Darling Harbour 2013

Gorgeous Girl and I headed off on our annual pilgrimage to Sydney for our girlies weekend. It was great fun, filled with shopping,room service, a trip to see 'Warhorse'(which was simply amazing), a day at the Sydney Craft Show and the token visit to something cultural - this year the Chinese Gardens.And here's some photos...

View from the balcony of the Craft Show...

The Chinese Gardens, which were truly beautiful..

And of course I came home with lots of goodies..but managed to resist buying the $600 Alpaca Wool Coat, so hubby wasn't too miffed (and I have the website in case I change my mind! :-)

These included a flannel quilt kit from Fifis Fabricology, the start of a paper piecing quilt from Cherry Pie Designs.. Some lovely wool, some bits and pieces for making Mother's Day tags for next year's school stall and a Smiggles container which I think will be perfect for my rotary cutter! However the suitcase was mainly filled up with the Pikachu onesie that I bought as a present for Boo..really didn't compact as well as I had hoped!

Lots of fun and we came home exhausted, of course!

Hope you're having a great week!

PS Still knitting!

Did you say yellow??

Recently we went to a family wedding and for their present I said I would make them a quilt, if they would like. (and very sneakily offerred no time frame for this to occur!) "Sure", they said, 'Can it be red and yellow?' - which was the theme of the reception. "Umm, sure" I replied and then the worrying began...
Now I don't know about you, but there are colours that reoccur in lots of my quilts...blue is one, green is another, I've even been known to branch out to a good old country mustard! But yellow has me scared...who knows why but it's a "zinger" of a colour and if you don't get "zingers" right then it doesn't look so great.
So I have started to gather bits and pieces together, keeping in mind they definitely don't like traditional stuff much, more modern kind of people, and so this is what I have come up with...


And what about the yellow, I can hear you asking?..well here it is..just a smidgen. My plan is to add it to a white background. I've been playing around on my EQ5, trying to get a design I'm happy with.





I hope to be back soon with a test block ..however all comments greatly appreciated, if it's going to look weird, tell me now!!

Oh, and in case your wondering about those churn dashes (or are they Shoo- Fly's??), I now have 20 blocks and 50 simple pieced sashings. I just need some floor space that is toy-free, and some time that is free, to get the layout right. Yep, should happen around 2012....

Today, in the mail, arrived a recent ebay purchase. I have always wanted a double wedding ring quilt and I saw this antique (? how old does it have to be to be antique..this one has lots of 1930's prints but also some machine quilting amongst the hand sewing) one being sold on ebay and figured I could buy it for less than what I could make it for!
So sure enough, it arrived in the mail and my first reaction was "wow"..followed by "umm, there is a few rips that weren't mentioned" and then I started to notice a smell....and lets just say, I think that at some time this quilt may have had a 2 pack a day habit. The cigarette smoke smell, is horrible! That smoky smell is one I hate so, and you will probably all be horrified, I have washed it. It still has a residue of smell but I am hoping that some good country air will do wonders for it!

But,in my best Pollyanna impersonation, the colours are gorgeous (notice how nicely it goes with the baby's blue room?) and some of the prints are so sweet. It even has some seersucker patches...reminds me of my Grandma's pillowcases!

So cross you fingers that the smell will disappear and all will be OK. And I think I have learnt another valuable lesson about buying from ebay..it's only about my 2ooth!
Have a great day!