Autumn Days

Today was one of those lovely autumn days that Sydney is known for - cold nights, crisp mornings and clear blue skies - just the day to go for a drive to the Blue Mountains. Off we set and along the way I found some of Percy and Petunia's relatives on the side of the Great Western highway. As you can see in the first photo a couple of uncles are busy supervising the roadworks taking place whilst in the second photo an aunt and two cousins are eagerly watching with interest.






After taking some photos of Percy's "family" we set off to Katoomba and you can see why they are called the Blue Mountains from the following photo.



I would call this "survival of the fitest". While walking one of the tracks along to the Threee Sisters I spotted this tree growing out of the sandstone rock face and I wonder what lives in this "house". I was not going to put my hand in to find out!!!





And of course the highlight of going to the mountains in autumn has to be seeing the beautiful range of colour in the trees.

Starry Starry Night

I seem to have been working on this quilt for quite sometime and I was hoping to have it finished for Mothers Day as a gift for mum which I achieved as I did the last of the "tidying up" at 9.30 last night and I must say that I am pleased with the way it has turned out. I was having doubts about it along the way as I was working on it from a picture I saw and only knew that it was made using 5" squares.

I like the way the stars seem to "pop out". The quilt appears to have a three dimensional effect.



And for those who are interested here is a piccie of the flipside



I have taken the last week off work and whilst out and about I took the opportunity to do a bit more stash building as can be seen below.



I am toying up with doing another quilt the same as the one above only this time using batik fabrics. I will have to do more thinking and magazine research on this before making my final decision. Then again I really enjoyed doing the "tube" method. Decisions, decisions.

Not happy .....

And in this instance I cannot blame "Jan" or anyone else only ME!!

Last night was Friday night sew-in and I had aimed to finish off a tablerunner that I have been working on using the "tube" method and all was going well until I got up to the binding - what no colour thread to match the binding - how could this be???
Off I went rustling through all my colour threads - every colour of the rainbow and grades of every shade but alas not the green I wanted. So for me Friday night sew-in turned into Saturday morning finish off after I called into the local sewing centre to get the thread which I might add took two of us to find just the right shade.

Anyway without any further ado here is my autumn tablerunner using the "tube" method which I enjoyed doing.



I can see more seasonal tablerunners - winter, spring and summer - being done using this method and a couple of cushion covers as well.

Baby business and other things

One of the girls where I work is having a baby boy early June with the theme for the nursery being baby african animals. I saw this adorable fabric and put together a couple of items for her including baby burp cloths (thanks Gail for the idea), singlets, face washers and made one of those cute baskets from Pink Penguin.





I have also made a couple of hot pads to match the hand towels for my "giftie"
box.

Who do you see?

This is amazing. Stare at the 4 dots in the middle of the face for 30 seconds then look at a plain wall for a couple of seconds and you will see a circle appear. Blink your eyes a couple of times and tell me what you see!!!!!!!!

Stars in my eyes

Last night was Friday night sew-in for me again and I have been working on a couple of items over the last few weeks however I decided to work on my Star Quilt. It is great being able to set aside some designated sewing time without any interruptions.

I have now finished the blocks - a total of 12 - which you can see in the photo below.



I have just placed a few together to see how they look.



I am still deciding if I will put a plain border next followed by a border of blocks in the fabric used in the blocks or vice versa. Once I have the blocks sewn together I will make that decision then. I might be lucky enough to get that far over the Easter break.

All the best dressed ....

bottles are wearing outfits in my house from now on !!!



The reason being that I am sick of the drops and rings being left behind on placemats and other surfaces. I saw this fabric a couple of months ago and knew that it would have a purpose one day and the day was yesterday. I did a quick google to search for a pattern but only came up with ones that had ties and I knew that the cellar master is not into tying up bibs on bottles so I drew up a pattern and I am pleased with the result. The covers just slip over the top of the bottle and catch any drips and spills before they reach the tablecloth or placemats.

Necessity is the mother of invention and I have to agree.

Here's cheers girls!!