Monday, 16 November 2015

Peg Packs and Pretty Tea Towels


Hello there Blogland, sorry I have been missing in action
 for a while, life has been a bit crazy of late. The office
 that I work in is being closed down by the Bathurst CEO
 and school fees will be billed directly from the 3 schools
 that I look after in 2016. They say that change is good
but not in this case because I will be out of a job and it
 is quite unnerving not knowing the future.....
I just seem to have gotten back on my feet after my marriage
 separation and now this has come along. They say
 that what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger.....
Well I'm not too sure about that!
 I have adopted the attitude that everything does happen
 for a reason and hope it all works out in the end....
 Not too much going on in my little studio at the moment...
 I have been making some magnetic peg packs and
pretty tea towels to sell along with my goodies when I
 have a market....
 That small amount of creativeness has helped to keep
me sane whilst waiting to see what the future holds.....
This is a snippet of my stall at the markets last weekend,
 the tea towels and Pegs were a hit and are nice
 ideas for a Christmas gift.....

The magnetic pegs are covered in washi tape and
 can be used on the fridge or to peg a card to a gift.....
 They are just a bit cute....
I had fun picking colour combinations and
 felt good to be sitting at my machine....
I made up these six the Friday night before market...as you do!
They sold out and I got a couple of orders as well....
Too pretty to use...
This one is a special order that I made up yesterday....
Anything to make doing the dishes more enjoyable....Ha Ha!
I have another 10 or so half finished
 but forgot to snap a pic of those.......
Thanks for stopping by, I hope to be back again soon....

Until next time, Happy Stitching

Kate

Thursday, 22 October 2015

FHFS Wool Swap to Marc

This is what I gifted to my swap buddy in our FHFS
Wool Swap, the challenge was to gift something made from
 wool or wool felt. We always add in a few surprises
 so I popped in these for Marc...
And some surprises of the sweet kind as well.....
The wool item I chose was these pure wool knitted socks
and I know that Marc loves them because she called me
 personally to tell me...Always a relief to know the recipient
is happy when sending swap gifts to ladies
that I have not met personally.....
I had a little try on for the photo shoot....He He!
I so wanted to keep these, I will have to get
 clicking and make myself a pair....
We have one swap to go for the year, Christmas!
 
Until next time, Happy Stitching
 
Kate

Tuesday, 20 October 2015

Carole's Jelly Roll Race Gift Quilt

A little photo shoot of the quilt I gifted to my Dear friend
 Carole in July. A Jelly Roll race quilt with a chocolate
brown peeper and floral border and binding in matching
 fabric. I spent the weekend with Carole in Narromine last
 month and finally sewed the quilt label to the back of her quilt.
 Today I wanted to share a little photo shoot that I had
 at Carole's farm house. The quilt was made from
Thimbleberries fabric and machine quilted
 by Julie from Jules Quilting....
Until next time, Happy Stitching
 
Kate
 

Sunday, 18 October 2015

Miss Hadley's Chair

My Beautiful Aunt asked me to make a cushion for the sweetest
little chair that she purchased for her Granddaughter
 Miss Hadley.....
I procrastinated over it for months because Hadley's Mum
has a more modern style in her home than I do, so I had to
make sure it was sweet but not too pretty and vintage
 (Like me! Ha Ha)
I decided to model it off a couple of cushions that I purchased for
 my bent wood chairs, they had piping and self covered
 buttons and were round....
I couldn't decide which colour to go with when I was covering
 the buttons so I did one of each and they will be able to
turn it over for a different look....
 I also wanted to some how add the illusion of piping to the
tie that goes on the back of the cushion....
Cute as a button!!!!
This is what I came up with, I know Hadley loved
it and I am sure her Mum did as well.....
I would love a Kate size version of this chair
 for my little Home Sweet Home....
Until next time, Happy Stitching

Kate

Saturday, 17 October 2015

Back Garden Transformation Part 1

This is a picture of my back garden when I first moved into my
 Little Home in 2013. The gardens were all quite overgrown
 and The Sorbus and Silver Birch trees were magnificent!
 I have since pruned all the trees along the side fence line and
 put up a 6 foot high cream fence because all that was there
 was chicken wire and star pickets and of cause very over
grown bottle brush trees. It was lovely and green but quite a
 bit of a mess. My Studio now sits at the right of this pic
 about where that terracotta pot is....
This is where my story starts for this post, the Sorbus Tree
 to the left of the picture died last year out of the blue and is
 a mystery to the tree arborist and myself as to why?
I guess it's time was up!
 The back of my house was very open and bare after the
 tree was removed so I have since had a patio/pergola
 built all across the back of the house....
That brings us to this point, the tree was removed and wood
 chipped and is now in the side garden helping in weed
 prevention. The roots were ground up but left was a mound
 of dirt at the edge of the pavers that was added to when
the patio was built.....
The whole section of yard was a tad higher than the pavers
 and needed to be levelled before I could start my project....
I got to spend lots of time on it in the recent school
holidays. The bobcat guy sure knew his stuff and set to work
 removing the mound and levelling the yard for me....
It was a shame to scape off the nice green grass.....
Like all projects there is usually a hidden disaster lurking, the
sewerage inspection hole was covered in dirt and the guy
broke the top off it with his blade. The good news is I now
know where it is because at one stage we thought it may have
 been under my studio. The council could not find it when
they were approving the DA for my patio so I am relieved
 that it is not buried under The studio....
A quick fix  and a new pipe soon got that sorted. We will cut
 it down to the correct height after the gardens are completed...
A blank canvas ready for me to create....
Very dusty and dry looking here but not for long I hope....
First job was a trip to the steel centre up the road for a post
for my birdhouse. My neighbours Max and Ruby were having
 a ramp installed at their place at the same time and the guy
 doing it kindly loaned me his post hole digger. it sure made
 my job of digging a 60cm post hole a lot easier for sure....
My first experience with Quick Set Concrete,
 that stuff is the best!
It dried in no time at all and was really easy to work with....
The best news is the post is level and solid as a rock....
And Yay! my birdhouse standing tall on it's new post....
 It will get a lick of paint eventually....
It was then repeat times 2 for some gate posts to swing one
of my vintage gates from, a bit of marking out with 
bricks because there will eventually be a path under the gate....
Dig, concrete and repeat until both posts were in....
Now the fun part! or so I thought until it took me over 2 hours
 to drill six holes in the metal posts for the bolts for the gate
 hinges. I mean to say really really really! I even went and
 purchased a brand new drill bit that would not penetrate
 the posts. I conceded defeat and called my cousin Murray
 to finish off the last two because by then I wanted to lay
 down in the dirt and cry. He told me the bit was blunt from
 me trying to get it through and because I had drilled and
drilled so much the metal had heated up and became
undrillable!!!! What the!!!!
Finally he finished off the last two holes and I bolted
the hinge components to the post...
I had contemplated using a couple of old sleepers for posts
 but was worried they would be hard to drill through....
Ha Ha silly me should have went with those!
It was all worth it at the end of the afternoon when I stood
back and saw my gate hanging proudly on it's new post.
 It was a great sense of achievement...
I am using a piece of chain for the latch because I am not in
any hurry to drill any more holes for a latch at this point in
 time plus I like the rustic look of the chain.....
I am sure you are wondering where this vision is heading,
well bear with me and I will show you....
This is to the right hand side of my back patio, I made this
 path to my Studio out of old rocks last year but it is a bit of
 a trip hazard and so I have decided to include this area
into my current transformation project...
This means I had to dig out my roses and a Daphne shrub...
The path proved to be a bit harder to break up than I had
 planned. I did make it to last after all so off to the hire
 place up the road to hire a jack hammer I went....
And didn't I have lots of fun with it, surprisingly it was very
easy to operate and made short work of the job....
Whilst Jacky Mister and I were dumping the rubble at the
dump I scored this little treasure at the recovery shop for $5!
 I like finding old relics and this one came home with me....
Another blank canvas ready to go...
This is how it now looks with the Kwik Kerb garden edging in,
 I will be brick paving in there to make a nice level path and
will extend it farther down the yard to the clothes line one day.
I am also adding 2 metre wide garden beds along the edge of the
back pavers with a gap for another brick path under the gate....
We got this far on the first day and I quickly planted 2 of the
 roses back on one side of the path, I didn't want to leave them
out of the ground for too long because we were having some
 very unseasonal hot weather....
On the second day the guy had his daughter helping him so he
 got the rest finished off a lot quicker than when he was on his
 own. He said I was testing him with the corners because he
usually just does long straight or curved lines. I told him that
 I was confident that he was up for the challenge but I must
 admit I was a bit worried as to how he was going at
 times, it all turned out not too bad in the end....
The plan was to follow the curved edge of
the pavers and I think it looks great.....
This is how it looks now, I will be planting
 hedging plants on either side of the gate to grow into a living
 fence. The straight section will be a brick path and
 I am planting a tree and shrubs in the round bed....
I think it looks like a giant flower, a friend
 commented that it looks like an angel....
It all looks a bit patchy here because some parts
 were dry and some were just laid....
Next job was to remove the turf from inside the round bed...

The Kwik Kerb guy had cut it all with his turf cutter and I
 am really grateful because it saved me a lot of work and I
 got to put it back down to cover the bare ground as well....
Eventually it will fill back in....
I planted the other 2 roses on the other side of my gate, they
look a bit distressed so I will fertilise and prune them so
hopefully they will produce some nice new
shoots soon....fingers crossed they make it!
They were looking so nice before I dug them out....
At this stage this is where I am up to, I have a tree being
delivered from the Nursery and a friend has dropped me in
 some bags of horse manure to dig into the gardens before
I start planting them....
I hope you have enjoyed reading about my project and will
show you some more progress after some planting today...

Until next time, If you can't be stitching
I hope you are having fun like me....

Kate
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