Designing Women Christmas Party

The company was great, the food was fabulous and the venue fascinating.

Juliet, Debbie G, Jaslyn and Dorothy watching Jan as she showed some of her fire damaged treasures.

Judith, Zena, Delys, Alcira, Pauline, Loraine and Margaret P.

Iris, Barbara, Margaret F, Liz and Debbie R. Somehow I missed out on snapping Helen and Linda - pity.

Jan was a wonderful hostess.

She made us so welcome despite the recent trauma of her heritage home nearly burning to the ground. Here is an external shot of the damage.

Thanks so much, Jan. A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all the group.

Contemporary Quilt Group

Today was the last meeting for the year and we were asked to bring our altered pieces again. I was delighted to see that Stella has done a further alteration of her piece.

This is what I did to her piece in the original swap. This is what she has now done: added the Mad Hatter Teaparty silhouettes and some buttons like a watch and a teacup and turned the whole thing into a bag. Well done, Stella!

The ATCs made a fabulous display. I couldn't fit them all into one pic - so you get two.


Fourteen people took part and almost everyone had made 18 or 20. I like my share very much - and my total collection is getting close to 200!

Feeling virtuous

because I have finished writing our Christmas cards AND put them into the post (except for those which need to go to Canada or the States). I have also beaten most of the people who send them to us - we have only had 4 so far. So glad one of the Christmas jobs is completed. And I still have a few cards and some stamps for anyone I overlooked.

Altered Art Journal

Finished! And I think it looks OK.

Even found some matching beads and embellished the knot at the end of the cords.

Altering Art

A couple of months ago we had a challenge at Contemporary Quilt Group where we took a piece of someone else's and altered it in some way. I received back a beaded and heat distressed piece mounted on black which was lovely, but I couldn't visualise a way to use/display it.

Today the light bulb went off. It will be the cover for a journal. So I tore up some handmade paper for the signatures, unpicked the fabric from its black base, fused a batik print on the back as a lining and machine buttonholed the edges and made some machine cords for ties.

No photos - because it doesn't look like much as yet. Maybe tomorrow. I need to finish it before Friday and the next meeting.

ATCs

Last month at Contemporary Quilt group we swapped small bags of mixed media materials to be used in constructing the ATCs we are going to exchange at the December meeting. The bag I received was hardly an example of mixed media - it was a half dozen fabric scraps and a length of yarn.

I was tempted to toss the bag in the bin and use other stuff, but I decided I needed to do the right thing and use the bits I was given.

So today I cut the fabric scraps into irregular strips, along with a couple of my own fabrics and constructed a crazy quilt type base.



I then used some of the decorative stitches on my sewing machine to embellish the seams with a decorative thread. It was starting to look reasonable.

After I had stamped the base piece all over with a text stamp and added some foiling it began to look more like a mixed media piece and I cut it into ATC sized pieces.

I have now neatened the edges of all of them and I think I am finished - except for the necessary labelling. I used every bit of the fabric I was given and I would have used the yarn to edge them, but there isn't enough of it.

It was good to spend a day fiddling with fibre.

Stop the world, I want to get off!!

Another funeral today, the second in three days. Nice to see some cousins on my father's side of the family, though I hate the circumstances. Sweet story: Enid (today's funeral) died on the same day, exactly 3 years after the love of her life (Uncle Ray). She wrote poems about their life together and the eulogy stressed how much they had loved each other, even living in a nursing home.

Not so nice. Our son besieged by a collection agency claiming unpaid rent and damages from a rental he left (amicably, he thought) over a year ago. Our daughter in the throes of dealing with an eBay scam - fortunately she is listening to us and won't finish the deal before she sees the money.

No fibre fiddling for far too long.

They come in threes

Unhappy events, that is - or at least that was what Nanna used to say.

Yesterday, while we were having our Christmas lunch, the husband of one of the group rang to say his father had just died (it wasn't unexpected - just sad it happened right then).

Today I checked the Death notices - which I don't usually do - and discovered one for my aunt Enid. She was the wife of my Uncle Ray, Dad's last surviving brother, who died a few years ago. Ray was the last of my father's 10 siblings. Now, with Enid's death, there is no-one left of that generation, so we (my cousins and my sister and I) are the oldest generation. Scary.

The funeral is tomorrow morning. Three deaths and two funerals in a week. Not my favourite social occasions.

Christmas Festivities

The round has started. Today it was lunch here with my sewing group. A few people missing because of conflicting engagements, but a most enjoyable occasion. Easy on the hostess too - everyone brought a dish to share and it was all delicious.

I have two events next week, so will need to do some more cooking for them. Christmas itself looms ever closer. Lunch here. I have bought a turkey - that is the extent of my preparation. It will all pan out in the end - it always does.

And now it is December

What happened to the year? (What happened to the last 5? 10? 20? 40? 50 years?)

Helen loves her quilt. I am so relieved - after all, it is 10 years since we collaborated on buying the fabric, and tastes change.

Kevin's 70th birthday party on Sunday was most successful. Thanks to Helen, her man James and our friend Margaret who looked after heating and serving the food. I felt rotten, but perked up with a few bubblies. Went to bed shortly after most people left though.

Monday was cleanup and washing. That disposes of November.

Today wasn't wonderful. It was the funeral of my mother's last surviving sister. Gwen was 90 and it was a celebration of her life. There were several children there, and I thought about how customs have changed. When our mother died at the age of 31, my sister and brother and I were not permitted to go to the funeral. We were never given the opportunity to say goodbye, and it still hurts, nearly 60 years later. After Mum died Aunty Gwen looked after Ian for 6 months - he was four years old - while Dorothy and I stayed with our grandparents. I was sorry that that act of compassion was not mentioned today to add to the the other examples of her caring spirit.

Then I was told that my uncle has bone cancer and I learned that a dear friend lost her husband a couple of weeks ago and I didn't know. Surely, if misfortune comes in threes, that must be it.