Merry Christmas

 

FNSI December

 I joined in with our lovely hostess Wendy for the last sew in of 2020. Whilst the year went exceedingly fast it also seemed to drag out. Contradictory i know but that is how it felt. Now that the year is almost gone i'm touching wood, crossing fingers & toes & anything else hoping that 2021 is a hell of a lot better year than this year has been.

I had to put aside my sewing plans for yesterday. I had an appointment after which i was going to sew but my daughter called & asked could i watch my grandson for her whilst she got a few things done. We had a pleasant afternoon but by the time he went home i was too tired to do much.

GS had bought a little craft box with him & wanted help making up a couple of things to give his Mum & Dad. I didn't get a photo of his little tree he did but i did manage a photo of the wreath before he put it all away. :)

The picture on the side of the box showed enough ribbon to go around & have a hanger. There wasn't. I had barely enough to get around the foam ring. I found up some ribbon in my collection to give it a hanger. The same with the Christmas tree, not enough green tinsel. I found up some green ribbon so GS could finish it off so the foam cone couldn't be seen.

I did a little sewing on Libby Morgan before i quite & went to bed with a headache.

Pop over to visit Wendy to see who joined in & what lovely projects they chose to work on. Thankyou Wendy for hosting us again this year.

Happy Stitching,

Libby Morgan

 I've been stitching away at Libby Morgan & it's slowly growing. Next step is to make more paths. I hope i don't run out of the fabric before i get to the size i want - 2 maybe 3 rows then i'll have to find border fabric for it.

Happy Stitching,

FNwF December

 Last night i participated in FNwF hosted by the lovely Cheryll.

Sadly i didn't get a lot done due to the heat & being slightly unwell.

Just a little more done on my Libby Morgan quilt. A few more rows then it's onto the fillers & borders.

Pop over here to find the links to who joined in.

Happy Stitching,

FNSI November

 Yesterday i joined lovely hostess Wendy for FNSI. 

I had a few Christmas things to finish to get into the mail. I started with this little mat

then onto these little tags but i was interrupted at this stage with my oldest daughter bringing me a gift & then going out to lunch so i finished them when i got back. :)

Last on my list was to make these 2 decorations

In the evening i did a little more stitching on Libby Morgan.

Just a few stones along the pathway & started to add the green flower.

Pop over to visit Wendy for the links to who joined in & to see what projects they worked on.

Happy Stitching, 

Cats, cats & more cats

 Today one of my daughters took us out to Lucky Cat Cafe to have coffee & to spend time patting the kitties. There are quite a few in residence but we made sure they all had pats.

First up we had coffee,

Nicely decorated with kittie shapes. Then off to the cat room to spend an hour with the beautiful kitties.

This little ginger guy is 19 years old.

This guy looks sad but he is very smoogie. After taking this photo he jumped onto my youngest daughter's lap. Then he left her to hop onto my other daughter's lap. Sadly by then our hour was up & we had to leave the kitties behind.

After that we decided to have lunch at our local hotel.

A very lovely day out indeed.

Happy Stitching,

FNwF November

 Yesterday i joined in with Friday Night with Friends hosted by our very lovely Cheryll. 

 I've joined in a couple of Christmas swaps & needed to make a decoration for 1 & plan out the gifts for the other. After sorting through patterns & cutting fabric out i settled in for a short machine sewing session making up triangles to turn into decorations.

Then some more sorting through my SIL's stash. It is giving me a headache. I'm coming to the stage, because i'm over internet buyers because they just don't read what i write, that i'm thinking of somehow advertising a "garage" sale of the fabrics, patterns, books, mystery ufo's, ufo's that do have patterns ect & just say make a reasonable offer. Oh & that is just the patchwork. I've still to collect all the crochet stash yet. 

In the evening i finally sat to make up the decorations. They may be small & fiddly but they make cute ornaments. I just hope the new owner/s will like them.

Not as much done as i hoped but at least i got these 2 done & dusted.

If anyone is interested in the decoration swap you have until tomorrow to sign up here.

During the day my latest Jim Shore ornament arrived. I love cardinals & i loved this ornament as soon as i saw it. Happy Happy am i. :)

Also on a brighter, happier note my birthday/Christmas present to myself finally made it to Aussie shores. Just have to await arrival from Tasmania now. :)

Bag & matching wallet set from Vendula London. I'm so excited. I can't wait until they arrive. I do already use a Vendula London set so now i'll have 2 to choose from. :)

Happy Stitching,

Zoom Zoom

 Yesterday i joined in the Zoom group that Chookyblue had set up. Thankyou Chookyblue.  It was a very lovely day & so nice to have a wonderful group of ladies to sit & sew with. I really miss having sewing days & i really hope we can do it again sometime soon. :)

I picked my neglected Libby Morgan quilt to work on & i managed to get 4 flowers surrounded whilst chatting & the other flowers whilst watching the football last night. Sadly my team lost & won't be in the grand final next week.

I counted about 80 flowers so i'll work on an 8 by 10 row quilt with borders. Hopefully it will be around a single size.

Happy Stitching

FNSI October

Yesterday was FNSI hosted by Wendy. After some farnakling around with more of my SIL's stash i settled down in the evening to do a little crafting.

First up was to prep these last few paths for my Libby Morgan quilt. I'd done a heap on Thursday night & just needed to finish off these.

Not sure how many path hexies i need but i've enough to make a good start on the quilt.

Next up is one of my SIL's projects. Everything is cut out & there are 3 put together but as i was making up the hexagon centres i realised not enough had been cut out. I have no idea if there is any more of the fabrics used or where i'd find it if there was. I've decided to go with a plain centre to match the diamonds that go along with these pieces.

This is what they look like finished but i will have to take out the centres of the already made ones & replace with the cream fabric.

Pop over to visit Wendy to see who joined in & what projects they worked on. Thanks to Wendy for hosting us again.

Happy Stitching,

FNwF October

 Holy heck how did it get to be October already. First time ever I think that I can say I'm glad the year is nearly over. Hoping 2021 is a heck of a lot better than 2020.

Anyway yesterday was time for FNwF hosted by lovely Cheryll. I sometimes think I'll just give up on doing anything on the Friday sewing days as my plans seem to go out the window. My fault yesterday for dithering around. Ah well.

I decided to sit down in the afternoon & drag out my long neglected Libby Morgan quilt. The hexies had been made ages back & all I needed to do was to choose fabric for the centres & then sew them altogether. I surprised myself & made more up than I thought I would. 😊😊.

I  think I need to draw myself up a plan to dedicate some evenings to EPP,  some to stitcheries & some to applique instead of just embroidering all the time. I need to get my ufos done & dusted though a lot of them just need me to sit at the machine to finish them off. After seeing what my SIL left unfinished as we've been sorting through her craft stuff to sell off it really made me sad & the realisation that I need to get my stuff sorted out.

Pop over to visit Cheryll to see who joined in last night & what their choice of lovely projects were worked on.

Happy Stitching,

FNSI September

 Yesterday was FNSI, hosted by Wendy, & i had plans to work on my quilt from last post but life as always gets in the way.

Time for that mammogram to occur, that done i came home slightly distracted almost forgetting about FNSI but i needed to pop around to see my brother whose wife recently passed away.

After that I quietly stitched on this little block i had started Thursday night.

Then it was out again with my learner burner daughter for practise before her test next week. I didn't think I was going to finish the stitchery but it's done & i started another.

Including this one I have 4 left & they are done. 

Pop over to visit Wendy to see who joined in FNSI last night & what lovely projects they worked on.

Happy Stitching,

FNwF September

Yesterday i joined in FNwF hosted by Cheryll.

I started early as i'm making a new quilt using up my 2-1/2" squares i chopped up many years ago planning to use them in a scrappy quilt "one day". I had started last year, i think, to piece together the squares as leaders & enders as i used my machine but they fell by the wayside. I was surprised though when I counted yesterday that I'd made 53 pair up. 🙂.

This is the quilt i'm making.

It's called Fading Charms Quilt.

 I'm planning on making 4 quilts but I don't have enough squares cut. I think my tin only holds enough for 2 quilts. I've plenty of scraps though to have another cutting marathon. 🙂🙂.

I was just pulling random squares out of my tin

 & sewing together when I decided that wasn't working so i pulled them all out & spread them over my bed

and the ironing board

With my daughters help I would pair them up & place beside the machine to chain piece

After taking a tea break back to sewing & another "helper" to assist in sewing

After lunch I was getting sore from sitting for so long so I decided to count how many pairs I made yesterday & they totalled 320. Adding the earlier 53 I've sewn together 754 of the 846 needed for the quilt. I could've kept going but I really wanted to get the centre together to see how it would look with the homespun i was using on this top.

The other 3 quilts I'll use blue, possibly black & pink for the borders as they are all for my grandchildren & although I'm using the same design for all 4 i want the borders different colours for each of them.

In the evening I finished the words, hearts & french knots on last Wednesdays Love and Hugs from Australia Christmas stitcheries.

I do wish the red wouldn't run on cottage garden threads but fortunately it soaks out with any damage to the stitcheries.

Lastly I started on the latest block in my Christmas bom from Fig n Berry designs.

Pop over to visit Cheryll to see who joined in & what projects were worked on

Happy Stitching,

FNSI August.

Last night I joined in FNSI hosted by Wendy. I worked on the free Christmas patterns from Love and Hugs from Australia on Facebook.

Just the highlights, leaf pattern & French knots to finish this block. 

I almost finished this little block of. Just 1 more & I will have caught up with these blocks. Wish I could say the same of the first lot of free blocks. 🙂.

Pop over to Wendy's blog to see who joined in & what projects they worked on.

Happy Stitching, 

FNwF July

Last night Wendy hosted us for FNwF & I was able to join in.

Earlier in the afternoon I traced the 3rd block for Love and Hugs from Australia Christmas designs.  Night time i added the "flower" to the centre on block number 2.

Then started stitching block number 3.

Pop over to Wendy's blog to see who joined in & the projects they worked on.

Happy Stitching,

FNwF July

Last night I joined in FNwF hosted by our lovely Cheryll. 

My project of choice was the first little Christmas stitchery that the lovely ladies of Love and Hugs from Australia on Facebook have given us to stitch. They are offering this one free too.

They are only small so quick to stitch up. 4" finished. I chose to stitch mine using Mistletoe by Cottage Garden Threads.

Pop over to visit Cheryll here to see who joined in & what projects  were worked on.

Happy Stitching,

FNSI June

Last night i joined in FNSI for June hosted by lovely Wendy . Oh dear, how is it June already & already half gone. 😔.

My poor little stitchery met with an accident. I'd started it earlier in the week & would've been finished but I came down with a migraine.  About lunchtime i thought I'd get a start on FNSI but discovered marks on my stitchery. What on earth I wondered.  I realised the cat with nose problems had been sitting on my chair & sneezed on my stitchery leaving blood spots on most of it.

Hmm what to do, will it washout & if it did that would mean my pen would wash out. Dilemmas for sure. So I thought try washing it out & retracing & if that failed I'd just have to start again. When I left it all the vines & most of the berries had been done. Luckily for me the blood washed out & I could retrace my pattern.

 I finished the berries, traced the birds, chain stitched the tops of the banners, got 1 banner stitched & started the 2nd. Doesn't look like I'll have the next one finished before Mondays stitchery is sent to me. 😔.

Pop over to visit Wendy to see who joined in & what lovely projects they worked on.

Happy Stitching,

Christmas BOM

I've been busy stitching the mystery Christmas BOM from Fig n Berry. I didn't start straight away as I was stitching the patterns from Love & Hugs from Australia. I stopped stitching those as there are 23 stitcheries in the Christmas BOM & I knew if I didn't get busy it wouldn't be done for Christmas. I was nearly caught up. Hoping to have the next 2 done before the next pattern is sent to me on Monday.

This is how the layout will look. I don't know about borders yet as we'll find out after we get block 23. There is 4 rows to the quilt.

The place I bought my jigsaw from got some more in so I bought another 2.

Happy Stitching,

FNwF #2

Despite almost forgetting it was Friday I did sit & do a little stitching for FNwF hosted by Cheryll.

Life has a way of throwing a curve ball at you & my mind just wasn't on stitching at all.

I'd started stitching the green Wednesday night at my Mum's. Got that finished last night & started the red before I gave up & went to bed.

Pop over to visit Cheryll & see the links to who joined in & what projects they worked on.

Happy Stitching,

A finish & a flimsy

Finally managed to sit at my machine today. First thing to be done was finish this little stocking off from Gail Pan's Christmas BOM Merry & Bright.

 Back in 2017 i decided to join in with Sue Daley's Round We Go BOM. I chose to be a little different & made my EPP in Halloween fabrics. I got them out the other day ready to turn into a flimsy & discovered I'd only trimmed back about half the blocks. That took awhile to do today, then onto laying them out to see in what order I wanted to sew them in.

 Yay another project moved from partially done to a flimsy.

Happy Stitching,