Friday - Kaffe Lecture - good, Saturday - not as good, today - bad!

I can't write about the lecture as I had told many bloggers I would, you

will see why in a moment, I am trying to type with neither hand in a good way.

Two or three days I will post, but

the lecture absolutely fantastic! See b elow

kaffe and my favourite fabric

exchanging a few words with Kaffe as he signs my book.

Saturday - flare up of my De Quervain's tendonitis every movement of thumb or wrist causes excrutiating pain now splinted up

but today (Sunday) was a doozy

trying to do a little quilting on Chinese Coins - big mistake!!

needle straight through fingernail and out the other side and brokem

off just below needle shank.

Emergency care visit 2 hours with cutting off  of quilting glove

the bit  withthe needle through was cut into tiny pieces because they had

to xray as they thought it had gone through the bone.

So, mikssed bone by a hair breadth and kindly pulled out by doctor

with surgical pliers and with great pain for me!! Much, much worse than the

needle goin g in!

Padded up and of course the necessary tetanus jab.You are, by now

b ored to tears no doubt so I shall say adieu b ut I shall be back with thoughts on lecture

on Tuesday - I hope!!!! 

Something Old, Something New and a Teapot flimsy

Let's start with the teapots.

Now a finished flimsy and I went with 1/2" inner border

in Kaffe Fassett Aboriginal Dot

then 4 and 1/2"border in Philip Jacobs Market Basket.

Measuring 42 and 1/2" x 68 and 1/2" and the

Market Basket fabric is more colourful that

this photo is showing, I'll try again when I've sorted out my

new camera.

Something old and something new - 

the old is not truly old but it's a book my husband bought for me

as a birthday gift in October

a perfect gift for me!

I also love photographing rusting items, flowers and leaves

as they decay, I still can see the beauty in that stage.

Here's a leaf I noticed on the path, obviously well trodden down!

Something new is another book from my husband for Christmas,

I'd seen this one on a post from a blogger, it is a treasure!!

Yep, this is also just me!

The foreword by Safrron Aldridge, a long time friend of the author,

and the introduction by said author Miv Watts, are just a joy to read even

before one begins to go any further!

As yet I've only covered the few pages on Marianne Faithfull ( you need

to be of a certain age to be familiar with her), very interesting!

Incidentally, Miv Watts is the mother of Naomi Watts the actress.

This isn't much of a quilty post I know but I hope to remedy that over the weekend

'cos look where I'm going this Friday!!

Hubby is coming along, for two reasons:

1. he is a painter in various mediums

and

                                                    2. he has lived with KF fabrics and books

for more years than he probably cares to remember!

I am so, so excited!

Happy Quilting

  Maureen

New project for the year - 18 in 2018

I've decided to join in this year with 

Lynette at What A Hoot Quilts
with the intention of getting through 18 projects
during the year.

I have quite a lot of quilt tops all waiting
patiently to have backings made and then basted and quilted,
I haven't decided yet which will be first in line.
Here they all are:

Scrappy Mountain Majesties

RSC 2015

Red Sea Sunset

HSTeria QAL 2014

Alley Cats 

RSC 2014

 


Blue Heaven

Cotton Candy

Quilt for Daisy

made after our lovely cat Daisy died

Scrap Rainbow

Tula Pink Summer Stars

loved this particular fabric range

Northern Lights

check out blog labels for the story behind this quilt

Desert Rose

Midnight At The Oasis QAL 2013

Chinese Coins

made in an invitational with AHIQ 2017

Terraces at Dusk

begun in RSC 2016 - stopped at 12 houses!

Isfahan

 creating the feel of an old Persian rug

2016


Golden Strips

Helicopters

I have four works being pieced at the moment

and I'l be steadily working through those.

One is almost a flimsy and I'm hoping to post with this

on Saturday.

I'm going to link now with 

Lynette at What a Hoot Quilts

hop on over for a visit!

Maureen

New Year, New Word, New Flimsy - Teapots

I should also add to the above a happy quilting year!

This year I'm taking part in a project to try and reduce
the number of quilts waiting to be quilting in my closet and
 tops waiting to be finished - more about this in my next post.

I've given much thought to my chosen word for 2018, there were many
when I jotted them down, this is the one which stood out for me as
something I need in my life.

Balance in my creative pursuits, balance
with regard to a healthy way of living and managing
my health problems,
balance in my dealings with others, in fact I need
balance in my life - full stop!!
So, plenty for me to work on here.

On to the new flimsy, well it's almost a finished flimsy really
because I need to work out the border/borders next.
I struggled to take a decent photo today, light, best placement
of my portable design wall and so on didn't work out.

So, my teapots are all sashed now and I've used quite an
unusual choice of fabric. This was one which shouted
out to me right at the beginning but thinking it was too much
I spent ages trying plains, pattern on pattern and lots of
quiet fabrics, none of which hit the spot.
My original choice won the day.
A better photo will be posted next time.

I have a tub of fabrics waiting to be put into their
respective stash baskets, new Kaffe Collective ones
and the rejects for my sashing and fabrics from other projects,

 hopefully by the end of this week, time permitting and
keeping in mind my chosen word for the year, I shall then have
an empty fabric tub.

 I hope all of you in the USA experiencing the
horrendous weather are somehow finding ways to keep warm and safe.

Maureen

Teapots, Fabric and Flowers

Good, just managing to get a post in before Christmas!

Whilst taking things slowly I've finished the applique on

four more KF teapots

only three more to go, hopefully before the New Year is upon us!

Have you see the newest book from Kaffe Fassett - 'Quilts in Ireland'?

I fell in love with Green Diamonds and decided to send off for the fabrics,

they arrived a few days ago and I'm so pleased with the

combination, this will be a project for 2018.

The weather here has been so very hot and humid, everyone heads for the beach

or stays home with every window open to bring some relief. The

other option is a very shady spot in the garden, luckily we have the large

Japanese Maple and nearby is one of my blue

hydrangeas, this year it has a mauve tinge on some of the flower heads.

This weather is great for the vegetable garden

and the courgettes are flowering nicely, tomatoes are coming along

 and I've planted basil seedlings alongside.

Before I finish up 

I'd like to say a big thank you for all your good wishes following my last post,

my spirits were definitely lifted after reading comments

and emails.

I'm hoping the New Year will see much more quilting from me!!

Wishing you all a

Happy Christmas

and a

Happy and Healthy New Year 2018

See you soon.

Maureen

Hot Summer Nights and Days & Freshly Squeezed

Last post but one I showed a new quilt I'd begun using my

left over fabrics from Chinese Coins,

Raewyn at stitchingfarmgirl 
said it reminded her of things sweet and sour and this gave me
the idea for the name
Freshly Squeezed - oranges, lemons, limes all in the mix

and this is the progress made so far, not much!

Due to pretty messy cardiac problems (in addition to other chronic health issues)
life has slowed down considerably for me, my quilting is
sadly missing out! I don't even have the energy to read blog posts sometimes
so I have lots of catching up to do, I'm hoping to do that after the evening meal
when the weather is a little cooler. The heat and humidity is making life
uncomfortable at the moment here in Auckland, difficult to sleep .
 The sun is just baking the ground, roll on Autumn
as far as I"m concerned!

I've been photographing in the garden early in the morning,
here is a lovely rose

Brother Cadfael

sadly showing signs of black spot on the leaves.

Below is a black stemmed hydrangea, this is a new hybrid, I usually

stick to the old fashioned plants but loved the colour so it's now in

our side garden bed.

Three years ago I planted a few gladioli, sadly they haven't performed too

well for me and this year I was down to only two flowering.

We have a large Japanese Maple in the garden with my old lichen covered

garden bench right under the canopy, this has been the perfect place to

sit in the shade and relax and read Quiltfolk magazines accompanied

by my little follower 

who prefers to be up high watching the birds!

A few bloggers wrote that they would interested on my thoughts

about the Quiltfolk magazine, this will have to be in my next post

as my concentration is not the best at the moment.

 I'm hoping I can get back into regular blogging and more quilting again
pretty soon but until next time
Happy Quilting!

Oh, almost forgot I'm going to link with
Linda and Julie
for
Sew,Stitch,Snap,SHARE
hope you'll go and visit, lots to see.

Maureen