Spring Stitchin' in the Scrub..........

Early in September I co-hosted Spring Stitchin' in the Scrub retreat with Deb from The Crafters Cottage......thanks Deb for co-hosting.....

There was 21 of us altogether...........great size group...........

Many regulars and some newbies............

As usual it worked perfectly............

Remember the daisies from the last post...........Brenda worked her magic with them and once again we had beautiful flowers on the tables............

We had so many we decorated the food area also...............

The room set up..........

massive thanks to everyone who helped..........

With Dad sick (not dying at this point) I was worried about him and popped away to visit several times........And my back was bad.........Standing was ok once I was up but how I got thru the first week when I hurt my back I am not sure..........I needed distractions really as not much provided any comfort except standing.....so pottering around was working for me........

I did quite a bit of cooking on the Wednesday after I hurt it..........Mr Chooky had to keep coming to do things like grab something out of the cupboard or put things in and out of the oven..........

Deb and I catered all the food..............

Most importantly we had to celebrate Brenda's birthday................

OMG I so want to be like Brenda when I am 90.........she is amazing..........

I didn't take many photos this retreat.........to many other distractions........

once again lots of happy faces and new friends to make.........

Machines and sewing stuff everywhere.............

Deb had set up a little shop in the corner which was great.............I brought a few bits........I didn't get a photo this time...........

my new table clothes..........an excuse for Janice to come and deliver the extra ones she brought me............She wasn't coming and then made a rash decision to join us...........

Unfortunately the cabins were not available so most of the girls stayed at Reggies Pub.........we had dinner there Friday night and I don't even have one photo.............woops...........

A couple of us were going to stay in one of the pavillions with Di and Miranda in their van but we got one of the cabins at the last minute..........they have painted and redone the floors and foundations of all the cabins so that is great...........

One of the quilts I made.............I did do a little sewing........

Some of the girls had there finished orange peel cushion covers that we made in the workshop I attended earlier in the year..........that's when this retreat was hatched...........nice to see theirs finished.........mine is still a work in progress........

Kaz one of the new girls was like a sewing machine........so inspiring.......she was constantly finishing tops..........some needed piecing.........others just borders etc....every time I looked over she was working on something else.........she held this one up at show and tell but it still needed the other borders on...........

Anyway that's it for the retreat..........

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

Chookyblue........

 

little red tractor.......

After a check in with the Dr I'm having the rest of the week off......I have plenty of leave so i'll rest some more and slowly keep increasing my activity......As it takes not a lot of effort I am trying to catch up on some quilt posts........some will be very boring no fun photo shoots.....but I have a few that I could easily get a photo of from the deck..........

Today its about Fairy Girl......Fairy Girl made a quilt this winter.............

it needed to have a tractor on it and it had to be red...........

Out came the grid paper and I helped Fairy Girl to grid up the tractor and work out block sizes etc.........

This is what I was binding as I got sick with covid........it kept me nice and warm.......it was hard work stitching being so thick.........

The quilt was made with my left over flannel fabrics from one of the first quilts I made way back when............its typical of Fairy Girl with bits joined here and there to make things fit......

the rounds just kept growing.........its got soft beautiful pale blue minky on the back......its a big heavy quilt........just what she wanted..........you can see the quilting so well in this photo.........

Quilt Details

Designed by Fairy Girl

Made by Fairy Girl

Fabrics various flannel scraps/leftovers

Quilted by House of Jackson - Jackson Cook

Started and finished winter 2022

Size 83x91in

just a reminder life is precious...... This birdy didn't make the distance.....

Appreciate what you have.....

Catch you later........

Chookyblue.........

Scrub Stitchin'.......what did I sew????

So just to show I did get "Something" sewn while at Scrub Stitchin'..........

This flannel quilt was mostly made by the happy recipient wrapped in it here...........the first job I did at Scrub Stitchin' was to finish this binding and thanks to a couple of the girls it was a team effort........

Sadly the red chenille ran badly when it got washed so now it is a shade of pink.........its been washed several times with every option I can think of....no luck returning it to the nice fresh colours......

anyway the recipient is still happy with it............

Then wanting to achieve something I decided to do a Jelly roll race quilt.........this spurred several others to make quilts also....digging in there stash and finding jelly rolls..........

Here it is finished......I joined it with 2.5in squares but I think I prefer the diagonal joins............

Once that was done I had found some webbing and ribbons while packing things for the retreat so decided to use up what I had........

Heres the pile  of keyfob's with a few made - I need to order more metal parts..........any one brought them lately????

Why did I make them??? Presents, sell some whatever...........

A lot of time was taken up with EPP lessons........I love sharing skills and we had quiet a few who had not done EPP before and the group project which I am yet to share was using EPP.........

got a bit of mine completed also............I have one more melon piece to attached but it had to be re-glued and I finally found my glue stick a couple of nights ago.......thats what happens when you pack everything up in a rush.......

I had a gorgeous pretty bundle of fabrics from Jude and I started playing with a pattern in my own head that I had started to draw up but no cutting instructions just cutting as I went it was a little hard with so much going on so I got to what you see below and another small section and I gave up..........

I am liking what I see but I will work on it quietly alone one day........

When I can spread out even more and make a big mess choosing what fabric I want to put where........

Then distracted by Sue @ Kiwikids Page and Helen who had both brought Drunkards Path precut kits from our little onsite shop.......I was wandering the shop and saw a pack of fabric I thought I would like..........and woops just like that I was making a Drunkards Path..........probably the only way I will make one as not bothered to get the templates and cut one myself............

Making progress..........Sue's on the left and mine on the right.............

was great watching them grow.........

they are pretty easy to sew and you can see Sue's here on her blog..........

Here it is stuck on the makeshift design wall..........not sure if this is the final setting but I don't mind it..........there is enough baby drunkards to make another block and make it 5x5 instead of 6x4.............

then it was all over and everything packed up except my sewing mess.........I have lots of pics from show and tell and probably others on the camera but yet to down load them.........must do that this week..........camera was missing for abit and I found it last night.........

Anyway that's it for now......

It's been a glorious autumn weekend........

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

Chookyblue.........

Ruby red lips.......

Yesterday the apprentice started playing with placement for this flannel..........

Bliss by Bonnie and Camille - such a bright fresh range of flannels.............

Started Nundle retreat 2011................it was a second quilt for the weekend..............I got two rows sewn together.........

there it stopped and got packed into a box.........

So the apprentice niece got it all on the wall...........

then she started sewing it together..............she did so well.......she joined all the blocks into rows and I helped joining the rows and let me tell you it was a struggle getting bumpy chenille and flannel thru the machine............

the chenille was a nightmare sewing wise but it adds great texture to the quilt with the flannel.............

One happy girl...........

now how to quilt it????

We added the narrow border of flannel to tame the red chenille edges...............

was a little challenging to take the photos as  it was windy outside............

It looked like a blood bath in the Chookshed with red everywhere............all cleaned up now and onto another project............

The mystery box no 7 i'll take some pics next and show you...............it's sort of done...........i'm undecided about the borders that I wanted but it did not have...............

Catch you later.......

Chookyblue........

Recruitments open.......

Yesterday I recruited an apprentice aka niece.......it's our sewing time...... Not that she knew what she wanted to sew but it is our first real sewing session together.......

So I put her to work on laying out no 1 ruby red lips........

Then she started sewing it........

I love encouraging kids to sew....... Must show you the quilt fairy girls friend made at the start of the holidays......

I'm still working away on no 7 mystery box .... I know why I stopped it was with frustration at bias edges but it won't beat me this time......

Catch you later......

Chookyblue.....