My birthday.

Early in November I turned 25. My dear friend Michelle came over in the morning and cooked breakfast for Jamie and I. Then Mum and my brother Jack came in for lunch - and ended up staying for dinner as well!

I was very spoilt! Mum gave me some beautiful antique dessert bowls. Michelle gave me some gold earrings, and Mill sent me a handmade apron and tea towel from America! But Jamie saved the best until last. He gave me this antique double wedding ring quilt! He bought it from American eBay and had it sent to us. When I first got it out of the box it stank of cigarette smoke, and I mean stank. I did some 'googling' to figure out the best way to get the smell out. First I was told to vacuum it with a stocking covering the vacuum hose. That did not work at all. After further research it turned out all it needed was some fresh air (go figure). I hung it out on a windy day and left it all day. The result is a beautiful quilt that has no odour whatsoever! I am delighted!

My dear friend Mill also sent me an early Christmas present. This is a Royal Doulton trio from the early 1930's. It is an art deco styled trio and the pattern is called "Shower". I love it! Thanks again Mill!

My collection of Royal Doulton trios is growing!

Sam xox

Cross stitch.

I have been working on a sampler cross stitch these last few weeks, as it is so much easier to just pick it up and do a few stitches, then having to pull out all my sewing so I can sew or quilt.

I found this book at Boarders a fornight ago and fell in love with it.

It literally has 2001 diffrent cross stitch designs inside. It is really cool because you can pretty much design any cross stitch you want from this book. It has different themes, a section on boarders, and a variety of sampler patterns.

I chose this pattern because it only requires two different coloured threads. I have to admit, this thing I dont enjoy with cross stitching is when you have to keep changing your thread colour. I appreciate it is important to a design to have a variety of colours, as it looks so much better, especially in things like flowers. But this is a simple sampler, and I think only having the two colours makes it very striking.

So far I have finished the 'M' pannel and I am beginning the 'N' panel.

Sam xox

My garden.

After all the excitment of Saturday, Jamie and I spent Sunday pottering around at home. Jamie re-scaped his display fish tank. He moved some of the rock around and re-arranged his coral. It looks so nice now.

I did some work on our balcony garden. I went to the local garden store and purchased some plants. They had a whole bunch for $1 each that looked ok. I figured I would get a few and see how they go. The garden store also had 5 potted colour plants for $12, so all up we only spent $19 and got a great result.

Sam xox

Camilla's quilt.

Oh you all have no idea how much I have been busting to show this quilt to you!

It may appear lately like I haven't been doing much quilting - it's a lie! Because Camilla reads this blog I was unable to post ANY of my progress on this quilt.

In February I decided to make a quilt for Camilla to take with her to the US to help make her appartment feel more like home.

I searched through my large collection of Australian Patchwork and Quilting magazine to find the perfect pattern. I came across this one, it is called Friendship Star and the quilt example in the book was made from coutry homespun fabrics, and the feature fabric was a mushroom brown. I changed that in my quilt to a bright yellow homespun, and complimented it with a variety of 1930's reproduction fabrics from my stash.

I love these fabrics as Camilla knows, and I also think you can't help but smile when you look at them - perfect when you are away from home!

So many nights were spent in secret making this quilt. I had it machine quilted by a lovely lady called Kay Brown at The Finishing Touch. Kay did an amazing job! It was the first time I have had a quilt machine quilted and I couldn't be happier with the result... I think I will do it again!

I had planned to finish it a week before the party, but the flu hit me bad, and I was still sewing the last bit of binding onto the quilt the night before the party!

It is also a relief to finally give it to Mill and tell her what I had been up to, as over the last few months I have been going to craft night with no evidence of progress on my vintage quilt - now she knows what I have been spending all my quilting time on! :-)

Here are some photos of the quilts journey...

And this is Mill with her quilt and pillow. Michelle knitted this pillow for Mill to take with her. She did such a great job on it! Camilla only taught Michelle to knit in January of this year, so I think this is an amazing job considering she has only been knitting for less than 6 months!

Again, every craft night Mill could not work out why the scarf Michelle was working on was just not growing!

Sam xox

Camilla's party.

We had Camilla's party yesterday and it went off without a hitch!

I stayed at Michelle's place Friday night as we were making all the food for the party. She made the most amazing cake for Camilla to cut at the party. She made the icing yellow roses and designed the purple ribbon to match. It was beautiful!

Camilla's boyfriend kindly gave up his appartment for us to use for the day!

Here are some pictures I took.

Oh, and here is a picture of the bunting!

Before the party began, Camilla gave both Michelle and I a gift to say thank you for organising the party. Inside the wrapped box was a Royal Albert tea cup and saucer for each of us! Michelle got a blue one and I got a pink one (see them in the picture below?). Such a thoughtful present!

That was not all for the gift giving. Michelle and I had a little something up our sleves for Camilla, but that will have to be in the next blog entry!

With my tea cup was a beautiful card with such lovely words inside from Mill. After the party was over and I was home again late Saturday night, I re-read her card. I have to admit, I had a few tears! I know this will be such an exciting time for my best friend, but I am still going to miss her so very much!

Sam xox

Vintage quilt.

This is my vintage quilt I have been working on for over 2 years. I am hand quilting it and I am up to the final round of blocks.

This is a photo of the quilt top before I had basted it.

Here are some photos of the progression of the hand quilting.

And here is the almost finished quilt... not long to go now! I am very excited!

Sam xox

Our wedding photos.

Here are some photo from our wedding in January.

It was a perfect day.

Sam xox

Dedicated to Mill.

As some of you know my dearest friend Mill is heading off to America in exactly one month.

She is going to be over there for one year to continue her studies.

I am going to miss her terribly. She is a beautiful friend who always makes time to see me. I was lucky enough to share a home with her for two years back in 2005-2007. Since I moved out we still manage to see each other weekly for our 'Craft Nights', where we share a meal, a nice chat, and encourage each other through our latest projects. Mill was also beside me at my wedding in January of this year as one of my bridesmaids.

I am throwing her a 'good-bye' party. It will be an afternoon high tea with her closest girlfriends, sister and mum.

I made her invitation using my favorite china and fabric. My dear friend Michelle helped me photo shop it and add the text. Do you like it? (Those pink rectangles are not really there. I have just covered some information up that was on the invite).

I have great plans for decorating Mill's apartment for the party!

First I am going to make some bunting. I have seen it in many peoples blogs where it has been used for decoration. I believe it is an American style of decorating, as I have not seen it used in Australia. But it looks great so I thought I would give it a go.

So far I have made 8 triangles. I am going to join them with some sort of ribbed tape or something similar from the local sewing shop.

This is what they look liked pinned together as a practice - I am happy with the result!

Sam xox