins set in a ribbon pattern.