On Holiday

Facinated by the colour in the gum trees as we've travelled down from Queensland.

Xmas Trees

Some of the ladies from my patchwork group made Christmas trees this week. They used ----- 4 wire coathanger, some tinsel, a star, a few baubles and a glue gun. pictured are Faye, Karen Pearl (who showed what to do) Carol and Lyn.

Quilting for a Friend

My friend Allyson has been making quilts for family members, truly sewing up a storm. This is one of the quilts that I've quilted for her, its lovely and the little girl who's going to get it will love it I'm sure.

Christmas Present Fabric

I got a lovely pack of fabric from my Santa Buddy on the sewing weekend and was thrilled with the colours and made up this table runner.

Great Weekend

A group of friends go away for sewing weekends and at Christmas time we always swap Christmas themed pot mits. This is us showing off our wares......

Sound of Music

Went along to the Sing along Sound of Music with a group of patchwork friends and we had a great night. For a group of people who do patchwork we did an amazing job of our costumes - Brown Paper Packages tied up with String - not a stitch in sight. That's me on the left with my friend Chris, and the whole group up on the stage.

Christmas Angels

I've made some little Angels for Christmas Decorating. We'll be on the road travelling to Melbourne so they will be going with us to decorate the car. No decorating at home this year as we'll be away for the best part of the Holiday Season.

Shibori Workshop

A great weekend at Boonah with quilting friends and while there Allyson and I did a Shibori Dying Workshop with Ankie King. A great day with lots of new fabrics to play with.

Greenbank Quilters News

Lucy's winning Quilt

Our friend Lucy made this quilt and won a prize in the Mt Gravatt show.

Congratulation Lucy.

Big O birthdays are important in our group and we make the special person a quilt. This month was Ann's special birthday with an O in it and this is the quilt we made her. She's looking like she likes it.

Ochre Pits

Wouldn't I have loved to take some Ochre home with me to play on Fabric. The $5,000 fine made me think about it for a short time only. Historically an amazing place to visit, out along the West Macdonnell ranges where Aboriginals have been getting and trading Ochre for many many years. I love standing in places thinking about the people who have been there for hundreds of years before me.

Holiday Snaps

I've had way to long a break from Blogging, now I have to do some catching up. Enjoy!

After a great holiday drive up the Oodnadatta track we arrived at Oodnadatta where I took this picture of a fantastic old door. Which was found on this building -

Playing with Photos

The above quilt in the State of the Art quilt 09 exhibition which is about to go on show during the first Expertise Events, Textile Festival being held in Brisbane in May.

I played with a photo in Paint Shop Pro, cropped the photo, changed the colours, printed it out using poster print 3 x 3, then used the poster as my pattern and traced pieces I wanted to use.

Now I'm playing with another photo, currently changing colours and seeing which I like. So far I'm not thrilled with any of them but thought you'd like to see what's happening so far.

This is one of the photos cropped further and I don't mind this one.
Let me know which one you like.

New Owl

Yesterday I posted an owl from my collection to another collector who lost all of hers in the Victorian Fires. It was difficult picking one of the family to send away but I did it and I really hope she likes him and he likes her.

Then today as I had fun op shopping with a friend we called in to an Antique shop and I found this little gem made in the 1960s. One went flying away and one came flying (not quite) home.

When your friend loves pink shoes and it's her turn to get a birthday quilt you gather your friends, buy some bright fabric and make her a shoe quilt.

Australian Newzealand Art Quilters display at Quiltfest on the Goldcoast, Queensland.

I belong to the online group for quilt artists that live in Australia or New Zealand, or are citizens of these countries, living elsewhere.

It was a thrill to see the display of their journal quilts while I was at the Goldcoast with the SotAq09 exhibition.

Well done girls, great work this year and of course they are all being busy making this years journals.

An article about my involvement in the State of the Art quilt 09 on display at Craftest on the Goldcoast was in the local paper this week and I was thrilled with the job they did.

The quilt in the background is the new piece I am working on - guess there's no keeping it to myself. The photographer liked it as a background.

The exhibition is now over and was a great success and is on its way to Townsville for display at Craftfest on the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th of April.

This is my piece from the exhibition.

I took a photo of a pot plant, cropped the photo then played with the colours using Paint Shop Pro, experimenting with the programm not planning to turn it into a quilt. Then I had a thought, very dangerous sometimes.

I copied the photo into a work doc then printed a black and white photo, (using 3x3 in page layout) which then became my pattern. The outlines were highlighted with black marking pen, I then traced pieces using fusible webbing and ironed them to selected fabrics.

This was a fun project, different from anything I've done before and I'd like to do another one and experiment more.

Dyeing Workshop

these photos were taken last month during a workshop I ran for Queensland Quilters. I love watching colour emerge amidst a bundle of plain white fabric, and enjoy the excitement people show when they see what they've done.

The pieces in this photo are low water immersion, paint with dye and experimenting with different utensils to apply dye with fabric flat on the table.

It was a fun day and there were 2 very welcome men in the group.

One of several quilts I'm working on to send off to the Bushfire people. This is helping clean out my stash and will hopefully make someone feel good.

My Friend Dot needs 1 mtr of this fabric to finish her quilt.

Any help will be gratefully recieved.

New Bags

I've been busy making bags for sale and plan to take them to a local shop to sell on my behalf.

I even thought of going to the markets and having a fun day occasionally, with a stall and some time out in the sun. The pattern for one of these bags sold well and I'm hoping to have some luck and sell a few.

Might try a once a month thing, I did try marketing once before (not with bags) but only made enough money to pay for my stall and buy lunch. therefore I'm not altogether sure if it would be a good idea.

there are also a couple of notebooks that have been covered that will be up for sale. I gave these as Christmas presents to friends and they were very much appreciated.