Back home

I have been tripping around the past week. Last week I went to Sydney and then on the weekend up to Toowomba to "Precious Time" teaching.
The girls were working on a variety of things, but a large group were commencing my BOM quilt"Stonefields"
I am nearing the end of it, a few blocks left to applique,two borders of the flying geese to make and a few more hexagons to make. All going well it should be ready to send off to Ireland at the end of February as planned.
I am borrowing a few photos from Lisa's blog at Precious Time

Lisa had a brand new design wall, so we christened it with the Stonefields blocks

Trish brought along her Ann Daggs. I had quilt envy as I have a few days of applique to finish mine. This was a quilt I did as a BOM several years ago.

I arrived home with finishitis so decided I will finish my "Little Sparrow" quilt for summer school. I have just a few pieces left to applique so I am planning on having it appliqued and quilted by January for our show and tell.

Meanwhile I am making my two quilts for summer school.
After a year of nothing but quilting, I am looking forward to a year when I can do a bit of knitting and crochet again next year. There are some beautiful knitting patterns around for children so the little girls I knit for, Mabel,Clemence, Imogen and Audrey might all have something special next year.

Sydney quilt show and lots of catching up

I am a bit behind in getting to this blog! thanks for all the concerned emails!

My father is getting better by the day and has a little quality of life back. He is up and about, going outside and even doing a few things around the garden this week. We went down to see him last week and he was looking the best we have seen him since Christmas.
After a weekend in Melbourne I flew the next day to Sydney to the quilt show and stayed a few more days and had some time to myself to wander around, see whats happening in the world of interior decorating and caught up with some friends and lots of fabric club members.
there werent as many quilts as I expected at the quilt show, but all the same some beautiful work.

Karen Cunningham gave me permission to put a photo of her quilt on our blog. This was probably my favorite quilt for many reasons- I have started this quilt and now have its beginnings shoved in a box. The quilt was hand quilted beautifully ( I felt some of the quilts at the show were so over quilted) and it hung straight. And most of all I love the quilt!
So here is Karen in front of her quilt doing white glove duty and looking like Miss Darling Harbour.

Here is the next little piece of the Ann Daggs quilt. Each month I cant believe how quickly it comes around and I dont think I have achieved anything between classes this time! I have a really busy July ahead of me so I will have to give up sleeping I think. I do enjoy watching the Tour de France, so I might see quite a bit of it this year.

We have had some great fabric delivered this week so I will go to work tomorrow with my camera and do some more posting in the next few days!
Happy sewing, Susan

catching up

I think I should have had this block posted up here several weeks ago!

and now for Ann Daggs

and finally the next piece of The Browne Sister's sampler

I goy myself into such a muddle when I did this block. I cut the pieces out in Melbourne, when I was at my parent's home when my father had a stroke a few weeks ago. Thinking I would be organised, I cut the pieces out for blocks, this one and the one in reverse. I tried to put them away carefully so they would not get mixed up and somehow they did. When I came to sew, it was like a jigsaw and and I have bits that should be on the other block on this one. I have tossed the rest and will do the second one a bit differently!

how grey is grey

It has been a busy week. I have spent most of it in Melbourne as my father is in hospital, very unwell. I came home last night and had to get stuck into my Ann Daggs today. I had the intention of being up to date at the end of next week but I have only stitched about four pieces this month. Maybe I might get a bit done over Easter.
Before last Thursday I was quietly enjoying a sew on the sewing machine. I was piecing stars in a quilt swap with my friend Rohan. He is traveling at the moment and said he would handpiece some stars but wanted to give away a quilt in may but wasnt going to get enough done in the time frame. We decided to do a swap, I would sew his quilt and he would sew a quilt I wanted to give away later in the year.
So Rohan's quilt had to match a floor rug which is all in greys. I have the picture and it is nice but quite a challenge as it needs to be grey and white. I have suggested a few other shades to be added to the greys but received a definite answer NO!! But as you can see I have been allowed to include some greyish blues and as they have grown in numbers, I am happy with the way it is looking.
I am still sewing my Hope Valley but I was waiting on some more black and white shirtings to come into the shop. Without any exaggeration there has been about 300 bolts of fabric delivered to the shop this week. I am sure somewhere amidst the boxes and bolts there must be some black and white shirtings!

My Ann Daggs is growing and although I havent made much time to sew it, I really love it. I am heading back to Melbourne on Saturday after my class, hopefully to see my father looking a little better, to go to the ballet and to check on my mother. She will be 80 in May and thinks she is superwoman.
My sister and I spent Monday morning trying to convince her she does not need to learn how to use a lawn mower.

and more Ann Daggs photos

more Ann Daggs photos from class

getting everything done

I have been more than a little busy the past week. I have had my friend, Joc, back to stay, tried to get the Ann Daggs for September done, mailed out our summer school mailout and answered so many emails, as well as getting some urgent quilting done. Summer school has almost booked out after 24 hours, which is great but kept us busy at the telephone and computer. I still have quite a bit of work to do before now and January!

Christine still has no baby news from New York but the baby is due today and Simon said Julie has had quite a few false starts, so I am assuming in the next few days. Christine and Bob leave for New York, with a stop off in San Francisco on the way, on the weekend. Getting everything done before she leaves, will no doubt work like drugs when she finally gets on the plane. She should sleep until San Francisco I think.

On Friday and Saturday we had the Ann Daggs class. Quite a few of the girls who are doing the quit by correspondence dropped in to see what the class girls are doing. I thought I had taken more photos than what I had in my camera, so I will have to add next month, but they are looking gorgeous.

My life was a bit chaotic on the weekend, Michael went down to Geelong to watch the football at the Cattery, met up with Paige and her friend, and then drove back here Saturday night ( in a much happier mood than last year). Paige has the week off this week so is coming home later in the week, so I am trying to get work done before they arrive.