October 30, 2009

Some new patterns

I have put some new patterns up on my website, five in all, so please go over and have a look.

This is one of my favourite patterns - Country Fruit table runner. I love the traditional country colours and there's some of my favourite fruits on there!



Then I can't help but make more in my cupboard series. I have so much fun creating these interactive pieces for children. In fact there's another one on the drawing board at the moment. Here's the pantry:



and the Refrigerator to go with it:



This sweet little Spring Showers Cushion is now available:



and in time for Christmas, I have released my Vintage Christmas Pudding design. It has a wonderful traditional Christmas Pudding recipe in the centre. This recipe has been handed down through a number of generations of our family and now my children also make it for their Christmas celebrations. Last year my husband and I invited some older single ladies to celebrate Christmas with us. They told me they hadn't tasted Christmas pudding like that since they were really young! It was a real hit! So I am sharing this wonderful recipe with you and instructions on how to print it on the fabric from your computer are included.



Keep an eye out for Block 7 of the "What is Love?" block of the month free design. It will be ready for download soon.

Meanwhile, happy stitching!

Val

October 21, 2009

Back from a fantastic weekend

What a great weekend we had at the Creative Craft Retreat - 50 happy ladies spending a whole weekend doing craft, lovely meals provided, lots of chatting, plenty of laughs - all in a beautiful setting at Lake Perseverance.

Here are the kits all set up ready for the arrival of the class:



My class of 8 ladies did a great job with their Etui. Here's Delma with her pretty pink choice:



Margaret and Robyn chose autumn tones:




Pat's soft green version is going to be a gift - lucky recipient! :


Here's Jan and Chris working hard ... with Jan's lovely aqua:




And isn't Rosemarie's sweet in blue:



Then there's Jill's pale green one with copper and pink accents. Don't you love the gold daisies?



And Chris's with lots of rich purples and cerise:



They managed to get them either finished or to an "almost finished" state so it was a great accomplishment. Don't you think they have done really well?

Happy stitching!
Val

October 14, 2009

All packed and ready

I'm all packed and ready to fly off to Queensland tomorrow to teach at the Creative Craft Retreat. The class will be making my Garden Delights Etui and I've been busy choosing all the fabrics for the kits. I hope they like my choices!

The bags are ready and labelled and I will pop the kits in when I arrive at the Retreat Centre:



Janelle,
who organises the Retreat, asked if I would like to donate something for the gift bags - (isn't it exciting when you go to a Craft weekend and are given a bag of goodies on arrival!) - so I came up with a little stitchery that each lady will receive. Here they are all printed ready for packaging.



I made a couple of samples to give the ladies some ideas for using the stitchery. One became the centre of a little cushion cover:



and another one is now a mobile phone pocket on this bag:



As you can tell, I'm excited at the prospect of sharing the weekend with lots of ladies who are also passionate about craft!

Now .... just make sure the airline doesn't lose my suitcase!!!!!

Happy stitching
Val

October 9, 2009

Block 6 - Free Pattern

1959 must have been a wonderful year! We have just arrived back from interstate having celebrated yet another 50th anniversary. That's the third 50th celebration we have had this year. This one was celebrating the founding of a college and it was fantastic to be able to catch up with so many of our friends from when we were at the college in the 80's. It's amazing how you can just pick up where you left off last time you saw your friends, even if it is 20 or 30 years ago! No doubt that is because these people were really wonderful friends with whom we shared so much of our life over a number of years.

Now we're home again and it is time to let you have the next block in the "What is Love?" free BOM.



You can download the pattern for Block 6 from here.

A number of you lovely people out there have told me you have only just found the free pattern, so I am happy to leave all the blocks on the website in case there are any more new-comers.

There are only three more blocks to add and then I will have some instructions on how to put it all together. I've already started thinking about another free BOM for when the "What is Love?" is finished!

Happy stitching!

Val

October 1, 2009

Our Morning Walk

We're currently having a week's holiday with our son, his wife and four children. We don't see them very often as they live interstate, so it is just lovely to spend time with them all.

We're in a beautiful part of the east coast of Australia and went for our usual before-breakfast morning walk. I took my camera with me to try to capture some of the beauty that surrounds us.

Here are some flannel flowers - aptly named as they feel so soft and velvety:



The rice flower has such intricate detail in its tiny flowers that make up the flowerhead:



The bush track was dotted with the brilliant purple of the boronia:



And we just kept discovering more and more:




The cone bush was in flower:



And the callistimon:



And right at the end of our walk, a lovely orchid:

.

Don't we live in an amazingly beautiful country! I can feel some designs coming on with all that wonderful inspiration!

Regards
Val