December Day Twenty-Five

We had a lovely Christmas Day today, with excited children, good company and good food. 

We spent yesterday chopping, cooking and slicing so that the only cooking today was too glaze the ham, and simple tasks like assembling salads and whipping cream.

The MOML's parents joined us, so with Mum here as well, we had three great-grandparents in residence. 

Not many photos were taken, a group one would have been nice but there was too much playing, too much eating and too much talking to get around to that!

The icing on the cake today was our son-in-law milking tonight - giving the MOML the first milking off on Christmas Day EVER!

Oh and the second layer of icing on the cake was what every farmer dreams of at Christmas; a nice bit of late afternoon rain. 

'til next time,

happy stitches,

Raewyn

December Day Twenty-Four

Merry Christmas!

Wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas ♥

I hope you are able to spend the day with people you love doing things you love,

Best Wishes,

Raewyn

December Day Twenty-One

This is one of my favourite ornaments. It was my grandmother's and is starting to look a little battered.

I think it's possibly 'just' a red wreath behind the reindeer but I like to think it's a Pohutakawa flower.

The Pohutakawa tree in flower is a sure sign that Christmas - and summer - is on the way here in New Zealand. They are appearing around the countryside now.

Ours has started flowering. Clay soil probably isn't the best for these trees but finally this tree is looking like it's established. It was planted about 15 years ago!!

Below you can see the big stack of wrapped silage bales we have, in preparation for the El Nino drought we're supposed to be getting this summer. We're hoping we don't have to use them but it's a lot less stressful to be prepared! They'll keep if we don't need them just yet.

I did a spot of marmalade making this morning. It's the first time I've made marmalade but Mum enjoys it so here we are. It's set rather well as YD visited while I was at the crucial boiling stage and I got distracted! I think it's likely that a spoon will stand up by itself when put in the jar. Tastes good though.

Thanks to the kindness of a friend who needed to go to Auckland for the day, Mum is now here. My friend met my sister (and mum) and transferred bags from one vehicle to another and brought her up north. While I missed seeing my sister (this time) it gave me an extra day at home to sort my Christmas things out!

'til next time,

Happy stitching,

Raewyn

December Day Eighteen

Tonight I finished the stitchery on this piece.

I had hoped to have this completed well before now so that Odie could enjoy it before Christmas. Looks like he will have to wait till next Christmas to enjoy it!!

These are wall hangings I made for the other families in previous years. 

2022 —

2021 —

(Can you guess this one went to the family whose Dad was at Antarctica for Christmas?!!)

'til next time,

happy stitches,

Raewyn

December Day Seven

Just a few photos from today.

Pretty Sweet William in the garden —

We weaned 9 more calves today. Here they are, off out the back —

A nice view from while I was out there. The Kauri in the foreground are doing really well —

The only Christmas Ornament I've made so far - I had better get sewing!

My favourite photo of the day. The big 'old man' manuka are flowering profusely —

'til next time,

happy stitches,

Raewyn.

All sorts of things!

Season's greeting to you all....I'm a little late to say Merry Christmas but not quite too late to say Happy New Year and compliments of the season!

I hope you all had a lovely Christmas, spending it with people you love and doing the things that you enjoy best ♥

I just can't believe I have barely been near my blog all month! As with this year, the month has just flown by.

I think I will spend a while writing this post; it will become a ramble, I'm sure, as I will add to it as things come to mind. Settle in with a good coffee while I catch up!

Obligatory Christmas Eve photo with the tree in all its glory —

We had an enjoyable Christmas Day, with various family members here all day. As well as immediate family, the MOML's parents visited and Mum is staying at the moment, so it was a good chance for everyone to have a catch-up.

This is about the only photo we took on Christmas Day ; a nice 4-generation photo —

One family was laid low with a gastro bug so couldn't come, so we repeated it all again on Thursday. Everyone decided to come out to the farm again and it was lovely and relaxed with no-one needing to go anywhere else for anything else!

We still had plenty of leftovers and unopened chocolates (etc) so, with the addition of a bit of extra BBQ meat, it was an easy prep day. Here are some of us —

(The beady eyed amongst you will notice that our son is back home again...after over 400 days in Antarctica (and all winter at The South Pole) we are really enjoying seeing him again. He won't shave off his Antarctica beard but has removed the lovely curly locks he grew while down there!!!!)

The big kids were ever so patient with the younger ones, who brought all their hair, face and nails 'products' with them!

I managed to wrangle 5 of the kids for a photo - not particularly successful but oh well. Fun memories!

This is a new decoration for this year. Thank you so much, Maria. I really appreciated receiving this. The younger twins were here when it arrived and they thought it was very cool!

I can now show you the one and only Christmas gift which I made this year, which I gifted to Mum —

The pattern is called Beatrice's Boite which is a Hugs n Kisses design.

The stitchery is wrapped around a large (and empty!) tin can, which gives it a lovely shape.

Hopefully Mum can find something to put in it!!!

All other sewing done in December is best put in the 'Labour of Love' category!!

** Mending of farm overalls. Sigh. No story to tell except the men are hard on overalls and they are expensive to buy.  (NO photo!)

** My sister asked me (a while ago) to attach a print she had bought while they were living in Singapore to a duvet cover. As it was intended for my nephew to take to varsity this coming year I thought I really needed to get onto it. What a bear - the duvet cover was Super-King so there was a lot of fabric to cut square(-ish), lay flat and man handle!!  Instead of the usual t-shirts and lollies Christmas present, I'm pleased to say that I finished it in time for him to receive a duvet set and lollies present!

**And ED had asked me to shorten the hems of some of her long skirts. As they are made from floaty polyester type fabric, I decided to purchase a rolled hem foot to make the job easier.  Once I took the plunge and started sewing it didn't go too badly! The foot was a very wise investment.

I was a bit worried about the pink pleated skirt but I pressed it with a damp cloth and it came up ok.

December was when our eldest (step) granddaughter turned 16, and all of a sudden we saw the revival of the paddock parties our kids all enjoyed as they were growing up!

It was such a lovely evening. Family was allowed there - for a while - the younger ones had a great time! —

The MOML had some very rare time off the other day, (24 whole hours) to attend one of his old school mate's 60th. I was in charge of the cows while he was away.

Getting the cows in for afternoon milking —

Partway through milking —

After the morning's milking, happily in their paddock —

He had a great time away, remembering all their stories and adventures from a long time ago. 

We had a really wet November and much of December was showery too but the switch has been flicked and we are now 'enjoying' some hot, dry weather. The river has been visited a bit more often lately —

It's unusual for it to be up as high as it is in the above photo at this time of the year; it just shows how much rain we've been getting.

Just a couple more photos and then I think I'll call it a day!

Crazy cousins up to no good —

Last Christmas I made Odie a Hound Dog which has been a bed companion for much of the year. Lately he has started carting it around a lot. One day the Dog was doing some sewing at home. Dog kept saying 'Ouch' every time he touched the needle —

And Dog also had his teeth brushed one day —

On that silly note, I will finish off. Well done if you have got to the end. I apologise for the overload of photos but once I started.......

I thank you all for your friendship this year, for reading my blog, and leaving comments. I enjoy the interactions but do admit to having a bit of an 'off year' as far as my blogging has gone!

I wish you all a very happy New Year. I hope 2023 is a creative, happy and productive one for us all.

♥Hugsxxx♥

Finishing bits and pieces

Some heavy rain over the weekend granted me my wish of a quiet, inside, sew-day. I had a few bits and pieces I really needed to finish up.

I had got to the binding stage of a wall hanging by The Birdhouse which I started and shared a couple of posts ago. 

I made a couple of corner triangles to insert a dowel for hanging, and then machine sewed the binding down.

Santa's Workshop by The Birdhouse

I know some people don't worry too much about quilting these little hangings but I like the finish that a little bit of quilting gives. The photo doesn't show it well but I used the walking foot to stitching in the ditch of the border seams and a couple of straight lines in the outside border.

Then I used the hopping foot to quilt around the outside of the stitchery.

Next on the agenda for the day was to complete a wee bag using this stitchery —

Some straight forward sewing and the bag was complete —

Alphabet Birds by Fig N Berry

Finally, I made the finishing touches to my Bear quilt. I shared copious amounts of photos of this in my last post. I machine sewed the binding on —

I also remembered to include a corner triangle (in the pink) to use as my label. The photo below also shows the scrappy backing. It's all brushed cotton, which I like to use for my young people quilts.

The background fabric I used is a light pink grunge - I'm really happy with how well it worked. 

I've seen other people share fun photos showing the threads they used. I'm pleased I have a 'comprehensive' collection of Aurifil - being able to match the threads well helps to hide the wonky stitches!!!

The quilt pattern is from Sew Fresh Quilts.

So that was a pretty good sew-day!

Since then, I have completed one more project. It's a small pouch for storing threads in —

Country Garden by Marg Low Designs.

It was nice to finally have three finishes for OPAM (the final pouch is a November finish). Although with all my galivanting about this month, I have only made 10 blocks for the 350 block project - and that includes the three stitcheries I've shown above! Swings and Roundabouts.

The flurry of wee finishes is just in time - they are samples to showcase patterns for The Country Yard. Today we are packing up the shop and going down to Auckland for Festival of Quilts. This is the first time this has been held for a couple of years so it will be nice to be there! I'm looking forward to being there and seeing everything :-)

'til next time,

happy stitches,