Wrapping up twenty-eleven

Just wanted to do a quick end of year post - more so that I can remember what I did his year:) So here are the quilts:

And  a few mini quilts/table runners/mug rugs:

Some other sewing projects:

And I even managed a bit of crochet......

But I think the highlight for me in 2011 was being chosen as one of the 10 finalists in the Umbrella Prints Trimmings competition. There were some amazing entries and it was a lot of fun thinking of how to use almost every tiny piece of fabric in the pack!

 photo source

It has been so nice to meet so many other lovely bloggers this year since starting this blog and becoming involved in flickr group swaps. Thank you so much for your sweet comments and wishing everyone a happy new year!!

Kirsten.

A Crafty Christmas

After seeing all of the lovely quilts at the Craft and Quilt Fair back in October, my sisters- in-law and I decided to make quilts for their other 3 brothers and sisters families for Christmas. We came across this pattern which was perfect for their youngest brother and his family who live by the beach and love surfing:

L and S made the applique blocks for this one and I put them together and quilted it.

And for their oldest brother who lives in the tropical north of Australia, they decided to make a "Raw Edge Layer Cake Quilt" using Kate Spain's Terrain:

 

And made the same quilt for their other sister using a Chez Moi "Sophie"  layer cake - and happy to say that all recipients loved their quilts!

Kirsten.

Merry everything!!!

Christmas card, a photo by kirsten67 on Flickr.

Hope you all have a happy and safe holiday!

(This was my submission for the Holiday Card edition of The Pioneer Woman's "Edit this" using "Flying Charlie" which she featured in Group 3 on the 5th of December.)

Kirsten.

Winner - Sew, Mama, Sew Giveaway!

After finally working out how to number the comments, I used the Random number generator to select a winner:

And this comment belongs to LynCC:

Hey there. I've enjoyed having your blog on my roll. :) This is a really nice mini.

Congratulations to Lyn!!!  I will contact Lyn right away to get a postal address for her so that I can send off the mini quilt ASAP:)

Thanks to everyone for visiting and participating!

Kirsten.

Sew, Mama, Sew! Giveaway Day

 

It is Giveaway day at Sew,Mama,Sew! and I am so happy to be able to participate this time around. Hi and welcome if you are visiting my blog for the first time - I hope you will come back and visit again soon!! And don't forget to go and have a look at all of the other blogs that have linked up to the Giveaway Day as it is on all this week.

Because it is the Festive season, I am offering a "Festive" mini quilt I made a few weeks ago using fabrics from Joel Dewberry (Aviary) , Denyse Schmidt (Winding Roads) , Sandi Henderson (Meadowsweet-Henna garden) and  by Basic Grey (Fruitcake):

This mini quilt measures about 14 inches square and is quilted with straight line stitching and has a cute tree print on the back:

The giveaway is open until December 16th, 5 pm PST (which is noon Saturday 17th December EDT) and is open internationally.  The winner will be drawn randomly and contacted via email so please ensure your email address is in your comment or in your profile so that I can get in touch with you. Good luck!

Kirsten.

A busy December.....

This time of year is always busy but the past few days were even more so than usual, with a lot happening in our household. I made another quick trip to Brisbane with my daughter to see the QLD Ballet production of Swan Lake which was wonderful - it is definitely my favourite ballet!



Queensland Ballet presents Swan Lake from Queensland Ballet on Vimeo.

And yesterday I went to Rainbow patchwork In Lismore  to do the Braided Tote bag class with 5 other ladies. We all had different fabrics and they were all quilted on the Gammill during our lunch break and they looked amazing.

 We all agreed that it was lovely to go to a class and 6 hours later, have a totally (toteally :) finished item to take home!!!

 Then we had my husbands work christmas party last night - his boss hired a "super stretched" Chrysler limousine to take us all to the Lennox Head Hotel for dinner. I haven't been in a limo before so it was quite exciting - and you really do feel like a bit of a rockstar:) It was a lovely evening and we had views over the ocean from the restaurant balcony. I chose the Bangalow Sweet Pork Rib cutlet which was delicious, and then sorbet (pistachio, berry and swiss chocolate) for dessert - yum!!!!!!!
 Now I am off to Sydney for a couple of days for work, then come back in time for Gemmas dance concert on Friday night, and an early christmas get together with my husbands family on the weekend.
Linking up to Fabric Tuesday @ Quiltstory.......


Kirsten.

Getting Ziggy with it........

I came home from doing the grocery shop earlier this week to find a nice little parcel sitting on my doorstep.I quickly dropped the bags in the kitchen so I could open it - and found a couple of "presents" wrapped up prettily:

It felt like christmas was here already:) But I certainly wasn't going to wait until the 25th to open the them........so I found the most gorgeous zig zag table runner made by Trudi as part of the Modern Christmas Table Runner swap:

She has made me the perfect runner as I just love zig zags and the colours and fabrics she has used are really lovely! And the quilting is stunning - some straight line quilting as well as a feathery design.

And the second parcel contained a beautiful pouch and some heart shaped christmas decorations and fabrics scraps from the runner.  

I wish it was Christmas all year round so I could just leave it out all the time......maybe I will anyway. Thank you so much Trudi and I love the label - so cute:)

Kirsten.

WIP Wednesday .

Nothing much to show this week as the last few days have been quite unproductive, but I have signed up for a class at a LQS this Sunday where we will be making a Braided Tote bag so I went over there yesterday afternoon to select my fabrics and came home with these:

 I have been looking for a good excuse to buy some of the Ruby fabrics that they stock:) And we get to have the bag quilted on the long arm while we are there too so that will be really fun!!

 Kirsten.

Fresh Sewing Day

I finished off the Denyse Schmidt Plus ("D+") quilt but couldn't take photos yesterday as it was raining and have ended taking them inside today with it hanging off my bookshelf  - which is also quite handy when I don''t have anyone here to hold the quilt up for me:)

I ended up using some blue backing which I had here already as it seemed to go with most of the fabrics.

It is actually nice to look back each month and see what everyone has achieved - I  know that there are times when I feel like I am getting nowhere but then I realise that I have actually done at least a few things:)

So last month I made the table runner for the Modern Christmas Table Runner swap along with a couple of decorations and a mini quilt using a leftover block , a pillow and the Plus quilt using some Denyse Schmidt fabrics, a green fabric basket and have pieced the top together for a Surfs Up quilt. I still have a few things to do by Christmas so hopefully this month will have a lot of finishes too:)

Also linking to Fabric Tuesday at Quiltstory  - so go on over to Lilys Quilts and Quiltstory to see what everyone has been sewing up!

 

Kirsten.

WIP Wednesday

I have pinned and quilted the “Plus” quilt and have the binding ready to stitch down:

And I was looking at the lovely Pernillas Journey fabrics that Marta (polkadotclassic) sent me as part of the DS doll quilt swap and am thinking of doing a Dead Simple QAL quilt using 7” squares or maybe fussy cutting them to use in stars like these:

image source

 Although I was working a bit in reverse, I looked through the colour palettes in Design Seeds and found this one:

 

I have gone through my fabrics and have found a few coordinating prints and solids in lilacs, coral, brown, olive and persimmon: 

Linking to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

 

Kirsten.

Christmas Table Runner

Didn't want to spoil the surprise but I can post pics now my swap partner Emily has received this:)

One side was made up of the Starflower blocks - I added a couple of green spotty buttons to the runner too.......

I then made the runner reversible with some trees on the back as she had said she really liked this idea:

 And made a little house decoration using a tutorial by Kim (Retro Mama):

 Emily has done a lovely post about the package too! There are some beautiful runners in the flickr group and I can't wait to receive mine so will be looking out for the postie this week:)

Linking to Sew Modern Monday at Canoe Ridge Creations (button in sidebar). 

 Kirsten.

WIP wednesday - Plus quilt

Now that I have all of the Salty Aire fabrics, I am able to start on my Plus quilt: 

 

I made a small  version for the DS mini quilt swap and really want to make a big throw sized quilt using all of the DS fabrics. 

 I am going with Toni's way of making the "Plus" which I saw on her blog and she was kind enough to give me the sizes to cut  - so last night I cut out squares and rectangles out of about 55 different DS fabrics :

and have them all laid out on my design wall floor and am just playing around with the colours this morning. The yellow plus seems a bit out of place but it really clashes with the oranges in the newer fabrics if I move it closer to them so it may just have to stay where it is.........

ETA: I have now moved the yellow plus over to the left more  - which I really should have done before I had pieced the rows together but I thought I had better do it before I got any further:)

 Linking to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced:

 Kirsten.

Only five weeks till Christmas.........

It was far too hot over the weekend to do anymore quilting on the Surf quilt, so I made a start on some presents for christmas. I used a tutorial by Retro Mama to make a couple of christmas decorations:

 And also got one fabric basket done anyway - still need to do a few more of these:

 This is for a friend of mine who likes green.

 Linking this to Celebrate Color at Stitched in Color and also to Sew Modern Monday at Canoe Ridge Creations and Fabric Tuesday at Quiltstory (buttons in sidebar).

Kirsten.

Nosey Parker in NSW

This is a new linky party hosted by Kat at Mummas time to create to let us tell a little about ourselves and the neighbourhoods where we live.

Question 1: About my home...

I moved from Brisbane to Lismore about 22 years ago after leaving Uni to work and have settled here with my husband and children. Lismore is a major regional city in Northern New South Wales, Australia about an hour south of the Queensland border. 

Lismore is situated on the banks of the Wilsons river and has a population of about 45,000 people. The area has a sub-tropical climate with temperatures ranging from about 6 deg C in winter to over 40 deg C (106F) with more rainfall over summer due to storms.

 photo source

Dubbed "the alternative capital of Australia" in the early 1970s and situated in what's called the "rainbow region" not far from the hippie town of Nimbin, it's a mix of old country town and alternative lifestyles. 

 My children at Lismore Lake.

There are some lovely old churches in Lismore including the St Carthages Catholic cathedral:

 

photo source

 Lismore is also renowned for having regular flooding with with more than 100 floods recorded since 1846 due to the convergence of two rivers (Wilson and Richmond) near the city centre, the last one being in January 2011.

Question 2: What are the houses like in my area...

There are a lot of older weatherboard (wooden) houses in Lismore and many of them are built in the QLD style of being elevated to catch the breeze and to let cool air flow underneath. Due to the frequent flooding, many houses are bring built higher in the hills rather than in the valley where the original town of Lismore is situated and the new estates have more modern brick homes. 

This is a google image of a street near our house and it is my 2 sons (in the brown and green shirts) walking with a friend to the soccer fields you can see over the intersection.


Question 3: Some of my favourite places to visit:

Lismore holds an annual Lantern Festival Parade around the time of the Winter Solstice (end of June) :

and is only half an hour inland from the coast where there are some beautiful beaches - Byron Bay which is also the most easterly point of Australia.......

 and Lennox Head especially .

There are some National Parks nearby too - these include Mt Warning National Park surrounding the caldera of the ancient volcano, the Border Ranges and Nightcap National Parks and the last eleven remnants of “The Big Scrub”, the vast rainforest which once blanketed much of the region. Mt Warning  was named by Captain Cook to warn future mariners of the offshore reefs he encountered in May 1770 and is only a short drive from Lismore  -  then a 3 hour climb to the top:)

 but the view out to the ocean is worth it!!

 Crystal Castle is also a lovely place to visit – beautiful gardens with lots of tropical plants and wonderful sculptures.

Question 4: How do most people travel around the city?
Most people drive cars, walk or ride bikes around Lismore as there is only a limited bus service. Lismore is also famous for its numerous roundabouts as there are more than 20 of them - this is a challenge for many drivers coming through the town (and for those of us with teenage learner drivers too!!)

 photo source

There is also a University here and students or school children from the many outlying rural areas catch buses to and from school. 

Questions 5: Is there a type of food your city is famous for;
 I am not aware of any food that Lismore is famous for, but nearby Bangalow is known for its pork belly - there is a recipe here which was used by a chef Reuben Radonich in the Australian Masterchef series recently.

 photo source

I hope you have enjoyed learning a little more about where I live:)

Kirsten.