Queen Daisy and picks of the week

Last week soooo many boxes of fabrics were delivered. I didnt have time to look through them all, or what was around the counter but these beautiful fabrics were my favorites. I loved the collection "Stripettes" as the colours were unusual, and the designs a little different, my favorites being the red stripe at the back of the photo as when a colour like this is used it can soften a red, or great to use with appliques when you are looking for shadings with oranges, reds or pinks.
The gold stripe was just a gorgeous shirting, and it came in a green stripe also. I loved both of them, beautiful for backgrounds and for sashings, especially when you want a very narrow sashing. Gold will work with most colourways, so great for putting in your stash.
The blue fabric is to die for, and a big piece of this fabric came home with me. The shade of blue is stunning, it has a hint of green, black ink work which I love but best of all it has a completely different shade of blue on the flowers which allows you to combine blues which sometimes might not work together.
So that is how I looked at what came out of the boxes!

This week I have to mail off my "Queen Daisy" quilt for an exhibition in Melbourne next month. It appeared on the cover of "Quilter's Companion" last year and as it is ten years of the magazine they are featuring their favorite quilts at the exhibition. I love this quilt, it is perhaps my favorite. It is a reproduction of the centre of a British quilt as featured in the book" Quilt Treasures of Great Britain".
I made the quilt at the time of the Royal Wedding in Denmark, and a friend of mine was dancing in a ballet there as part of the pre wedding celebrations. It was very exciting, he met Denmark's Queen Daisy and I was reminded of picking daisies as a child with some elderly neighbors who taught me to search for king and queen daisies amongst the millions of daisies in their fields.
Before making this quilt. I could rarely make up a class of girls keen enough to attempt applique, but when I made this quilt. we had so many girls who became addicted to applique. So it was the beginning of a journey for many people.
I hope Australia post and the exhibition look after it for me!

Home to Roost

Sometimes at the shop we just cant wait for certain fabrics to arrive. This month I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of these gorgeous treasures. There were about 18 fabrics all up in the collection, and I will be taking a little of each home. I loved them so much I actually cant wait to sew something with them.
We have been doing lots of buying the past week and the fabric is wonderful this year. I think the economic crisis has forced the companies to be more careful with their ranges of fabrics.
Whatever, there are some super gorgeous fabrics to come.

a job half done

My husband Michael thinks I will never get my rooms of fabric sorted out. Maybe I wont, I don't really care. I have been collecting fabric for about 45 years, so there are lots of treasures to make acquaintance with, as I sort out the mess. I have been finding so many gorgeous fabrics I forgot I had ( blues and greens this week). And just to show those husbands who moan and groan ( we get them in the shop when they should be at Bunnings) this is what 50% of a serious fabric collection looks like.
Yes I like fabric! And yes this is not quite half of it.
Some of the fabric I had never unpacked since I moved from Melbourne to Hobart 21 years ago.

Christine is back from New Zealand, and had a gorgeous time catching up with family, seeing her grandsons ( they are just beautiful!!) and catching up with her sisters. Christine's sister is more than prolific with the amount of work she gets through and Christine has brought back some of her hard work. She has appliqued "Plain Jane" for Christine so I am hoping to see it the next few days. My Plain Jane still needs the border appliqued as the bias unravelled and I need to pull it all off and remake the bias stems. When I see her quilt I am hoping it motivates me to get mine out and fix and finish it.

the week that has been mine

I have had a lovely week. It has been the first week since about June last year, I have not had someone breathing down my neck to have something finished for them ( perhaps it was the silence that followed my announcement I was retiring). I had no classes this week other than my Monday night girls, no reps to see and no notes or newsletters etc. Pure bliss!

So with all the free time, I embarked upon a few new projects. There is nothing like starting something new. First up was to cut out a few blocks for the "Duck Hill " BOM quilt we are starting next month. It is a very cute whimsical quilt. The full picture is in the Roderick Kiracofe book, "An American Quilt". I am going to Sydney for the weekend (Christine described it as baggage), so I might get a bit of that appliqued. They are big easy pieces.

Next project was to start drawing and selecting fabrics for a new small quilt. I have been undecided as to whether I go with the original colours of cheddars, hot pinks and greens, or something that is kind to my current mood- restful and quiet!

My trip to the post office today was quite eventful. I was expecting my envelope from Karen Cunningham's correspondence school as knew it had arrived in Sydney, and I was hoping to read it while I was away. It wasnt there but a few other special surprises. First I had a gift of some little pieces of les Olivades fabrics, and then parcel no 2 was my catalogue of the forthcoming exhibition of quilts at the V&A, London. I have only skimmed through the book as I will read it on the plane tomorrow, but it looks wonderful.

discovering treasures and Ann Daggs update

I am hoping for a quiet week this week. Christine has gone to New Zealand for ten days, Jan is running things at the shop and other than tonight I have no classes. Last week was more than  hectic, the next stage of Ann Daggs had to be glued, notes written and packed, fabric club had to be mailed out and there was teaching for a few days also. How lovely it was to see almost everyone back at class after the summer. Most of the girls had caught up with their sewing over summer ( not me!) , we had grandmas with new babies, a special birthday and just news in general. I told the girls I was retiring in three years.

Friday morning before class, we had one of our four favorite reps pay a visit. There was so much gorgeous fabric to order. Some of it will be delivered quite soon, so I cant wait.

My plan this year is to take a little time off from work, and do some things of my own. So as I teach on Monday evenings, I have had a bit of quiet time to myself today, done a little hand piecing and ventured into the room all my fabric used to be stored. I have to walk through this room to get to my new room, so many times a day I am confronted by the explosion of mess that is in there. I have been making an effort each day to put at least a few pieces of fabric into my new room and I found so many treasures over the summer. I have discovered wonderful fabrics for quilt backs, pieces of Yuwa large and small, many quilt tops to quilt and more than a little bit of rubbish. All my putting away has made no difference to the tidiness of the room. However, I did manage to vacuum a small area before. Although I would love a fairy godmother to tidy it up for me ( they have offered) I also want to go through all my fabrics myself. If I find a treasure, it makes me happy and I am hoping to come a cross a few missing things.
The photo is of today's discoveries- a piece of Anne of Green Gables ( I think I will make myself a new little sewing bag instead of washing my other one) about a metre of Sarah Johnston blue border fabric
(still with its $3 sticker on it from the USA). I remember my husband was disappointed he brought me home some fabric I already had. I just thought he had good taste! The last little crumbs of a favorite Yuwa were what really delighted me. I will use them for some applique so they stretch themselves a little further.

And here is Ann Daggs. I am hoping to be up to date by Easter, but if I'm not I dont mind, I am enjoying the journey.

a bit of whimsy

I have been aware I needed to update this blog, but I was trying to get some work finished to post here! Neither happened, but this week is the last week of the month so I have been busy writing fabric club, busy doing the next blocks for the Browne Sisters sampler ( a little delayed as I glued block one onto the back of the fabric). Meanwhile I have had another trip to Melbourne to the doctor for me and to check on my father.
He started his second round of chemotherapy last week and is going along reasonably well. just not coping with the amount of his time being taken up with doctors visits, and missing out on golf.

I had a long wait myself at the doctors last week and realised I needed another very simple project to take along with me, so I went back to that huge pile of quilts I want to make before I die ( I will have to live a very long time)  and found a piece of beautiful whimsy. I have drawn most of the quilt and we will pack it as a block of the month, until we run out of the same fabric, then it will be on the waiting list for a pattern sometime next year. Whimsical quilts are my favorite things as I collect American folk art. I made the Finches years ago and now this will be a very exciting project for me.
Now I had better get to Monday night quilt class. Douglas is coming with me tonight.

back to work

Its February today and I cannot ignore the pile of mounting work, and tell myself I am too tired to touch it any longer. Summer school was exhausting and Christine and I are still hoping to find our brains. Despite all the hard work it was lovely to see so many of you and we hope you enjoyed yourselves.
Karen Cunningham brought along lots of gorgeous quilts and inspired me to embrace the year ahead once again.
I am mindful not to take on too much this year, as I have my father very ill, and I know I will have to increase my trips to Melbourne, so along with my own doctors visits to Melbourne, I am imagining quite a few trips in the car.
Summer school ended and two days later I had to go to Melbourne, then arrived back home and then my husband and I went to Hobart for four days. It was gorgeous, beautiful and cool, quiet and relaxing. I am glad I dont still live there, but its possibly my favorite place to visit.
There is a wonderful art supplies shop in Hobart "Artery", and as I also love to draw, I made my annual visit to the store. They have probably been there for years, but I found some great pencils, "progresso" graphite pencils. They are woodless pencils, finished in a lacquer, but absolutely wonderful to mark dark fabrics. They are easily sharpened and with a bit of sandpaper, the point can be kept sharp. Best thing is they were $1.70 each. I bought a silver and a white one, but they came in all colours.
Somehow I think we get a little ripped off with our quilting pencils! I have to go to Melbourne this weekend, so I will search for them down there. Now I have discovered them I need back up supplies!

In my few hours I have done anything, I started on my Hope Valley quilt. I had a pack of 25cm strips of each fabric, so along with my stash of black and white shirting fabrics, I am slowly piecing a quilt. It will be large as I am determined to use up fabric this year, and I just wanted a new quilt to put in the car. I had a pile of 2 1/2" squares left over from a few quilts, so that determined the size of the corner triangles. A big effort this week might see it finished.The collection is such a happy one, I love it.

Now I must get back to work, tonight I have my Monday night girls back for sewing. We have a new member Portia, born in the break, so I hope she comes with her mum.

Susan x