Better late than never

A bit late in posting my FNSI project for last Friday. I do so enjoy just being able to sit and stitch with so many friends. Didn't get to post over the weekend as we made a surprise visit to my son and daughter in law who are in Ballarat. I gate crashed the baby shower Robyn was very surprised we made the trip down and I did enjoy catching up with the 21/2 of them for a few days. The new grand baby is due early April. 

I have been working on doing some Chicken Scratch and cross stitch. I have finished one tablecloth already and the one I am working on now is for our friends we go caravaning with. I hope she likes it. 

My mum used to do this type of work when I was a young child. I have many of her aprons she made and her hand drawn pattern books which I treasure.

The first photo is the cloth I am working on now and the second is the completed cloth.

FNSI.

Firstly my apology for not getting back to those that left lovely comments on my blog. 

On Monday 10th. February 2014 I lost my beautiful Mother. She died peacefully in her sleep and I was so happy and grateful that I was able to spend those last days with her being constantly by her side.

Mum was a wonderful wife to Dad for almost 69 years, a fabulous Mum, Grandmother and Great Grandmother. A great role model who loved life and everyone around her. Mum enjoyed so many crafts I have lost count, trying her hand at almost anything. Her great love was knitting. I am thankful that she taught me the love of creativity.

Joyce Daphne Mildred A'Bell

 

Binding and a quilt finally finished.

Yes it is finished. I stitched for several hours last night and this morning to get the binding finished on this huge quilt. The work coleauge that it was made for will be returning from England in March so it will be a lovely surprise for her after almost 3 years although she was in no hurry.

If you have not read the blog post from way back the blue and white fabrics used are about 30 years old purchased in Paris. I guess you could say she definitly was in no hurry.

Friday night with friends

This is my very first FNWF. 

I have decided I really need to finish some of my UFO projects that are crying out to be finished. My first project is a blue and white quilt I started in October of 2011.

I posted about this quilt on my blog then but unfortunately time has just flown by,

and here we are now in 2014, I REALLY need to get it finished. The quilt was professionally quilted at the end of last year and I only have to do the binding all 446 inches of it. Wish me luck.

I look forward to seeing what everyone else is up to over the weekend.

Hello blogging friends

It has been a very very long time since I last posted. From time to time I have been able to catch up on some blogs I have followed for many years and been amazed at all the beautiful items that have been crafted. I have not been able to get to any projects over the past year or so a little bit of stitching every now and then has been all I have done. For the best part of 2013 I had to commit to many family events and issues. 2013 was the worst year from beginning to end. Most distressing was to place my darling Mum into a nursing home as a permanent resident. Dementia is very confronting and too watch your loved one slip away slowly is heartbreaking. Other family issues kept me busy and at the end of the year my dear dad had major surgery that had him in hospital for 10 weeks. He was finally discharged on Christmas Eve and is now living with us. 

This is going to be a much better year and I am going to give myself ME TIME. I have joined Cherylls Friday Night Sew In so am looking forward to getting back to some stitching. At least finishing off some of those projects that have been hanging around for quite some time. 

One project that I have completed was my vintage doily hexagon wall hanging. I am trilled at how it turned out and it is now hanging above my bed.

WHERE HAVE I BEEN

Truthfully I have not been anywhere but just very busy. My daughter Sheree is getting married in April so getting things organised for this event has been taking lots of time.

I have to share with you a parcel that I received last week. A blogging friend Mary in America after seeing my embroidery hexy quilt offered to send me some of her pieces. That was back in October of last year. We had all but given up on this parcel ever reaching its destination when I received a phone call from a woman I had met once at a quilting class some 18 months ago who luckily for me remembered my name (her surname is also Power) and thought that the parcel was meant for me. How lucky was I that the post office sent it her way and not to another address that would not have known who I was. As I said to Mary "Miracles do happen"

This is what was in the parcel. Lots of beautiful embroidered doilies and other embroideries. A bag full of fabulous buttons and bits and pieces of laces and trims. I will have lots of fun putting some of these little treasures into my hexy quilt and will look at this quilt with lovely memories.

Earlier this year Australia Day in fact I found I had won these beautiful patterns from

"One Day in May"

Melissa Grant does some of the most beautiful designs and I was absolutely delighted to have won the "Thankful" block of the month

My only bit of stitching that I have been doing is attempting to make my little grand daughters dress for the upcoming wedding. I am not a good clothes sewer... I fly by the seat of my pants sometimes and deep down hope the article I am trying to create works out.

I have put the tulle under the dress what a job that was and now I am getting ready for the netting to go over the top.

Looking quite good so far and Sheree loves it and that is all that counts.

I am also attempting to make the ties for the guys.

I have been trying the pattern out on some scrap satin and I think my prototype tie has worked quite well. Ties are not that hard to make really.

AUSTRALIA DAY

I hope everyone is enjoying their Australia Day. Usually we go to the river at Gross Wold for a picnic lunch but because we have had so much rain we decided to have our Aussy day at home. Kaitlyn loves the water so the sprinkler was the next best thing.
I had to take photos of Kaitlyn for her Mum to see (Sheree flew out to America on Wednesday) to show her that Kaitlyn was having a great day.

I think she had a great day.

(((HUGS))) Roz

A QUIET DAY

Lots of pictures to share today.
Today I have a day to myself. Kaitlyn has been here for the past few days and will return again tonight after going to the airport to see her Mum off on a business trip to the America. Whilst here she wanted to do some sewing on her scrappy quilt that she started about 18 months ago. Only one block to go and then ready to put them all together.
Kaitlyn couldn't decide what colour to use so brown it was. She quite enjoys sewing but like all 11 year old an hour or so at a time was enough.

However the next day all the blocks were completed and now just the sashings to do. She has done a great job and for me not too much unpicking. She is very proud of her quilt and says she wants to get it finished before her Mum returns home.

In between the cutting and ironing for Kaitlyn I was fiddling with an outfit I am hoping to wear to my daughters wedding (Kaitlyn's Mum) in April.

This little dress was the "Mother of the Bride " dress my Mum wore at my wedding 42 years ago. I have a wonderful friend Margaret who just loves a challenge and is making this into something special for me. The lace is beautiful and I have been cutting lace pieces to make an edging along the hem edge. I will show more pictures as it progresses.

I have found this old treasure. While over visiting my parents on the weekend and looking for empty jars I found this wonderful cake cooker on the very top shelf in the laundry. I had never seen this before and as a child I don't remember it being in my home so maybe it was there all the time but was never used. Has anyone ever seen one of these before. I think it to be quite old
especially when it reads you can cook a sponge for a penny. There is no thermostat only the little glass top into which you look to see if the contents are cooking. No on or of switch.

The name on the little recipe book says "St. George" electric cooker and is designed to cook cakes, scones and biscuits.

Yesterday Kaitlyn and I decided to try it out and made one of the recipes in the book. A Chocolate coconut cake. It was very strange cooking a cake this way to see how it was cooking we had to use a torch to look into the glass panel. It took longer to cook that it said but the cake cooked well and is quite moist.

Kaitlyn enjoyed icing the cake.

I also made some tomato chutney from our home grown tomatoes.

I forgot to show these photos in my last post. I usually try to make a little Christmas decoration each year for the grand children and these are what I made.

The blue snowman was for Zoe.

The red one for Kaitlyn.

And the penguins for Ryan.

Thanks for looking in. (((HUGS))) Roz.

A New Year

A Happy New Year to Everyone.

I have been absent from blogging for so long now, with my limited knowledge of computers I think I may need a refresher course.
I have been somewhat busy as we all were through the Christmas period but did get a bit of stitching done here and there. I've decided to do the 365 days journal this year and have found this to be a great way to remember the year of 2012 and to have a quilt at the end.
As I said a bit of stitching. A cushion made for my eldest daughter made from 2 tea towels.

The left over linen was used to make my very first Tilda doll for little Zoe. These 2 things were supposed to be for Christmas but did not quite get finished so were my first finishes for 2012.

The first weekend of December saw my youngest (Joshua) turn 30 and get engaged. We travelled to Ballarat for the occasion which was wonderful Josh and Robyn seem to be on top of the world and very happy.

Another stitching project I had to get finished before Christmas was an apron for the Patchwork group I belong to. Kaitlyn so graciously models the apron for me.

Has anyone ever seen a lemon like this one? We found this one on our lemon tree recently and thought it to be really strange. We counted 16 lemon forms coming on the one fruit.

During the lead up to Christmas I stitched these little embroideries and completed putting them together on Christmas Eve. I like to make something special each year so was happy to see these hanging over the door.

Also made these little bon-bons for gifts to special friends. I filled them with a little tree decoration and chocolates. They looked fabulous I thought.

Zoe Grace's Christmas stocking was finished in time to hang up for Christmas. This year I hope to get another stocking started for our soon to be son in law Craig.

(((HUGS))) Roz.

QUILTING AT LAST

I have finally started to quilt my "Seasons of the Heart" quilt. So far everything is sailing along smoothly. I have quilted almost half of the quilt over the past few days. These is so much embroidery deciding where to quilt can be a problem at times but I am pleased with it so far. A bit of a diversion from quilting. I joined up to do this free online workshop on
Sew Mama Sew's blog every Wednesday (Thursday here) for 4 weeks. I have been following along and today the second lesson we had to fuse all the pieces to the background and stitch them in place.

I am quite happy with how it looks and can't wait until next week. The wall hanging is called "A Partridge in a Pear Tree" and is an Advent Calendar.