September 1

I really wanted to put this post up yesterday while it was still August ... but I just ran out of day. So September the 1st it is! Hello Spring, I'm happy to see you!

This is the time of year when I'm spending a lot of time working on secret squirrell projects, but I do have some bits and pieces I can share with you - today I finished working on the applique block I will use in my Sarah Morrell quilt. I'm pretty happy with it:

I did some embroidery around the edge of the broderie perse flowers at the top as I wasn't satisfied with the edges, and I quite like how it looks - so I may do some additional embroidery at some point. Next up I'll make up a wreath style block, and beyond that I'm not sure. The little bits of broderie perse weren't too daunting, maybe I'll get more comfortable with it as I go along and ultimately make up some whole blocks. 

Recently I rescued a stitchery project from the archives. I had purchased some perle cotton with the gift voucher prize and this was what I thought I could use it for:

The flower and the lettering was all I'd done so far, so the ovel shape and the green box were what I did recently. It was just a fun little thing to work on for a bit, but I need to put it aside again so I can finish with my 'must do' projects. Mum and I are travelling to Europe next year, and this is what I'll take with me to work on on the plane and on train journeys. We're having fun with our planning, and I simply cannot wait until we head off.

I've also been putting more stitches in my wholecloth quilt - as I mentioned on Instagram, it won't be finished this year, and probably not next year either. But if I keep working at it, my wholecloth will be ultimately be complete.

This weeks fun news was that my Lily Rosenberry quilt has won another ribbon at the Royal Adelaide Show:

I never tire of seeing Lily hanging with her ribbons. Unfortunately my schedule means I'm not going to be able to get in to the show to see Lily in person, but I very much appreciate my friends sending me pictures to enjoy.

The last picture for today is Rowley-centric. We love taking him on long walks, and here is one from last weekend:

He's such a happy boy, and will happily head out for walkies two and three times a day. It's hard to wear him out.

Well, that's it from me for today. Hope you're all doing well - I'm off now to check for any comments I haven't responded to - I really have dropped the ball in that regard. Chatter soon lovely friends!

July 13th

Well, this has been the most exciting of weeks! As you know I finished my Lily Rosenberry quilt recently - I was working really hard to have it ready for our guild show. Tuesday was the day to hand the quilt off to guild committee, and I spent an anxious evening wondering if I'd remembered to trim away any stray threads, had I missed any dog hair etc. You know, stuff that you can't do a darn thing about ...

On Wednesday evening I got a call to ask if I was coming to presentation night as my quilt had won a prize. Ohhh my goodness I was so thrilled, and still kind of anxious. On Thursday to help with all that nervous energy I made myself a cute skirt to wear to presentation night - mostly to keep my mind busy. I sent a picture to my sister-in-law as she's getting into sewing ... here's what I made:

I love the big houndstooth, and I've got extra for some fun cigarette pants. You see Rowley there bottom right - he really wanted to get in on the picture too:

Sweet boy, he always wants to be in on the action. He's bugging at me to go for a walk right now ... it's late, and we'll drag him out shortly.

Anyway, I won't keep you in suspense any longer:

I was gobsmacked when I learned that my quilt had won 1st in Professional Applique, Best Hand Quilting, and the Retaining the Tradition award. And then I was rendered absolutely speechless when it was announced that my quilt had won Best of Show. Ohhh my goodness, I feel so lucky!

I spent Friday and Sunday at the show standing with my quilt chatting with old friends, making new friends and generally having a lovely time with the folks at the show. What a great weekend!

The major sponsor for our show was Bernina Australia, they're always incredibly supportive, and my prize for Best of Show was this darling Bernina 570QE machine.

Thank you Bernina Australia!

And the cherry on my sundae was learning that my dear friend and quilting twin Zara Zannettino had won runner up to Best of Show. I was so thrilled to share the stage with such a wonderful person and huge quilting talent.

Last of all for this week, I managed to get another Morrell quilt block made in the evenings as I was winding down. I had this block about one third pieced on the machine, and I was just so unhappy with how it was going together - with so many Y seams, points weren't meeting as well as I'd like them to, and it was just looking a mess:

So I pulled the block apart entirely, and used all the pieces to hand stitch it together. I'm so much happier with how it looks now:

So, that has been my news over this past week. Honestly, I feel like I'm floating on cloud nine. I'll check back in again soon, though I'm sure I won't have any news to beat this in a good long time!

May 14th

I'm just so entirely thrilled, on Wednesday last week I put the final stitches in my Lily Rosenberry quilt. It was such a relief to have it finished finally - I wasn't sure I'd be able to get it done to the deadline I set for myself at the end of last year. The first pic is while it was laid out drying in the lounge room:

It's on a hanging rail now so I can see if it hangs nice and flat, and so far so good. When I started quilting the top I didn't really have any plans for the quilt and so I quilted at leisure, and in the end it took about three years. But I'd say that more than half of the quilting was done in the final year, there were stretches of time prior to that where I didn't work on it at all and was distracted by other things.

I love the texture of the crosshatching, when the light is just right it really shows well. I did plan to do more interesting quilting with feathers and such in the border, but the background fabric with text that I chose is quite busy and the quilting texture just didn't show up well at all.

This finish makes me so happy, and I'm extra happy to be able to pick up other projects in the sewing room and also do some tidying in there with a clear mind.

So I've picked up a couple of Morrell quilt blocks, and finished this one which I put aside last year. I originally had some hexagons to accessorise this block but they just didn't seem to work, so I've done some broderie perse and I'm much happier. This block is now complete, and I also finished another block yesterday which I've yet to photograph. 

I also picked up some of the tiny nine patches and sewed them together. Though they're tiny, the pinning and stitching takes just as long as larger blocks, so I'll keep plugging away at those.

Last of all today, I wanted to share the lovely treat Amy found for me for Mother's Day. She knows my love of dishes and china, and tracked this lovely Masons Vista treat:

It's a darling ginger jar. Amy must search for ages leading up to special occasions as it's rare to see Masons Vista pieces in the wild lately. I'm so thankful to have such a thoughtful and caring daughter. 

So that's all I have to share today. Now that I have my all consuming project out of the way, hopefully I'll be able to blog more frequently and potentially participate in some of the zoom quilt happenings at times. Chatter soon lovely friends - thank you for sticking with me!

March 30th

Hello there friends, let me see if I can remember how to use this thing ... it seems like such a long time since I've written. And it is actually a while - just over a month!

I have been super focused on hand quilting Lily Rosenberry, I'm pushing hard to get it finished, and I feel like I just may be able to get it done. As soon as I'm done on the computer this evening, I'll get right back to it:

All the corners are done now, and I have only about one third of the last side to do between the blocks and the applique border. And then I'll do the final lines to the edge of the quilt, you can see a couple marked on the left of the picture above. Fingers crossed! I even had to order another reel of YLI taupe hand quilting thread. And that wasn't easy to find at all!

In other news I now have the pattern for one of the next quilts I'd like to make in my hot little hands:

I have admired this quilt for a LONG time, and know that I'll just love it! You'd think I'd have had enough of little berries, but apparently not, and I have a lot ahead of me. There will be no pressure with this project, and I will have a couple on the go for a little while.

Also during this past month's absence, my extended family and I went on a Pacific Island cruise. We had the very best time - please enjoy this selection of pictures, I'll just throw them up here (oops, they've come up in reverse order, but I'm sure you won't mind!):

Alrighty, I'm going to head back to the quilt hoop and get some more stitches in - I hope I don't abandon the blog for a month before posting again. I thought about it often, and then the thought would drift out of my mind. Does that happen to anyone else?

Chatter soon friends! xox

Feb 21st

Hello friends, here we are almost at the end of February, and I'm looking back over the last few weeks wondering what I've actually achieved!

I'm still plugging away at hand quilting Lily Rosenberry, I'm very pleased with how it's progressing after being at a bit of a standstill for so long. It's hard to share pictures that look different to previous ones, but here is a new view all the same:

I was so thrilled to complete my dolls quilt for the Instagram #dollquiltswap2025 - it's winging it's way to the new owner on the other side of the world, and I hope they love it!

My parcel in the swap arrived on Thursday last week, and I was so thrilled to learn that Angela Homicz was my exchange partner. She is such a lovely person, and the quilt she made me is just darling:

Her parcel also included some beautiful wrapping paper, a very sweet little lavender sachet, some lovely Lenox china which is local to her, and a sweet piece of fabric which my grandies will love. I feel so very blessed and cannot thank Angela enough for her generosity. Linda from Quilts in the Barn has done such a wonderful job coordinating this exchange and I was so lucky to be able to participate.

I'm heading back into the sewing room to work on my hand quilting some more before I head to bed - here's hoping I can be organised and chatter with you again soon! xox

Jan 26th

Here I am watching the men's tennis final at the Australian Open on TV, and remembering I really should pop something on my blog so you don't think I've forgotten about you.

This year I made myself a commitment that I'd get 300 days of hand quilting under my belt - I've gotten to 26 of 300 so far which I'm super proud of, but I won't be able to keep up that pace all year. We have another cruise scheduled, and other things that will get in the way, but here are a couple of pictures I've shared on Insta so far:

I've also completed the top of the doll quilt I made for the swap on Insta. It's now basted and ready for hand quilting, I'm thrilled with how it came together. I really hope my swap partner likes it - I plan to have it in the mail some time next month.

The flying geese units are one inch high, and two across, and the little applique panel in the middle is two inches wide and runs the whole length of the top. I think the applique vine is about an eighth of an inch wide. This project has been fun to make and shouldn't take very long to hand quilt.

I found a cute little dish at a local discount store, and thought it'd look nice on display in the hallway.

I put it on top of the Dresden Valentine table topper - it's one of my favourite little projects. A quick project if you'd like to make one for yourself for Valentines Day coming up soon.

And last of all for today, we planted some tomatoes again this year, hoping against hope we'd have more success than in recent years. This time we tried the Roma variety, and ohhhh my goodness, we have been overwhelmed!

This is what I picked yesterday - we've given away this much and more, and I've made passata and bottled it. I'm waiting on some more rings for our Fowlers unit before I can make more passata - hopefully they'll arrive this week.

Though it doesn't seem to be a lot for this month, I have been super busy, and based on what I'm seeing so far, this is going to be a super busy year in total!

Hope you're all doing well, and I hope to check in with you again soon! xox