See my fabric line, online..

The lovely folk at Henry Glass Fabrics have told me that my Christmas line of fabric is on their website along with a downloadable free quilt pattern. With some help from a friend of mine I have designed this quilt using fairly big pieces of fabric as sometimes for Christmas you need something quick to make for a gift or just to snuggle under. If you look closely at the design you will see I could not resist adding a bit of redwork stitchery, all the instructions are on the pattern at Henry Glass Fabrics. You can check out the fabric swatches at the bottom of the first page and then go to the 'New Free Projects' to find this pattern and many others.

Want some more fun? Then pop over to Jookies scroll down a bit and take a look at the Pond House quilts some of her ladies are making, the colour variations are very exciting to see. For those of you who have not seen the original version, here is my Pond House...... I am dreaming of a time when it will be on my bed here at home..sigh!

Its been hot here again today and Poor Hugo really wants to go for a walk but I think we will wait until its almost dark and hope that it will be a bit cooler.

bye for now

Photo album fun and new project..

Just thought I would tease you all with a teeny weeny peek at Hugo playing his Cello, I have to admit he is getting quite good at it and informs me he is now keen to try a brass instrument, maybe a trumpet?? Do you think I should let him try?

I have seen a couple of these fun photo albums around the world and thought I should have a try at doing one. I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed making it for you.

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

Bye for now

Happy Australia Day..

It has been a wonderful holiday today with everyone celebrating Australia Day, the parks were full of people enjoying a bbq together with many organised events around the country for us all to enjoy. This little stitchery is from the front of my patriotic needlecase.

We did get to China Town on saturday which was fun. 

We managed to get all the dried goods we needed to replicate our cooking class recipes here at home. A gorgeous steamer, some shrimp paste (bit smelly), palm sugar, a block of tamarind and various other strange things. 

The store we bought our goods in also had a medicine section, with jars filled with all sorts of wonderful things. The ladies were busy making up some sort of medicine which presumably you brewed into a tea and drank.

I hope that you have all have had a great long weekend if you are here in Australia.

best wishes

Breast Of Friends quilt...

I was very thrilled last year to be invited to participate in a wonderful project with Australian Homespun Magazine. Breast of Friends was to be a designer block of the month using fabrics from Buggy Barns In The Pink 2 range, the blocks have been designed and stitched by 10 well know Australian designers including myself.

The magazine is now on the shelves and over the next nine months (Vol 10 No1 to Vol 10 No9) each issue will have a part of this amazing collaborative quilt.

The finished quilt is then going to be given to National Breast Cancer Foundation to auction.

This quilt is just stunning so start collecting your issues now.

Have a lovely weekend whatever you are doing,

 

Cooking Class..

Here I am racing ahead to get to the cooking class...

The restaurant and cooking school are set in beautiful gardens around a pond, there are other lovely water features around the gardens which create a wonderful ambiance which are in keeping with the Asian theme.

Arriving at the kitchen nice and early I managed to get a snap shot before the other 'students' for the evening arrived. There was 11 of us altogether which was fun.

Here's Vince with his apron on ready to get chopping...

This was how the huge piece of salmon was before we prepared it...

To smoke the salmon we placed a double layer of foil in the bottom of the wok, we put some jasmine tea and rice onto the foil then placed the steamer which contained the salmon on top. It smelt very smokey which was fine as the kitchen had few walls but the suggestion was to do this on your bbq outside.

Here Chef Kelly is demonstrating how to test how cooked a piece of salmon is, I must have a tough muscle in that part of my hand as it felt the same wherever I put my fingers! You can see the salmon in the wok has gone a pretty yellow and is apparently cooked perfectly!

Here I am about to seal the beef prior to popping it into the oven, after suitable instruction of course!

Miang of Scallops, we nibbled on these whilst sipping wine before we put the finishing touches to the main course.... mmm... quite tasty, although personally I thought the betel leaf was a bit peppery.

The table is laid...

I totally forgot to take photos of the main course due to the fact that it was almost dark and I was starving after all the chopping etc. Sorry, but it was delicious.

Adding the finishing touches to the dessert, a quick easy and very tasty cool parfait.

How about this for a weird but wonderful combination for ice cream!! Vince tried it and said it was pretty good.

Well as you can see we had a great evening and I think a trip to China town on the weekend may be needed so we can stock up on some of the more unusual items and then we can attempt to cook this gorgeous meal at home.

bye for now

My Birthday..

Here I am with my Ma and Pa and three of my boys who were able to come to my birthday dinner, the missing boy is having a wonderful holiday with his wife in Tasmania and will be home on the weekend when the celebrations will continue.

Ma and Pa produced some wonderful food, this was my plate of Moroccan chicken, it was delicious.

I was of course spoilt rotten with presents and this afternoon we are heading off to The Spirit House for one of their famous cooking classes. This is such a fun thing to do, along with about 12 other people we get to chop and cook all afternoon and then eat the product later this evening. We are going to learn how to cook, Scallop Miang, Salad of tea Smoked Salmon, Green Pawpaw, Lemongrass and Green Chilli, a Peanut Curry of Char Griled Rump and a dessert of chilled Watermelon and Lychee Parfait with Lime Vodka Syrup......mmm sounds delicious! The great thing is that you come home with the recipes so you can have another go at home!

Tell you about it all tomorrow

Friendship and more fabric..

What a relaxing weekend we had, Saturday was too hot to think of doing anything, so we hired some dvd's and lazed around all day. Sunday was much cooler and we went for a fabulous walk with Hugo and the family all came for a lovely dinner in the evening.

Today I popped into my local quilt shop to deliver the sample for them to display once the patterns arrive, which is anyday now. Here I am handing The Quilt Shoppe pillow to Penny.

I couldnt resist these fabrics today, after working with the pretty ones for the Easter project I felt I needed a change! I have also been busy working on the drawings for the H&F musical project, I will have to think of a good name for it and maybe I will need to enlist your help. Will show some pictures another day but please get your thinking caps on for a good name.

Catherine from France has sent me this lovely picture of her Noah's Ark blocks but I see she hasnt stitched the bug block yet! I think there must be quite a number of ladies who go direct to the Ark page and have missed the January block! 

Not many more days left of the school summer holidays left and I know that my 15yo is looking forward to seeing all his friends again.

talk soon

H&F share a bowl...

This dog food must be good as Felix happily abandons his bowl of food to help Hugo eat his! I am not sure what Hugo thinks but he seems to be OK with sharing.

My Easter project is making good progress but now I cant find my work table...anyone else have that problem? Yes, I hear you all say. I am getting quite addicted to these colours and in my head lots of fun projects are taking root, from your messages it seems that quite alot of you are liking these colours too. 

Just had a quick thought, maybe I can squeeze another table into my studio?? ......... no chance says Vince its cramped enough anyhow!

Block tryout...

Last year I bought this gorgeous tin chicken for our Easter table display and I promised myself I would make a tablerunner for her to stand on this year. Of course it will also end up being a pattern so stay tuned.

So with my Easter project in mind I made this block, well six of them to be accurate! I knew it probably wasnt what I wanted before I cut it out as the pieces are quite big and I really like little pieces of fabric but I dont always listen to the little voice of my heart and I really should learn to always listen as its always right! Are you the same?

After a restless night, this morning I pulled out some extra fabrics and made this block, dont the fabrics looks great together, I really love the scrunched dirty brown fabric I found at the quilt shop, it looks like an old paper bag. This is the block I wanted to make from the beginning and I love it, now I need to cut out the pieces to make 5 more and then I can start the bit I like best, the hand stitching.

Hope you are having fun stitching,

 

PS. I just got this email from Shona

Hi,

Just writing to thankyou for your very kind donation to such a worthy cause! it is helping me get closer to my goal (and closer to being shaved - eek!)

Thanks again!

shona

(your blogging ladies are angels...i'm getting overwhelmed with support from them all!)

Your donation will help the Leukaemia Foundation provide free, practical support to patients during their long and tough treatment.  Plus it will boost research into better treatments and hopefully cures for blood cancers such as leukaemia, lymphoma and myeloma.

Thanks again for your support.

shona

Fabric purchases...

Vince didn't read my blog but guessed I needed a trip to a quilt shop, yeah! So early yesterday we took Hugo for a lovely long walk and then after a delicious breakfast of eggs, bacon, tomatoes, mushrooms and pancakes we headed off to The Quilters Store in Brisbane. Its a long drive to the new location of Karen's shop from our house but well worth the trip. There is a huge wonderful selection of fabrics and threads to see at this shop, I could happily have spent all day there, they just need a coffee shop too!

I am thinking of an Easter project or two....

Hmm, these fabrics are just so me and the milk chocolate jumbo ric rac was a must have... 

Yes, you spotted some musical fabric in amongst the rest, hmm, maybe this is the fabrics for the H&F learn to play an instrument design. However I never stick to a plan much less using the fabrics that I spent an hour or more choosing so dont rush out and get these fabrics just yet! I am planning on going through my stash tomorrow morning to add to these selections.

Did you notice the necklace I was wearing yesterday? 

Well, this absolutely divine creation 'sky' which I totally over indulged myself by buying when I was in the US back in October has brought me so much pleasure. It looks great with lots of things and just everyone who sees it admires it. It was made by the very talented Nina Bagley who not only produces these amazing one off pieces of jewellery but also has a blog which is a delight to read.

Well, I am off to play with my fabric...... and have a cup of tea, anyone else need one? Now wouldnt that be fun, there are so many of you I would love to meet and have a proper gossip with! Maybe I will be doing a workshop near you soon and we can catch up then.

Until then.....