My Welcome Mini

Here is my gorgeous Welcome Mini sent to me by Larrissa from Crafty God Chick. In the parcel as well as the Welcome Wall-hanging is a gorgeous knitted washer/flannel, some mint & lavender tea (might calm me down over Christmas???) and two lots of ymmy choccies, Lindor & Guylian.

Larissa very thoughtfully put my precious Little Brunnie & Hun-bun in my welcome hanging & lets face the facts, they are the owners & therefore welcomers to the house. The stitching is exquisite Larissa & I love paisley so it is deemed PURRFECT by all three of us. Thanks very much!

Another gorgeous addition to my little mini collection, looking forward to more next year if you are up to it Swap Muma Chez??? Thanks for all your hard work with this club Chez, we all have had such fun and have beautiful minis to decorate our homes with thanks to you! xx

Happy Days!
Tracee xxx

FNSI - Mini Madness!

Hi all

Last night was the Friday Night Sew In for this month. I used this time to do some minimal quilting & then the borders of my Christmas Mini Swap pressie.

 

I think it turned out quite a treat & here it is on my special 'Merry Christmas' mini stand.

This is one of Nancy Halverson for Art To Heart designs from her Be Attitudes applique quilt. I love Nancy's design & fabric. Most of the fabrics used are Nancy's designs too. I have gathered little bits over the years as I find them from her Star of Wonder & Angels Amongst Us ranges so this is the first thing I have made with them.

 

My last task to finish this last night was just a touch of blusher to give Santa rosie cheeks. I hope he like mineral makeup?

Now I wonder whose place he will be winging his way to on Monday? I'll give you a hint - he's travelling East. Considering I live about 3 kilometres from the Indian Ocean on the West Coast that doesn't rule many of you out..... Oh well, I guess everyone who hasn't yet received their mini is watching for our friend, the postie.

 

I am one person who is not watching for the postie. My mini arrived nice & early on Thursday. I held off opening it until today. My partner for this swap is Marie from Life On The Block here in rural WA. We haven't met before so yippee a new blog to read.

 

Look at my lovely wrapping....

 

 

And yes, that Partride in a Pear Tree is fabric - yah!

 

 

Marie included a great shopping list - she must have sensed my love for lists..... Today I have made a sewing list, a Christmas list, a blog post list, a jobs for over the Christmas break list & a cleaning / chores list - see, I said I loved them! Loving that backing fabric too...

 

 

And here it is & that gorgeous pressies fabric is on the front as well as the back.

 

 

The stitchery presents & Christmas tree have gorgeous sparkly little beads on them too. A bit of Chrissie bling..

 

 

Here it is all set up for Christmas display...

 

 

Thank you Marie, it's a beautiful mini & I will love displaying it for Christmas!

 

Thanks to Cheryll from Gone Stitchin, who is a brilliant swap mama & has hosted 4 wonderful mini swaps this year. I hope we are on again for next year Chez!

 

It was another successful Friday Night Sew In too. If you go to Heidi's blog Handmade by Heidi, you can link through to 115 blogs whose creators were taking part, many from Aussie too.

 

 

Now I am going to attempt to take my washing machine apart. Get the washing machine guy on speed dial I hear you say! Maybe... I googled the error message so have a few things to check first to get it spinning & draining again, then maybe I will ring the wm guy.....

 

Happy sewing.

Tracee xx

The Week That Was.....

Hi all

It's been a big week, lots of work including our AGM on Wednesday which meant getting home from work at 10.30pm (followed by a nap in on Thursday morning). A bonus was being able to bring home one of the flower arrangements. The photo below was taken Thursday so now all the lillies are out & it is even more gorgeous.

Like many I am doing the mad secret sewing rush to get all my Christmas swaps ready. Lots of hand stitching & Friday night I surprised even my self with a machine sewing frenzy. I zipped through a couple of swap pressies, part of a table runner & a little bag for a precious little lady who has just turned six.

 

The bag is called Ruby's Party Bag, a free pattern from Moda Bakeshop's blog & website. You can find it here. It is the perfect tiny size for a perfect tiny little lass, one of my big hands almost fills it. I used three of Melly's 'Where The Wind Blows' fabric, the main one great for a fellow pinkaholic.

Today was the first meeting of the WA Quilters Guild's applique group, now known as The Applique Junkies. We met in one members house with 11 of us to begin with. Next year we will have a hall & welcome everyone so it should grow much larger. There was a great show & tell (with my camera sadly forgotten at home), needleturn, machine & blanket stitch applique in progress and of course plenty of food & coffees. At last, a quilt group that meets way North of the river in Perth. It is only once a month but was a great day.

I worked on 3 projects today, finishing the binding on a swap gift;

Finishing the blanket stitch applique on another swap gift;

And starting the blanket stitch applique on a third swap gift;

Quite a productive day amongst lots of talk, recommendations of places to buy, lots of comparing notes on the frustrations of free motion quilting & longarm quilting and even some discussion on applique, especially the dreaded needleturn which a couple of ladies were very proficient at - hope for me yet!

 

Now I am going to sew three Snugglybug blocks - good thing I don't think I will need dinner.

 

Please note: NO santas were harmed in the making of these swap gifts!

 

Happy stitching

Tracee xx

Spring Mini Swap

Hi all

I had the sweetest parcel to pick up from the post office late this week. It was my Spring Mini swap parcel & it came from our sweet friend Melody from The House on the Side of the Hill blog. If you are not a regular visitor to Mel (unlikely!), rush over there & check out her blog, the posts of beautiful creations & all the amazing free designs Mel find & shares with everyone.

My parcel was a delight right from the outset with the parcel wrapped in blue kitty fabric & blue ribbon. I love ribbon (almost as much as kitty fabric - I'm a ribbon stasher - shhh don't tell anyone!).

There was a beautiful card with my favourite flowers, sweet peas, on the front. My mum always grew sweet peas & they are so fragrant & prolific in flowering- I love them.

Inside was not only my lovely spring mini but generous Mel had also sent me a book - 'A Friend Like Ben' by Julia Romp. (A mother desperate for love. A little boy who can't show it. The cat that brought them together). All I need to add to that is a nice big box of tissues - the cat goes missing too! Thank you Mel, you thoughtfully picked up on my love of reading as well as kitties (surprise, surprise!).

And leaving the best to last - my Spring Mini quilt. Isn't it gorgeous, redwork stitchery, red & turquoise fabrics, bright & happy colours & a gorgeous design with buttons. Here it is, on my bronze mini quilt frame with the ribbon header. Purrfect!

Yes - that is a stack of magazines on the coffee table behind it - the ones I can't bear to put away yet.

So big kisses & thanks to sweet Mel - you can see I love everything!

Thanks also to our swap mama Cheryll of Gone Stitchin. There is still time to take part in the Christmas Mini Quilt Swap, it closes on the 25th October. Sign up to join in the fun on Cheryll's blog.

Happy stitching
Tracee xx

Spring Mini Swap

I did the recent 'Spring' Mini Quilt swap hosted by our swap muma Cheryll from Gone Stitchin'.

My partner this time was Dannette from Quilting Chemist in the USA. Great to meet, well really it was to stalk, someone new. These are secret swaps so Dannette didn't know I was stalking her a few weeks back to learn what she liked & what would suit her in a mini quilt. It ends up we have a lot in common - definately not the chemist bit but we both love hexies, stitchery, applique & birdies.

So this is the Spring mini I made for Dannette.

The stitchery is from Homespun magazine, a design by one of my favourite designers, Lisa from Cubby House Crafts in Tassie. The original pattern is for a great tablerunner & included hexie flowers. I didn't want to lose the hexies so used them as a border feature. The colours are soft & subtle with the lovely blue birdie.

Dannette emailed me last night to say it had arrived safely & she loves it. Yippee! This is my favourite mini I have made so want to make an identical one for myself too. It's on the list!

Can't wait to see more of these mini quilts as they arrive at their new homes & mine too. As always, Thanks to Cheryll for putting in the hard work.

Happy stitching
Tracee xx

Mini Swap Quilt Send

Hi all

I have taken part in the first of Cheryll's min quilt swaps. The first subject very fittingly was Welcome & doesn't everyone need a pretty little welcome quilt in the entry of their home. The stands that fit these 12 inch x 14 inch quilts look so wonderful. See the white one below in Cheryll's swap button.

My pictures will show my quilt on a wall as I have been a bit slow at ordering my stand. However when they get here there will be celebrations as I haven't stopped at one buying both the white & the silver that you can put different headers on matched to your quilt subject, season or celebration.

So here is my mini quilt I made for my swap partner that is currently winging its way to its new home.

I hope my partner likes it. From stalking her blog it seems she like bright colours so I used my current favourite paisley fabric in pinks & yellow on a white background. I also used this on my last swap with Raelene on her journal with lots of other bright contrasts that I posted about back here. Maybe now I should make something for me with it & then put any left to rest for awhile.

Here's a close up of muma & baby bird in their happy nest. When I receive my swap pressie & my hangers I will show you more.

Thanks to the lovely Cheryll from Gone Stitchin for hosting this gorgeous swap. Naturally we are not stopping at one of these little quilts, there will be ongoing swaps where you enter the ones that interest you (you don't have to do all of them) and end up with a selection to display. The next subject is Fathers Day so go to Cheryll's blog to sign up.

Happy swapping

Tracee xx