A Day Out,Crochet and "FNSI"

Hello,

On Tuesday I  had a day out with my Mum. We left at 9 in the morning and got back home about 7.00pm. In that time we travelled about 210 kilometres visiting garden centres and libraries,craft shops etc.

We had lunch at the Melville Rose Nursery Restaurant. Lots of potted tulips were around the
outside of the restaurant.

The displays were absolutely magnificent.

Pots of Tulips and Dianthus in the smaller pots. This is the view I looked out upon. The bees were having a field day.

Pots of vegies were on display around the side of the Restaurant. The meal we had was delicious and so filling. If you haven't been to eat here you must. They cook "real food."

After lunch we travelled to a nearby garden centre and I found these two Emu's. Mind you I could have bought a round the world air trip for the same price.

I loved this artwork. With the light on behind it at night wouldn't it make a great garden feature.

The same garden centre had a chook yard. Look at there lovely feather heads.

I started this little doily earlier on in the week and have finished it. I used a size 20 DMC thread and a 1.25 hook. Hopefully I have enough thread to make another one which I will add beads to the final round to make it into a Milk Jug Cover.

Tomorrow I will be joining in Friday-Night-Sew-In. I have spent this morning getting a project ready so tomorrow is set aside to sew.

Happy days.
Bev C

"Makes Me Happy Monday"

Hello. Happy Monday to you.

Well Spring weather has been with us over the past week, especially on the weekend. A beautiful clear blue sky blessed us on Sunday. Lots of work done out in the garden over the last week. A little sewing was done also.

"Spring Delight"

I'm happy that I have  finished the "Spring Delight" bag designed by Sally Giblin. I didn't use as many fabrics as the pattern called for. I wanted to use the green material which is quite bright and found it was a bit difficult to match colours  I also added the applique and prairie points to both sides of the bag. The pattern called for iron on pellon but I joined up some wadding I had left from the sides of the Catnip quilt. This made it a bit harder to do the cross hatching stitching and sewing the bag together. The good thing about using the wadding it makes the bag a bit stronger and protects my camera etc inside the bag.

"Everlastings."

The applique on the sides of the bag reminds me of the Everlastings that are in flower in the back yard and the green material reminds me of the crop of Barley that is growing in the paddock opposite us. A real "Spring Delight" Thank you Sally for the pattern.

I am happy to have won a some fabric from Sandy. This is some of Anni Down's fabric. Not sure how I will be using it but I do have a few ideas. Thanks Sandy.

Now I better go and make a  Birthday cake for the man of the house. Happy Birthday Ian.

I will catch up later on in the week. Tuesday I will be taking out my new bag on a outing.

Happy Monday
Bev C

"Tuesday's Treasures"- Blasts from the past!!!

Hello and Welcome to Tuesday's Treasures.

I have a couple of Treasures to share today. The first is a cutting from a magazine.

My Mum gave this to me a few years back. Can you guess what is behind the cutting? I will tell you soon.

One of my other Treasure's is the common  Nasturtium. Now these come up each year in the garden. It wasn't until I was having a conversation with someone who had visited a friends garden and she was proudly shown the Nasturtiums growing out the front yard. The lady was so pleased to have them in her garden. It made me realise we take a lot of plants for granted.

So I went looking for information about it and found that Monet, the great French Impressionist used these old fashioned plants along the central alley of his famous garden at Giverny.

The spur of the flower is full of nectar and the bees love this. Children have been known to sip on the nectar as well. I have used the leaves in hamburgers instead of lettuce. The flowers can be thrown into a salad or used as decoration on a plate of sandwiches. The seeds can be pickled in vinegar and used like capers .

So next time you see some Nasturtiums growing in a garden remember that this plant has been around since the 1500's.

Sally  wanted some information about the Sweet Pea  (Lathyrus odoratus) so I will include it in this post.
Sweet Peas are native in the Mediterranean, growing wild in Crete, southern Italy and Sicily since ancient times. The first seeds were to England by Father Cupani a Sicilian Monk. Seeds were first released commercially way back in 1724. Sweet Peas are self fertile and apart from mutations come true from seed. Often the smaller shrivelled looking seeds are the darker colours so don't  discard them because they are smaller. They will grow into beautiful plants. It wasn't until growers realised that they didn't cross pollinate they took steps to ensure cross pollination and improvements in the plant  were possible. Around 1877 Mr Henry Eckford began crossing and selecting Sweet Peas leading to a strain with much larger flowers which became known as Glandiflora Sweet Peas. "Prima Donna" was one of the Glandifloras bred by Mr Eckford and from this a new sport was named which eventually became known as "Countess Spencer" which the famous English "Spencer" peas originate from.
The oldest developed Sweet Pea still in existence is the intensely fragrant,red and white, eighteenth century Sweet Pea called "Painted Lady" The Australian two-toned pink heirloom variety "Bushby" was bred from "Painted Lady".  I hope you enjoyed reading about the Nasturtium and Sweet Pea.

Oh yes, you are probably wondering about that magazine cutting. The page behind has my birth weight and my weight for the next couple of months. I weighed 7 pounds and 4 ounces when I was born.

Visit Melody to see who is joining in Tuesday's Treasures this week.

Happy days.
Bev C

"Makes Me Happy Monday"

Hello and a "Happy Monday" to everyone.

I am so excited that I have finished "Catnip". The sun has been playing hide and seek with the clouds today so the colours show up a bit different in each photo. I can guarantee that it is a very bright Happy quilt.

I started the hand quilting on  the evening of Friday 12th August and finished that on Friday 2nd September. A little bit each day kept me motivated to finish it. Then the binding was sewn on and I put the last buttons on this morning. I didn't realise how long it took to sew the buttons on. This was the quilt I had almost completed the quilting by machine and unpicked because I didn't like it. I am so Happy to have done that.

I changed the design around a little leaving out the mice that were originally in the pattern. I do not do mice.
I also added the doll faces and the border was completely different. I added flowers and paw-prints and some machine embroidery with the words Catnip and Meow.

I used the fat quarters that I received with my Homespun Magazine subscription last year. The lime green fabric was from the 7 metre length that I got from Goody Sammy's for the sum of a dollar earlier on in the year. I used the same pink that is on the binding for the backing.

The pattern was in Australian Homespun Yearbook Volume No. 92 (Vol 12.1). The quilt is one of Toni Alexander designs.

I have thoroughly loved working on this quilt and adding my own personal touches to it. Near the end of it I was going a bit slower because I didn't want to finish it. Not that that is a bad thing I was enjoying working on it and it will feel strange not having it on my lap in the evening,quilting it.
"Happiness is a completed quilt"

I hope you have a very "Happy Monday"
Bev C

Shopping and the Markets

Hello,

Yesterday Ian and I had a day out visiting the Kalamunda Monthly Markets. These are run by the local Rotary club and seem to be a great fundraiser for them. Boy was this place busy. Finding a parking spot took quite a while this time. There are lots and lots of interesting stalls selling jewellery paintings plants statues,everthing you can think of. Of course my main aim was to get some plants.

I purchased 5 plants then we went and had a lovely lunch in a cafe nearby. I had by then decided that I needed to go back and pick up one more plant a Sweet Pea. This one is called "Windsor" and is a English variety. I am planning to save the seeds from this one. The other plants are great at setting seeds which is the type of plant I am after in my garden.

It was then time to go to Midland to purchase some material I was after.

I called into Textile Traders and got some Pink Backing fabric which was on special for only $7.50 per metre, a great saving so I purchased 3 metres. While we were picking up Ian's Fathers Day present in another shop I saw a basket of magazines for only 50 cents each with the money going to the Cancer Council. Which is a cause close to our heart. I chose a fairly old issue of  Australian Country Collections. I just love looking through this type of magazine and after all some things don't change that much in decorating. The other magazine was a recent copy of Australian Patchwork & Quilting and I was enthralled to see Melody's teddy bear on the front cover of the Handmade magazine. This magazine was printed in 2001 and Teddy bears will always be in vogue. Melody is having a giveaway on her blog at the moment,make sure you check it out.

Happy Fathers Day to Ian.  Presents and a phone call from Lucy in New Zealand made it extra special. Bacon and Eggs for Breakie.  When we went for our walk this morning we could smell quite a few meals like this being cooked. I hope all the Dad's have a great day.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend.
Happy days.
Bev C