Hmmm....over 2 months....

...since my last post! How terrible :(  Well, here I am again!  Today was the beginning of the Christmas Pageants in South Australia, and for those of you that don't know, we hold the biggest one in the world!  Speaking of Christmas, one of the ladies that goes to Thursday craft, entered her Christmas waistcoat into the local show and won a prize! Well done, Mary :)

It has been quite a busy few months, that's my excuse and I am sticking to it!!!!  YWCA Encore Adelaide were successful in securing a decent grant for 2012-13, which has enabled us to be able to run several programs, so that's part of what I have been up to :)  Below is two lovely ladies, Marilyn on the left is a volunteer ambassador in SA for The Otis Foundation ( they provide retreats free of charge for people who have had breast cancer to go and have a holiday with family, friends or supporters) and Ruth, my colleague on the right :)  We were at the St Andrews Breast Cancer Luncheon which is held every year.  People (and I say people, because breast cancer is applicable to both men and women) who have had BC surgery at St Andrews get to come along for two years after their treatment and can invite a friend to come along.   There are guest speakers and a lovely lunch too!

Please ignore the dates on the pics - camera was not set right!  So...then it was a bit of quilt therapy for me...I booked in to see Ricky Tims at the AMQ Festival :) :)  What a fab day we all had (well, I think we all did!) Exhausting, lots of woo hooing and light bulbs going on during the course of the day.  The venue was at the Adelaide Convention Centre and I have to say I was impressed - staff were great, food (gluten free!!!) was provided and it was EDIBLE!!!! and delicious :)

This is one of Ricky's quilts, unfortunately the picture does it no justice at all.  It is called Bohemian Rhapsody.

Here is one of my friends, Marilyn, with Ricky.  He was sooo nice, he signed every ones book and had a picture taken with all that wanted one! You don't get that very often.

 And just have to show you all again! This is my 1/12th Quilting studio...

More R&R, this time up to the Lyndoch Lavender Farm with SW and the Fossils for a lovely morning tea.  We then headed up to Tanunda for lunch (ice cream really), had a mooch around and then headed back home.  Believe it or not that took the whole day up!  Was my birthday so it was nice to do nothing much.

October was our middle great nieces 5th birthday, sadly I did not get a pic of her :( But this is one of the 8 new puppies in their household.  Soooo cute, but no! I am not getting one :)

There is always a fugly pic somewhere, and this is mine for this post.  If anyone would like to purchase it (the light fitting that is) it is up for sale.  And NO, it does not belong to me, but to one of the Snobs & Slobs, it came with the house she bought.

Last week, we had some lovely weather, so I was able to leave my studio door open while working and in flew this little butterfly!  It made a bee-line for the fake flowers and it took me a while to get it to go back out the door. 

Other people have been busy too...this is Quilty Gal holding a baby - two reasons for the pic....1) She doesn't often like to hold babies 2) The baby is only 3 weeks old, but look at that hair!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Moving right along, we are now in November so that meant it was Father-in-law Fossils 85th Birthday, so I thought I better make him a quilt :) Very easy one to do and I love the way they all turn out differently - "Disappearing Nine Patch".  He put it straight on the bed, so I guess he likes it.

 This is Tom with the great grand kids and grand nephews and nieces.

These are some of the lovely friends I have made through doing Encore.  We get together for dinner every 5-6 weeks and its always a laugh.

The Adelaide Quilt and Craft was on this weekend.  I had not been for a couple of years so was eager to go and see what was out there.  The Eggers had a lovely display - so here is a few of what they did this year.

The quilt display was good, but this one caught our eyes (mine and Quilty Gals) cos its different.  It is a Dragons back with a tattoo of a lady who has a tattoo of a dragon :)  Congrats too to Tara and Lizzy for winning a prize with the Farmers Granddaughter quilt - just beautiful!

Well....that's about it for now folks, probably bored you enough at one time!  Till later, I better go and do some more work!

Where is the warm weather???

...certainly not here yet!  Oh well, get over it I am saying to myself, however that is not really working...just sooo looking forward to summer!

So, since my last post - which has been some time - life has been busy.  Some of you may know I work as a coordinator for a program called Encore (YWCA) - this is a free mild mobility and exercise program for women who have had breast cancer.  We rely on donations and fundraising, so in July we had a wonderful day at our local Bunnings doing a BBQ.  We were flat out all day and managed to make a nice amount of profit! So thanks to all who helped and certainly those that ate our food!

Three little munchkins enjoying their sausages!

Some of you may also know that I go to a Craft on a Thursday.  One of the crafty friends made my birthday cake last year.  Earlier this year she sent the pics of the cake off to the Cake magazine in the UK and she got her/mine cake published! Well done Beth....and of course I still have the decorations from on top! (Don't be surprised Claire)

We have also been very busy getting our miniature festival items ready for the show - S.A.M.E.  One of the items SW and I put in was a copy of my Studio workshop and Garden.  This is 1/12th scale and most items except for the ironing board and two swivel chairs were all made by us!  It was a great project to work on and got us thinking a little outside the square of what to use to represent the real thing,

A close up of the "Gammil"!  LOL (needs a couple more bits and pieces on it to finish it off but we ran out of time.  The panto pattern on there is 'Florence' from Lorien quilting - a copy of the real one I also have on the setup.

Another item I displayed - St George and the Dragon - this was for the medieval section.  Sadly the Dragon killed St George this time round!  Once again, except for the Dragon and the bones, I made all the other parts of the scenery.  The sad knight in the front was made by one of our members Bev.

And our third item - not a real good pic - might have to change later! - is the Christmas Bon Bons.  These are 1/48th scale and to give you an idea of size - the 'box' they fit in is a Pringles or similar size container.  There is a bit of quirkiness here if you enlarge the pic and have a look closely!

During July, I managed to catch the dreaded 'lurgy' that is going around :( So I confined myself to home for 12 days....very hard to do!  Anyway, didn't have much energy or thinking power, so hunted through my cupboards and found some kits I had bought a while ago.  What better time to get them out and do them??  The following four houses are 1/144th scale (they sit on the palm of my hand)  I was very pleased with the finished items..don't know that I need to do anymore though!

Last Friday was Snobs and Slobs get together.  I have not been there for a while for sickness and other reasons so thought it time I turned up!  Angela has done this lovely warm looking stitchery quilt.

Glenice showing off her grand daughters hat that has stretched a bit - looks like Claire rather than Glenice!

Saturday, a couple of us got together for the Farmers Wife meeting - ROFLMAO here - Farmers Wife!!!! Anyway, moving right along, Kay has done this lovely stitchery quilt.

And this Cathedral Window looking quilt.

And this round the world quilt.

Claire sorted her Suffolk Puffs out in order.

And me? Well I didn't do much, just took some photos! LOL

Sorry....

...but I have re-introduced the word verification to my blog posting :(  Due to the fact I keep getting some comments that either make no sense or are not applicable to me or my blog.  Would be nice if people that left a comment would make known who they are then I wouldn't have to make this adjustment.  Hope you all don't mind!

Winter, wet, cold....

...and just soooooo over it already! Never the less, we must plod on! So...since my last post, things have been busy!  Some of the Thursday Craftie's have embarked on a few new projects.  Margaret has been making these delightful shopping bags.

Nancy fashioned this bag using the 3D cameo as the main theme and built the bag up around it.

Ella brought in three of her waistcoats to display for ideas to use in our next project - a crazy patch project - either a waistcoat or cushion cover.

Also since last posting, a few more of the ladies have finished their Grandmothers Flower Garden Friendship quilts.  The first is Pats.

 The next is Joyces.

 The last for the month is Beths.

All different and all lovely! Only a couple or so to go before we can get a group pic of them all!!!

Mary completed her embroidered quilt top this week, ready to get put together now and get quilting!!

SW has been squirrelling some time away in his shed....trying to keep a surprise from me...but I found out before it was finished! Isnt it cute? Its my new 1/24th scale house "The Maddison" (bit like Bates Motel my brother thinks!)

I was also given a couple of boxes containing items to be decorated for our Miniature Festival in August.  One was the first item displayed - an empty false book, it has a print of the Eiffel Tower on the outside.  Was trotting along past some scrapbook items and saw the lovely little red dresses, and the light went on in the old head!  So we now have a little Moulin Rouge display that will be raffled off at the Festival.

My next challenge was a gathering of bits from a kit - so now we have a cute little coffee shop also to be raffled off with the other room boxes at the Festival.

I have been attending a workshop at the miniature club for the last few months.  Christmas Bon Bons have been the project in 1/48th scale.  But for some reason I have not photgraphed mine yet??!!! But here is a peak at one of the other members Bon Bons!

The next pic is of my colleagues from the YWCA Encore team and our boss Karen, who sadly finished her contract with the Y.  So we all met for dinner and said farewell to her (even though its only a work farewell as Karen will be around in other ways to help out with our programme.) (Me, Karen, Ruth, Judy, Ros and Margaret)

What would a posting be without mention of the Snobs & Slobs???  This Snob is now beginning to be an over achiever in her field of quilt making.  Lorraine has done christmas stitcheries in between charm pack squares for this little lap quilt (or table cloth?!)

She also has put together this jelly roll log.

And not quite done yet is her Farmers Wife quilt which is being hand quilted - so stay tuned for that one!

Lynne completed this lovely little Noahs Ark quilt - well almost completed, awaiting the name of the recipient baby at time photo was taken - so no label attached yet :)

Last week I had an appointment in the city and all the way from the car to the building these two little parrots flew or walked in front of me singing! How sweet was that?

So now the pics bring us to the past weekend....SW and I were lucky enough to be able to enjoy a visit to Ambleside - a lovely holiday home in Moonta Bay courtesy of the Otis Foundation and some lovely people who donate their house to the cause for periods of time.

Unfortunately most of the time we were there, the rain was heavy and the wind was blowy and cold so we only ventured outdoors a couple of times.  However, the kitchen wall said it all and thats what we did....

 

Whilst in Moonta town center, we spotted this quaint little house in between two rather large shops

sadly I don't believe anyone lives there anymore but must of been quite a nice little place to live once.

 

Just noticed the time stamp on the photos and they are wrong :( Will have to check camera out)
Anyhow, Sunday evening was quite a calm evening and the sea looked half reasonable - wasnt thinking of going for a dip though - so this was the right hand view from our holiday home.

 Directly below us - grass was in our garden.

 Then out to the left.

 The sea and the sun always make a lovely pic together no matter the weather. 

 Till next time, stay warm!