Thursday, December 30, 2010

Wild wild west !

The morning dawned as if it was the beginning of creation with the sun out- omg is that the sun?? And then after checking that my retinas were still intact i wondered down to the kitchen  for my morning coffee, when i heard Sam screaming from the drive for me to come quickly, thinking he must have a spider (he is extremely arachnophobic) bothering him. I looked out the window and discovered a CAMEL standing there checking out his car! Sam was beside himself - "OMG THERE IS A CAMEL- LOOK A CAMEL!!!  To which i replied yes its a camel, dont worry ! Sam was too busy trying to run away, yelling "OMG CAMEL, THERE'S A CAMEL !" I gave up on Sam and left him to sort out his own hysteria!
This guy was very friendly- a bit too friendly actually and tried to follow me inside, except he wouldnt fit in the door thankfully! My neighbours have a couple of them and this one must have stepped over the fence, as it did with my gardens, hmmm. I got a few photos but he made a beeline for the camera, probably thinking it was a shiny nut or something edible!



im backing off fairly quickly here, these things move fast!

That has made for an interesting start of the day, all of the wildlife must be out in the tiny bit of sunshine we have this morning as our water dragon was sunning itself beside the pool, and the birds were in full chirp!
Have a great day, hope yours is full of surprises too!

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

New Blog, rain, fmq and not much else really

Could someone let god know he left the tap on full over north eastern australia, it is still raining nonstop! And that we now have waterfront property everywhere, thanks !
The poor dog has been skirting around the house under the eaves to find somewhere to pee and not get drenched!
I tried a bit of creative stuff and managed to quilt most of my bloom quilt but then had to unpick a bit (ok lots) as i caught the fabric underneath in a couple of spots, but i seem to have a feel for the FMQ now. I have to get an extension table for my machine, its a challenge at the moment without one. I keep staring out the window and then look at the computer to see what everyone else is up to, which seems to be a lot more than i have done! I did redo my blog as i was bored with the old one and everyone else has been updating so i thought i had better keep up! I went with the raindrops to go with our weather!
I think i will start knitting again, i have a half done cardie in a black mohair which is fine but i doubled the wool hoping it would halve the time to knit ! Is it obvious im not concentrating?



I have done a swirl of sorts -kind of like possum tails!

I have seen the amazing quilting out there and decided they must all have those fancy long arm computerised things as they are too perfect! Mine are very basic and mostly wobbly, i think i will call it the merry possum !
Apart from that our feet are now webbed and the dog thinks she is a duck! 
Hope you are all having a lovely time doing whatever it is that makes you happy!

Monday, December 27, 2010

Breathing a sigh of relief or wish it didnt go so fast? Whichever hope you all had a great christmas with family and friends. We were fiddling around the yard in the morning as it wasnt raining for the first  time in about 2 months, squelching around the yard ankle deep in mud trying to clean up a bit. Which was fairly useless as it has been pouring ever since! It is so wet everything is going mouldy, our tile floor was wet and we hadnt mopped! So the aircon is on to dry out the house and us before we go mouldy!
But we had a great day at a friends house the food was fantastic - yummy pastries, things on sticks and dips, it was so nice not to worry about cooking!
You know when you have had too much to drink because all of a sudden stupid stuff comes out of your mouth- well more than usual- and then your feet seem to be switched around, and your giggling at everything! I started hiccupping, giggling, hiccupping some more and nearly fell in the water feature- which i think i mistook for the ground  its so wet! Fortunately husband propped me up and lead me to safety and drove us home!
i promptly fell unconscious for next couple of hours! Ah it was fun!
We did our turkey in the evening it was stuffed with apple, pine nuts and some cinnamon yum! All prepared otherwise we would have had toast!
Boxing day evening was spent with our son's girlfriends family, more yummy food, champagne and son chauffered us home, so it all has been a very merry christmas!
 Santa arrived- a bit too skinny this one!

 self explanatory!


 Yummy chocs - there were boxes everywhere this one somehow survived until boxing day!


Its a bit tropical  here !


Hope you are all enjoying yourselves way too much and looking forward to the new year!


Friday, December 17, 2010

FTF- Santas coming to town hohoho!

Well as this is the final FTF and i have been a bit busy (aka working my ass off0  i thought i should at least get one last entry in before i miss this one too, thank you Mrs P you have given me so many laughs and its been great to join in !
My family occassionally give me the poos, but i do love them, and i love shopping particularly on the net, so Christmas  has to be the final FTF for me! I did most of my shopping earlier last month so i have been able to enjoy this without stress this year- i definitely recommend this, and it was a great excuse to buy loads of stuff!


The tree looks great with its little twinlkly lights and mottly assortment of decorations, the houses around are decorated with loads of beautiful lights, people go to so much effort its amazing! The shops look so merry, and its all very - well christmassy! I love it!

isnt this guy cute!


Some of the booty!



These are just amazing



 Brisbane city tree

Merry Christmas everyone hope you all have a wonderful time with your family and friends xox

Thursday, December 16, 2010

New Year Phd Challenge

Hi all,   i recently got back into quilting after a long hiatus! I made two quilts for my children when they were little- they are now very big! So this year i started again and have been slowly working my way into improving my skills without tearing my hair out - well only a little bit of hair pulling!
So when i saw this challenge i thought it would be good fun!
My blog is about my journey with quilting, teenagers and anything that amuses me really!

Myra's PHD's  should get us all on our bums in front of the sewing machine, so i have nominated three projects that are waiting to be finished,

Number one is a quilt i started a while back - and have been looking at it and wondering how to quilt it, the thing is bloody humugous, big enough for a double size bed.


Number two is something i thought would be a challenge, and is still waiting for me to be challenged!



 I am scared all the points will be crappy!


Number three is another kit i bought at a craft show- actually i have more but im trying to be realistic!

Still in plastic ! lots of little points hmmmm...

I am really looking forward to seeing everones work, its very inspiring, so thank you very much Myra !xox
And i will try to become more tech savvy! 


Wednesday, December 15, 2010

While some of you were sleeping !

 I have had my sewing machine for approx 17 years, and recently- as in yesterday ! I found this wonderful little foot in my box of sewing machine bits ! Low and behold its a foot i can FMQ with !!! I did a little happy dance - as Mrs P says,  which was prob more like a OMG what an idiot i am not to notice this before!! Picture me smacking myself in the head- duh duh duh!!!
I had spent $50 on two that dont fit properly, only to find this little beauty that works perfectly! I was so excited- i know small things !- that i had to give it a go, well i had to wait until i finished work, but this is what i did when i got home,


I have never done this before so its just wiggly lines all over the quilt
but when i get better at it i will try patterns,  
 
I was very happy with this, i now can bind it and give it to mum for xmas! 
WOOO HOOO!!!

Monday, December 13, 2010

humid, stupid and only slightly mad

Holy snappping duckshit, its so humid here it feels like a permanent sauna ! Thankfully (i think) ive been at work in the aircon for the entire week set at 21-23 C  thank you very much. So now im too tired to do anything except look at what everyone else is doing, good god you are all so bloody talented i think i will just stop right now! I had hoped to get my quilting foot problem solved but was called in to work, all week, did i mention that?
It was an interesting week, i had a change of scenery and did a few recovery shifts - i had to stand up to a burly rude surgeon who insisted his patient was fine post a procedure, when clearly she was not, and ended up in ICU where i normally work, after i called an emergency, and said to him -I TOLD YOU SO!  He was very sheepish after this. So i made some friends in the theatre!  The nursing staff (and most of the Dr's!) were all so supportive and thankful, they made me feel very welcome and cheered me on for standing up for the patient.
I even got invited to their xmas do, which was lovely.
Well it seems to have finally stopped raining, seriously thought about building that ark, but noah was probably busy filling a gazillion orders as the entire east coast and inland of australia is under water!
I did manage to brave the shops today to get  a few more odds and ends - im spoiling my kids again, undies with smurfs for the girl and lookalike ed hardy for the boy, you have to get undies on xmas it wouldnt be normal not to! they are so lucky i love shopping! It wasnt too bad, surprisingly, i managed to fill my litlle drag along basket with loads of stuff,  i found a new book by Dawn French - its hilarious, i will read it before xmas, then i can give it to someone! Hehe, what? No im not being cheap, just practical ! Besides i need a good laugh, she has described life with teenagers in an honest and very funny way, and like the title its a tiny bit fabulous!
Hope your week is filled with only a tiny bit of madness!

Tuesday, December 7, 2010

Ark weather and other ramblings

Finally a day off to do nothing in particular, so i thought some more FMQ would be in order. The sewing machine had other ideas, hmmpff. I had done a few squares when i noticed the foot moving around a bit, i took it off and had a look, nothing seemed amiss so back on it went and then the needle plunged into the foot and broke. Its not aligned for some unknown reason., so off to the shop tomorrow to see whats the problem. So at a loss of what to do next, i hosed down the windows - its been raining continually for what seems like the 40 days and nights, so there is water pouring out of the tank,  so the windows had the dog drool and other bits cleaned off. We might need noahs ark here soon, there was a moat around the hospital yesterday, and some were worried about not being able to get home, being stuck at work isnt everyones cup of tea, but at least we had beds! Back to today, so after 10 minutes of hosing it started to rain again, i gave up, and decided to hire some movies to watch, theres very little worth watching, but we managed to get four ! The aircon is cranked up to deal with the 100% humidity - the condensation looks like it should be cold outside, but its 29C -yuk. Im really in the wrong hemishpere or latitude- i hate the heat and humidity, i love snow, and dont mind shovelling it to get the car out, and dont mind wearing my snow jacket everywhere, and my kids and the dog love it too, esp the dog- she has enough fur for a blizzard !
 Here are some old photos at Falls Creek,

 kids having fun

 digging out the car




these were taken a while back, the kids have grown loads since then.

Hope you all have a great week, and those in the snow find time to have a snow ball fight, its fun as long as they are not packed tight !

Friday, December 3, 2010

Gardeners Delight/ FTF

I love a beautiful garden full of colour, so when  recently my hubbie and i visited a local garden on display, it has been the home of some rich and famous, so we had to have a look. The gardens were extensive (lots of hectares!) and impressive, and i think in the process of some tarting up. It looked as if the current owners like some colour, and lots of bromeliads have been used. It was a very wet and windy day, not exactly good for garden snooping around ! But we enjoyed the visit, didnt get to see anyone famous, but we bought a couple of bromeliads to add to our little collection from their nursery.






 Anyone could achieve this with a team of gardeners and loads of spare cash!
Check out Mrs P for more fabulous FTF, have a great weekend everyone!

Monday, November 29, 2010

Camera issues

 I have just read another bloggers issue with her camera, which is coincidental, as I recently purchased a lovely expensive nikon camera, and have had to have the lens sent away to be fixed, and its only 1 week old., which is a bummer. So likewise the posts will be made from old snaps, which may have absolutely nothing to do with the post! It keeps life interesting!

I also purchased a box  similar to this but not as fancy, for all my crafty  things so it wouldnt look like a bomb has hit in the living area, mind you it still manages to find its way out! 

A friend from South Africa is about to arrive for a visit, she has been living there for some time, she has said its dangerous on the road!

My mum is in Bali with my sister, having a swinging time i hear! She is coming back soon, and will be with us for christmas and will be driving me bananas by boxing day!


I finally got the tree up- it took a couple of weeks! Hohoho only 25 sleeps to go! Well nearly!

 Have a great week everyone,

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Follow your Heart

Its wonderful to have great people around, who can make you laugh and look at life on the funny side and yet share the times that might not be great with care and compassion. I have a friend staying with me at the moment, she is a fabulous person, we laugh so much together its such great fun! But she has been through some really difficult times, and has travelled to some wonderful places, found and then had to leave a man, but through it all she laughs. Like the old saying "better to have lived and loved, than not loved at all, I think she would love the following picture.

 Isnt it beautiful, im not really a cat person but this is so cute! I think i will add this to my site now!  So hope you all have a wonderful week filled with laughter and smiles!

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Friday Night Sew In

 Friday night sew in  at Hand Made by Heidi  its loaded with great creations, so take a look, thanks Heidi !
  I spent the night finishing off my calender, which is in the nick of time, it will become a perpetual one now! Anyway its finally done! This was done at my local scrapbook store, they have  friday night craft till midnight, its great fun, lots of sillyness and laughs! They all laughed at my lateness in finishing this off, but better late than never i think!








Hope you all had a creative and fun night !

Friday, November 19, 2010

Favorite things Friday

 
Some favorite things, my practice at free motion quilting, loads of fun -lots of wiggly lines everywhere !  i love that it doesnt have to be perfect, which of course it will never be, but that it looks great. I havent had much time to do more than a couple of squares but cant wait to do more. Apologies for the lack of colour.


My other favorite thing was today, see previous post, i will never forget this day.
 My two beautiful children.


Hope you all had a wonderful week and be sure to  see Mrs p at her lovely site