Modern Quilt Guild- Second Meeting.

This meeting was always going to make me nervous. We had been promoting the Guild at the local quilt show and shops. Over the month we had about 15 ladies sign up on line and others who signed up at the shop were we are holding the meetings, All About Sewing.

Jody was our Vice President, but owning a shop and doing dancewear as well was always going to be a stretch, so we asked Ally and she was very excited to be asked and said yes. I'm looking foward to working with Ally. Her enthusiasm is quite infectious.

It was all very exciting. The ladies arrived and filled in their membership forms and paid their yearly dues and then it was time to get to know each other. It was great meeting other ladies from all over the coast and talk fabric, designs and everything else you could imagine when a bunch of women get together. Chat Chat Chat.
Here are some of the photos I took.

A great day was had by all

I can't wait til the next one.

Happy Quilting

Leanne

I Don't Have A Title

After the whole crushed wrist thing I had to clean out my sewing room. I had boxes of magazines that had to be sorted through and fabric I had to say yes or no to. With the fabric, I did have a pile I was going to pass on to someone who wanted it, but once it was in a pile together I looked at it and they all went together and now I will be making a quilt from them. It will be a bit more country than modern but I do live on a farm so I can justify the country look. It will be a modern style though. So the fabric cupboard is no lighter. Once it was folded and stacked neatly I realised that I don't have as much fabric as I thought. I did separate it though. The precut fabric is in a different spot.

This is half way through sorting. That is the new cupboard on the left (beech colour).

It took a few days to get through it.

My fabrics all colour coded.

Now all neat and tidy ( for now anyway)

The boxes of magazines will be going to Cassie. She is one of the girls from the Central Coast Modern Quilt Guild. Cassie hasn't been quilting long so I thought the magazines that set me on the road to patch addiction might just be helpful to her. Enjoy Cass!!

I haven't been stitching much this week but when I have I seemed to get heaps done.A Bonus.

Oh Cherry Oh.

This is a quilt I started for Oscar about 2 years ago. I can't believe I left it there so long. It's back out now and it should be finished soon.

My Pledge: to get ALL my UFO's finished this year. (oh no, what have I done) there I said it. Now I gotta do it!

Best go sew

Happy Quilting

Leanne

Livin'in the 80's

OMG, our local radio station has been playing 80's music all weekend. I have been having super flashbacks to a time in my life that was fun, full of laughter and play and when my family spent every weekend at "The River", water skiing, sailing and spending time outside and NO TV.

My sister a I made life long friends at this caravan park. We are still in contact with them today.

This was the decade where I looked like this-

That's me at the back right. I was 14 . We had just had a red iceblock. From the left is my brother Michael, My sister Monique, my cousin Elise and my little brother Graeme.

We looked like this every weekend(minus the red tongues). We were always in the water.

This is Monique and I skiing together. It was so much fun.

This is me in the parafly. It was so high. I can't believe I was such a daredevil back then. I would never do that now.

If there was a horse I was on it. Look at that gorgeous blond hair and long legs. Sometimes I feel like an imposter in my own body. If only I looked like that now.

This is me at home. I loved riding.

Not only did we have great weekends but we lived on a small farm so home was heaps of fun too. There was always something to do. We had a menagerie of animals to look after and heaps of space to run. Mum had a cow bell she used to ring for us to come in for showers and dinner.

The music today brought back all of those memories. I started looking through a box of photos of my Mums' that I have to scan for her. I laughed alot and kept annoying my boys to look at them. Right at the end of the photos I saw one of Adam. I started to cry a little. He was a life cut way to short. We all miss him.

So living in my little bubble in the decade of the 80's wasn't without sadness but most of all it was GREAT! We were kids having fun

Cheers

Leanne

What A Week

Sorry I haven't been here for a while. A lot of things happened in the last couple of weeks.

*I made a quilt for my nephew. I only had 6 days to get it done.

*On the 3rd day I crushed my right wrist helping my husband lift my new sewing room cabinet. I thought it might be fractured but I didn't have time to get it X-rayed so I battled on. Silly me.

*My car has been playing up. I've had a tyre go down, and now it taps when I start it. Time to get rid of it.

*Cleaning out my sewing room. We only moved in 6 months ago, who would have thought I already needed a clean up. It was mostly because of the new cabinet. I rearranged and finally put away all my magazines.
*The wrist is feeling alot better now. I have a couple of nurses in my Tuesday sewing class, one of them checked it for me and she thought it wasn't fractured, just badly bruised.
*I have just spent the weekend finishing the sewing room and catching up on all the house work that is neglected for my obsession

I got the quit finished and I love it and so does the recipient.

So all's well that ends well.

Wyong Quilt Show - Day 1

Today was the first day of our local quilt show.It is a charity event for the cancer care services of Central Coast Hospitals. It is a lot of work but alwasys ends up being fun.
I was promoting the Central Coast Modern Quilt Guild. I met heaps of people who are interested and we had a few sign- ups right on the spot. So the word is spreading. All the usual suspects were there.All About Sewing, Blueberries, Cherry Pie Designs, Floriani, Red Shed Quilting, Down Under Quilts Magazine and a bunch of other talented people. I met Kate Conklin, a local quilt designer, whose blog I have been following for a while. She is just as passionate about fabric as I am and she is very excited about the Quilt Guild. 
My Aunty Judith came all the way from Parramatta on the train to check things out. She was happy that I showed her how to use the stitch regulator on the Bernina 440. She owns one and hasn't yet used this feature. There will be no stopping her now. Happy Quilting Aunty Jude.
Tomorrow is Mothers Day so we are not sure how the day will go. We have heaps of machines on the All About Sewing stand and we all bought something to sew if it gets too quiet. Guess we'll have to wait and see.

More to follow tomorrow

Happy Quilting

Leanne

Morning Glory

This morning I had to leave home by 6am to go to the Wyong Quilt Show. I walked out the door and this is what greeted me. A beautiful sunrise. Some say that you can't beat a sunrise over the ocean, I disagree. A sunrise over  the mountains is much more beautiful and has so much more texture.

Cheers

Leanne

Modern Quilt Guild- First Meeting

We had our first meeting of the Central Coast Modern Quilt Guild. We had 8 members come and sew for the night. It was good to be able to sit and sew with the girls from the shop. We never get to do it any other time because we are all busy with classes and the day to day running of the shop. We are really looking foward to the next sew day as it is on a Saturday, All Day! Yay!

Happy Quilting

Leanne

Learning to Crochet

The thing about having boys is that I thought I wouldn't be able to pass on all the things I love to do most because they are too "girly". Well I was wrong! My boys have watched me craft their whole lives and to them it is natural for anyone to be doing it. So when I pulled out my crochet the other day I was surprised be asked "Can you show me how to do it Mum". "Of course, I can" . The concentration on Oscars face is intense.He did really well. I don't think he'll be doing it full time, now he knows how hard it is and I'm not just a "Grandma" doing an easy blanket. My Grandma taught me to crochet when I was about Oscars age ( 10 ) and it's something I've always loved to do.

Happy Quilting & Crocheting

Leanne

What Have We Here??

My Sister and I were looking through the boxes under my quilting machine and look what we found. I kind of knew they were there and I was ignoring them until I had time to finish them.

This one is a Texas Star done with Half Square Triangles. I did it as a sample for class and it never got finished. It's only a wall hanging size. I don't know whether to add some more borders, maybe pieced, or just finish it as it is. Any ideas??

This is a top my Sister did out of here left overs from this quilt. I will quilt it for her one day, promise:)

I did this quilt to test the pattern. One of my students was having trouble with it.I did find a problem with the size of the pentagon in the middle of the star. It is quilted and the binding is ready to go on.

I LOVE this quilt. The Half Square Triangles are about 18 inches square. I saw it done at the Sydney Quilt Show and just had to do it. It was the simplest, quickest big quilt I've done.All I have to do is quilt it. (same old story)

Out in Blogland the Hexagon craze has hit pretty bad. I started this gorgeous Grandmothers Flower Garden quilt about 10 years ago. It is so close to the top being finished. Then I will be hand quilting it. The whole quilt has been done by hand over paper pieces. When we pulled it out today I couldn't believe how it felt like a vintage quilt. It was the first time I had someone hold it up for me and I was really proud of how beautiful it was.

I started this hand pieced quilt 4 years ago. It is my project that I take everywhere with me. I don't necessarily get anything done when I take it but it's always waiting patiently for me.

Best get onto these. If only I had an extra 12 hours in a day.

Happy Quilting

Leanne

Toasting Marshmallows

The kids couldn't wait to get their mashmallows in the fire.

Oscar is just like his Dad. He loves an open fire.

Yum. My Sissy enjoying a really toasty one.

Blimey what a mouth she's got!

He"s my Main Man. My firestarter. He was always meant to live in the country. He is a hillbilly from way back. Ha.

Cheers

Leanne

Awesome Autumn Sunsets

Cheers

Leanne

Life On The Farm

Archer just loves horses. Since we went to Cobark all he want to do is pat the horses. We have two horses on our property. They are actually on the neighbours property but as we don't have fences yet they are on ours too. They love it here because we mow our grass and they like the fresh green shoots. The young one is like a puppy. He is always looking at us wanting us to play with him. He is a bit of a pest though. He licks the dew off our cars in the morning, he comes on the verandah in the rain. Although, I have stopped him doing that now.

My Sister called to say she coming to stay for a few days during the holidays. In the last week all of our kids have had the vomitting virus. We thought a country break was what was needed (even though we are permanently on a country break). Paul, Oscar & Archer went out collecting wood for the campfire to toast marswhmallows in.

Yep, I think that ought to do it.

Cheers

Leanne.