Hello

As mentioned in my previous post way back in April, I have been busy with family stuff. Hopefully I think it has all been resolved, except that I now have DS3 (Warwick) living back home - not just his 'stuff' but him as well.  Having spread myself out over the past few years in my little house, I now have to 'compact' a lot of stuff (that word again!!).  But this exercise has been good in one way - I have had to make strong decisions about what is really worth keeping and what is not. 

At the same time I have found some photos of stuff I have made over the years and given away as gifts etc.

Decided to scan these onto the computer so they wont get lost in the future.  Here are some - the first one is an old photo of me and my very first quilt, a scrappy pyramid.

The second one a basket wallhanging.

And the third is a sampler made in country style colours and material.  The original pattern came from Marti Michell.

I'm also learning to navigate myself around the new look Blogger. 

So much has changed since I last posted.

Oops, I've forgotten to change the aspect of the last photo.  You will have to turn your head to look at it properly...sorry about that.

Stuff etc - I'm sort of still here....accumulating stuff...

My apologies for neglecting my blog.  I have been busy with family stuff.  Hopefully most stuff has now settled down a bit. My mum's unit has now been sold and was settled last week so all the sorting/cleaning etc is finished.  I still have quite a few boxes of stuff in my house that need to find a good home.  DS2 returned from 5 years in Qld (Noosa) and bought all his stuff, even though he is sharing a house with a couple of mates, says his stuff wont fit there!  Then DS3 whose house has just been sold - please mum, can I store some of my stuff at your place until I get new digs!

Amongst all this stuff happening, I had a wonderful 5 days in Kiama last month at the annual Scquilters Retreat - 120+ other quilters from around Oz invaded the small coastal town just below Sydney.  In Melbourne we had the annual Australasian Quilter's Convention and Show and I masqueraded as an Angel for 2 days - the first doing White Glove duty in the Show area answering questions, showing the backs of quilts and making sure no-one bought in food or drink.  The second day was working as a Tutor's Angel with Gloria Loughman, an Australian Landscape Quilt Artist.  Both days were fantastic and I will definitely do it again.

After all of this, next week I'm off on holiday - flying to the US with DS1, DDIL and granddaughter.  We're going to NY, Chicago and Boston AND Disneyland!!!!!  Can't wait to experience this with a 4 yo who firmly believes the 'real Cinderella and the real Snow White' live there.  Not the pretend ones!  The real ones!

Hope to post again before I leave as there has been lots of other things happening around here.  I have even finished a couple more UFOs, but still have to take the photos.

Take care,
Joy

Another PhD completed

Would you believe this quilt was first started in 2002 with a block exchange between our little Tuesday night group of eight girls.  When we did this exchange we had only been quilting for a couple of months, so everyone was a beginner.  The idea of the exchange was to learn new techniques - each month one of us chose a block that we liked and gave out instructions for making the block with some suggestions of colour etc.  Most were pieced, but I chose an applique as I particularly wanted to learn this technique.  The cups/mugs symbolised our many cups of coffee/tea that was consumed while we had our little gatherings.

It was a few years later I came across the patterns for the teapots in the first round of corners and the coffee mugs in the final round corners and also incorporated the words.  Unfortunately, they are a tad bit hard to read in the photo because of the light thread I used.  But they say:

"If you are cold tea will warm you,
If you are hot it will cool you,
If you are depressed it will cheer you,
If you are excited it will calm you."

Now onto my next PhD (Project half done)....

What Sharon won...

These are the Fat Qtrs that I sent to Sharon after my blog giveaway.  I wanted to make sure she had received them before posting a picture. 

I contacted Sharon when her name was pulled out to ask if she wanted any particular colour or style.  She told me she was collecting some autumn materials for The Farmer's Wife quilt.  This is what I chose.  Sharon was thrilled with them. 

Australia Day

Let's celebrate today with the same guts and determination our forebears did when they arrived in this harsh, but beautiful land.  Throw a lamb chop on the barbie!!!

In Dorothy McKellar's iconic poem she says - 'I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains, of rugged mountain ranges and droughts and flooding rains'.  Droughts and flooding rains couldn't be more true  when it was written than the past couple of month's events.  Most of Australia has been in a drought for 5-10 years or more and especially where I live, we have had Stage 4 Water Restrictions for the past 5 years - that means:  no washing or hosing windows;  cars;  lawns;  etc. Garden beds can only be watered by 'hand only' and then on certain days of the week and only for 2 hours.

Over the past 6 months or so most of Australia has had more rain than our dams and rivers can handle so hence the devastating floods in the Eastern half Australia.

You ask - 'with droughts, floods, bush fires, some of the most poisonous spiders and snakes in the world, sharks and stingers in your oceans - what is it like to live in Australia?'

Bloody beautiful!   We have a strong feeling of mateship that comes from some of the above situations/disasters.  We dig-in and help our neighbours.  I believe we are tolerant and accepting of all people and we welcome newcomers to this land with open arms.  It is because of these newcomers (I don't like the word immigrant) that we have a wonderful multi-cultural society and all that brings to a country.

I wouldn't live anywhere else.

...Joy



First ATC for 2011

I can now show you my first ATC made for the International Birthday Swap organised by Kate North in the UK.  Sheila (who was the first recipient) has now received it and has posted photos to her album in the group's page.

For this particular one I used some water soluble and stitched a grid over it.  Then I laid down some ribbons and stitched them down then kept adding more stitches and bits and pieces and finally washed the soluble away.  I had to wash a couple of times as the stitched piece was quite stiff.  Finally I cut it into 4 ATC sizes and for Sheila's I attached it to a piece of black velvet and then added some embellishment and finally edged it.  Not sure how I will finish off the other three - would like to make them look different for each person.  You can see here the one edged with green is Sheila's.

Unfortunately, I wont be able to post pics here until after they have been received.

Congrats Sharon

Sharon, you were the winner of the Fat Qtrs.  Congratulations.  DS3 said everyone's comments were good and honest.  So we put the names in a hat and out came Sharon's.  I will be in touch with you very soon.
Thanks everyone for playing along.  Not a lot of players, but I thought it was a fun thing to do that I will do this again. Maybe on a significant visitor number - ie 4,000 - my stats show 3,500 or perhaps a significant date on the calendar! I will put my thinking cap on and let you know in a few days what I come up with.  This is a great way to reduce my stash, which is getting too big for the cupboard I am using.

I have tried other means of reducing it but to no avail.  A couple of retreats I went to last year they had Fat Qtr raffles where you take along some of your collection and for each piece you receive a ticket and throughout the retreat at various times they draw a number and the winner gets a bundle of Fat Qtrs - well each time I won a bundle it was more than what I had actually taken along!!! My stash increased instead of being reduced.

I really love all my material but there is a lot which I will never ever use as my tastes and my quilting is going in a different direction than when I first started.  It's all good quality material I don't like seeing it sitting there looking very sad that it is not being used.

Thanks again everyone,

Take care,
Joy

How much do you spend on your hobby? And a surprise giveaway.....

I came across this interesting link about how much quilters in the US spend on their hobby.  It has been quoted that some spend $500US a month - wow even with our dollar at parity with the US$ and knowing the difference in their prices per yd as compared with our prices per mtr that is still a lot of money.




http://www.commercialappeal.com/news/2010/aug/02/focus-quiltmaking-sew-big/

My question is - How Much Do You Spend?  And Where, local shop, web, quilt shows?  You have to be truthful and as you know it is only 350 days to next Christmas Santa is still watching..... The best original and truthful answer, judged by my DS3 will receive 6 fat quarters from my stash.  But you must leave your email addy so I can contact you.  You have until next Saturday 15 January 2011 at 5.00pm (EST in Australia)

...Joy

A give-away on 3Creative Studios blog

If like me you are fan of this blog and also the girl's website you must go over and see what they are doing for the year.  It looks exciting.  This week they are having a fantastic give-away (3 in fact) of some of their fabulous stuff and all you have to do is comment on their blog here to be in the running.  I get a second chance of winning by posting their link here. But of course if too many of you go and post a comment that means my chances are less.  Boo Hoo.......

Sign of the times??

DS3 Warwick and DGD Jorja playing with games on iphones........Jorja has her father's, that's his feet you can see.  By the way, she can see through her hair......