Don't look now!

Saturday Night .... Don't Look Now!

I have spent the last two days here learning to refine my machine quilting skills with Deborah Louie. Deborah is a well known quilter, teacher and regular contributer to Australian Quilters Companion ... but unfortunately she is blogless and does not have a web site that I can share with you.

I had a great couple of days and learnt many new skills. I tend to approach most things in life like a 'bull at a gate' and hopefully Deborah has helped me to at least try and overcome this trait! She is also very knowledgeable when it it comes to Bernina Sewing Machines so I also learnt many little extra things about my machine that will make it even nicer to use!!! Is this possible???

If you have the opportunity to do a class with Deborah or if you like the look of machine quilting and would like to have a go then I would highly recommend that you do a class! This is now my 3rd machine quilting class and I have learnt so much every time, little skills, tricks and techniques that could never be learnt from a book or by just having a go by yourself.

By the way do you remember this quilt? 

The pattern for this quilt, Rainbow Lollypops, will be in the Australian Quilters Companion magazine's yearbook (that's a mouth full!) which goes on sale in January. My family are so very excited about this and if there is actually anyone out there that might like to purchase a copy of the magazine then I suggest that you be waiting for it to hit your local news agency or maybe get your self a subscription before January as I fear my family may well buy them all! :) Thank you Tracey!!!!  

Tonight I am taking part in a blog sleep over, over at Fiona's place in her new creative space!!!!! Should be fun however my husband needs to do some reports so my participation will be spasmodic unfortunately. While the girls appear to be hitting the spirits I will be sipping tea, watching Star Trek Voyager & may be some DS9. So now that the kids are tucked in bed I need to decide my activity for the night .... sock monkeys...

pencil cases ...

or invites to Ben's birthday party. Mmmm what to do, what to do????

I hope you enjoy your Saturday night!

Kellie

PS. Thank you all so very much for the kind birthday wishes for my beautiful babies. They had a fabulous day and are now looking forward to their parties which will be next week and the week after.

PSS. I also need to post about something else that has happened to me in this bloggy world but I have been told that I must hand over the computer to DH or else (not sure what the or else would be?). Thank you Lisa!!!! :)  

Six years ...

I can hardly believe that is has been six years that these two little people have been in our lives! They were so very tiny, well at least Jessie was! She was only 4lb 5oz and Ben on the other hand was 6lb! They escaped 6 weeks early after giving us many horrific scares of even earlier arrival in the 14 weeks before they were finally born. I barely remember any of their first year and only a precious few moments of their first 3 months. These guys have been both a delight & a hell of a lot of work!

They are so very different not only in physique! They adore each other and annoy each other to the point of distraction. Not so long ago when something would go wrong in the life of Jessie she would promptly bop Ben on the head! Thankfully I have been able to abolish this habit! Benjamin is such a kind and loving child. Just this morning on the way to school he pledged his undying love for Jessie, which apparently lies "deep in his heart". 

I am so very pleased to have you both in my life! I have been so very grateful every day of the past 6 years that not only the Dr chose you both but also that you managed to hang in there where others had not. I love you guys so very much!

Happy 6th Birthday Jessica & Benjamin!!!!!!

Thanks for indulging my loves!

Kellie

PS I would love to share the recipe for these delicious cupcakes! Which I can most certainly confirm are so very yummy, however, Betty Crocker has sworn me to secrecy! Sorry! There you have it I am no domestic goddess!!!!!!!!!!!

An Art Smock anyone?

Or maybe 9!

Thats what I have been doing this past week ... among other things of course!

The kids return to school tomorrow, it's a 'pupil free' day today .... what is that? I never complain about 'no school' days as I am always up for a sleep in! But a pupil free day ... they never had those when I went to school!

Jessie's birthday party is planned for Sunday fortnight & Ben's is the Sunday after so I have a heap of things to do between now and then. Plus they have been invited to a Star Wars birthday party this Saturday, so I will be making costumes for this later today. I'll actually be at a class on Saturday so my poor husband who 'doesn't do girl hair' will be left to make Jessie's somehow resemble Princess Leia :) ... I haven't told him yet!

It is the most beautiful, mild & gloriously sunny day here today, by far the nicest day this winter! The children are all out running around, yelling, screaming, giggling and generally annoying the neighbors ... at least they got to do this one day in their holidays! 

Have a great week!

Kellie

On the weekend ...

I collected a pile of pretty spectacular fabric, some fusible web, a permanent maker and a pair of scissors and started work on an idea that has been bouncing around in my head for a while now.

I ended up with this ... 

and this .....

 

and this ....

106 flowers, 3 lady bugs and 3 butterflies all arranged on some linen.

This will become Jessica's birthday quilt. Now it's off to spend some quality time with my machine!

Have a great week!

Kellie 

Monkey Business!

So now I am sure you will remember Shelby ...

She has shown little improvement in her housekeeping skills. The ironing basket is overflowing to the point that I fear entry into my laundry. Beds remain unmade until after lunch and when I asked her to clean the windows last week she just laughed!!!!

So why do I keep her on I hear you all asking ... well it's the kids! They love her and she's very good with them. But the real concern are all the 'family' members that she has 'visiting' with us. It seems that every time I turn around there is someone new sitting up to the dinner table and you know it's just gotten TOO much. And just between you and I, I've started to wonder if their legal! The last thing I need is the immigration police knocking a my front door.

Take a look at what I mean ....

First there was Shelby's younger twin sisters Lilly & Milly ...

Then came Sophie who we managed to farm out quite quickly ...

Then Lu-Lu turned up who is Shelby's second cousin on her mother's side. Jessica and Lu-Lu are inseparable so I doubt that I will ever be able to find alternative housing for her!

On Monday Amy, Annie & April moved in. These guys were also easy to re-house! They found new homes and new identities over at Lululollylegs with her lovely girls. Louise made us a lovely afternoon tea and the kids had heaps of fun playing together. Benjamin was in good form and helped himself to half a loaf of fairy bread, I kid you not!

Yesterday these two guys showed up. This is Thomas & Timothy and I have decided that these delightful and very well mannered boys are going on a journey far, far away!!!!!! Sorry about the frightening background colour they are actually very sweet boys.

But the last straw was this ...

How can I tolerate this? I now have a sock stash ... we need to buy a bigger home!

Have a great weekend!

Kellie

PS.  You do realise that this is all your fault Kitty!!!

A Slumber Party with little sleep!

Thank you everyone for your kind birthday wishes for our sweet Megan! This photo was taken on Friday the night of her actual birthday.

Her party started on Saturday afternoon at 4pm and for all intensive purposes was a great success. We kicked off with a craft activity where the girls were to design a pillow top for a 50 x 50cm pillow insert using Megan's birthday quilt as inspiration (by the way we have called this quilt Garden Party). I provided the girls with pattern pieces, fusible web, a perminant marker, sissors & a huge pile of fabric choices. I also made up a sample to help them in case they got stuck which they most certainally didn't need. 

The girls first traced the pattern pieces onto the fusible web then roughly cut out the shapes. They then selected fabric for each piece, I then ironed the fusible to their fabric.

They then cut out the applique shapes and began auditioning them on their background fabric. Once they were pleased with their design they removed the backing paper and I ironed them in place.

I then made a quilt sandwich using each of their tops and secured the applique using free motion quilting. I then intended to then quilt the backgrounds and finish off the pillows so that the girls could take them home in the morning. Well, when I staggered to bed at 2am only the applique was completed. I am never good at recognising achievable targets!!!!

So now I will finish them off over the next week and Megan will take them to school with her when they go back after the holidays. So far the quilting has been done on one of them :) . 

The girls really did a great job of this activity and I was amazed at how enthuastic they were even though their part of process took 3 hours! 

Once we had finished the pillow tops we all went out for dinner. The girls sat at a table by themselves and did their own ordering and generally behaved like delightful little ladies! Other than this they watched 2 movies (one of these twice) ate lots of popcorn, painted their nails, did eachothers hair and chatted and giggled and giggled some more until around 4am. I made them French Toast for breakfast and they headed home at 11am. And I felt like a zombie for the remainder of the day!!!! 

Instead of lollie bags I made the girls a denim tote, lined with the same fabric that I used for their PJ's and appliqued their names on the front. I also made them a sock monkey each. 

These guys are begining to take over our lives! They are multipling like flies!!!!

This little cutie is Lu Lu and she has become Jessica's closest companion!

 

So that was Meg's party ... now I only have 16 days until Jessica & Benjamin's!

I hope you are all well and for those of you who are in the midst of school holidays I so hope that you are enjoying them as much as I am!!!

Kellie

PS. This is the second time that I have written this post and it is only through absolute determination that I am actually writting this again. The last time I wrote it I was at the spell check stage and the page froze! So I wont be checking the spelling again this time so I appologise in advance!

It's all about Megan!

Happy 9th birthday my big girl!

We received Meg's half year report yesterday and the first sentence was "Megan has a heightened sense of the ridiculous". I must say I wasn't sure if I should laugh or cry at that comment ... I don't mind admitting that I don't really know what the teacher means but I have come to the conclusion though that it can't be all bad as further on she said that she had a spectacular imagination and she is a pleasure to teach. What more can a Mummy ask for?

I have spent alot of time over the past few days thinking about what I wanted to say about Megan in this post. I have come to the conclusion that I haven't a hope in hell of reflecting what this person means to me. What has struck me though is the enormous impact that she has had on my life. She has been an incredible catalyst for change how amazing that one little person could have totally altered the course of my life. She has brought us all so much happiness, pride and pleasure.

Mind you she has a very strong personality and we tend to meet head-on on a lot of occasions and I swear that she already suffers from PMT ... but really I wouldn't have her any other way! Happy birthday my big little girl I love you more than you could possibly imagine!

I have made a start on my Doll Quilt. I must say that I was pleased when my swap Mama suggested that my partner might like a tree ... so now I have the perfect scapegoat should my partner not like the tree! :)

  

I am also loving Kaffe Fasset at the moment it cuts up so beautifully. These pictures don't really do anything much for this little quilt. I am sure the sun will come out again sometime soon so that I take a photo out side!

I am using a Floriani product called Wet & Gone to achieve a turned edge to the applique pieces. If it works as well as it claims, it will eliminate the hardness that is left behind when you use a fusible product. I have been using the Appli-Kay Wonder for all of the machine applique that I have done lately. I just love it's self sticking surface as it makes rehearsing applique pieces so very easy when you work I like I do .... with out any real plan :) .

I also spotted this new Michael Miller fabric in one of my new American magazines, isn't it lovely?

I still have at least a million things to do before Meg's party on Saturday so I will go for now.

Have a fabulous weekend! Oh and by the way HOORAY for school holidays!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

Kellie

Unfinished business ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jodie from Vintage RicRac introduced us all to a new term a little while ago "blog finished". I wanted to have Megan's quilt finish by today but alas it is not even blog finished. So tonight I will get to finishing off the binding and I will hopefully only be one day behind.

 

When I was getting myself packed for my trip last week I realised that it would be the first time that I would be by myself (away from home) for 10 years. Pretty amazing I say ... how on earth did that happen?

I really enjoyed the trip, much more than the other times as it wasn't so exhausting as coming back in the same day. The class was good and I am sad that I will not get to go back again next month ... maybe once the quilt is close to completion I will talk my lovely husband into another trip. I never really did much to the quilt in the class except for some hand quilting. I did however learn a few new skills. It is amazing how much you do learn from classes such as these.

Even more amazing how much fabric you can shove in one small bag ... these lovely fabrics escaped with me from Material Obsession ...

 

 

This one has so many interesting little aspects to it that it is just screaming "fussy cut me"!

 

The Craft Show was great! And amazingly enough I managed to run into Jade! I still can't believe this. We attempted to prearrange a meeting but missed each others e-mails. So while I was busy chatting with Jenny from at her stand ... who should be standing right beside me? Jade is the most gorgeous girl and it was lovely to meet her ... next time it will not be when I am frantically trying to take everything in while not missing my flight!

Other than meeting famous bloggers I bought two books which I have devoured already.

 

 A couple of pieces of fabric from a new designer;

 

And now for some beautiful quilts!

These are from a special exhibit by Kim McLean. These quilts are spectacular and stunningly vibrant! 

 

 

And these are a few others that caught my eye ...

 

 

This one is by the lovely Emma from Ballarat Patchwork - I love this quilt!!!

 

By the way they are having a 20% off sale at the moment :)

Last but certainly not least, we discovered a package on our front step this morning ... and to Megan's surprise and total delight it was a birthday present from my dear Lisa! What a kind and thoughtful girl you are Lisa. There were cards and postcards, chocolates and Ci-Ci the bear!

 

It took Ci-Ci a little longer than anticipated to make it all the way over here ... you see she had a little trouble with Customs ... I suspect it was the knitted knickers!!!!!!!! (Megan begged me not to take this photo)

Have a great week!

Kellie 

PS. I have a plan for my Doll Quilt which I am dying to get started on ... but that is enough for this post!

 

 

What are you doing tomorrow? ... episode 4

My alarm clock will be going off at 3.30 tomorrow morning as I'm off to Sydney for the last of my ‘birthday trips’ to Material Obsession for my class with Sue Cody. This trip has an extra little twist because rather than flying back tomorrow night I am staying up there so that I can attend the Sydney Quilt Show on Saturday. I have absolutely no idea how I wrangled this one as my husband will have to manage the kids by himself tomorrow ... including getting all four ready for dancing and choreographing the schlepping around to all of the kiddie engagements of the day. He is not good at 'girlie hair' and stockings!

             A picture of Sue's quilt to keep me focused ...

Unfortunately I have not really progressed with my Tree of Life much further than a few odd rows of quilting. There have just been too many things going on here.

I have made a good start on the machine quilting of Megan’s birthday quilt...

 

Megan has been working really hard on her project and she too is getting close to the quilting stage. I am very impressed with how well she is managing such a big job. Not bad for an 'almost 9' year old!

I have also joined the Doll Quilt Swap 4 ... I am sure that I will eventually workout how to put the button in the side bar. I have the name of my swap partner and a sketchy plan for what I will make but that will have to wait for now!

 I also received this lovely little package from Amitie yesterday as a part of the Blog VIP program ....

 

I have a plan for the linen ... not quite what Jenny would expect but we’ll see how it works out. As for the other one ... who knows ... any suggestions?

I had better go as the planning and set up for me to be absent from my little family for 36 hours is enormous!

Have a great weekend!

Kellie   

Waiting for the sun ...

I have spent the last week waiting for the sun to get a decent picture of what I have been working on. I have now resigned myself to the fact that if I continue to wait I may well be here until September!

So no more waiting just do it ...

 

                         Compulsary funny faces!

I shouldn't totally bag our crap weather as it was beautiful on Sunday so we took the children to the Diamond Valley Minature Railway . We had a lovely time and the kids just loved it. Mind you I think that they had almost as much fun running like mad animals around the oval beside the tracks!

I have been working on the quilt for Megan's party. I have managed to convince her that there would not be enough time for them to make a quilt each at the party. She is now pretty hopeful that I will make them each one ...

We have chosen this gorgeous handbag fabric for the backing and the Kaffe for the binding.

Mind you the thought of making 2 extra lap quilts is far more appealing to me than the thought of making 10 Jack Sparrow costumes, which is what I did last year.  

   

Regardless of all of this negotiation we do plan to make pillows using the quilt as an inspiration.

This lovely stack of fabric will become pajamas for each of the girls.

Thank you all so much for the comments regarding my last post. It was my first time to break that elusive 20 mark!

Have a great week!

Kellie

PS. I have got no idea how to make the photos smaller when they are selected now that Typepad has made itself more 'user friendly'. Sorry Lorraine I know you like to take a closer look ... but I guess not quite this close! :)