Wednesday, June 27, 2018

Comings and goings

Just because I’ve not been around here much doesn’t mean my life has become completely bereft of fun. Quite the opposite, in fact! I will probably take a couple of posts to tell a few stories, but I might start with last week.

Last week I went to Sydney for my annual sojourn to the Sydney Quilt Show, and this is the fifth time I’ve entered. I love this quilt show. Heck, I love this quilt guild! I always have the best time catching up with my besties. I feel like I belong there - it’s kind of hard to describe, but everyone there is so open and warm. It almost makes me want to move closer to Sydney. Joking - I love Canberra too much. But coming up here for the week each year is always a great holiday and a break from the everyday, plus I will never complain about a week off work!



My quilt this year is called “365 Stars Around the Sun” and is made from 365 hexagon stars that I made from birthday to birthday. There are a lot of meaningful blocks - made to represent friends that passed away, moments with my family and friends, walks in nature - you name it. This all makes it an incredibly personal quilt and it has shot up the charts to be my number one. I can’t wait to hang it when it finally comes home.

The entire top was pieced by hand using the English Paper piecing technique. I machine quilted it with vertical lines 6/16th inches apart and hand quilted the centre blocks with Perle 8 thread.

A couple of weeks before I started quilting  the quilt, I was decluttering my dress fabric stash and rediscovered a cotton-linen fabric designed by Melody Miller, originally intended for a skirt. I absolutely love the fabric but it would have been a horrible skirt on me as its definitely not my colour. But it became a fabulous quilt backing!

 

Sadly I managed to acquire both a virus and a pretty painful condition in my hands and thumbs called DeQuervain’s Tenosynovitis just as I was about to start the quilting - so the straight lines were a struggle to do without hurting myself further. 



But I did it, and I've promised myself I wouldn’t do any hand stitching for a while, but not before I performed a happy dance when it was all finished. 


So Sydney last week was great. I spent some time volunteering at the show and also at The Applique Guild of Australia table in the guilds area. I didn't need to buy anything except pins,  new ergo scissors and a cutting ruler, but in the end I bought just one piece of fabric and a heck of a lot of coffee! The quilt show was incredible - you just can't believe the amount of talent on display until you actually go to one of the Sydney shows. 

My hoop sample has been on display at the quilt show entrance this week again so that’s always a thrill. I really should offer to make another one sometime soon.



On Wednesday night I attended Blak Box at Barangaroo with a friend. It was amazing.


And on Friday night I headed to the Sydney Opera House to head the Central Australian Aboriginal Women's Choir. Most amazing night of my life.


I’ll leave you with a photo from a rainy Tuesday when Rachael met me at my favourite slice of heaven, The Fabric Store in Surry Hills. What a couple of goofballs! Honestly though, she’s one of my favourite people in the world so it’s always a blast getting together. One day we will get the pink dumplings we ordered, and not the green ones, hey Rachael? ;)


Actually I’ll leave you with one more photo - of a spectacular sunset as seen from my back door a couple of weeks ago. 

Back sometime soon with stories on my trip to the Blue Mountains ... for quilting of course!