Road trip

While in Cairns I enjoyed a look in the  Crystal Ball bookshop and found these cards:

Oh look what followed me home (after I paid for them!) hahahahha

A nice early walk around the park, and we were straight back to this spot to swim for a few hours before the heat really ramped up.

On the drive home we came across these bats going bat crazy... thousands of them flying in circles, and after we pulled in to take a good look, we could smell smoke, and that's what was worrying them.

The children were excited to get closer to see them,.

And you can't go past the giant gumboot without stopping, can you?

Resting my hands in the air con, and hand stitching.... my hives are all slowly improving.

Cairns

So it's school holidays, hot as all get out, and we needed to escape our cabin fever from being in a small space air conditioned space... hey! let's drive 400km in an even smaller space to go somewhere else! Hahahahhahah

And so we checked into a Big 4 park with waterslides and 3 different swimming areas, and we hit the Cairns night market!

Well, the kids are enjoying eating baby octopuses (eww)....

And I bought a couple of tea towels.

And we found a gemstone/gumball machine! Woohoo!

School holidays

Resting my swollen hands for another day, and took the children to the local shopping centre to enjoy the air conditioning and some free crafts.

They made snakes, and are alreadty thinking where they might hang them at home!!!

When master 4 wants to "knit"

So today it was the children's turn to stitch, which worked for me with my swollen, sore and tired hands.

Master 4 said he wanted to "knit" which was quite surprising to me, as he knows I mostly "sew". I  guess machine sewing is sewing and hand sewing is to "knit". 

Lucky I had this felt kit with a plastic needle for him, and he loved stitching his finger puppets.

And miss 8 1/2 didn't want to miss out on the chance to start her stitched horse, with a bit more work involved, but she is determined!

It has been started, and wouldn't it be great if it was finished for the local show this year.

So proud of them. x

The heat strikes

It's full on Summer here in the far north of Queensland, and I have been handling lots of batting and holding quilted bits.

My sewing space is outside under a verandah, and it was so hot, I kept hosing the concrete floor, and hosing me down too, then i would sit at the sewing machine and keep sewing with the fan supposedly cooling me off.

Well, my body doesn't like it, and I have broken out in hives all over my body, but especially on parts of my hands that are swollen and sore.

So I have moved onto a foldup table inside in the air con, which is inconvenient for everyone, but bless them all for supporting me and my stitching, and are working around me. I've even given up doing the dishes for a couple of days, because even wearing dish gloves my hands were getting too hot.

I started to cut up the panel pieces adding frames in different prints, including this cherry scrap I had in my stash.

These look so cute!

They should be relatively easy to quilt in a star and cross before trimming to size. This time I will try a different method of joining, as I didn't like the bulk in the seams last time.

First big finish for the year!

 Ta-da! The yoga frog quilt is not only finished, but it looks magical! Watch it hover in the air! Hahahah...

35 blocks in a 7 x 5 configuration make quite a good sized quilt!

This quilt is joined in the suggested way on the Oz Comfort Quilts page, by putting back sides of the blocks together and making the seam on the front, then covering the bulky seam.

I don't like the bulky seam so much. But they are strong service quilts that will be used and loved.

The back is made from a cotton doona cover I picked up at H & M for only $5. Great value. And of course a label.

Next fabrics include these Dick and Jane panels I bought for a rockbottom bargain - only $1 each (originally would've been at least $20 each), and I found these prints at another shop on sale for $10 a metre so I thought, let's do it!

35 blocks at 10.5 inches

This is my stack of blocks, completed and trimmed! Excited to create the first entire quilt. I have used every scrap of poly/wool batting.

9 and a half inches of quilted goodness

It's left my sewing space in a state of disarray!!

I recently found out from the sewing machine servicer that one shouldn't leave the thread wound onto bobbins for too long, so i used up everything in the bobbin box, and an entire small reel of thread (in pink) while making the yoga frogs blocks.

Time to join them!

Today I wanted to share a post with 22 different heart designs for quilts. What better way to show your love than to make something in a heart! https://www.quiltfabrication.com/2020/01/free-heart-quilt-patterns.html

And in another share... I just found this life changing tool!!! The Vivilux Laser https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAB7Qu6KuTk

I wonder if I would ever use it!