SIT 2011 - A Day of....

...meeting up with fellow bloggers. It's lovely to put faces to names and blogs. Look at lovely mini shops. Buy stuff. Talk about what's being made right there in front of me...see some fine stitching, applique...There was the constant background noise of happy chatter and laughter. Someone commented that my sewing machine was so quiet...but I think in truth it was drowned out by the sounds of FRIENDSHIP AND HAPPINESS!
...receiving goodies...(I'm going to put in as many links as I can, to let you go & have a look at some of the sponsors, who contributed to the excitement going around)...bag from Innergreen...

Out of this bag came an assortment of patterns from Clares Place, The Red Thread, Chasing Cottons, Jodie   - and one made especially for the day: Honey Bunny from Clares Craftroom,

Fun stuff - a key fob kit from Earth Girl and a badge from Handmade Canberra...

loads of wonderful fabrics: fat quarters, width of fabric pieces and some sweet samples from Hawthorne Threads and Saffron Craig who I had the pleasure of meeting again on the day.

...swapping: I swappped these

for these...

Thank you Michelle, Dolores, Kayscha,(who added some other goodies and chocolate that has already disappeared), Sarah, and my poor overworked brain can't remember who made the crochet roll that I am so grateful for (no more zip lock bags for these little babies!) Edit: Fiona of bee-abi made the crochet hook roll... If you know, please let me know, so I can stop dying of embarrassment and acknowledge the clever crafter...

...winning: more goodies from fabulous sponsors...Retromummy and Material Obsession . I finally got to meet Kath, who is a mutual friend of a very dear friend of mine. Somehow with the busy-ness of life I've never made it to Material Obsession, but now they've moved closer to where I live (they've WHAT? say the MaTH) and time and distance is less of a barrier...yippee!

...accomplishment: these fabrics went from a pile of strips...

 to an almost finished quilt top...

There was also a night of laughter, food and wine...

...I can't work out why there is only water at this end of the table!!!
A huge thank you to Sheridan, the amazing organiser of a 3 day long, sewing/knitting/crochet/quilting, fabric buying and classes, extravaganza.

Roll on SIT 2012!

thanks for taking a peek over the fence...

Swap World...

Giving...                                     Receiving....

The end of The Great Big Stitched Postcard Swap #3.

The theme was "LOVE"

The Postcard I sent is going to Diana in Georgia

The Postcard I received is from Cindy in New York. 

It. is. just. beautiful. I LOVE it!

Amazing how two people from different sides of the world can have such complimentary ideas.
The world is indeed a small and fascinating place. The world over, we are so much more alike than we think. I find that even more true, the more I blog and interact with crafters all over the world. Not knowing where a person is from and I could be talking to my neighbour over the fence, such is the closeness and language of sewer, quilters, artists. We all want beauty in the world and to make another's day by showing what we make, sharing how we made it, sending off gifts to each other, rallying together to support those caught up in natural disasters.

I say we make all world leaders sit down and work together on a quilt or an artwork. Actually cooperate on making something beautiful and worthwhile. Make them blog about it with all the real people out here.
Say once a year. Make a day like World Quilting Day.
I think the world would be better for it, don't you?

thanks for taking a peek over the fence...

I like a great bargain...

Made a lightning raid on Logan's Patchwork on Friday to get

some Japanese prints for the mug rug swap.

I found they are selling off all their Gutermann threads.

I SHOULD have got the blues and greens packs too,

but I couldn't fit them into the bag I was carrying.

I was trying to stuff/hide quite a few lengths of fabric and these in my bag.

Wanna know why?

The MaTH was waiting in the car and I told him I only needed a place mat sized amount of fabric!

thanks for taking a peek over the fence...

Under Pressure...

Only 6 more sleeps till Sew It Together 2011.

I've spent today finishing working on my swap items for the sample swap. Apart from having to share the sewing machine will Miss Bee, who wanted to make 2 headbands for her big sister, things that I know I can do, I just kept getting wrong.
On a good day  I can make my own double fold bias pretty quickly. Today...
...I got the direction of the lines wrong...

...I had to unpick the teeny tiny stitches because I forgot to offset the lines by one row!...

...even the seams were dodgy when I got it together!

I waaayyy over estimated how much binding I'd need, and have enough left over to make a crazy binding for the bright quilt that is in the pipeline for Minky.

...and that doesn't include the green that I still have to sew on!

Anyway, despite these annoying hitches, I'm pretty happy with how it all turned out.

This is my favourite little tool, 

 and gives the neatest corners.

Four down, 1 1/2 to go! (I had to have a sample one for myself too you know!)

thanks for taking a peek over the fence...

Happy St Patricks Day

A little bit of Irish in Sydney:

On Air...

A slight break in transmission occurred. Returning to normal programming shortly...

It's been hard to get a moment to catch up here. Good things have been happening though.
Here's the lovely name tag that came in the mail for the SIT Name Tag Swap.

From Rachel at The Two Windmills.

Look at that exquisite stitching...

I'm slowly getting ready for Sew It Together...I haven't finished all the goodies for the swap (I just need a full uninterrupted day... Oops...sorry hope that flying pig missed your head!)...or cut out the quilt pattern that I'm taking to start on the day. It's a pattern from Clare's Place, a Tasmanian blogger/pattern designer.
I just found out that Clare is now sponsoring Sew It Together, and is including one of her patterns in our goody bags...they are going to be overflowing with sewing goodness! Yippee!!

I went to CraftExpo yesterday (hurry if you want to go, Sunday 13 March is the last day). I did a class in Sashiko embroidery...making a coaster.

I got the embroidery finished in the workshop and I need to put wadding and sew on the backing. I don't pass the "even stitch" test, but it nice to learn a new technique. 

I'm thinking of using something like this on a mug rug for this mug rug swap I joined...turns out my partner LOVES oriental fabrics, now to work out a suitable design. MUST do the SIT swap stuff though!

thanks for taking a peek over the fence...

Name Tag for SIT

The name tag I made for Sew It Together has reached it's destination!

A bit of canny detective work by Jen and she was able to email me to say it's arrived.

I'm driving the postie and the rest of the family nuts as I wait for two parcel to come; one is my nametag and the other a blog giveaway prize.
Just realised there are only 25 days to go till SIT. I'd better get a move on with the sample swap then.

thanks for taking a peek over the fence...