A Crafty Weekend

Sometimes a crafty weekend is all you need!
Friday night dinner was yummy porterhouse steak and potato bake. I usually make it with lots of cream and tasty cheese, but this version I used chicken stock instead (a bit more healthier).

B-Fab visited the Zumbo Pop-Up shop at the Cullen Hotel on Friday, and arrived with these - top is Milo, bottom is Pina Colada. O.M.G.

A bit of Friday night crafting (and a typical shaky blurry photo from me - damn anti-rejection meds)!

It's so lovely to have a houseguest that makes hot milo and serves up dessert while I'm sewing!

On Saturday, we picked up Michelle and headed to Geelong to visit Jennifer at A Piece Of Cloth.
We spent over two hours here - it's completely amazing. So many beautiful vintage quilt tops and vintage fabrics, and Jennifer is an absolute font of knowledge about them - everything from age, fabric type, the types of dyes used..... and so on!

Most definitely worth a road trip for anyone who loves fabric.

Next stop was lunch - we celebrated International Bacon day in style!

.... and then headed across the road to visit Joy (with jazz hands of course)

Just around the corner was this sweet little shop named Frank & Dollys - lots of lovely things and great service (unlike another handmade shop we visited later in the day - we were being watched as if we were going to shoplift and didn't even get a hello when we walked in. NO money was spent there)!

Hope everyone had a lovely fathers day!

Not everything goes as planned

I had grand plans this week. Lots of blog posts in my head. Unfortunately exactly zero of those posts came to fruition!

Life got overtaken by hospital visits once again. My three month routine bronch went a little awry and I ended up staying in hospital rather than coming straight home.

Now I'm back at home recovering, with all weekend plans cancelled (including bike riding), and trying to catch up.

What I really wanted to do this week was to finally show the finished quilt that B-Fab and I made for Cathie's upcoming arrival.

All those vintage sheet squares were so soft and snuggly. I hope the new bubba loves it!

This photo is just to show my new appreciation of hand stitched binding. I was ooohinh and aaahing at it once I'd finished.

I have another girlfriend who just had a new bubba so I might even try my hand at making a baby quilt all by myself....  but I have a couple of other projects that I need to finish first, so I really should get off the computer and get cracking!

Sunday Snippets... the Nurseslave edition

One of the rules after my transplant was that someone has to stay with me for the first three months.

My mum has been staying during the week, and I've been so lucky to have a wonderful group of friends who have put their hands up to come and stay on weekends.

This weekend it was B-Fab's turn on the roster (and yes, OCD control freak me has an excel roster going on).
 

We cut lots and lots of five inch squares from vintage sheets and pillowcases... and took two trips to Spotty for sustenance.

.... and then I watched as Brianna did all of the hard work piecing it together...

... before she cooked me a gourmet dinner.

Michelle coined the brilliant #nurseslave hashtag over on instagram. Trust me - it fitted perfectly!


Please excuse the blurry action shot but the anti-rejection meds make me really shaky!

While the puddings cooked, she cut out all the pieces for her second quilt top of the day.

Before it was time for the piece de resistance...

She had me exhausted just watching!

Hey Sunday Snippets is back over at Tinniegirl today - Yah!

The Happiest Place In The World

Gosh the blogosphere is an amazing place.

Despite the fact that we only ever hear negative stories about blogging in the general everyday media, I have to say that the crafty blogosphere is one of the happiest places on earth. Maybe it's even our very own adult version of Disneyland?

May I present proof....

Specimen Number One:

This surprise package of loveliness arrived in my mailbox last week from Virtually Sally. Beautiful fabrics and thread (in my fave colours), crocheted coasters (gorgeous), a little granny square notebook to carry with me so I can record all of my brilliant crafty ideas on the run, and....

..... Rusty

He quickly made himself at home on the bookshelf.

Specimen Number Two:

B-Fab bought me this amazing Bacon Cookbook. It has every recipe you can ever think of that uses bacon... even desserts.

It's Baconpalooza brilliance!

Specimen Number Three:

Iona and I met up with Carly and her friend Jo at Finders Keepers on Friday night, and she'd bought me a pressie.

You can't really tell from my photo but it's the size of a matchbox.

I can't believe that she found something so teeny and tiny and beautiful with my name on it. She also didn't know that I'm a huge fan of Sweet William.

This is now living on my special treasures shelf.

So thankyou dear blogospherians.... you always make my days happier!

My B-Fabulous Quilt

It's Brianna's Birthday today, and a perfect time to show off her magnificent lap quilt!

A little while ago, she hosted a fabric giveaway on her blog featuring fabrics from the Kate Spain Terrain collection. I had my fingers and toes and everything crossed as I desperately wanted to win (I mean seriously... all those pinks and oranges were screaming my name).

Well, imagine my delight when I found out that I was the lucky winner!

But what was even better about this particular giveaway is that B-Fab was well aware of my penchant for procrastination, and my lack of skill and motivation in the quilting department.

So, instead of just giving my the fabric, she transformed it into this absolutely beautiful lap quilt.

I love it (who wouldn't)???

I'm saving this one.... (not for the pool room), but I'm putting it away with my hospital suitcase, so that I'll have something soft and snuggly and comforting when the time comes.

Thankyou so much Brianna. I hope you have a super fabulous birthday!!!

A Perfect Match

A little while ago, I made B-Fab and Boyance a personalised cushion as an engagement gift.

I knew that they were moving into a new place, and buying a new couch, so I was having a massive dilemma trying to choose the design colours. 

There was only one solution. I had to engage the specialised spying services of a double agent to find out the colour of the fabric on the couch, and make a cushion to match.....

But, the cushion was blue and grey.... and totally not B-Fab's colours at all.

So, a quick brainwave and.....

Voila!

The Happy Couple now have the perfectly matching set!

The best bit about crafty blogging...

...is most definitely the people that you meet.

Red Brick Gallery

Where else can you find so many likeminded souls who'll spend an entire day chatting about craft and fabric and blogging and op shopping?

Thankyou so much to Brianna (my personal navigator), Vic & Punky, Bianca, Abbe & Harvey, Jodie, and Sel for coming along for a slightly forgetful and disorganised day out in Ballarat.

Ballarat Patchwork

PS - I'll be back tomorrow with some photos from the fabulous Group Exhibition at Red Brick Gallery. Can't wait to show you my favourite piece!

A very late engagement

Sometimes handmade gifts don't quite get made in time for an occasion...

The fabric panels arrived on Tuesday and I madly scrambled to get this cushion finished so that I could take it along to NCB lastnight for B-Fab (please forgive the hastily taken blurry iPhone snaps as I was running out the door).

Just in case the design doesn't make any sense to you.... that's the happy couples first initials.

....and here it is in its new home - on Boyance's couch!

Advent Blog-a-Long Day 3... late with an excuse

Whoops! I didn't quite make it before midnight for day 3, but I have a perfectly good excuse.

I was too busy celebrating with the happy couple!

Go Granny - Exclusive Behind the Scenes...

Apologies lovely readers - I know I promised to show the Go Granny behind the scenes photos last week, but then life and general craziness and phone problems and babysitting took over... yadda yadda yadda... you know how it is!

I must thank Brianna for snapping some photos while we working away trying to get the colours just right (and of course, for making me cups of tea).

It's actually quite cool to have some photos to document the final design process.

This was the very first print...

Checking the design size.

A few more rows....  check out that printer head whizzing past!

This was the first full metre printed...

The Money Shot!

Thankyou so much to Michelle from Frankie and Swiss for her invaluable help and hard work at such short notice. I was kind of in a huge rush to get printing...

Can't wait to get stitching with it now!

PS - I have panels listed in the shop but it's also available as metreage... just purchase multiple panels and I'll cut as one piece.

Featured Hottie Number 44

Tonights fabulous hottie is by Brianna (or B-Fab as we like to call her) from Rolling In Fabric

Brianna is a fantastic quilter... as you can see from her lovely patchwork hottie.

Stripey binding - swoon!

Thankyou so much Brianna.

It seems that I've made it to the end of the Hotties in the Flickr Group. If I haven't featured your hottie right here on the blog, please add it to the Flickr Group ASAP.

....and of course, if you haven't yet been to Open Drawer to see them in person, then quick sticks before the 24th!