Sew, Stitch, Snap, SHARE - 2018

Hello and welcome back to the first Sew, Stitch, Snap, SHARE of 2018.  

Here in New Zealand, we have been experiencing a record hot summer, which has at times, made sewing or hand sewing feel like a chore.

Nevertheless I have been stitching away on my Solstice Dream blocks and have finished another one.  I love the how the hedgehog block turned out and am so pleased I and managed to find just the right scrap of Liberty fabric for the flower and all the threads I had on hand.

That moment you realised you used felt from the offcuts bag, not the project bag. Half an inch too short.   I posted it on the Solstice Dreams facebook  page, and both Kerry Green and my sister suggested adding a strip of felt to the block and embellishing it,  I figured I had nothing to lose, cos if it didn't work I still had to do a new block.  This is what I came up with.  I think that once it is properly quilted, that will hopefully  help disguise that extra seam too.(tell me that will work please Leeanne

Guess this is the impetus needed to clean up my sewing room, and put the offcuts away.

And I'm finishing off with a little sewing room cuteness, Meeka has obviously decided that unused quilt blocks and an almost empty pincushion make a great bed.

Now it's your turn to share, it doesn't matter if it's embroidery, a quilt, applique or epp, or some other stitched or sewn project,  It can be a start, a finish or just a wip.  All we ask is that you follow these guidelines when linking up:

• Link up any post from the past week that features  a sewing or stitching project you have been working on.

• Somewhere in your post, please link to this one.

• Also please take the time to read and comment on some of the other linked posts, it is always nice to know that people are reading what you have written, and we are trying to encourage people to keep blogging and reading blogs.

Thanks for joining us

Julie and Linda

Sewing and Stitching

Late evening stitching in the cool, means another block has been completed from my  Solstice Dream project.   I loved working on this one, even the little spider was cute, though I have found it doesn't matter what time of day you stitch with black it is still very hard to work with.

Slow progress on the Marsh block, after three attempts, I am very happy with my little frog.  Now onto the dragon fly with her sheer wings and metallic thread - not a great combo to play with.

Still plodding away on the Sea Glass Sampler quilt -  it is in large panels now ready to piece together, I just have to summon some enthusiasm to do it.  A few blocks have actually been unpicked and redone with different fabrics, so I am a lot happier with how it is looking now.  It has actually turned out to be a way bigger quilt than I anticipated making, so I'm not looking forward to wrangling that through my machine, when it comes to quilting time.  Hopefully next time you see this, it will be a finished quilt.

Scenes from my Week

I had a couple of days leave which added to my rostered days off and an upcoming long weekend  have given me a nice break.  I haven't done anything majorly exciting though.  Lots of running kids around getting ready for school next week, and painting the deck. 

A few little things giving me pleasure this week are:

• Solstice Dream -  It's quite normal isn't it, to start a new block when you don't like the stitch you have to do next, or don't have the correct coloured threads, hence three more started and none finished.

• In the garden - my tamarillo tree has flowers and baby fruit for the first time in it's life.  Having never grown watermelon before, we are quite delighted to see that  my son's watermelon plant is also fruiting, goodness this plant would take over the garden if I let it though.  My cosmos are flowering and this beautiful bloom is from a small unknown plant I got from my sister in law's garden last summer.  I have since discovered it is  a Brazilian Plume Tree.

• Currently reading and being inspired by the the author and homeowner of this beautiful property in Australia.

• Also being inspired by the lovely Liberty Kantha projects I am seeing here - I keep thinking I need to start one, but I have a lot of other wips I need to finish (especially the sampler quilt).  We'll see how long that good intention lasts.

Have a fabulous weekend.

Solstice Dream - Update 1

January 1,  saw me starting my Solstice Dream  wool applique and embroidery project.  Both my sister and I are doing our own versions of this, aligning colours as closely as possible to what is used in the original pattern, while still making them to our own tastes, as we did with our Bird Dance project last year.

I have currently completed blocks one and two and am still working on block three.  I am really enjoying this project so far, it is satisfying my love of colour, texture and slow stitching. It is also challenging at times with some of the new stitches required.   Working with wool felt is not so fun when the weather is extremely warm though, as my sister who lives in Australia is constantly telling me.

The idea with both of us doing these wool felt/embroidery projects is that they are meant to make us use up our stash of felt and threads, I can emphatically say that this is not the case, and I keep requiring new colours of threads.  Such a shame ....

Pattern from here

**These blocks are really hard to get an accurate colour representation of the background felt, photo 4 is probably closest to the actual colour**

Day Hiking - K2W Track

View back to Kinloch

The Junction

View to Kawakawa Bay

View towards Whakaipo Bay

Rangiora - Bushman's Friend

Old Man's Beard

A day hike was also done while we were staying in Kinloch.  We walked the K2W trail, which is also a mountain bike track.  Instead of doing the full hike into Whakaipo Bay, we did the Headland Loop track.  It is a relatively easy track, no major hills, some stunning views from the look out points.

I have to admit I have never seen so many Rangiora plants growing and with such large healthy leaves, way back in the old days it was often used as toilet paper, so subsequently is also known as Bushman's Friend.  Also seen for the first time is Old Man's Beard which though beautiful is a major pest in New Zealand native forests.

Miss B and I think that by the time we added in all the little detours to lookout points, we had hiked between 17-18 km , The Scout thinks about 15km.  Either way it was a good hike and I certainly felt it the next day, so I very was glad to have a rest day, reading and stitching.