Cut Short —

The MOML and I with our feet up, enjoying a change of scenery the other day. 

Each year we try to get away for a weekend between the end of calving and the start of mating....a very narrow window of time...and when our son-in-law offered to milk for us recently, we jumped at the chance!

We headed up north as we usually do; this time we went to Omapere, at the mouth of the Hokianga Harbour on the west coast.

Even though it was school holidays, it was very quiet (it usually is, but more so this time) as only Northlanders can access Northland at the moment.
The view from our unit —

Looking down into the Hokianga Harbour —

The huge sand dunes across the water really dominate the view —

Unfortunately Northland suddenly went into Level 3 lockdown on Saturday night after two Covid infected people forged their way through the border and spent 4 days out and about. One person went into hiding, and they were both very uncooperative about their movements.

That meant we had to go home early, after just one night away. We did have a very full 36 hour holiday though! We had a good couple of walks. This walk was a 4 hour one (one-way) but we just went 40 minutes to an accessible beach. It was beautiful. — 

Some trickier areas —

We had taken a small picnic and had a wee rest before heading back —

Barely a soul around! —

So back home again, earlier than intended, I decided I needed a Sunday-Sewday! The next best thing to having some time away.

I really wanted to catch up on my star blocks for The Great Scrappy Star Adventure. I'd done the instructions for Month 9 but had only sewn the star 'spike' units as part of the writing process. 

I needed to check that it actually worked!!

I got carried away, making a whole lot of units, and then working out which ones would go with what—

The resulting stars (just 9" ones this time) —

A closer look at some of the fabrics —

And not yet shown, the Month 8 stars —

And quickly before I go, I have done a little more on my Squirrel project, the 2021 Laundry Basket Quilts mystery quilt.

Last time I shared, I had done the centre of the quilt —

The next lot of blocks have moved more to the reds, rather than the deep reds —

And this is where it is now; I have done another two rounds. (It's not designed as a round quilt but that is how I am sewing it.) Sit back a bit and squint at it; it looks pretty cool, I reckon!

(It looks elongated because I have only joined horizontally. I can't join the rows together until I have worked my way out to the outside edge, which is another three rounds. Getting there!)

There's plenty more to talk about but that's it for now, as it's well past my bedtime, 

'til next time,

happy stitches,

A no-sew weekend

To be honest, a no-sew weekend doesn't happen very often around here, but this last weekend I had the perfect excuse to keep my needles and threads idle.
The MOML and I spent 4 nights away ... we went on a road trip to visit our daughter, ED, who is now living and working near Wellington. It's a long way from the top part of the North Island where we live to the bottom of the North Island but we had a great time, the trip was well worth the hours spent in the car.
Wellington put on fabulous weather for us so we were able to get out and about a lot :-)

The MOML and I on ED's front fence.
No it wasn't rain I heard in the night, but ocean waves!

Both mornings we went on lovely walks to exercise the dog - and ourselves.

"Fetch the stick" games (if you look carefully you can see the wee dog).

Of course we had to visit ED's work - sadly the photo doesn't show her
'Dr' status which is on the door :-)
(Sorry, proud parent moment!)

A visit to Te Papa (Museum of NZ) was a great idea also.
The Gallipoli Exhibition was worth viewing.
The larger than life models were incredible and the
exhibition very moving.

We did a little more than walk the dog and visit the Chiropracter (etc) and on route we also visited YD, Mum, some old uni' friends and squeezed in a bit of shopping...but we came home feeling refreshed and rested so that was great!
And you all know I cant keep my fingers still for long so I was happy to while away the hours in the car with some crochet projects. I made two of these African Flower pin cushions... wee gifts for a couple of special friends :-)

And started this project too - I have a lot of scraps of wool so wanted a blanket/afghan pattern that would use a fair bit of it up...I think this lazy waves blanket will keep me going for a while, it takes me ages to do just one row!

 Mum must have known I was on a scrap-crochet mission as she'd sorted out a basket of 'bits and pieces' wool for me —

And I was extra happy that it came in this basket that Nana made back in the
70s when she was in her basketry phase - my kind of family heirloom!

One last photo - I offered to teach ED to crochet (yes, my job as a mother failed miserably as I'd not taught her in the past) and she had quite a nice little time doing it. She did decide she liked doing rings with double crochets (sc? in US terms) and making the rings one on top of another so we decided she was a free form crocheter!

And here she is the next morning proving that I really did 'teach' her as she
remembered how to do it!

See you next time,

happy creating

♥

, 

Excitement!!!

For the significance of the keys and the passport, read on :-)

Excitement is building here in my house as two wonderful things are happening very soon...!
Tomorrow morning I am off to retreat with some lovely quilting buddies. 3 days of sewing - oh bliss. We go to a spot out by the beach and we always have a great time. I have done some pre-cutting so I have bags of part projects all packed into the car already. Of course I think I am taking far more projects that I will get done but never mind, no harm in being optimistic :-)
So that's the car keys in the above photo taken care of, what about the passport?!
I have a couple of days after retreat to unpack and do my washing and then I'm on the road again.This time it will be to hop on a plane (well, several actually) to go to Pittsburg! Yes, lucky me is accompanying my boss to Quilt Market.  This is a trade show so we will have to have our 'shop eyes' on -very exciting :-)
Sadly we aren't able to be away for too long but we do hope to squeeze a little bit of sight seeing in before it's time to come home again.
If I'm a little absent in blogland, you know why!! I will catch you up on my adventures when I'm back!!
Happy sewing!

Stop the clock!

Gosh, since posting last time so much has happened...and I'm sorry, I have to throw in this old chestnut; "where has the time gone?"!

I see in my last post we were just getting ready to attend my cousin's wedding. We had a fabulous time down country, the bride was blushing and beautiful and we caught up with a lot of Mum's family which is always a good laugh. I also spent time with some cousins who I hadn't really seen for a LONG time.  And top it off, the weekend ended on a real high with a call from our YD to announce her engagement - wonderful news :-)

YD and her fiance!!

A few days after that Mum and I popped over the Tasman to visit my son and dil in Queensland, Australia. Phew talk about hot, but copious amounts of water and use of the air conditioning helped with that! It was awesome spending time with them; we did the customary drive-bys of places of work etc, saw some Aussie wildlife in a local zoo and local places of interest. Dear son googled quilting shops; we visited one and were told about a craftmarket that was on... by the time we'd finished there, the others were closed, but I was ok, I'd had my fix :-)

Of course we visited the local eateries too, and spent time 'just chilling' enjoying each other's company. All in all a great time. The (extended) weekend flew by.

It was exciting to arrive home to see that my Secret Santa gift had come in the post - squeal!!
We are allowed to open one gift now; oh look, gorgeous little hangings, thank you very much, whoever you are - they are lovely and will look great on our tree!!!

Handcrafty-wise I haven't squeezed much in but I do have a little to show. Following on from my successful discovery that I can crochet in the car, (this post) I finished a short scarf (the pinky one) on the way to my cousin's wedding. It was a horsetruck project from several years ago (easy projects to do while whiling away the hours at horse shows with the girls). So early in the trip that we had to stop at a small town to find some more wool for another project :-)





And because I have now finished both my horsetruck UFOs (ignore the fact that I started the little blue scarf!), I rewarded myself with being allowed to start my ripple afghan on my trip to Australia...yippee..! I have looked longingly at ripple afghans created by other crocheters and bloggers for several years now and have been collecting up a little wool for when I would start mine. It is so good to have started it, the pattern is really easy (click here to get to it) and it is a wonderful way to spend time on a plane or just sitting visiting with someone. You don't have to concentrate quite the same way as when doing closer work, and a crochet hook doesn't get lost as easily as a sewing needle! - plus I don't get car/air-sick

Woohoo, my ripple afghan - I love it!!

Of course the visit to family in December meant that I could deliver some Christmas pressies - here are the tags for them. The pattern for these is The Alphabet Noel by Michelle Ridgeway Designs. I used Cottage Garden Threads - perfect for this type of stitchery.

And in my last post I showed the postcard I had received from Mary at NeedledMum... here is the one I sent her - you may recognise the reindeer from here, he is a little pattern I have fallen in love with :-)

Just before the MOML went out to do farmwork this morning, he commented that my 'palace' used to be 'quite a big room'... in other words it is FULL OF STUFF!! I need a good tidyup - wish me luck :-) [this is an all too frequent occurance!!].

Happy sewing to you all, and thank you for calling in,

Quilt Week at Paducah

Wow!! What an experience!!
Aren't I lucky that my brother lives only 1 1/2 hours from Paducah!
And that my sister-in-law is a fellow crafter and quilter :-)
Can you imagine 4 days of non-stop movement, diving from quilt to quilt, booth to booth, talking, talking, meeting, greeting, sighing, thinking, scheming, oohing and aahing? [No time to eat, little time to sleep!!].

That was Sandie and I while we were at Paducah.
Quilt week started off with a boom; flash mob style---copius amounts of quilters dancing and waving behind a local school band weaving it's way around the convention centre - so much fun - what a blast. (It was also great that the 'mob' finished in the main convention centre so we didn't have to queue to get in!) (To see the fun, click this link if you haven't already seen it- I am the goofy one calling "Hello from New Zealand!).

And it was non-stop from there.
Quilt week at Paucah was HUGE - like nothing I have experienced before. It had at least 4 BIG exhibition areas and many other places around town to hunt out and explore. It was fabulous having so many exhibition quilts to examine and so many booths to get lost in.

So many people, this was the lunch area on one of the fine days.

It was incredible to see all the quilts on display. So much inspiration and beauty. Lots of very clever quilters out there. Quilts old and new, small and large, colourful, muted and made using every technique you could think of.....I took so many photos of them all - where I was allowed to - and to show my favourites would take a Very Long time. Instead I'll just show the Best Of Show, an applique quilt by Karen Kay Buckley. The quilter was Renae Haddadin, and you will see that she surely deserved to be sitting up there with Kay's eye-catching quilt.

Best of Show, Fiesta Mexico by Karen Kay Buckley.

Longarm quilting by Renae Haddadin - Back of Best of Show quilt

I took two great classes - both centred around free motion quilting - how great to have the opportunity to take classes with Sue Nickels and Jenny Bowker.... both have made award winning quilts and are reknown teachers. It was wonderful to have the opportunity to get up close and personal with some of their creations.

Sue Nickels and I. Class - Feathers Wholecoth.

One of Sue's beautiful quilts, which was inspiring to
fondle and examine.

Sue used a camera and an overhead screen to show us closeups of her demonstrations. Very effective.

Jenny Bowker and one of her inspiring quilts.
Class - free motion quilting with an inspirational piece. 

Jenny Bowker was also responsible for bringing the Tentmakers of Cairo to Paducah. Historically the insides of their tents were decorated with colourful applique - nowadays the same techniques are used to make quilts for sale. It was fascinating to watch the tentmakers in action. Incredible skills.

Very fast needleturn. 

All made using huge sicssors and big needles!!

Beautiful quilts by the Tentmakers of Cairo. For Sale.

We also visited the National Quilt Museum... amazing to see even more (famous) quilts - the highlight being seeing Innocence by Hollis Chatelain (please go to this link to see it) which won viewer's choice at the Houston International Quilt Show in 2011. Absolutely heart shopping, if you ever get the chance to see it in the flesh, please do.
We also got the opportunity to meet some quilting legends. Eleonor Buns was a hoot, and the evening spent with Alex Anderson and Libby Lehman was very entertaining. It's so sad to hear of Libby's illness since Paducah and I hope she recovers soon.

 The bag I made to take to Paducah was well used... it was often heaving with purchases [:-)] and is looking slightly more adorned now than it did when I left New Zealand.

Fun to have these signatures and badges... Alex Anderson, Ricky Timms,
Gwen Marston, Sue Nickels, Pat Holly, Jenny Bowker

Karen Kay Buckley (Best of Show), Lisa Bongean, Lori Smith
and Edyta Sitar.

Of course there was so much more to see that I haven't shared... but I hope I have been able to give you a little insight into what Quilt Week was like. If you ever get the chance to go, I say, grab it with both hands. I've started saving for my next one!!
Happy stitching everyone,