It's a wrap

First there was the quilt.

Then the phone case.

Then the luggage tag.

Now (tadaa!) meet my newest creation, wrapping paper featuring my Daisy a Day quilt!

My 15 foot roll arrived in the mail on Friday and I couldn't be happier.

Well, actually I could, because today Zazzle has 30% off absolutely everything and my Daisy a Day wrapping paper would have cost me a lot less :-)

Never mind, you can take advantage of this great discount to order Daisy a Day gifts from my Zazzle store, QuiltMe, or indeed anything at all from the entire Zazzle site.

Just use the code: FRIENDSFAM13 at the checkout.

Coming up for air

Sorry I've been a little quiet of late, dear reader.

My creative voice has been somewhat muffled because I've been buried under a monumental pile of paperwork and admin tasks and a tad too often the sun has set on my day before I've had time to complete all the tasks on my To Do list.

Life's events have slowed down my productivity and the words just haven't flowed as easily. Perhaps you know the feeling?

Let me give you a quick glimpse of what's been keeping me smiling in spite of everything.

I've been...

Having fun…
…making a gingerbread village with the Princess when she came for a sleepover.

Cooking…
…apple slice and other sweet treats for some visitors.

Learning…
…not to leave the leftovers on the coffee table while I go outside to farewell my guests.

I wonder who "tidied up" for me while I was gone? I couldn't be cross with him, though, when he showed me this "sorry" face.

Sewing...
…with my friends at our latest class with Blue Mountains quilter Lyn Alchin.

Their Laurel's Stars quilts are looking so gorgeous, aren't they?

Di B was so keen she's finished her quilt top already - Oh, what a feeling!

Hosting…
…a rather depleted English Quilt Group for the first time in my new home.

Circumstances prevented Gail, Rae, Anne, Robbie and Wendi from being here, but it was fun to catch up with two of our travellers, Lyn and Jill, and hear tales of Mediterranean cruising and travels in Turkey (from Lyn) and traversing Russia via the Trans Siberian Railway (from Jill).

I love visiting exotic destinations vicariously through my adventurous friends!

Jill's making steady progress hand quilting this spectacular Mariner's Compass quilt for her daughter.

For a change from quilting, Lyn was crocheting granny squares in vibrant colours for a rug.

Helping…
…Di B and our friend Jane use safety pins to sandwich the quilt Jane's making for her daughter, another lucky girl.

We introduced her to the nifty Kwik Klip, a finger-saving tool we'd never be without for a job like this.

Growing…
…my little balcony garden.

My lime tree loves its new home and has a healthy crop of fruit, the diplodenias are climbing high, and the petunias, snapdragons, pelargonium and orchid brighten my day with their bold colours.

Being blessed…

…with new readers. My balcony garden's not the only thing that's been growing.

May I extend to you a warm welcome if you're a reader who's started following my blog as a result of seeing Snippets 'n' Scraps featured in October's Down Under Quilts.

The name of my blog says it all. I write about the snippets 'n' scraps of my life - quilts my friends and I are making, the joys of being a grandma, travel, photography, as little cooking as I can get away with, and settling into a new home and the next stage of my life after my husband's sudden death last year. 

Every day I'm conscious of God's blessings to me, but sometimes, when life throws me a curve ball, I can't help asking God "Why?".

I don't think He holds that against me :-)

100 Things Every Quilter Should Do - A Bucket List

 A little bit of fun we've been discussing in my Southern Cross Quilters online group.

Click on this link if you're a quilter, and see how many of these things you've done. Of the thirteen I haven't achieved yet, only two are truly on my Bucket List.

Can you guess which two they might be?

100 Things Every Quilter Should Do

Comfort and Joy

Christmas Day might be 6 weeks away, but today St Mark’s Quilters held our final workshop for the year and celebrated our 4th year of quiltmaking together with a break-up Christmas lunch in the garden.

We began the year making quilts for the folk of Dunalley in Tasmania who had lost their homes in the January bushfires, then went on, over the following months, to make dozens of Blankets of Love for Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and child-sized quilts for “The Marcia” kindy for autistic children at Liverpool.

Sadly we’ve ended the year once again working on quilts for victims of disastrous bushfires, this time closer to home in Winmalee in the Blue Mountains. That’s the harsh reality of summer here in Australia. And the season has hardly begun.

As soon as Di B and I read Tracey’s appeal to quilters for assistance in giving every school aged child a quilt, as well as an extra quilt for every household, we knew we wanted to get on board to make her vision a reality in the new year.

We emailed our quilters the instructions for a very simple double square block and asked them to raid their stashes, if they wanted to help, and bring along as many completed blocks as they could today. These were to be the building blocks for our quilts for Winmalee.

Those girls are wonderful. They brought along more than a hundred blocks!

After a day of crawling on the floor to arrange and rearrange blocks into child-sized and adult-sized quilts, we have around 8 finished quilt tops – and rather a lot of homework to do quilting them!

The blocks were numbered with masking tape and stacked together in order, making it possible for many hands to work together stitching them into quilts.

We have quilts in reserve (we like to keep some for emergencies), so along with these we’re confident we’ll be able to make a decent contribution to this heartwarming effort by the wider quilting community.

Lunch in the garden was a fun affair, with delicious food contributed by everyone.

Once again we thanked God for giving us a passion for creating quilts, a gift we all love using to give comfort to people in need of encouragement and hope.

There were paper hats (no photos!) and Christmas earrings.

And the usual show and tell.

Another Blanket of Love by Margaret

And these colourful kiddies’ quilts…

Barb

 

Gail

 

Di C

 

Michaela

 

Moo

 

Gillian

 

Michaela

Michelle worked on the binding of a beautiful quilt she’s made for the newborn  daughter of an Iranian refugee couple in her church.

1930s fabrics, large quilting stitches and knots give this quilt real vintage charm, and I know it’s going to be treasured.

Gillian has finally finished a real labour of love, two storybook quilts for her granddaughters.

I could suggest you play “spot the differences” and there are quite a few, but both are enchanting, with sparkle and quirkiness, and all the traditional elements of a fairytale – a king and queen (complete with golden crowns), a handsome prince and a frog who might be a prince in disguise, a beautiful princess, a rather friendly looking dragon, and a snow white unicorn.

Finally, if you’ve made it this far I’ll leave you with a little bit of silliness, a collage of some of the bags people brought today. They just made me smile

Di