What a busy month

Oh boy have I been busy.......I had a birthday in April and my husband whisked me away for mystery mini holiday for 5 nights....how exciting........I had to pack walking shoes, warm clothes.....flying to our destination but passport not required.......

and this is were we ended up.......Melbourne......

what a great time we had.......so much nice food...

so many things to see.....

so much to explore in the city........

I came home exhausted.....

Since then I have been playing with fabrics making Tags with the ladies at the Textile group in Caloundra.........

these are the 5 tags that I made.......

and then a week later.......

I met this beautiful lady for a 2 day workshop at Buderim......

artoftracyverdugo.blogspot.com.au

I caught up with the lovely Jenny 

onevintageday.blogspot.com.au

and Lyn who I use to work with many years ago......

and Michelle from kielmtcolours.blogspot.com.au


I also met the lovely Denise denthe.blogspot.com.au who's blog I have followed for a couple of yrs now.......sorry no photo....make sure you have a look at these ladies blogs to see their fantastic work.......

I am not much of a so called painter/artist.....but I have been following Tracy's blog for so long and wanted to do the workshop just because I could.....anyway here is my painting.......still needs a little work...and I am very happy with it.......

There are a couple of other ladies I met at the workshop who's work I just loved....a big hello to Sharon.....Renee....and her sister Anita......

So this last 2 weeks have been rather hectic for me as I have been putting together another Circle Game quilt........Why the rush.....well tomorrow I am meeting Jen Kingwell....:-)

Jen is teaching a retreat at Maleny this weekend and the ladies from the Thursday class are showing their quilts to Jen and all the ladies at the retreat on Sunday night.........

I hope everyone had a great weekend.......until next time......

Happy stitching.......Cathy

Bits and Pieces

What wonderful weather we had at the Sunshine Coast for Easter......a great time to work in the garden, clean out out the garage, catch up with odd jobs and housework.......

This post is a bit short on photos this time..........on Friday afternoon we invited Rhonda and Hanno and Kerry over for drinks and nibbles as we have not seen them since our Australia Day bbq.......we also invited Sandra and our neighbours.....a great time had by all....I have so much Basil growing in the garden at the moment so I decided to have a go at making Pesto using walnuts.....yumo it was delicious with rice crackers and a couple of ales.....and sorry no photos.....Rhonda bought her new camera over but I don't think she ended up with any photos either....anyway...

On Saturday we got stuck into cleaning out the garage as we need to make some room to put a secondhand upright freezer that we hope to buy soon......we have a huge chest freezer that holds all of our surplus of dog and chook food....it works really well....but I find it too hard to get stuff out of it....anyway....Bardo's the charity store at Caloundra were very happy when we unloaded the car yesterday......it's amazing the stuff we keep and have not  used in 10yrs.......it's all gone now....

On Sunday we were invited to friends place for drinks in the afternoon.....unbeknown to me it was a surprise birthday party for me......and it was great......pink bubbly wine to celebrate, party hats, pink balloons, party lights, chocolate eggs everywhere, more wine, delicious food, homemade ice cream and to finish off a delicious cake......and I didn't take my camera so no photos....... 

So on Monday it was a quite day....phone calls from my family for my birthday.....I had a lovely morning in the studio working on my Spectrum Wheel of Life page and sorting out some hand work......hubby served breakfast for us on the verandra after he returned from taking photos of the sunrise at Caloundra......

So enough about me......last Thursday at the shop the ladies have been busy working on their projects....

Barb

Tania's Circle Game all finished

Leanne

Barb

the lovely Angela made us all these little Easter gifts......

I hope everyone had a happy and safe Easter for 2014........

Cathy

Monday ....again...

Well it's Monday morning again.....oh boy are the weeks flying by.....

Jens and I have been so busy constructing garden beds and building up soil and sorting out drains, moving turf and replanting in other areas of our back yard........I have just been out checking how it is all working after a night of drizzling rain......it looks a though there are still one or two things that need to be changed......I have also planted out nearly 50 Daylilys in the front yard last week...they seem to thrive in this area so lets hope they all take....only time will tell......

Apart from the garden I have been doing more charity quilt on the longarm and a couple of customer quilts.

I used a Pantograph to quilt this quilt for  Maria.... who made it in my class at the Laura May P 'n' Q shop

This is Jenny's quilt top from the same class 

and this is Virginia with her quilt that she ditched quilted on her machine

A friend came around the other day and quilted her Circle Game quilt on the Longarm.....

here is Tania freemotion quilting for the first time her quilt 

and here it is finished......

Another group of ladies have been busy making more blocks for their CG quilt.....

Jenny's blocks

?????'s block

Lorraine's block

Sandra's block

and here is Heather's all put together using the EPP method......just has the borders to go on now

There are another couple of ladies doing this class but I don't have any photos of their blocks......sorry June...Pam and Lyn.....

The ladies from my Thursday class have been doing an unreal job of our design your own Medallion quilt...... 

This is Angel's center with the first border

her is Libby's quilt with her second border on

and Deb's starting her second border

Sorry about the photo overload...........I hope you enjoyed seeing what I have been teaching.....

Have a great week......and enjoy your Easter break.........Cathy

Amazing how quickly time goes by......even though I have been so busy I'm feeling though I have not done a lot in the last couple of weeks......

I have been playing on the longarm quilting charity quilts and a couple of quilts for friends.....lots of fun.....

I also made a little runner with 3 blocks from The Circle Game using  a new fabric range (from Japan) that Bev at Maleny Magic Patchwork n Quilting has in her store.... there were so many fabric to choose from I just chose 7 of the spots and strips and then added the plain  black and red fabric......I'm really happy with it and Bev is using as part of a  display at the shop....... 

As I sit here blogging I can hear the rain falling on the roof......It is good soaking rain... so relaxing and a welcome sound after being so dry for so long.....

Enjoy your day.......Cathy 

Circle quilts

Here are some photos of quilts from the other ladies doing the Circle Game Quilt.......

This is Barbara's  top....love the green accents in the sashing and border

This is Angela's made from Amitie's  Fabric Stash  that has been
collected over a couple of years.....love this quilt too

Saturday's class...

June's

Lyn

Jenny's

Leslie's

Sandra's 

Some very different fabric collections......it just proves that you can do any of Jen Kingwells designs with your favourite fabric collection.......

Check out Jen's blog......http://amitietextiles.blogspot.com.au/.......and/or......Maleny Magic for information on the Retreat in Maleny .......

We (as in the Thursday Ladies ) are hopeing to show our finished quilt to Jen at the retreat......

Hope you all have a great day........

Cathy 

I'm back.......

Well as you may see I have a new cover page....it has only taken 12 months for me/us to change it......every time I would take a photo my husband would say there is too much shadow....or it too dark and Jens always offered to take the photos and/or the photos he took I did not like....I wanted to have the Studio in the header the same as last time....and it so much better because we had it painted 18 months ago and now I have an awesome spiders web on it that Jens found in his travels....we got the web powder coated black to match the trim.....I was told that the web is very significant to the studio.......

Well......this morning we finally did something about it......I had an idea for a funky header with photos but it all turn to a mess so we kept the name the same and just changed the background......and I'm pretty happy with that...... 

So what have I been up to since Xmas......I hear you ask.....oh well maybe some of you.....

My Mum came down to have Christmas with us and we were invited around to the in-laws for the day......which was all very nice.......it was good to catch up with the family as we generally only see them a couple times a year....funny thing is they only live less than 10 minutes drive from us.....our lives are so busy these days.....at the start of the new year I decided that, that needed to change.....so on Australia day 26 January we invited  Rhonda, Hanno, Kerry. Sunni and Jamie around for lunch....and, as Santa had bought Jens a new BBQ we decided to have roast lamb with salad and trifle......I was pleased that we did because we heard that Sunni was visiting her family for a couple of months.....so it was nice to see her and Jamie before they left...... 

Early January my family gathered at Mums so that we could scatter Dads ashes and Christine's ashes..... which was a sad day.....having a heavy heart we enjoyed our brief visit together.....

So since then I have been playing on the longarm, quilting some quilts for friends......and also a lady I know is involved in the local CWA and someone had made a heap of patchwork tops and they need them quilted so that was good practice too.....they are very happy with them....I did pantos on some and freemotion custom work on the others......

I also made a mess in the studio....well a crafty mess....it was so much fun sitting with all the fabric around me making these blocks again for a second Circle Game quilt.....

This quilt will be mine...so I wanted a bigger brighter quilt......I have drafted up 4 more blocks....there are 2 of the new blocks in the photo can you spot them......I am hopeing to have this quilt finished for the retreat with Jen Kingwell in May.....fingers crossed.......

Last Thursdays class at Kimz shop Deb bought in her finished quilt......

It looks so good......if you have a closer look you can see that there are Flying Geese around the border.....Well Done Deb......

So I hope everyone has had a lovey weekend...........

Happy stitching........

Cathy

Merry Christmas ................

from........

Koda and Matilda

Xmas break

I hope everyone has a Happy Christmas with your family and friends... ...all the best for a creative and prosperous 2014........Thank you to all who follow my blog..... happy holidays to all......Cathy

Last night was our last get together with Margret, Jenny and Jane for 2013......We have been very slack this past year having only met up three times......

Margret has been studying, working and has now graduated with a Diploma in Early Childhood Education.....

Congratulations Margret.....

Jane with a new business venture....

Jenny teaching her fabulous style of crazy patch......

Talking about Jenny's crazy patch......look what she gave us all for a Xmas present........a copy of her new book......

 
Congratulation Jenny....we are all so excited for you.........

have a look at....http://sewsocrazy.blogspot.com.au/ .....  http://jenniferclouston.com/.......to see Jenny and her students beautiful work.......

so we celebrated with some bubbly and delicious food

this was delicious no idea what it was called.....but it is made with creme fresh, cream and white chocolate with the fruit on top.......yum......

Thank you ladies for a great night.....

Cathy......