Christmas Fair and our Blog's Anniversary

Well there was certainly a lot of excitement in the air today, mountains of patchwork goodies were arriving for the Christmas Fair, fabric leaves were being cut out, and hopefully the cotton ends snipped off those that needed it (sorry girls, bit slack there) and Sheila had a big surprise for us all,

This wonderful cake to celebrate our blog anniversary.
Can you believe it, another year has rolled around, and over us, honestly I have no idea where the last 3 months disappeared to.

Heather and Sue, busily snipping those leaves apart for Caity to count.
Gwen, Wendy and Marcia stitchin up a storm.
The cake getting it's first cut.........can you make a wish when cutting a group cake? I did, for a very successful Christmas Fair, well, it was a no brainer really, I love to say I made a wish and it came true! don't you?
Betty telling Sheila all about her flimsey she bought in to share with us, since retiring as Cottage Treasurer and the myriad of jobs that that entailed, Betty now has time to make lots of quilts, and a good thing she has lots of time too, this little treasure was created after Betty discovered that she had cut a whole pile of squares ....the wrong size, dontch just hate that!

Lyn bought along her finished friendship quilt.  It didn't get finished in time for last Christmas due to a packed calendar - read gadding about on a wonderful holiday - but its all ready to go for this Christmas.

Sheila had a great idea for a Christmas gift for her Grandies, Pillow cases to match their quilts!
Some of the inspiration came from one of our recently acquired library books, lovely kisses on a case to go with the hugs and kisses quilt for one Grandaughter.

  7 pillowcases made, and only one to go, brilliant idea.


Betty and the troublesome flimsey, Betty shared that she has made a pattern for the next attempt, and it will be right!

Jackie shared her latest quilt, made with wonderful Kaffe Fassett Fabrics,  and all ready to have the binding attached, a little job for the holiday break.

Last week we all thought it was pretty impressive to have your long arm quilter deliver your finished quilt, well guess what,  same happened this week, yep Judy bought Jackie's quilt along to the meeting, now that's service!
Showing the girls the  floral quilting design.

and here is a bit of a closer view.  Judy used a lovely variegated thread in reds for the quilting.

Jackie had another quilt to share with us, a lovely soft 'Shabby Chic', simply quilted with a cross design

Sadie stitched these lovely Princess skirts with glitzy tiaras as a donation to Val's charity group.  Val and her Monday group have been making charity quilts for some time now.

A couple of weeks back Lorraine gave us a demo on QAYG methods, Wendy, who is also a member of the machine embroiders group, decided to have a go at the technique using some lovely Babushka doll stitcheries that she has created.  Showing us how easy it is Wendy had to pause to remember just how to deal with those corners.

Lorraine's demo pics and instructions are on one of the 'stand alone' page links just under our banner, just click on 'Tutorials and Directions from Members' and scroll down.

If perchance you will be in our neck of the woods this weekend, please pop in and say 'Hi' to the Patchwork Girls, we would love to see you.  The Fair gets off to a start on Friday night, and will run over the Saturday and Sunday.  With 13 groups of crafters and artisans there is always an enormous range of quality goods for sale.

Treasure Found, Sneak Peek at a W.I.P and other lovelies

Christine bought along her 'blue' quilt to show us today, she started collecting the blue fabrics a few years back, about 20 of 'em actually, the idea being that she would make a quilt for her Son, well she has made a stunning quilt with some advice and following a pattern from Monica down at the Sewing Basket.  DS has sadly missed out on this one.

Christine had envisaged that the quilt would go rather nicely in the spare bedroom......a.but her Darling had other ideas, its now proudly in use in their bedroom....I guess you could say he rather likes it!

 Christine had her quilt machine quilted by Fiona using a variegated thread in a swirly edge to edge pattern.

As a bit of a change from the blue and black, Christine ventured into the world of the vibrant with this bright quilt,

all sandwiched up and ready to go, she bought it along today to ask for quilting ideas.  Louise very kindly helped hold the quilt out while we all put in our tuppence worth.  Christine went home with quite a few designs, books and ideas.  We will all be interested to see the finished quilt and what Christine decides as the final quilting design.

Sadie, back from some time away bought in her flimsey from the Tessellation workshop she started with Val, soft apricot in the blocks is echoed in the border print fabric.

Caitti made good use of the Q.A.Y.G. demonstration that Beryl shared with us last week, creating her own version of the Q.A.Y.G. table runner,

The runner is destined for use on the patio table, not too far from the flower bed with blooms of the same colour palet as the runner.  Catti also made a wine bottle coaster and two coasters to complete her table setting.

Spied this rather unusual piece being worked on, just a little peek at a WIP,

Can't wait to see the finished.......(well that would be telling, now wouldn't it!)

Fran, famous for her one quilt every 10 years philosophy, started this beauty in Val's first Tessellation workshop, she finished the blocks at home, but assembled the flimsey at our Retreat and has since had it beautifully professionally quilted by Wendy.

It will be put to very good use for the Grandies to snuggle under when they visit.

The show and tell table had quite a collection of Christmas goodies,  they are all samples of what we will be working on in our upcoming mini Retreat,

Lined Christmas Stocking, tree baubles, and machine pieced and assembled hexies for a christmas table runner, oh yeah, and a mystery project.........no sneak peeks on that one yet!

Caity has been off to the Op-Shop, and found this little cutie, an embroidered linnen drawstring bag, cost her the princely sum of $1, don't you just love a bargain??

The Napkin holder is all Catti's own work, beautiful silk ribbon embroidery.
There is a matching book mark in the making as well,........ just picture it, lounging back reading a book with a beautiful marker to keep your place, sipping a pleasant cup of tea from the finest china, munching on the tinsiest little cake or pastry and helping yourself to a napkin from this beautiful napkin holder....Bliss!!

Well, its a girly-er (is that a word??) scenario than the actuality, trying to peer around a cat that has just discovered that sitting on the computer desk and snuffling into your coffee is really quite rewarding....it really makes the hooman snitty!

Arvo tea was Mud Cake, Ginger Spoges and choc bikkies, all on pretty plates on a white cloth. 

Quilts, Classes and how we use our language

There was a bit of a startled 'look around' last week when someone was talking of using orphans to make a quilt, don't know if the thought was more along the lines of  'what a good idea'   or   'is that allowed?'.... of course it was orphan blocks that were being referred to, well... that was all sorted and we had a bit of a giggle, well not as big a laugh as when the girls were getting ready for Gwen's class today........one of the items on the requirements list was a compass.......Catty, for the life of her couldn't see why you would need one, but it was on the list, so..........

she bought along a compass!!
One of the cool uses for the compass.....the other kind of compass, was how to draw up hexagons,

now where was that little bit of knowledge when I needed it??, You make the radius the same measurement needed for the side of the hexagon.  Cool huh!?  Looking forward to learning lots more tips from Gwen as she takes us through her Beginners Hand Quilting Classes.

Some of the girls, wrestling with the creation of templates, all agreed by the end of the day that it really was easy, once you got the hang of it.
While some were learning new skills, others were enjoying their friends company, Louise was researching ideas to use those pretty circles she has in front of her, and Sadie was really getting stuck into those black hexies.

while Fae was way ahead with her Pink Hexies

all will be revealed at the Christmas Fair, yep, the gals are gearing up for Christmas.......

Fran crocheted two cloche hats, a white one and a steel blue one, both decorated with cute little yarn flowers.  She bought them along to show us, so of course, had to ask her to model one for us...

Innes donated some offcuts from a quilt backing to Val, who promptly added some plain fabrics and turned them into another charity quilt using the disappearing 9 patch design.

Janette bought along her ditch quilted 'I Spy', looking for some inspiration for further quilting on the blocks,

The backing was bought before the quilt was assembled and there just wasn't enough fabric (how often does that happen?!) so Janette was rather thrilled to find a purple and orange that toned in beautifully,

With such a pretty and vibrant backing this is truly another reversible quilt.

Lorraine has finished her 'Orphan' quilt, who would think it was orphans??

The flying geese and strip blocks were from a paper piecing class that Lorraine did, the toile center of the medallion was from a hand quilting class...

and the double 9patch blocks were from last years Row x Row, after making 16 of them, Lorraine then changed her mind and decided on different blocks for the RxR, moral to the story?  when doing classes always use some of the same fabric!  you can then turn the orphans into a stunning quilt! Lorraine even practiced her new embroidery stitching skills to make the label for her quilt.
She then used this continuous quilting design to practice her machine quilting skills in the medallion border.

Arvo Tea saw us scoffing down smoked salmon, yummo, lovely date cake, a buttered slice (didn't manage to get even a crumb of that one) lovely biscuits and some of Fran's shortbreads.

Happy Quilters and..........

the biggest quilt we've seen for awhile..........that was our lot yesterday, along with lots of excitement when Marguerite found this ........

a beautiful BOM in the mag 'Patchwork & Quilting' that she quite thought she would like to try, the interest and excitement mounted as others also thought they might like to give it a go..........perhaps it will turn into a group effort? ........time will tell.

The quilt is in lovely soft colours, softer than this pic and is a mixture of applique and pieced blocks, it is a Therese Hylton pattern of a couple of years ago named Flower Dell, perhaps someone out there has made this quilt? would love to hear from you if you have.

But enough of quilt dreams, on to the quilts that  made it to Show and Tell yesterday.





Firstly we had this lovely flimsey from Betty H.  Betty used a pattern from one of our new books by Kaffe Fasset, in Betty's words, a simple and easy pattern.  But such a pretty quilt

Wendy bought this wonderful quilt along, 'Girls Day Out', with all the places and things gals love to do when they get together for a day out.......notice how the patchwork shop with its window display of a quilt and a treadle sewing machine  is front and center........the fave place to visit.

Quite a number of Patchworkers are also Needleworkers, and ever so conviently Needlework meets in the a.m. making it a full day of busy and fun for some, Sadie had a framed piece for Needlework show and tell and asked if I could take a pic for her to send on to friends........well of course a bargain just had to be struck........piccie taken and I could put it here for you to enjoy..........

Beryl started this BOM with the Nowra quilters group and bought it along to show us, it is quite the largest quilt we have had for show and tell for awhile. Beryl ditch quilted this beauty herself!.

Beryl also had this rather cunning reversible, quilt as you go table runner, another group project from Nowra.

and of course...........the reverse

While all quilts get admired and closely examined, it's been awhile since a quilt has elicited such interest and excitement as this one from Sue, it is for her Grandson's imminent first Birthday and we all had a lot of fun finding the meaning behind, and discovering some of the hidden pics, little Grandie will love this quilt and spend many hours snuggling under and finding little secrets.

 assembled block by block in a QAYG style, Sue gave an impromptu QAYG lesson on just how she had created this quilt.

Sue created a lot of the 'I Spy' icons, trying to incorporate more that the usual 'I Spy' meanings and pics, Q is very innovative, -just love the little quilt,  T has 'tail', M has a Martian, and G has a cute little kitty wearing Glasses!

The lighthouse on an Island in I got a bit of conversation going, along with the Imp, E was a hit with the little teddies Eyes and Ears, but the all time fav was X with the little boy being X-Rayed, Sue had some skeleton fabric that you can see she used in the border to create the boy. All the letters were machine embroidered by Sue's sister.   Just a few stitches.........well a few hundred..... to finish the binding and this treasure will be zooming off to one lucky little Grandie.
Sue does have a couple of hints for us that she discovered while making this quilt though........... write the name of the store on the selvedge when you purchase fabric, this would take away the need for you  to traipse from one end of the coast to the other, begging store owners to think.........did you stock this?........did I buy it here?.......have you got just a tinsy bit more? and the other hint is, for heavens sake, if you have fabric put away for a project......leave it there!!, don't get all carried away thinking you have plenty and won't miss just that little bit..........or you will end up wishing you wrote the store name in the selvedge!

How old are these beautiful table cloths?

the work is exquisite, bought in by Gwen for Chantell (Show and Tell), they were made by her Grandmother, and as Gwen's Mum would have been 110 yrs old this year these beautiful cloths could be into the latter half of 100 years old.
The cloths were worked by Gwen's much loved Grandmother, to match various tea and dinner sets that she had in her home 'Inverness House' in Bexley.

One cloth was made to match part of a dinner set that was made for a visit by Prince George, Duke of Kent, who unfortunately died in a plane crash in 1942 which of course cancelled the visit. As it does.

This is just the cutest, a pillow cushion made by Sheila for the Easter Fair, she's so busy with group business that she stitched half of one eye last week and the other half this week, , as Ailsa pointed out, so far puss doesn't drink and doesn't smell, sounds like a perfect pet to me!

Working away in the background on a beautiful piece of silk fabric with appliqued vibrant silk patches is Meg.
Meg will be turning this created fabric into a bag, hope it makes it to the Easter Fair, I'm starting work early .... (very big evil grin).
Meg told us the story of this fabric, quite a number of years ago, at a store that Meg frequented someone came into the store with a cup of coffee and managed to spill the coffee over the roll of silk fabric, after dry cleaning there was apparently still a little shadow of coffee, so Meg scored about 10 - 12 meters of beautiful silk. Lucky Girl Meg.

Last week we saw Sadie and Maureen sandwiching a quilt for one of Sadies Grandies, here is the proud Grandma and the finished quilt.
Well done Sadie!
And what's this I here you say, some of last weeks piccies? no no no, this is Sadie and Maureen sandwiching a second quilt this afternoon. Yep, it's for another of Sadies Grandies.
A long table view and no doubt we will see the finished quilt next week.

Janette will be off having fun at a family re-union at Easter and so has donated this lovely wall hanging of a Japanese Geisha for our Easter Fair.
Janet took the sandwich with her to while away the wait time for a recent day surgery procedure, the wait was a whole lot longer than Janette was banking on so most of the quilting was done in hospital.
The Geisha doesn't show up too well in the top pic, so a little faffing around with Picasa and presto, a much better view - Don't you just love Picasa!

How stunning is this, Barbara (of the nine patch r x r - for those of you who read my blog) saw this great idea in a patchwork magazine, they are her mothers doilies, all worked by Mum about 80 years ago.
Barbara plans on giving this to her daughter, no special occasion, as Barbara says, 'out of my cupboards to hers.'
This stunning quilt, another of Barbara's, started off as stitcheries done with a friend some years back, in fact Barbara remembers that it was a pattern but cannot remember who's or even just how long ago.
A close up of the 'girl sleeping' block
The central panel of park gates
This block is named the 'bird watching chair'.

There are more pics of wonderful quilts, but the Darling is making tummy rumbling noises, so off to feed my Hero. Will post the remainder tomorrow and believe me they are worth waiting for. Stunning purple quilt and the cutest softest little baby quilt