I am still here..........

I know it's been awhile since I last posted, no excuse - just laziness or maybe a very busy year. Daughter getting married, a new baby in the family, our first grandchild, a beautiful baby boy who is now 10 weeks old.

To ease myself back into blogging I took some photos around the garden yesterday.

I also had a visitor take great interest in what I was doing, he flew that close a couple of times I thought he would land on my shoulder!

 I do have some new quilt pictures but not on this computer, lots of stitching and knitting going on this year. I will add them shortly.

Holiday Pictures

1956 Hudson

 We have just come home from a week away with the car club. We were based in Warrnambool for the week, there is plenty to see and do on the shipwreck coast. This trip we used the '56 Hudson Hornet

12 Apostles

Loch Ard Gorge

Hopkins Falls

Hopkins Falls

A huge Sigh of Relief....

I have some good news,  the tumour I had removed last week was benign.  The Drs suspected it was but as you know there are always those little niggling doubts especially when the surgeon wanted it removed as soon as possible.

I haven't really been feeling up to sewing, haven't been able to concentrate. I have been doing a little knitting and will post some pictures when I find where I put the camera for safe keeping.

Failed Resolutions

On January 1st I made a New Years resolution, I was going to make a blog entry every week.  As you can see I've failed miserably. Life just seems to throw  a spanner in the works.

I have been busy quilting and will post some pictures shortly of the quilts I've finished this year. Until then I will show you the quilt hanging on my design wall at present.

Below is the original fabric that I used.

We had a massive hail storm recently and I couldn't believe the size of the hail stones, fortunately we didn't suffer any damage to the house or cars but the garden took a beating.

Happy New Year Everyone!!

Wishing all my friends a safe and happy 2010,
may the coming year bring you much love and laughter.

Seasons Greetings

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Wishing you all a safe and Happy Christmas/Holiday Season and all the very best for the New Year!

A Quick Trip Away

It has been a very busy weekend for us. Saturday eldest daughter and her BF came to stay and to collect the Peter Rabbit quilt that I made for them to give to friends.
It was a quilt panel and all I had to do was the quilting and binding. I used the new machine and it was quite a learning experience.

I will be glad after Friday when I've had my first lesson on operating the 'beast.' The machine is great to use but the instructions booklet is next to useless. Talk about trial and error.

As a thank you I was given these lovely iris'. The were just buds on Saturday but when we came home yesterday most of them were open.


Sunday lunchtime Himself and I packed a bag and took off to Lakes Entrance for the night. He wanted to visit Lake Tyers to see the water wheel there.
Some people would think we're crazy driving 4 hours to look at a water wheel. It was fun to get away, go out for dinner etc.

Yesterday we drove home via Yarram instead of coming straight down the highway. It was good to see some other parts of Gippsland.

Forthcoming Visitor

I am still trying to use up the fabric in my stash, it seems to be a never ending challenge. I've made a couple of autumn toned quilts, a few scrappy ones, a green one and now I am working on the blues again. This is the first block of the new project. I love HSTs, you can do so much with them.

Last week was my mother-in-laws birthday. We went to Melbourne to have lunch with her and other members of the family to celebrate her 92nd year.

On the way home we called into the Camberwell Sewing Centre and came home with this little addition to my sewing machine collection. I think it will be lovely to sew and quilt on when I've had a little more time to play with it. I hope to go back to the shop in a week or two for a lesson.

I'd like to introduce Pino. Pino belongs to our youngest daughter. The very same daughter who is going overseas for 3 months, guess who is going to look after Pino????
This is an 'inside cat' we already have a black cat who lives outside, should be interesting when they meet through the window. The 'Man of the House' hates cats, especially cats inside the house. I should be in for a fun 12 weeks.

Give Away

Just been to visit http://bozzysblog.blogspot.com and Lynda is giving away a beautiful bag pattern that she designed.

What a wonderful prize to win, might just have to purchase the pattern for myself.

ATCs & Foggy mornings

Once again I have been slack with my blogging, nearly a month has passed since I was last here. I haven't been up to a lot in the past month, my Mum come and stayed for a few days and we had a great time together, shopping, going out to lunch etc.

This picture was taken early Saturday morning, not long after sunrise, as the sun was coming up over the hills, the valleys are covered in fog and there was a heavy dew.

I participated in an ATC swap recently for those that didn't go on the SCQuilters retreat in Adelaide. I'm finally getting around to posting pics of the one of the ATCs that I made (forgot to take photos of the other set)and ATCs received in the swap.

This last ATC is the final one from the end of year 'Seasons' swap with my fellow ATWIAQs

Thanks for swapping Robyn.

I've Been Keeping Busy

It's hard to believe that more than a month has passed since I last posted, sorry about that. I have been keeping myself busy with sock knitting and quilting 2 quilts for a friend. I will post some pictures when I finish the binding.

I'd like to introduce Jonathon Jack, for a short time in the years before quilting I made bears. I made a bear for each of my daughters and nieces. After that the novelty of making bears wore off. JJ is the only bear I kept for myself, most people think he is very ugly but I think he has a charm all of his own.

Below are a couple of blurry pictures of the socks I've just finished.

Last week I went away for a few days to Phillip Island. It was one of our sewing getaways. This is the result of 2 days of concentrated sewing. We had most of the blocks cut before we left. The pattern is featured on the front of Homespun Magazine, No. 70, Vol 10 and the pattern is by Keryn Emmerson. A great pattern to use up the stash. The only fabric I had to buy was for the dark cornerstones and the first border. I still have to add the borders.

Hello to all the followers of my blog!

Bushfires - 2

Some more pictures taken of the aftermath of the fires.

These top two were taken on the road I use to get into town.













The third one is some of the debris that were blown into our yard on the night of the 7th

Bushfires

Last Saturday night was a night from hell, I never want to experience another one like it. We were very lucky to suffer no damage or loss. My heart goes out to others who have lost their loved ones and everything they own.

It was hot, 47C plus and with the forecast of strong winds things weren't looking too good. When the wind change came through the fires from Bunyip Ridge were swept around the hills to the west of us. I have never experienced winds like these. On Sunday we went to call on neighbours to make sure everyone was safe and the number of trees down in our road was unbelievable. One neighbour had a huge gum tree fall, it just hit the corner of his verandah, missed the cars parked in the drive-way.






The sky darkened in a matter of minutes. We were covered in ash and embers. We had to be outside checking to make sure there were no spot fires.

I took the opportunity to get these pictures. It was amazing to watch the black smoke sweep across the hills behind us. It looked like a rain cloud.

The electricity went off not long after this and we
relied on candles, torches and a battery operated radio for news about what was happening. Around 10.30 pm the telephones, both the land line and mobiles went dead.

Our girls were getting frantic when they couldn't contact us until the next day.



These last 2 pictures are the fires still burning in the hills to the west of us, about 5 km from here.

They were taken on Wednesday.

All our water tanks have been contaminated with ash, everything reeks of smoke but we're here and have suffered no loss. We are very fortunate and are counting our blessings.

On a lighter note, we had an unexpected visitor Saturday night. Himself was sitting listening to the radio when he looked down and saw the pattern on the rug move ....... most unusual! Turns out is was a small tiger snake slithering along beside his foot. I have never seen him move so fast. I can tell you it's really hard to find a snake by torch & candlelight. Managed in the end after much furniture moving.

2009 - Already!! Happy New New

I can't believe that it is already the 12th of January. Belated Happy New Year greetings to everyone.

We have had a hectic start to the year with both a wedding and funeral last week. Husband's aunt passed away at the age of 96. We travelled up to Swan Hill for the funeral, it's a six hour trip from here so we stayed overnight and caught up with family the next day.



We had a picnic lunch on the river bank. I managed to get sunburned for the first time in years. I though that I was sitting in the shade all the time.I thought the flowers on this tree looked lovely but I have no idea what they are called.

The picture below is what the countryside is like away from the river.


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Op Shop Bargains!

Yesterday morning I went to the library and for coffee with a friend. On our way home we visited the local op-(thrift) shop. I found these two bargains, my youngest daughter has been wanting an old style hand beater/mixer for ages and I thought that the apron was too good to pass up. All the work that has gone into the apron and for only 50c! I'm sure she will be pleased with the new additions for her kitchen.

A Recent Visitor

This male King Parrot was a recent visitor to our backyard. He seemed to be very tame, inquisitive. and posed for photos without any problems. He was approx a metre from me when I took these pics.

I did think that he had come to feast on our fig tree but he seemed much more interested in what we were doing to the hydroponic garden experiment.