A Short Break

I have just had a short holiday in our nation's capital, Canberra. It was the first time I had been in Canberra on Australia Day, January 26th.
The photo above is of the Captain Cook fountain in Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra. The National Library is in the background.


The highlight of my visit was a day at the National Gallery of Australia. The current major exhibition includes a collection of about 150 costumes and accessories from 34 productions from 1909 to 1939 of the Ballet Russes. There are also photographs of original performances, original programs and sets.



Many of the costumes were purchased by the Gallery in the 1970s and have been beautifully restored. It was interesting to see the kinds of fabrics used and the sewing techniques. One unrestored costume showed a chiffon shirt with a hand sewn hem. Also visible was a hand stitched repair to a tear in the skirt.
Many of the embellishments were painted on. One was a leotard and tights combination painted with Barium paint! Where applique was used on costumes it was machine stitched down with a raw edge showing. One set of cotton dresses were embellished with shiny, metallic looking squares make from bakelite. Few of the costumes were simple, most were highly decorated.
Many of the costumes were made of wool and looked very heavy. Quite difficult to dance in, I imagine. Silk, cotton, velvet and rayon were used in the majority of costumes.
There was a great variation in the sizes of the costumes. Some of the dresses were quite tiny, as you would imagine for ballerinas of today. However, some were much larger.



The costume below on the right was designed by Leon Blakst and worn by Vaslav Nijinski in Le Dieu Bleu (The Blue God). This ballet premiered in 1912.


The dress on the left was made of pale pink silk and was worn in Les Presages in 1933.


While at the gallery I looked at some of the other collections. I saw Blue Poles, by Jackson Pollock. It is arguably the most famous painting in Australia. The purchase of this painting was very controversial. In 1973 the government paid the highest price ever ( A$1.3 million) for an American painting. The purchase of this painting marked the beginning of the era of Australia's movement away from the British Empire.


While I was away I did a little stitching. No photos yet.
My next post will be back to quilting.

Is one more new project one too many????

.....not when it is Lori's new Doll Quilt Quiltalong! :) This time her quilt is called Midnight Stars and I have joined in. I have sewn the little hst squares in the first step and I am looking forward to the next set of instructions.....no photos yet.


The photo above is my latest finished blocks for Josephs Coat. These blocks were already prepared, so I just had to applique down the petals. I have lots of half square blocks to make now.



Below is North Star, the second block from Barbara Brackman's Civil War Commemoration quilt.


Edit.......I have just been told by a lovely lady my points are on upside down!! Ooopps!!!
I am un stitching as I type (well almost! lol).....new photo coming!!!


North Star the second!!!!



Now it looks like a star! Thank you Julia :)




Look what just arrived! :)






Time for a cup of tea and a quiet read.

The fabric the book is lying on is also a creation of Michele Hill's. This is her first range of fabrics and it is called The Adelaide Collection.

Something old, something new, "Catch Me If You Can" and a win.

This year I am going to try to concentrate on finishing a few WIPs. There will be a new start or 2, but I have quite a few projects that are partly done that deserve to be finished. I finally got all my klosjes sewn together! There will be a couple of borders added to this little quilt. You will see it again soon!

The small quilt below I started last year, but left it at the point of quilting. Up until now any quilt I have finished has only had in-the-ditch, straight line quilting or meandering on it. This quilt was my first try at more "challenging for me" free motion quilting.


I outlined some doves and did pebbling around them.



I still like the look of meandering.


A view of the back.



I will keep practising my machine quilting. I have another quilt that has lots of curved lines and straight line patterns in the quilting design. If our weather stays cool enough I will be working on it next.



This WIP is from the pattern I won from Barb late last year. I love hand applique and Folk Art Fantasy is different from anything I have made before.



Still a few more pieces to applique. I have used all Dargate fabrics on this panel.



The new year has brought lots of new projects in blogland. This one is one I have decided to join in. Barbara Brackman has started a new blog to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the American Civil War. Each week there will be a true story from people of the time and a pattern for a quilt block. I thought it would be a great opportunity for me to learn some American history, and to make 52 blocks which will make a commemorative quilt.

The first block is named Catch Me If You Can, and here is mine.


The fabric I used is designed by Barbara Brackman, but it is from The Morris Workshop collection. Certainly not Civil War repro fabric, but I had this fabric on hand and I love it!


Since finding Kathleen Tracy's group specialising in small quilts I have discovered several blogs written by people who make mostly small quilts. One blog I read regularly belongs to Jeanneke. Jeanneke makes doll quilts and has made patterns for several of them. Late last year Jeanneke had a giveaway and I was lucky enough to win!!! Below is what arrived in the mail yesterday! :) Thank you for your generosity, Jeanneke!



The card has a photograph of another of Jeanneke's quilts. There is a pack of Aunt Grace fabric already cut into squares. The pattern also includes all the papers required to use English Paper Piecing to make the quilt.


I plan to have some more Josephs Coat blocks finished before my next post.

I hope 2011 brings everyone happiness, good health and lots of sewing time!

Morrell blocks all together!!!

This morning I finished sewing all the blocks together for my Morrell Quilt!!! :)

Photography was a little difficult with the size of the quilt and the strength of the wind.

It was rather warm here today. It got to 43 C (about 110 F) in our backyard!


I hope 2011 is a healthy and prosperous year for all. ...... with lots of sewing time!!!

Woohoo, it is done!!!

My very last block for the Morrell Quilt is finished!!!!


I admit I did procrastinate over this block. Look at all those triangles!!!! So, block 46, I won!!!

Sixty blocks finished, 59 by hand and the triple Irish chain block by machine.

It won't take long to put all the blocks together. I already have the top 2/3rds sewn together.

There is a border of triangles to come.



I wish everyone a Merry and Blessed Christmas.

Thank you for visiting! :)

Just a chat

There is some sewing happening here, but nothing to show yet. I have been working on the last Morrell block. I have the last 2 sides of the last round to sew together.
I am also doing a little sewing for Christmas presents, so I won't post any photos of them until after Christmas.
Tonight I had a play with some FMQ on my sewing machine. Lets just say I need lots more practice!!!! I can sew very wobbly lines! lol

Yesterday my DH and I celebrated our 33rd wedding anniversary. We had lunch at a cafe in the Yarra Valley, north east of Melbourne. The photos are of some of the valley. It is looking lovely and green now. After lunch we took a leisurely drive home via a cherry farm and a berry farm. This afternoon I made strawberry sherbet (anyone remember Gabriel Gate's book French Cuisine for Australians????), berry muffins and a big batch of shortbread. (See a trend here????....I have a huge sweet tooth lol!!!)

I hope everyone in the Northern hemisphere is keeping warm and safe from all the snow.

Enjoy the preparations for Christmas and remember the Reason for the Season.

Special thoughts to friends with health problems at the moment.

WIP

I finished the binding and quilting of the little doll quilt. I am very happy with how it turned out.


Below are all my hexie flowers for One Flower Wednesday. I now have enough finished for the design I want to make. I will be using a light cream fabric for the background.




This is my last hexie flower.



Two more Morrell Quilt blocks this week.





I have just one more block to make!!!!!! Woohooo!!

The First Day of Summer.....

Yesterday I made this little doll quilt top. I found the pattern here. It is from Kathleen Tracey's blog A Sentimental Quilter. Some great little quilt patterns there! I wanted to make something fun that could be finished quickly. I have backing and binding fabrics chosen, so hopefully I can finish it today. Most of the fabrics are from Barbara Brackman's Civil War Homefront. I love her fabric designs. (I have a little piece of turkey red fabric from Barbara Brackman's Civil War Reunion fabric on the way here too. :))


Summertime here in our garden brings strawberries... delicious!..



...and the coriander that has bolted to seed with the warmer weather. The flowers are pretty!




I have finished the last of my Dresden Plate blocks. I still have to chose a background fabric. I had fun making these blocks! :)




Summertime brings lots of new fruit. This is the beginning of a small crop of Gravenstein apples. When we moved here we planted a Jonathan apple tree on to which my husband grafted several other varieties of apple from my parent's garden. The only one that took was the Gravenstein. We have one branch that produces a small crop of fruit that are great for cooking.



This rose is actually from the root stock of a Mr Lincoln rose that died years ago. This year has been a great year for roses in my garden and this plant is covered in small flowers.


Two more Morrell blocks are finished!

This is the only block in the quilt with a vase.




This one has 33 flying geese blocks......well, I thought I made 33....one flew the coop! I hunted high and low for the blue fabric and couldn't find it. Luckily I found a replacement in my stash that is almost a matching shade of blue, but not the correct spot. If you don't look too closely the "odd" block fits in!




Recently I have tried a couple of "new to me" techniques. I love learning new ways of doing things. Both techniques I used when I made my friend's quilt.

The first was strip piecing....yes, I had never sewn pieces together that way before!!! It was much faster than the usual way of stopping after every sewing line. Saves thread too!

The other new technique I tried was for basting the quilt. I usually try to find a large table and spread the whole quilt out and pin baste. Often the quilt won't fit on the table and mostly I have ended up with (huge) tucks in the back because part of the quilt hangs over the edge of the table!!!! That leads to lots of frustration, then procrastination over finishing the quilt because I need to rebaste the whole thing!

Well, several moths ago I saw videos on youtube by Sharon Schamber where she showed a different technique to baste quilts. I was reminded of the technique when I saw the links again on Janet's blog. Here are links to the 2 videos. Part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhwNylePFAA and part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_EjBGz5vGQ
You don't need a huge space and luckily for me DH had 2 pieces of wood that were just right.
The technique worked perfectly for me first go!!! I will definitely be basting my quilts that way in the future.

The weather here is warming up and we have had the wettest Spring in years. (Last month we reached average rainfall for 12 months for the first time in 11 years!) The garden is loving the rain and warm weather. However, some parts of Australia have had more rain than they need. Spare a thought for Chookyblue and others who have had too much rain!


My favourite red rose Red Velvet. The photo doesn't do justice to the true colour of the rose.

Morrel progress and a win

Two more Morrell Quilt blocks finished. I have 4 more prepared ready to sew. After that there is only one block left! The last block has lots of tiny triangles in it, so I have been procrastinating over that one!




A few weeks ago Barb of Fun With Barb and Mary had a giveaway. I was lucky enough to be the winner! :) I won the pattern below. Barb also included a cute Halloween card. Thank you Barb for a great prize!



I started working on the pattern earlier this week. Here is my progress so far. I have found enough fabrics in my stash to make the whole top.




A few photos from my garden.

The tree below is a Native Frangipani. The yellow flowers have a wonderful scent.




Several of my orchids are blooming at the moment.



Thank you to everyone who left a comment on my last post. I will reply to you all.
Still feeling not so good.

Goodbye Snoopy

Yesterday our dear loving and lovable dog, Snoopy went to doggy Heaven.

Snoopy was a papillon and was 13 years old. He lived with liver problems all his life.
We got Snoopy when he was 6 months old. It was quickly evident he had health problems.
After a few weeks of intensive feeding to build him up he had a major operation to try to fix him.
The surgeon repaired several things and said he did his best, but would be surprised if Snoopy lasted another 12 months.
Well, Snoopy lived another 12 years!
We changed his diet a few times to find just what he liked and what would keep him healthy. He had his ups and downs and the vet called him their wonder dog because he managed to survive many set backs.
Over the last couple of years Snoopy became blind and deaf. He could still find his way around the house and loved to play with Jasper our cat......yes, the cat! They even slept in a chair together.
Yesterday Snoopy deteriorated quickly and I knew it was his time to go.

Goodbye Snoopy. :(