Big Day Out

Today was the first day of the Annual Craft and Quilt Fair held at Darling Harbour. This year it is celebrating 25 years and from memory I think it was said that there were over 350 quilts on display  to wander amongst and admire.   The biggest number of quilts on display ever at the Show.      It is always inspirational and motivating to see what other quilters make.

 

As well as the quilts to see there are also plenty of demonstrations and workshops as well as  retail therapy to keep one happy for hours.   I had been looking to purchase a new sewing light but did not want it magnified and found just what I was looking for as well as a few other bits and pieces.

One piece of fabric that is missing from my stash is a white background with black writing and whilst I had seen some they mostly had very large writing and pictures on them - not what I had in mind so when I saw a bolt of what I was looking for today a metre was purchased for a future project.    I also stocked up on some more bobbin huggers and the black object behind the fabric is 50 metres of macramé cord.  That will be used for another purpose which I will show later.

My plan is to head to my sewing room tomorrow to set up my new light, wind more bobbins and put the huggers around them and with all that inspiration gained today work out my next project.

Back soon and in the meantime

Happy sewing all

Winter garden colour

A walk around my garden over the weekend proved to be colourful experience even though we are nearly at the end of the first month of winter.

First up is a bromeliad which gives a lovely splash of red in amongst some ferns.

This azalea which is near my sewing room flowers for the majority of the year

These colourful succulents have self seeded from where I do not know and provide a pretty cover in front of the garden fence.

My bambino bougainvillea obviously loves the spot that it has up against the front wall where it gets sun for most of the day

And lastly my Chinese tallow tree which by now should be just bare branches still has many green leaves as well as a mixture of yellow and deep red.

I hope that you enjoyed your stroll around my winter garden.   I am glad  these photos were taken on Saturday as it has not stopped raining since and even though the colour is still there it is looking very wet and dull.

Back soon and in the meantime

Happy sewing all

Purse size

Or shopping size

Now that plastic shopping bags will no longer be available at the end of the month it will be necessary to have reusable bags available at all times and while I do have a good supply of fabric shopping bags none of them can be folded up and tucked into a pocket on the front keeping them neat and tidy in my handbag.   This problem was solved today when I made the above bag and of course I could not stop at one.      I have had this aqua fabric in my stash for quite sometime and I thought it would make a pretty bag and even better  as it is the colour for this month's Rainbow Scrap challenge. 

And after making these two another 3 were cut out.  As you can see they are all pinned where necessary and the plan is to sew these up tomorrow.

Thanks Wendy for hosting another fun FNSI.

Linking with Finished or Not Friday, So Scrappy and Oh Scrap.

Back soon and in the meantime

Happy sewing all

Third time lucky

My walking companions and I have been washed out  twice over the last couple weeks when we tried to do the walk from Mosman to Balmoral but today was the ideal walking day....not hot, no strong cold wind or rain.   On with the walking shoes and packed in our bags were water bottles, an apple, some nuts and  a camera of course to capture our adventure.    The sign shows the beginning of the walk.  Normally I am travelling on the Manly ferry but today I was able to see it as it crossed the harbour and the third photo shows one of the many secluded bays along the harbour front.

Time to get out the book of directions and have a rest before we climbed the next lot of stairs.   One of the many lovely sandstone rock formations that we passed along the way.    I was able to make it to the top of the stairway and took advantage of the seat facing straight out through the Sydney Heads to have a sit down and a quick snack before the descent  which will take us down to our destination.  

The descent took us 15 mins of walking down stairs which can be seen in the photo below.    We are about one quarter of the way down at this point.     Our destination - Balmoral Beach and our reward of fish and chips for lunch.   We all felt we earned it after walking for 2 and a half hours.    I have never walked up and down sooooo many steps in one day.

Fortunately there was a bus stop just across the road  which took us to the top of the hill and then it was out of that bus and into another one for the ride home.  

Back soon and in the meantime

Happy sewing all

A wet long weekend

We have been without rain for such a long, long time and once it started it has not stopped.    With all that dampness and lack of sunshine we have little clumps of toadstools popping up all over the garden.

Seeing that it has been far too wet and cold to do any outdoor activities like gardening so what better way to spend a long wet weekend than warm and dry in my sewing room.   Each year my quilting group does a  charity project and this year we are making library bags for students in underprivileged countries.   The group was divided into cutters, side seam sergers and I ended up in the group that was forming the casings for the drawstrings to be threaded through.   Each of us were given around 20 bags to work on.

My pile is now ready to be handed over to the  drawstring threaders.   I have also been given fabric to become one of the cutters so we vary the tasks between us.  

Back soon and in the meantime

Happy sewing all

Can you see it??????

No nor can I.    What you are looking for is this hiding behind the thread holder.

The story behind this is last year I made a few snap top glasses cases and the metal tape measure somehow became unraveled from its holder and I had a "bright light bulb moment" to store the unraveled tape in a cardboard tube and put it in a safe logical place where I would find  it next time it was needed.    Not so.  Yesterday when I was looking for it  as hubs was in desperate need of a new glasses case I spent half an hour looking for a much smaller rolled up remainder of the metal tape and had forgotten all about my safe logical  place.


Anyway after much moving of things, muttering of not nice words  and just when I beginning to think that I must have used it all up because it is definitely not in this sewing room I  spotted it lurking behind the threads all upright,  safe and waiting to be used.     How many times does that "safe place" get forgotten about?    Far too many I am afraid.

Once it was retrieved, things put back to their place I was able to continue with my plans for FNwF which was a snap top glasses case for hubs.

Thanks Cheryll for hosting another fun sewing night and if you would like to see what the other 17 participants did last night this is the place to go.

Linking with Oh Scrap.

Back soon and in the meantime

Happy sewing all

A Team Effort

Miss M has been having "a go" on my sewing machine for a sometime now and it was decided that she could perhaps start to make a pair of pyjama pants for herself so into grandma's stash and we found some leftover fabric from a top that I had made her a couple of years ago.   The little video below shows Miss M making a start

She went as far as getting the side seams on both legs sewn up and then handed over the tricky bits of the construction part to me.   Here is our team effort below.

Hubs and I live opposite a wetland area and we frequently have  wildlife visitors come into our back garden.    During the week I was lucky enough to get a photo of a white faced heron.    I have seen this bird in the garden before but it is very nervous and usually takes flight when it sees me  however this time I was able to get up quite close without it realising.

Back soon and in the meantime.

Linking with Friday Finished or Not.

Happy sewing all