A GOING AWAY GIFT

My SinL has been transfered to Richmond Airbase in NSW and my daughter and two grand daughters will join him shortly. I am going to miss those little girls terribly. I have them one day a week during school holidays and we go out and about on the buses and do lots of interesting things. Jade, the elder of the two is also a budding quilter and crafter and I will miss our sessions together of just looking and feeling fabrics as well as those sewing lessons. Little Brooke is a joy to have around and has an opinion on everything and I will miss that as well. I also think they are going to miss their Nan, so I have made each of them a worry pillow. I will give the pillows to them when they fly out of Adelaide and tell them to hug and talk to their pillow if they are feeling sad or just missing the family members back home and the Worry Dolls will help them feel better.


Jade`s pillow is in her favourite colour and was easy to make.

I couldn`t do Brooke`spillow in her favourite colour of purple as I didn`t have any matching colours to do the doll in. But I hope she will like it.

The pattern is Worry Dolls designed by Kellie from DONT LOOK NOW. I have not made the quilt, just the bonus pillows using dolls from the pattern. Very easy and quick to make but I used blanket stitch instead of raw edge stitching around the aplique as I think it will be more servicable for little girls. I am also getting better at free motion quilting but I still need lots more practice.

Well this has been a long post So I will leave it there and be back soon with more news.

Cheers Judy

THE OLD AND THE NEW

I have just finished this table runner and it was one I really liked doing. It was a Charm Pack mystery challenge from Our Craft Forum. Participants had to send charm squares to others in the swap and other sewers made up the block and sent it back to you. The final e- mail came with the instructions to make it up and I decided to finish it straight away to avoid another UFO. I did it a little differently to how Dawn had advised us to do and I am very happy with the results.
It will now grace my table unless one of my daughters takes it for them selves.

I also wanted to share with you the first quilt I ever made. I went to a local Neighbourhood House and was taught by some very experienced mature English ladies. I had to hand piece all the blocks and this took weeks of sewing and many pricked fingers from the tiny little needles they said I must use. Fortueately after working out how much material was required to finish off my quilt I was allowed to sew the sashings by machine. Then to make a quilt sandwich which I soon found out was not going to be my lunch that day and taping it all to a table and hand basting all layers together. Then again all quilting was to be done by hand with even smaller needles. More sore fingers from the needle, finally bound and it was finished, and my addiction had well and truly begun. So thankyou to those lovely ladies who have given me a new direction for my leisure time. And finally I have not made another quilt by hand, thank God for sewing machines.

GIVEAWAY

The Gumtree designers have a great giveaway and I am hoping to win it. It is a complete set of patterns for the charity quilt they have designed for Fresh Hope. You can access it from the button on my side bar directly under the new button for the Gumtrees blog. So give it a go and enter, you just might be the lucky winner.

XMAS COOKING AND SOME GIFTS

I have been very busy since before Xmas and things have started to slow down now so here I am adding a new post. My daughter arrive 2 days before Xmas with 2 of my grand kids and when she went for her checkup we did some cooking. The Greens cake brand have a lovely gingerbread packet including the decorations and the cookie cutter and this is what we made.


Here are Charlie and Emma rolling and kneading the dough. They enjoyed doing this and their hands got sticky and were licked many times, and I think they liked that even better because Nan didn`t tell them to stop doing it. I think it was the most kneaded dough in Adelaide.

Next we had to decorate with smarties for the buttons and little silver balls for the eyes. luckily I had plenty of smarties extra as 1 button went onto a gingerbread man and the next into a little mouth. Needless to say that not much dinner was consumed that night. Then into the oven they went and for the next 8 minutes I was asked "Are they ready yet?" Finally out of the oven and on to the bench to cool. More asking if they could eat them yet.

Finally onto the plate and we enjoyed them with a cup of tea or milo and they were delicious. I enjoyed cooking as much as the grand kids did and we will be doing it soon with some Easter cooking. cant be far away I saw hot cross buns in the shop today.

I cut this bag out before Xmas to make a gift for myself and then ran out of time to make it. So yesterday I got down to it and as it was such an easy bag to make I finished it in 1 day. I now will make another for my sister. Its from Homespun but I cant get to the book at the moment so I cant tell you which one.

this is the cow I made for my other sister and she loved it. She has a property at Springton and it will join the other real animals there. She has sheep, cows horses and a donkey and I dont know what else and animals are her passion.

Well that`s it now as i am going to have a cuppa and go to bed.

Cheers Judy

NEARLY XMAS

Its nearly Xmas and I have finished two more gifts but still have two more to sew plus a new bag for myself. Hope i can fit it all in as well as some xmas cooking.

I decided to get little dolly beds for the twins Hayley and Chloe and they came with awfull blanket and thin matress and pillow, so Out came the fabrics and i made new matresses and pillows and a little quilt for each of them. I decided on the same fabrics so there will be no fighting but I did different backings. They look so cute sitting in the spare room and I dont know how i am going to wrap them yet.

My little next door neighbor Jessica is getting a peg bag just like mummies, pegs and a minature wash basket. Her mum mentioned that they were giving Jess a little clothes line for xmas and could I make a peg bag, it was a great idea and I had just the fabric in my stash.

I have to finish a cow for my sister and i also need a new bag so a little bit of time is set aside to do these last two pressies. I wish you all a safe and happy Xmas and hope you all get some lovely gifts. Bye for now, Judy

FLOWERS ON THE FARM

DH and I have just spent four days down at the farm. We went to help celebrate two of my grandkids birthdays and we had a lovely time. Each day we go for long walks around the farm and I thought i would take photoes of the flowers I came across.

These are the pods on the wattle tree and I liked their silver colour, this tree will look great when it bursts into bloom.

This bush was a mass of white flowers and looked pretty spectacular. It is a yucca.

This is the yellow gum flowers and they are very dainty and the tree was just covered in them.

Here we have some blackboys in flower and birds just flock to these to get the nectar. They are very plentiful around the farm and when the blooms die they turn black. this one was about 5 feet tall. Some of them were not as straight as these but they still looked interesting.

The red bottlebrush was really vibrant and was my favourite because of the brilliant colour.

This is the broom bush and grows everywhere and is used for brush fences. The flowers are very small but dainty

This is a gravilea and not yet into full bloom but when it is the bush is a sight to behold. i hope I have spelt it right.

This is the chicory plant and I really liked the blue of the flower but this photo does not do it justice. This plant roots is used as a substitute for coffee and I think its the root that is ground up.

I hope you enjoy these plants like i have and so goodbye for now, Jude

A BIRTHDAY GIFT

Hi all, Ihave been ill again and spent 4 days in bed without even feeling like sewing or blogging but back on track now and hoping to get to all my Xmas sewing and swaps that I must fulfill.
Next week DH and I are going to visit no. 2 daughter and family as my 2 Gchildren both have birthdays.
I had bought this cradle at a Fair for Emma and decided to make a quilt to make it more personal from nan. I found a pattern in a book and down sized it to fit and had it sewed in a few hours and last night I just had to hand sew the binding. I was very pleased at how it turned out and I hope little Emma enjoys playing with it.
This is the quilt and littkle pillow.

I thought I might as well show you the cradle as well and I got it for a bargain price. I cleaned it with detergent and a spray with disinfectant and it looks lovely.

Thats all for now as i have to pick DH up from work as he is on 3 weeks holiday and after the farm visit i hope we can get away for a few days in the caravan. Cheers for now Jude.