We're all soggy......still.....

......started this post last week, but unfortunately there has been a hiccup or two, nothing major, just life slowing down the old fingers across the keyboard kind of hiccup, but with the help of a friend from the cottage we are able to suss out what those clever ladies at the cottage have been up to.....last week was a bit of a short showing of numbers at Patchwork group meeting....there was so much of the wonderful liquid stuff falling from the heavens and congregating in the lower areas that some folks were unable to motor up to the cottage.  However, those that could make it, took part in some in depth reasearch into Crazy Patch in preparation for our upcoming yearly challenge.

Sheila gave a tutorial on 'the fastest way ever' to create a crazy patchwork block, and she was so 'fastest', that all I got for a pic was a blurry streak, but how wonderful is this little Elna? those little sloping supports actually fold up to become the carry case, a perfect light weight machine for taking to workshops.

Fran got into the creative mode with a vengeance, Fran loves embroidery, so is really looking forward to assembling a canvas for some of her lovely stitching.  Patricia, who wasn't so convinced at first, decided to give crazy a go after Sheila's tutorial.......with the occasional comment or two of  'maybe.....perhaps....'

Judy was up to her elbows in books from the library.....lots of planning and ideas flowing there, but what's this?.....Patricia is back to her hand work, but not ruling out the possibility that crazy might take a hold on her life in the near future.

Here is a rather interesting little thing for you to try out, and if you have a colour blind family member or friend, this site gives you a real insight into just what colours they do see,..........in my world....this answers a whole bunch of questions about teenagers bedrooms and the decorating thereof.
It is a Colour Scheme Designer, you get to click on your main colour and then choose you colour wheel, be it, complementary, triad, etc etc., so pop on over to http://www.colorschemedesigner.com/ for a visit and click on the 'vision simulation' tab in the top right hand corner for the various colour vision simulations and the ratio of men/women and the rest of us ..........bit scarry really.  But a wonderful tool for planning your next quilt colour palete.

Remember this lovely quilt from Lorraine?

Lorraine vowed that this was the first and last pastel polka dot quilt she would ever make........I reckon that when the little lady below is able to sit up, look Great Auntie Lorraine in the eye and sigh..Lorraine will be stitchin' another pastel polka dot or whatever this little ladies heart desires.  What makes me so sure?  These are Lorraines words that came with the Pic....

"The totally un-me pastel polka dots have finally been put to use.  Ava arrived in January but I only got to see her last week.

She is obviously the most beautiful child in the world, being my great nice, but the quilt don't look half bad either".

Lainey

Sorry about the quality of the pic, its had a bit of a travel, from phone, to computer, to computer to you.

Denise bought in some delicious bags for show and tell, two ruched lovelies decorated with organza flowers that she got from Johno's, firstly sweet roses all in a row.....

 and a lovely multi layered daisy

and lastly, a strip pieced log cabin style with really great leather handles, the handles have punched holes to make it easy to affix them to the bag.

Denise will bring along others from her current collection next week to show us.

We rounded the afternoon off with this lovely spread, mini banana muffins, a lovely fruit cake and biccies and dip..........yummo, we really do do ourselves proud.

 and just as we were finishing up for the day, a ray of sunshine broke through the clouds and shone on this lovely Croton.......not proton as some bright spark first uttered..........well, I was kind of on the right track.

It's been so long since we have seen the sunshine, we all rushed to the window for a little visual relief and trot down the old memory lane of 'gee, sunshine.....is that what it looks like'........as opposed to a few weeks back when we couldn't remember what rain felt like.  -  no, no complaints..........after all the dams are now full, the grass is green,  the ceilings are black....you have to live in the tropics to get that one!

And now, in Lorraine's words and with her pics,  a chance to catch up with what the lovely ladies got up to last Wednesday.  Thank you so much for making this effort for our group Lorraine. -A

'Cos you were away I thought I should get out the Camera, aren't you glad I had it with me?, and do the rounds of the pw room.
Starting with Beryl.  She created a roll based on a Aust. Post roll to carry blocks.  The sealed ends of the roll let her casrry the necessaries.  Neat and compact.

Pic to follow.  -  am having a few probs with some of the e-mailed pics.
 
Wendy has been playing with Dick and Jane.  She made a gorgeous bag,

but the main item was a Disappearing Nine Patch.  Never heard of it?  Neither had I.  A cry went up of "Workshop" so there might be a few more of these in the future.  We might even give away the secret.

Denise has been playing bag lady again.  These are really lovely.  Loved the charcoal and gold fabric.  I want a pup out of that when she breeds it.  I am glad to see that Denise never wastes her left over knitting yarn.  What great embellishments.
Pics to follow

Lorraine presented a mystery object.  Everyone had a guess but no one came close. 

The new truck has a flimsy polystyrene cover over the 'Bed' behind the seats and the vinly cover started to tear very quickly.  The Darling, knowing his wife is agreeable to almost anything, asked her to make a patchwork cover for it.  They contract to Boral so Lorraine used the company colours of green, yellow and black.

Here it is, in situ, in the Cement truck.

Another day was spent in the back room with ladies going crazy - patchwork that is.  Another day of fun and help for those crazy challenged.  I wouldn't have thought that was a problem in our group.  Jan, our resident expert on all things crazy lent some expertise.

Breast Cancer Fundraising

A bit of an addition, Sheila phone this a.m. and tells me that we raised $180. for Breast Cancer research. Well done ladies!
Jackie was quick off the mark with displaying this beautiful 'Roses' Quilt, about the fastest thing that has ever happened to it from the story Jackie tells, she fell in love with the pattern way back last century.....gee I've always wanted to write that.......when she saw it in a Joanne Brasier book ......back in '95 actually.
It was then a 2 year project of collecting and assembling, but Jackie really got a go on around April & May last year, with the quilt living on the floor for a couple of months (either no pets or very well trained pet) and although she now reckons that there are fabrics in the quilt that she wonders 'what was she thinking' no one could agree on which ones they were.
Its a beautiful quilt and will adorn a wall in Jackies Home.

Sue was finishing the binding on this little beauty that she said was an excursion into the realms of what not to do & use. Her sis Marion, that we met in a previous post, named it "Jewel in the Crown" because one of those little squares is not repeated in the quilt at all.
It was a joint effort between Marion and Sue to assemble the squares into a top, with Marion setting the squares out, Sue deciding that it needed the black to set off the colours and adding the green to give it zing.
Ugly duckling into beautiful Swan..........maybe we can re-visit some of those old U.F.O.'s and turn them into Swans for the Quilt Show. ummm perhaps.

The Group recently purchased an 18 1/2" square ruler to add to our 'tools of trade' collection , and as luck would have it, Heather, who had just recently done a Machine Quilting class with Judy Bellingham, and was wondering what to do with the practice squares, decided in the spirit of 'use it up' to make us this great cover for our ruler! Thanks Heather.

Di, one of the Thursday night gals joined us for our Breast Cancer Fundraising Arvo Tea, and was working on this 'Stolen Quilt' - better than a free quilt using your scraps, a stolen quilt comes about when you raid your long term friends stash, and yep they're still mates!
Sue with this vibrant pink and orange quilt, although I conned a piccie, I missed the story! how slack is that. Love the great effect the floral binding makes.
We had our little bit of Australia's Biggest Morning Tea today, it's an annual event to raise funds for breast cancer research, generally aimed at being Australia wide on a specific morning, it's become quite acceptable to hold one within that week. One contacts the Cancer Council and is issued with a kit and off you go...................raising funds to your little heart's content.

Porcelain Painters share the Cottage with us on Wednesday so we invited them to be our Guests and share in the fun.

Inge, who grew these beautiful orchids, bought them along for our table decoration, she suggested they be raffled off at the end of Arvo Tea and we were all agreeable to that I can tell you!
And the were won by someone who had the Good Luck Fairy sitting on her shoulder,

Just look at all the booty! Flowers..........


A prettily embroidered wash cloth and scented soap ummm can still smell that fresh fragrance.

Not to mention a cosmetics bag for it all to go into.

Inge, being shy behind her table runner, (Inge! shy! I here you splutter, your right, really she was hiding from Betty). Just look at that laugh! Gorgeous Japanese prints set on point and sashed with black and a blue/black binding.

Two of the early winners, pretty pleased with themselves, but notice the prize on the chair to their left? that was the beginning of a winnings pile won by Barbara
who was having too much fun sampling Patricia's shortbread to worry about unwrapping goodies, that was to be savoured latter on, back at the worktable.

How 'bout that finger, is she telling me that she has only had one biccie??.................
Lucky Sue won this pattern for a Sewing Folder, lots of storage compartments but she won't be stitching that on Friday, she is off to the Textile Art Show in Brissy.......woo hoo......
One of our guests got a little booty, a lovely silk scarf in just the right colours and a little note book, Next to her Barbara had to be prodded to open her gift cleverly wrapped in a chux dish cloth.........
..............it turned out to be another kitchen goodie, a lovely tea towel, can't have enough pretty tea towels, it's a pip when you have someone volunteer to wipe up and all you have to offer is the 3 for $4 type you picked up at the supermarket.

Maree was happy to win this pretty magnetised shopping list pad for her fridge, very handy, just what she needed she was saying

Another big winner was Heather, who decided this little lot was just the ant pants for the new caravan
she also won this lavender embroidered shower hat,
and Sue thought that it should be modelled...........
How cute is this covered and logo'd little notebook, just right to pop into your purse with a list of must buys from the LQS.
Barbara nearly had a conniption when she won this, white hangers wrapped in bridal paper, ...omg...but then she remembered, her daughter is engaged......whewwww
It's been mentioned before (and will again) that we are gearing up for our quilt show, and as all you quilting folks out there would know, advertising is a bit of a challenge as every penny spent comes our of revenue, it's a tough call on where to spend your advertising dollars, well how lucky are we.........
Elaine has a son in the printing business, and he very kindly made us up this eye catching range of variable sized posters. Thank you so much Scott.
So ladies when you next need printing done pop over to Maroochydore to see Scott at Snap Printing, just across the road from the R.S.L. - Now that's gotta be good business placement, a great place to wait for your printing to be done........
Now there was a fair bit of shyacking around when I took this pic, and a lesser person would have posted those pics, ...........oh all right then, if they were just a little in focus I would have, but I guess shyacking at the Cottage should stay at the Cottage.

Meanwhile the quiet achievers were hard at work, Patricia stitching perforation lines on more raffle tickets to be formed into books.
This is why Patricia was our 'Star of the Month' recently.
and Betty, who was so busy with the photocopier that she managed 1 3/4 lines of her knitting, what wonderful colours, and that's the pattern under the skein of wool.........maybe when you finish Betty, you might bring it in for us to see.