Happy 13th birthday Xavier.

 We have celebrated Xavier’s 13th birthday 

having fun at ten pin bowling.

Lucky me won the first game and 2nd the next.

But I am so sore the next day.

What have I been doing

 A friend of mine has sold her house and decided to travel, in a caravan, with her family. Single bed bunks are a lot narrower than a bed so the sheets are far too big. So I made her 5 fitted sheets. 

And they fit beautifully.

They also had 2 quilts that were a little wide so I trimmed them down by 12”-15” and rebound them. Elastic still to be threaded.

Next up was to shorten her dresses by a couple of inches.

This was done while on an Australia Day zoom. Thanks Chooky.

All done and delivered. She was very happy

C2C crochet blanket.

 I have a few crochet blankets that have been started and I just wanted something easy to do. I haven’t got too much to do to finish this one.

I enjoyed just sitting for a while and did a couple or more rows.

This blanket is now finished. It covers my 2 seater couch.

Just need to sew in the ends.

Days of Delight Calendar stitchery project

 I thought I would do some more on my 2022 BOM stitchery. All I had done previously was trace out some words. Silly me started to use a friction pen . Then I realised I needed to iron on the pellon before I stitched so I had to retrace with pencil.

The pellon is now on and ready to stitch. All packed in my new project bag.

To see this beautiful project have a look at Val Lairds blog Here

I thought it was $20 per month but it was only a one off fee of $20 for the digital patterns. You save and print your own. So easy.

A little completed, quick project

 I am going through a few little projects sitting on my workroom floor. I had a few placemats cut out ready to quilt and finish. This piece was a bit large and I needed a new project bag. So to get rid of one project in the pile repurpose it.

I now have a large project bag finished and 1 less ufo in the pile.

Simple quilting and I put loops on each end.

I just love this print.

CHOOKSHED January challenge no.06 is completed

Progress has been made on my CHOOKSHED bag.

I decided to quilt all the pieces as I had used light weight pellon behind the bag front stitchery. I even put some in the handles.

I recently had this machine repaired so I took advantage of trying out the quilting foot to see how it sewed.  It was beautiful. So quiet and smooth. It was worth the money spent on the repair.

I cross hatched all over for the quilting.

All the preparations are ready.

 I have finished. My CHOOKSHED bag is done.

It actually is larger than I first thought when I was cutting out the pieces.

Thank you to all.

Thanks to zoom I finished my butterfly top

 Well Chooky held a zoom today. I managed to get the 2nd butterfly quilt done.

I started here

Last week on zoom I did this.

I continued on 

And got this amount done.

Today there was another zoom so more was done.

Then the borders went on.

It now measures 60” * 78”.

The backing is prepared and will be off to another member for quilting.

More stitching on my Scrub Stitchin’ bag

 It has been a really busy first week back at work. I am so tired but the days are going by very fast.

I actually have managed to do some hand stitching on my bag.

I am happy so far with my progress. I may even be able to cut out the rest of the bag pieces on the weekend.

Catchup post. Japan in November posts. Blog book day

 I was really slack a lot of 2023. I didn't sew much or even blog much. I did read other blogs but couldn't be bothered doing my own. I had a very busy year with other things going on so the other day I decided to get stuck into and add in a lot of posts that should have been done. The blog2print was a push offering 50% off until tomorrow helped. I have done my blog books. Yes, BOOKS. I had so many photos that I needed to do 2 books. Thankfully they were 50% off. I also decided to change the format, so my printing stayed in the correct spot in reference to the photos. This made so many more pages. Ill compare the 2 formats when I get them in the post.

My Japan trip took a lot of days up but are now all done. That was a challenge as there were over 1000 photos that I added. These all start back on 13.11.2023 if you want to go see a lot of photos of what I saw and where I went. I know it's not the same as being there but be warned. 

VERY PHOTO HEAVY POSTS.

If you want to see a media video of the Yokohama Quilt show go to this post.

I have spent hours and days trying to catch up.

Sorry I missed zoom yesterday Chooky but I needed to focus and didn't check emails or my phone while doing this. I spent from when I got up to midnight on the computer. I got there. I have just only finished now. So off and do the following while watching some Quilt Show episodes on YouTube.

After I finished doing the blog2print I hope to trace out more of my Scrub Stitchin' bag 

to look like this

then work on the next butterfly quilt.  This is sort of the layout I will go with. Now to start trimming, adding in filler blocks to make the rows the same width and working out the finished size.

Butterfly quilt no.1 has gone to be quilted by another member

That will be my Sunday gone and back to work on Monday after a few weeks off.

Away camping and stitching too

 We have had another trip away free camping to Nyah, Victoria.

We didn't have a river view but it was peaceful for the night

All set up again

I sat and did some stitching

Concentrating

Tony doing well with the cooking. Only a small fire is needed for this cooker and it does a brilliant job.

The next day a few more campers turned up and parked very close by. One group even drove through our site just missing the cooker so next morning we packed up and moved on to Walpeup.

There is a nice campsite near the lake which was relaxing too. Only 1.5 hours from home too.

What was I stitching? My no. 6 challenge project.

2024 January

I have decided to blanket stitch my pieces on. I didn't have those matching threads with me so I could only get a bit done. Id left the weft at home too and I hadn't traced the writing on. So not a lot was done. I also didn't get the placement correct so my ladybug is either just landing or taking off in flight.

I'm home now. I will get all that sorted.

Scrub Stitching pouch from a few years ago

 While my no. 6 challenge item to work on is also a scrub Stitchin bag I have decided to finish this pouch first. Back in January 2023 I put this bag together. I was working on the label but it disappeared with the threads. Could not find it anywhere so I just finished the pouch. 

One day recently, out of nowhere the label and thread appeared. I thought I would finish this before working on my challenge project.

Tada… FINISHED.

Butterfly quilts.

 How did I spend the first day of January 2024. Sewing, of course.

I was working on the butterfly quilt I am making for the local hospitals birthing room. Members from our group and a few of the zoom ladies made some blocks to help me out. After deciding what to do I have enough to make 2 quilts 1.5 * 1.8 metres.

Blocks are trimmed to the same size. As with any group activity the blocks don’t seem to arrive all the same so some thinking is required. Trimmed to 12” and will end up being 11.5” finished.

All the sashings, border and binding was cut.

After a good days sewing and the top is all together. This will be passed on to another member for quilting and hopefully another person for the binding.

Here are the leftover blocks for the 2nd quilt. As you can see there are so many different sizes. I have laid them out in a way that won’t need sashings but will need some scrappy pieces to fill the gaps and make the rows the same width. I will make some string blocks then cut 1/4 sq and 1/2 square triangles for setting in those on point blocks. It will be very different to the first one I did but will be about the same size.

HAPPY NEW YEAR and Chookshed Stitchers 2024 Challenge has STARTED

 

Deana has drawn the first number out for our 2024 challenge

Here is what I will be working on. So are some of the other participants. Maybe I might even get it finished. 

I had made a start on this a while back, but it got pushed to the back of the pile. It has now been taken out to get worked on. I will be taking this away camping with me so progress might be made.