annual retreat

 This year we were given a pile of colouring in pictures to do while we waited for dinner!  Its all the craze at the moment, adult colouring in books are everywhere. this was my fox!  I did an owl too but left it behind.

 I worked on the froglets double wedding ring and I have nearly completed all the melons.  My lovely friend Jennifer bought me some bike fabric.... swoon.... Every time I see some I'm buying it and will make myself a quilt with bikes!  I got a great one in Queensland... its a skeleton with a top hat riding a penny farthing.

 This is what Jennifer is working on... hand piecing.

 There was strips of fabric all over the place.

 bits in progress....

 A few Christmas quilts being finished up.....

 Stunning paper piecing... I am in awe of this one.

 little bears.....

 quilt as you go blocks.....

 hexies of course....

 show and tell at the end of the weekend showing some of the over achievers off....

 simple but beautiful....

 my friend Simone has needle turned this, only part of a quilt for her sister....

 stunning colours....

and marge made this for her lucky daughter in law.

I had a lovely weekend as per usual, I think the best part is you don't have to cook and can just sew until dinner is served, you eat and return to your work... no dishes either!

tram tracks

Today's post is brought to you by the letters T and W.

 Today's valuable lesson was in how to fall gracefully off ones road bike on tram tracks.  Yes Road bike wheels fit into tram tracks very nicely.

these aren't my actual wheels (wishful thinking there!) But they give you an idea of my wheels

 

 This is however an actual picture of my elbow that took the brunt of my fall today.  could have been much worse, my bestie who fell a few weeks ago is still nursing a sore arm, but is riding with me still. (waiting for someone to tell us that perhaps we shouldn't ride together any more lol)

So here is my garmin... shows you the time I started, how long we rode for and the distance. Was a nice ride and we missed most of the heat (36 degrees here today)

So the quilt for the boyfriend continues... strips are being sewn together, and four patches are now ready to have the next part sewn to them.

S

 I'm really pleased with the colours and pattern, I hope that he will appreciate the quilt, I usually only make them for those that I hold close to me and that will understand the time and love that has gone into them....

Have you ever given a handmade gift to someone and realised that they have no idea how much time and effort can go into something specially made?

busy busy busy!!

Well those that know me, will be nodding their heads at the above statement heheheh.

My friend and I did our 2Nd round the bay in a day. We had her hubby, her 12yr old son with his new road bike and my other gym buddy come along. Was a great day out, I didn't enjoy the headwind at all, which was all the way to Altona. The best thing about the headwind is that I knew I would have a tailwind home whoo hooo. But it rained on us for a while so that was rather chilly.

We got a really nice finishers medal when we got back to Alexandra gardens so that was a lovely finish to the day (not to mention a crunchie bar or two!!).

Cookie was sitting eyeballing something this afternoon, he was supervising the unpacking of my new fabric purchases.

I took the noisy one and my mum for a little jaunt today, we visited Gail B's patchwork shop in Bayswater.

She has a large selection of fabrics, notions, and everything you may need to create a masterpiece.

I picked up these 2 yummy jellyrolls and was told that the yardage wont be out for a couple of months....

No probs I thought as the pattern I was going to use doesn't need any any extra yardage.

But then I read the pattern again and started to measure my strips and discovered to my horror that the pattern doesn't really suit these fabrics at all. so fortunately I had 3 other patterns that I was considering and was able to change my mind. The bad news is that I now need some background fabric grrrr. The good news is that I think I can get away with some other fabrics from other ranges... the stripey stuff is for binding (hope I have enough) So I may have to make another trip to Bayswater.... damn! Will go without non quilting people this time!!


Tomorrow I have my first ever fun run. I am not a big fan of running due to the fact it hurts my feet. This run is local and is only 7km I know the track as my team coffee mate and I have walked it several times together in the past weeks.

I will post how I go. The froglet is doing the 3.5km walk with some of my other friends. I know my friends will help me keep on going, I'm not doing this to win but to finish so wish me luck. I only did 4 training sessions this week, last week in 5 days I did a whopping 9 sessions! so hope it pulls me through. Just adding a little extra note here, will be dedicating this run to a fellow blogger that I admire greatly, she knows who she is...

cold, dark and wet

At 5.30am think of me..... outside in the dark, and the cold and the wet!

Tuesday morning was a classic! We got into 3 teams and off we went to do battle. We all had sheets with exercises to do and the aim of course was to finish first. I had my team coffee with me and then there was the ring ins lol.

We had to run around the oval and one of the boys wasn't as fit as some of us, so we dragged him around, yelling encouragement to him all the way... the other teams and the instructors thought it was hilarious and great to have such team spirit. I think the people that live in the houses behind the gym might have been cursing us and wondering who in the hell was up at 6 in the morning yelling at the top of their voices.

We got our man around the oval and he did all the extra exercises then he found out we had to go around the oval again! He didn't let himself or the team down and made it around again. In fact the team did so well that we won the overall challenge against the other teams that had some of the more fitter men!!

So tomorrow we have John. He is no push over, actually he is bloody hard and if you stuff up or try to skip out or drop to the ground, the whole group will have to do at least 50 push ups... every time. *groan* But I don't mind being pushed, I will rise to the challenge as I don't like to be beaten.

To reward myself for my hard work I am taking the rest of the morning off and going shopping for fabric.

road trip 2!

Today the girls and I embarked on another road trip... such fun!

today we decided to invade the other side of town and went down to Mentone. Our first stop of the day was primative patches

You enter a small slice of patchwork heaven and dive in at the deep end!

I really dont know how long we were there but we managed to do a bit of damage to the bank accounts heheheheh. I kept on finding fabrics that I knew Jennifer would love but she was strong (most of the time) and deflected my attempts to empty her purse.

The next stop was to Carmels warehouse.... Anita said it was just like project runway! I agreed with her and thought we should have run in there screaming make it work!! That show is the bomb!
We also managed to go into Carmels actual shop in Mentone.


This was I think my find of the day. the froglets best friend is goth (babybat for those in the know) I saw this epic spider fabric and knew I had to buy it for her. I also bought some black satin backed crepe... both these were in the remenants bin so a total bargin!
I bought it home and showed the froglet who was delighted, but when I told her that her friend could sew up a skirt, she told me she is "crap at sewing mum" Looks like I might have to have a sewing day with the girls. Sewing clothes is my least favourite sewing thing but if push comes to shove... I will have to wait until Friday morning to present my finds to the babybat, I can hardly wait!!

funky owls for the froglet... yes yes I know its not frogs but she likes owls too and we have a cunning plan for a bag.... stay tuned for that saga!


The noisy one likes cats and the froglet made herself a frog quilt some time ago and now the noisy one wants the same quilt but with cats. Im slowly collecting cat fabrics for the hexagons and some century we will make it together.

Of course I bought a few other bits and pieces and then we had a very nice lunch at truely scrumptious Anita had a yummy looking (and tasting) vegetarian foccacia melt, Madeline and I had the B.E.L.T. bacon, egg, lettuce and tomato on a very light roll and Jennifer had the breakfast in a roll... All looked and tasted very good. The coffee was pretty good too (better than the crap I had last week!).

Tonight I did a danzika class with the girls as I missed my gym session this morning to partake in the road trip.

road trip!

Today a couple of my friends and I went on a little road trip! As I had done extra at the gym yesterday I allowed myself to miss my pump class this morning so that we could head for the hills and have time to browse without rushing too much.

Our first port of call was to Mrs Martins quilt shop in Monbulk I can highly recommend a trip to this shop! Karen made us a very welcome cup of coffee and a lovely lady to chat with. Go and have a look at her blog (click on the link I made to her blog)...aren't I clever heheheheh! But better yet go and visit her at her shop I will definitely make a return trip there.
Monbulk is also holding their community quilt show and it is going to be on March 13th with all the proceeds going to the Monbulk CFA (very worthy cause to support!) I bought some raffle tickets for the very nice quilt, I never win raffles so I doubt I have the winning tickets! So go and buy some as you are still in with a chance haha.



Lots and lots of nice patterns and the shop is full of samples and great gifty items.

We then started back down the hill as I spotted another quilt shop in Tecoma which is foothills fabric and threads

Another very nice quilt shop that was different to to Mrs Martins so make sure you allow yourself time to visit both these shops. The foothills also had lots of samples I love seeing the quilts in the flesh, I cant believe the stitching that Leanne does OMG! (that's oh my goodness to those who don't read initials lol)I'm also now showing off with my ability to do links hheheheh. Teeny tiny miniature daisy chains and minuscule running stitches... I wish I could sew such beautiful and tiny even stitches.... I'm just too impatient I think *sigh*


Jennifer bought some of those really yummy variegated threads that are becoming very popular.... After seeing them today I think I will invest in some in the near future. I also bought a couple of Melly and me patterns, some nice civil war fabrics and I also found a very nice skirt that was half price!!
We could have visited another couple of shops but due to us having children that needed to be picked up from school we had to by pass them (might have saved a plastic melt down!)

Lots of craft markets to visit in the coming weeks and months, bloggers to meet, crafts to buy! I go back to work next week so that will help me pay for all these lovely goodies.
I also apologise to those who cant comment on my blog, I have ticked all the boxes and made it so that anyone can comment but still there is problems...anyone else with a clue??

my daughters quilt

I have been working the last couple of days but last night I managed to baste a quilt for my niece, thanks Maddie for the help. I will post a photo of this quilt when I have quilted it.

In the meantime I thought I would share some photos with you of an epic quilt I made for the noisy one. The centre fabric was a special gift from a special friend who taught me a lot about quilting, most of it via the Internet. I love pretty fabrics, especially the Robyn Pandolph ranges and similar ranges and have amassed a decent amount of fat quarters.

I finally found the pattern I wanted to use, its a Jane Austin style pattern, but instead of using diamonds, you use squares. The pattern is from an Australian patchwork and quilting mag, but I must confess I don't know which one.











The quilt ended up being enormous so I decided to have the quilt professionally quilted. Anita Ellis of Hillside quilting in Warrandyte did a fantastic job and custom quilted it perfectly! I asked for feathers and basically left the rest of it up to her!

Hope you all have a quilty weekend, or whatever floats your boat! :)