Red Home bag..........

Finally I can share pics of my first project from the Natalie Bird's new book Red Home 

I used the red fat 1/4 bundle of fabrics I got at the quilt show from Natalie's stand......a mixture of fabrics including some French Generals...........

True Friends Tote Bag.......

The bag is a great size........little pockets on the outside front of the bag.........the back side............

love the saying...........

"A true friend is one who comes in when the whole world goes out" 

This bag went to my friend Jo for her birthday...........

We have a birthday swap in our Friends in Stitching online group.............

Our theme this year  is Eat, Grow, Cook.........

the bag covered the "grow".........."grow" flowers and "grow" friends "Eat" a yummy local salad dressing and some chocolate "Cook" one of my recipes

I also included some of my cards..........

.........take care til next time.....Chookyblue.........

busy watching TV............

In the crazy life it is here at the moment I will be watching as much of the oylmpics as possible.  Most of our coverage starts at 6.30pm and runs thru til 9am I won't be staying up all night but I will be watching as much as I can  I LOVE the olympics. I am supposed to be painting some bedrooms in a house today but I told Mr Chooky that we (Fairy Girl and me) can't go until the opening ceremony is finished........ I'm not a big TV sports fan but come the Olympics I am.......... Will you be watching the Oylmpics? .........take care til next time.....Chookyblue.........

retreat run down.........

Life is busy here I bet your waiting for a run down of the retreat weekend at Cottage on the Hill Nundle...........this is my 9th or 10 retreat year I always look forward to it.............
Kerry runs a wonderful weekend of sewing, morning/afternoon tea and lunch...........
Thanks for all the lovely/funny comments you left on my mobile posting while away.....I have given up trying to reply to all of them (and you know I always reply) but know they are appreciated............

All good weekends start by gathering for lunch in a chilly Nundle............
Mount Misery was the sunny spot for lunch

I love seeing everyone's bundles stacked up waiting to be cut by Kerry...........

yep she cuts everything for you..........

and another bundle........

a flannel bundle.............. 

and mine.........

some people needed a "coffee" to help relax with the free motion quilting..........

sunset Saturday afternoon after a windy cold cloudy day...........

Cardy couldn't join us at the last minute so she joined the "girls" for some nibbles........the "girls" were just free riding in on our weekend as they have there own retreat coming up soon........we thought they may have liked a seek peek at our weekend........"Cardy let go of that red wind glass"

this is a friends first quilt and I found the border fabric at Kerry's for it and added that and joined all the scraps together for the 2 outside borders and the egg lady put those 2 borders on......thanks for the help and I left it to get quilted.............

beds are always great for laying out.........most of my blocks were finished Sat night.....I would have had them finished except for the "oh ^%$^%$" moment when I had done a mountain of chain piecing only to discover the threads wasn't sewing right - thanks girls for the unpicking...........

Sunday saw quilts coming together..........

black/greys I would never pick but they look great...........

progress........

someone was very lucky..........only the glove attached.........

my progress on Sunday 2 rows together and auditioning pieces and borders..........

here we are.........ready to start packing up.........and very sadly head home.....

My bundle to take home........

Thanks Trish, Sandy, Lea, Anita and Belinda for a wonderful weekend..........

how many sleeps til the next one?????

i'm going to have a little giveaway too to thank "you" my wonderful visitors..........all your contributions make blogging lots fun for me........and I have made many fantastic friends thru blogging..........
Catch you later..............

Chookyblue

home and roosted...........

home safe and roosted.............tired and exhausted..........

more to come when I get it organised..........

a gorgeous sunset on the way home.......

hard on the driving but beautiful......

Saw a few kangaroos but no close calls thank goodness..........

Catch you later..............

Chookyblue

Hhhhmmmmm

Cardy, Peg and Dale are a little under the weather
Chookyblue

Progress......

It's happening .........bloody cold here in Nundle........
Chookyblue

Fabric chosen....

Now to sew........
Chookyblue

off on retreat.......

Off with my quilting b u d d i es.............sewing up a storm.........well that's the plan anyway...........

.........take care til next time.....Chookyblue.........

Sadly the e..n..d.............

Well all good things have to come to an end..............I have had a pretty good holiday......the last week especially seems like it has been long with plenty of time at home..........unlike other holidays where is seems like it is gone in a flash ...............

tomorrow it's back to school, back to work, back to bus runs, back to school lunches, back to reality............oh well it was good while it lasted.......cooped up here ignoring life..........I have been stitching but nothing to show yet so i'll keep working away and hope I will be back soon...........it has been a busy blogging week here at Chookyblue..............and it's been great to add a couple of things to the finished section on my sidebar too...........

(image removed)

Oh and if you want something to do go visit this new blogger and encourage her new journey in blogland...........welcome to blogland Fairy Floss Stitches..........

.........take care til next time.....Chookyblue.........

The adventures of Peg and Dale continue...........

Thanks Jo for having us in Tassie.........we had stowed away in Helen's luggage to get from South Australia to Tassie.......but we had to lower ourselves and hop onto Australia Post as we headed north to NSW.......
Since Chookyblue went to Sydney with the "fake" Peg and Dale girls we couldn't go and confuse everyone..........Chookyblue's handbag was way to tiny to fit us is.........
but lucky for us a few weeks ago Chooky has some friends over for sewing day...........
we got to have some fun.............
It was great checking out things in the chook shed.......
"Oh Peg look what's happening on the Threadbear Newsletter"

"No power plugged into this one Dale I can't sew yet...............

"Oh Dear Peg..........the cover hasn't even made it off this one"
"Where are these girls?"
"Dale I think they are still in bed.........not up with us Chooks that's for sure"
"What time is it Dale"
"Peg it's 9am....nearly time for a cuppa and they are still sleeping"

Lucky Chooky was up early and sewing we'll give her a hand and keep her company til the girls get out here.........

"That morning sun is glorious"................

The girls must have got into the sewing as this is one quilt that was worked on.....piecing the backing for this flannel..........
"Hey Dale I have seen this quilt kit at Kerry's shop........."

And Chooky finally got another block done from this old Fat 1/4 Shop BOM............
"Bout time she finished it Dale she's had it going since 2008!!!"

oh and Chookyblue made these great Spinach and Feta Quiches for lunch..........you can find the recipe here.........they were very delicious............

"thanks for having us for your sewing sleepover Chookyblue..........hope Dale and I can come back soon........"
"So Peg where are we off too now?"
"Not sure Dale but I know we're not going home this is too much fun."

Peg and Dale

Antique Tumblers...........

This is a quilt I made at my retreat at Cottage on the Hill in Nundle last year (just about to go again)

It was to be for me but it wasn't finished..........since being inspired to sew again I decided to attach the remainder of the binding so i could sew it down..............

But recently I found out a friend is seriously ill and suddenly I was heading off to see her............

Knowing she needed a quilt but no time to make one I decided to get this one finished for her............

she was stoked and so excited to know I had made it myself..........

With a sleep over on the way at Cardygirl's we all know how much she LOVES binding............she must be a good friend cause she helped me get the binding finished...........

then organise the photo shoot..............and in the neat tidy perfect sewing room she was able to find a quilt label................Thanks Cardy

Fabric - Antique Fair by Black Bird Designs

Tumbler Pattern ???

On the way to Cardy's I got stuck behind this triple escort wide load............the only way around is when they stopped which thankfully wasn't too far up the road but on the way home I got stuck behind another one and got stuck there for about 15-20 mins.............You know your in mining country when you have stuff like this on the roads............

and sunset as I was arriving at Cardy's...............

a view on the way home..............gorgeous.............

It's so exciting to have a finish...............

Catch you later..............

Chookyblue

Heart Quilts.........

I promise this is my last quilt on my Sydney trip..............remember the excess luggage...........lucky I had a bigger suitcase as below is what I had to fit in.........

I am blessed to have amazing gorgeous friends and these quilts were delivered to me when I was in Sydney............I was in shock there were lots of tears I had no idea about them.......it was the most wonderful surprise...........

This one is for someone close to me................

This one they made for me............

thanks to all the amazing girls involved which were some bloggers from Girls Day in the Country or my online Friends in Stitching group.................

Dawnie, Lynda, Kerri, Jane, Leanne, Vicki, Teresa, Fiona, Bec, Jenny, Janice, Miss Jules, Fiona, SandyN, Belinda, Lea, Sam, Tracey, Lynda, Alison, Anita, Trish, Khris, Deb, Suzie, Susan, Lise, Maree, Kayly, Ann, Bronwyn, Peg, Dale, Kerry and SandyC

Keeping my friends near..........and they are keeping me warm..................

TAHNKYOU..........

Catch you later..............

Chookyblue

95% oraganised for now........

this is much better........things are back together as they should have been........

last night while I was tidying and it was pouring (ended up with 26mls of rain) Bookworm was sewing away...........

Here are the heat packs he has made...............i only had enough rice to fill one so will have to get some next time shopping...............

showing both sides of the heat packs..........his colours are a little OMG for me so I won't be taking his colour advice...... although I do like the one up the top with the farm.........he had to have the chook wire and barb wire prints between the animals and the tractor and wheat.......and the tractor and wheat had to be beside each other cause you need to the tractor to grow the wheat........he put a bit of thought into the planning and loved sewing....... he had fun and we spent some time one on one.............trying to avoid the sick people in the house who are still sick..............I think Fairy Girl is worse today not better.............

the sky was glorious today...........

the jet streams showed up well..........lots of wispy clouds too.........

loving the school holidays...............more rain forecast too........

Catch you later..............

Chookyblue

ThE sHoPpInG........

So where was I before I disappeared...................oh yes the stall holders who were there and others MIA..............it seems to be the problem of the huge cost is the most off putting for people to have stands at the quilt shows.......really way to many paper stuff and beading thingys for my liking...............would be fantastic to see more QUILT shops and designers there since it is a quilt show...............if they didn't have the NSW Quilters Guild quilt show I am not sure I would make the effort so maybe the people who organise these things need to have a rethink about attracting more QUILT shops.......after all we pay a fare price to get in for a day.............just my opinion but that why I blog to say what I want........but it did spark lots of interest from you girls out there in blogland and a few extra emails back and forwards with other info that wasn't in the comments..............
&&&
So what did I get..........I did my share to support stall holders who went..........

I did a workshop with Studio Mio and made this little zipper purse.............cute turtle fabric................all hand stitching......I have never made anything from start to finish all hand stitching and even worse it had a zipper in it too.........OMG.....but I did it and it looks fine and has held many coins for days and hasn't got a hole..........so my stitching must have been fine..............I was so excited and it was all done in the hour............my hand stitching needs a little work but I did it..........went back and got some more zippers after the workshop..........

Hatched and Patched...........Had to get Anni's new book and a kit for the turtle........the green fat 1/4 was for Fairy Girl..........

Quiltmania had this gorgeous book.........Scrap Quilts (mania) by Linda Koenig

I got an old issue of Quiltmania magazine too............

I went to Kathy's (Material Obsessions)colour workshop with Reece........this was a great workshop..........i'll be looking at things a little differently now............while I'm not that keen on some of the fabrics Kathy uses I can see what she is getting at so will try and look at what I have better and see how things go...........

I'm going to have a play with this block and see what I can do with the fabrics I have...........

And Kathy's book was on my shopping list before I left..............gorgeous photos...........and quilts...........

Natalie The Birdhouse had her new book out too..........another must have.............and a little bundle of fabrics to play with.............

Blue Willow Cottage had lots of lovely patterns.........

Cherry Pie Designs had this great pattern that includes a little bit of EPP.......

....and a kit too so even better.........

Marg Low's stand was dangerous...............I went to he stand too many times and I am sure I brought something each time I stopped in................

extras............cute notepads..........

I did a workshop with Marg too an after the workshop I went back to get 3 felts..........hhhmmmmm......... thanks to Marg and my friends I ended up with all these............3x3????

And the kit for this will make up a little purse..........it was in Homespun no. 94 Vol 12 No3

the pattern is called Delightful Blooms........now to hunt my copy down.........lol

Marg Low's workshop was Gem's Needle Keep...........

this is how far I got in the workshop.........

And not sure where I got this reproduction but I had to get a blue piece..............lol..........

Finally I felt like I brought more then these needles from Sue Daley but it's cause i went shopping there with Dzintra...............the needles are great for EPP.............

Well I think that's it for the shopping.............
the sewing sorting is going well and while I was out there tonight we had 18mls of rain.........1 drip.............but you know where you will find me all day tomorrow............more rain is forecast so I will be out there all day..........well that's the plan anyway.........Bookworm has been out sewing with me last night and tonight and I will take a photo of his creations tomorrow...........talk about out of your comfort zone with fabric choice and colour.............lol

Catch you later..............

Chookyblue