CLICKITY CLACK, HOOK AND STITCH

Hi everyone. The past week I have been knitting, crocheting and stitching frantically. I have finished the charity blanket which was knitted by mum , stitched together by me and the border crocheted by me. This is the first time I have attempted to crochet the edge. Last week at knitting group, ( we meet every Wednesday) , one of the lovely ladies kindly showed me how she does it . I was determined to learn and this is the result. Our knitting group has knitted over 600 blankets for charity within 3 years as well as knitting trauma teddies, penguin jumpers etc.

Meanwhile, I have nearly completed a lap blanket that I am knitting for the group and may have a photo of it stitched up and edged with crochet next time.

I also completed 3 more Farmer's Wife blocks.

I have now done about 30  blocks for this quilt and find them to be quite addictive.

I am signed up with Sue Daley's "Block to Block" and the 3rd lot arrived this month. I haven't started it yet but plan to later this year. I just love the fabrics that arrive each month.

Speaking of fabric, I went to Spotlight last week and bought these fabrics for my Farmer's Wife quilt. They are not Civil War reproductions like I have been mainly using but I think they will go nicely.

Did you make anything for Easter? All I did was these cute eggs I found instructions for on the Red Brolly blog. Bronwyn Hayes always has such wonderful ideas and tutorials.

Since my last blog entry I recieved another beautiful birthday pressie from the talented Vicki of The Pickledish Patch.

Thankyou  for visiting my little cyber space home. I am now heading off to knit, stitch and crochet some more. Many angel blessings to you all.

COLLECTIONS AND OTHER THINGS

I don't know about you but I love collecting things. I collect cats, chooks, owls, witches, tins and boxes. In more recent times, especially being a stitcher, I have been collecting ceramic souvenir thimbles , pincushions and also wooden cotton reels since I discovered that they stopped manufacturing the wooden reels in the 1970s. I have been looking everywhere for a wooden thimble rack but could never seem to find one so I asked my dad to make me one. Look at what my darling dad made for me.

Isn't it lovely! I have put all my thimbles on it and my wooden cotton reels. There is a lip on the edge of the shelves to stop them falling off if they wobble towards the edge . I know this sounds strange but we have wooden floors and when you walk past some things tend to move a little.

Last week I found another cute tin from an Op Shop. It is not an unusual one but I particularly like it.

On the weekend my girlfriend took me to lunch for my birthday at a little cafe we love in Tyabb which just happens to be next door to one of our favourite patchwork shops. So, naturally, I had to come home with some more fabrics for my Farmer's Wife quilt project.

Today I opened my pressie from Barb that has been sitting on my table unopened but well squished and fondled. Thankyou Barb it is just gorgeous!

Isn't it lovely! Barb is a very talented lady who makes many gorgeous things like this. She crochets as well as doing stitchery, patchwork and quilting. When I can work out how, I shall add a link to her blog on here.

For my birthday, among other surprises, my lovely man gave me this.

Yep! It is a Spotlight voucher. He certainly knows his way to my heart. More fabrics here I come.

AND

The pressie from my parents came in this beautiful box.

So spoilt! ( And I love it hehehe)

So what am I stitching? Currently I am working on this stitchery pincushion that is a free pattern on  the Red Brolly blog. I love Bronwyn Hayes stuff. Hopefully, or is that hopfully, I will finish it in time for Easter to add to my pincushion collection.

Talking about birthday pressies, it was Barb's birthday yesterday and I made her this.

Thanks for stopping by. Tell me if you have the collector's bug too. What do you collect?

Angel Blessings to you all. 

A FINISH WEEKEND

No, I did not go to Finland for the weekend. What a trek that would be!  For the past few days I have been determined to complete a few projects . A while ago I did some stitcheries and pieced the top of a tablerunner that was in one of the magazines.

The original pattern was done using  1930's reproduction prints but I wanted to use a  pack of Charm Squares that I had  and  my Cottage Garden threads for the stitcheries. I did the stitcheries on white linen. Here are some closeups of the stitcheries. I love the Cottage Garden variegated threads.

I am rather pleased with how the tablerunner turned out. And it is just for me.  I also completed the 4 Gail Pan pincushions I had made stitcheries for.

I completed a birthday present I have been working on for a girlfriend but I cannot show it to you until next week because chances are she will look in here and I want it to be a surprise.  Last week  I completed another Henrietta Whiskers block and also realised that I hadn't appliqued the sign on a previous one I showed you, so here they are.

AND 3 more Farmer's Wife blocks.

Okay, away from the sewing now. I couldn't resist buying some more lovely yarn and a knitting pattern. The cotton is to make a vest for myself and the 2 balls of Noro  are to make a scarf.

The knitting bag was from one of those discount stores. I need  a few  bags for different knitting projects just like I need a variety of project boxes and bags for my patchwork and quilting. Do you have heaps of bags and boxes to keep things in order?

Thanks for visiting again. I love your feedback as it keeps me inspired. I also enjoy looking at your blogs too. Angel Blessings. 

MORE BLOCKS, BIBS AND BIRTH SAMPLER

Hi everyone, Thankyou for visiting me again. I have finished another 4 blocks of the Farmer's Wife Quilt Sampler.

I completed one when I went overseas last Friday.  Yep, overseas from Sorrento to Queenscliffe on the ferry to visit the quilting group at Pt Lonsdale, The Lonsdale Lights. About 19 of our patchwork group met at Sorrento for the 9-00am ferry across the great waters to have a day of  chatting, eating and show and tell.  This is an annual trek we make and the Pt Lonsdale girls visit us later in the year. They are a lovely talented bunch of ladies, and we look forward to catching up every year.

I finally completed the last birth sampler and bibs for my newest great niece, Miley. I have made the same birth samplers in different colours and the same bibs for my great nephew, Ondre and other great niece,  Lillah. All 3 babes were born between November and February so I have been rather busy. I like that kind of busy.

The past week I received the 2nd pack from Patchwork with Busyfingers ( Sue Daley)  "Block to Block Fabric Club". This is a monthly club where you receive  8 x  fat 1/8ths of reproduction fabrics  and a couple of block patterns. I shall be hand piecing mine. No surprise there!  The first pack came with some lovely templates which will be useful for a number of projects.



And finally, on a whim, I bought this cute little tray today.

   Until next time, angel blessings to you all.

WHAT'S IN THE BOX?

I thought I would show you one of my "ready to go" project boxes.  This one is for my "Farmer's Wife Quilt Sampler" (FW) blocks.


 



Inside this box is another box among other things.

This one has my embroidery scissors, a selection of threads, my handy needle threader, and my nifty Clover finger press. Seeing that I use size 9 needles I really do need the threader sometimes, especially when I am doing a lot of handstitching. 

I keep the pre -cut  blocks in little plastic bags which are labelled with the block names.

And  the current block I am working on is also in the box pinned to the calico.

Here is a photo of the latest blocks I have completed.

And finally, another Henrietta Whiskers block.. 

Thankyou for visiting . I would love to know how you store your projects and whether you have any other "ready to go" storage ideas. 

ANOTHER TIN AND OTHER THINGS

Hi everyone. Despite this past week having been rather busy for me dealing with a bit of a crisis at this end I have still managed to get a little bit of stitching done. It is not as much as I would have liked to achieve but at least I did some. While I was checking out an Op Shop the other day I came across another tin. This is a specialty tin from The Silver Crane Company stock box range which was made in the U.K . ( No, I am not that savvy when it comes to tins,I took that all from the back of the tin).

It says " Fresh Fruit" but the light hit the tin and the "F" cannot be seen. You like?

I had been handpiecing quite a few blocks of The Farmer's Wife Quilt Sampler but came to a grinding halt when I restarted other ongoing projects. Now that I have some more yummy fabrics for it I thought I'd get back into it again. Here is a photo of the block I completed yesterday .

I have another one in progress.  It is pinned to a piece of calico which helps keep all the bits in their right place. I have been known to stitch the wrong pieces together and I find this helps avoid any silly mistakes when one is a bit tired  or simply too busy chatting with others and drinking cups of coffee. As we do!

AND

What's in my hoop? A Teddlywinks design. I usually stitch in any other colour than red but I thought redwork looked rather sweet.

Until next time, keep well, keep happy and keep smiling.

Angel blessings.

THE FARMER'S WIFE, A SQUIRRIL AND MORE

Woohoo! I have had a wonderfully productive week. On Saturday I went to a Vic Quilters gathering in Tyabb and had a fantastic time. There was a lady there who was piecing the Insanity quilt, (in the proper size hexies) , and it looked magnificent in Kaffe Fasset fabrics.  It was so nice to see one nearly completed, unlike mine which is still awaiting the first 2 borders and is huge in comparison as I used larger hexies. Above is a photo of mine.

The patchwork shop was only a few doors down from where we were so I bought some more reproduction fabrics .

For what? The Farmer's Wife Quilt Sampler ofcourse!

Today I received 2 things in the mail.  Lynette Anderson's BOM  kit  In Full Bloom. The fabric range is gorgeous and it also included some Cosmo threads which I have been wanting to try.





The other thing that arrived was a book I had ordered before Christmas "Praire Children and Their

Quilts". I ordered it with some other books but it didn't arrive so I had to re-order it. I love little quilts , civil war quilts and  the history behind them.





My knitting group resumes tomorrow . We have knitted several hundred blankets for charity , slippers, penguin jumpers, teddy bears and now I am knitting facewashers. I found a lovely pure cotton yarn that I am knitting these with.

I almost forgot to show you 2 more of the Henrietta Whiskers blocks I have finished. Sorry about the colour. I don't know why it came out like this.

Here is a pic of the blanket I am also knitting for the group.

I should have warned you that there were lots of photos. I promise this is the end of today's post.
Clay and I thankyou for popping in again. Angel blessings.