Friends With Benefits Swap

I've been camping by my letter-box lately.

A big thank you to Kathy of Sew-Happy House, who organised this swap, which Kallie and I enjoyed. We both decided we needed more time so were a little late posting off our gifts.
We were so excited today when we both had received our gifts and we could open at the same time (live via email at different ends of the world!).
Here is the lovely gift I received from Kallie.

A gorgeous friendship sampler; I'm looking forward to hanging this up.

Beautiful detail

A hexagon needle case and a very fancily folded fat quarter.

She finished it all off with a label on the sampler - which I forgot to do on her
gift so will have to send another package across to her!
Thanks heaps, Kallie!!

 [Interesting - 4 days from Canada to New Zealand; 13 days from New Zealand to Canada. There's a slow postie there somewhere!]
This is what I made for Kallie.

What is it...?

Yes; a block holder.

A touch of kiwi to signify friendship across the miles.

I also included a couple of little edible goodies which I hoped would bring pleasure :-)
(Oops;acknowledgement; the block design on the front was from Quiltmakers 100 blocks vol.2, by Jina Barney Designz).


And besides camping at the letterbox this week I have been doing a little work on my Temecula Blessings Baskets, another mini.

Coming together nicely - I'm really happy with this.

 I had started it when it first came out but had put it aside till now.  I'm hopeful that I'll be finishing this soon, along with the Threadhead Friendship Sampler I'm also doing.
So a happy day all round.
Happy stitching every-one,
thank you for visiting:-)

hey Mum...

It's been lovely to read all the Mothers' Day wishes and stories on every-one's blogs this weekend.
Here is one of my favourite photos of my Mum with my sister and I.

2011; Mum in the centre with my sister on the left and me on the right.

 Isn't it fun to get together your own family and to have a good laugh - each family seems to have it's own individual sense of humour that is unstoppable! I guess it's all based on shared memories and experiences which means everyone is on the same wavelength.
Here is a cross-stitch that Mum did for her Mum in 1989 which is now back on Mum's wall.

(Raewyn's having light issues again!)

Mothers' Day for me has stretched over 3 days! My ED made me a delicious lunch on Saturday when I was travelling back up home. She is at the half-way point of the journey so the break and meal was most welcome. Yummy Pumpkin Soup and homemade bread went down a treat, and a nearly-well-timed dash to the local coffee shop meant I had a nice coffee too!

 Had a lovely chat with our son on Sunday. He's just moved to a new job in Queeensland so it was great to hear all his news.

This morning YD arrived out at the farm (to work) with a lovely gift.

She's made another bear! And look at those cup-cakes!

I get to keep this bear!

Thank you my 3 lovely children.

I hope all you other Mums out there also were made to feel special. Have a lovely week,

Minis on the mind

Just a little to report this week.
I've finished my Silhouette Challenge piece (more about it here).

I went around the applique shapes with a tiny zigzag and fine monofilament thread.
Then had fun quilting in the background - A Deborah Louie Quilters Companion DVD I watched called this pattern Teardrops, Erin Russek calls it Turkey feathers. It was a great filler to use.

I was a bit stuck with my binding but decided the backing fabric would look great - so I used that - easy in the end!!

I've managed to keep up with the mini friendship sampler quiltalong by Joanne (Threadhead). It's been fun doing just a little block a day - even when I got behind one day I caught up really easily :-)
These are my blocks so far. Next step is to join them all and add some applique.
(Colours are a bit washed out in these photos - they look better in real life!)

I've just had a peak at today's instructions and the 4-patches will be cornerstones.

The light 9-patches will be used for some applique.

I'm helping out down at my parent's this week. Here is a pic of my sewing cave when I left home (yippee we are adding a bit more on to this end of the house - mostly to benefit our small bedroom but my sewing cave wins too!)
I wont show you the room that now has all my sewing stuff piled in it - put it this way - the MOML stood at the door gobsmacked!(It was no small task to move 'my stuff' either!)


Hope you are all having a great week - and managing to fit a bit of creativity into it.
Thanks for visiting,

Rounding up my week

The weather has turned for us this week, we're definitely feeling a lot cooler that we had been. After a lovely autumn, winter seems to  be in the air. I felt for the Duckshooters out in their Maimai's this morning on Opening Day of Duckshooting season. None out on our farm this year but I could hear shots going off on neighbouring properties.... hope they had plenty of flasks with warm refreshments with them!
It's been catch up week this week after my recent quilt finish. I joined the Friends with Benefits swap...Kallie, my swap partner, and I both got a little behind so we delayed our mailing for a few days. Kallie's gift is now winging its way to her.... of course I cant show you what I made for her.... but maybe a sneak peak won't go amiss.......

Hi Kallie, this is all you're seeing for now....

Another challenge I have taken part in recently was one run by Edyta Sitar of Laundry Basket Quilts. She mailed out small packs of randomly selected pre-cut shapes for people to play with. They were already backed with fusible web.
Here you can see YD had a play and decided a scene was needed.... if you stretch your imagination a little you can make out people riding horses along a road..the horses are reminiscent of frilled neck lizards!.



'person on horse'

Back to the drawing board, me thinks...Here is what I ended up with.... pleasing I thought, but I ran out of time to create something really spectacular!! I emailed a picture through to Edyta by the first of May as required. This weekend I hope to work on it a little more and make it into a mini... I have a spot on a wall where I think it will look quite nice;


I like how Edyta manages to successfully combine batiks
with other fabrics so decided to try a plaid background.
I quite like the effect.

And speaking of minis... if you are up for a challenge, why not join in Joanne's Friendship mini sampler.....  free instructions every day for a week..... I did Day One this morning---it was quicker to sew today's block than it was to decide which fabrics to use!

Happy sewing everyone - and thanks for visiting,