A swap and February Plans....

I joined a swap with Jane from Loopy's place.  She (via f/b Get Creative with Loopy) has an accent on mental health and one of the many things to help is creating.... and giving..... so she offered it out and although most are from the UK there was someone happy to send over to me....

I don't participate in a lot of swaps these days, but felt this was a fun one and didn't require a huge project.

Louisa sent me this gorgeous piece of hoop art.... it is so clever.....

she didn't make the card but it is hand made and just perfect too....

I think this guy has a little bit of a mischievous expression

It was a fun swap...... I sent over a little zippy purse thinking it might be useful for things like crochet hooks...

A pattern by Natalie Bird and one I have used before... lovely sentiment....

There was also a fabric origami butterfly magnet but I forgot to take it's picture.....

My main plan this month is to get back into the routine of having at least 15 minutes of me time on the sewing machine each day.  I hand sew practically every evening but machine sewing often seems to be overtaken ….

I have already started making the blocks for my Twisted blocks quilt..... and want to get this top together..... 

They are lovely bright happy spotty fabrics which I have teamed up with some white....

I have two zippy bags to be done……  work has started on these....

Tumblers will continue as leaders and enders....

United Stitches will continue to be my main hand sewing at night.....  I would like to have finished all the stitcheries by month-end....

prepare 3 more Happy Hearts snowmen.....

quilt and bind this little quilt..... only 22" square so not too ambitious....

To end off some of the quilting I have been doing lately....

This is the back of quilts

Busy, busy... just how I love it.... (if it's sewing related!)

Righto, gotto go.... I think I can fit in 15 minutes of my own quilting today and do that little baby quilt.....

Have a lovely weekend......

January monthlies......

This month I have done this hand work for 1 Christmas Item A Month....

These are going to be little heart ornaments but I have decided to do the handsewing first then make the hearts later

Once they are prepared they don't take too much time to stitch up, so though I am not actually finishing an item each month I am making progress ...

Thanks to Narelle for hosting 1 Christmas Item A Month...

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This month's WOOFA items were....

Garden Sunshine quilt....

I managed to get all the blocks together and sew the border on to make a flimsy.....

United Stitches.

These are the little hand-work blocks I am doing and this month I got 7 done.....

The other project I am working on is my tumblers … as leaders and enders so a bit of progress each month as I get any sewing done...

I have a nice pile of pairs … will still keep going and use up the light rose fabric which is going in between

Thanks to Cheryll for hosting WOOFA.....

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OPAM

As far as finished projects... there are lots of little things as a result of trying to do a bit of a clean up....

Loads of kitchen cloths.....

… a bunch of baby wash cloths....

… one more penguin jumper.....

3 little blue quilts.....

… a bunch of block boards.....

… and a little pink baby quilt....

Thanks to Kris for hosting OPAM.....

Righto, Gotto Go.... I'm going to sort out what's to be done for February.....

A hot week.....

A bit of rain has made my plants very happy.....

fushcia

crucifix orchid

even the baby lemon just shot through new shoots....

Hoya....

Frangipani....

Frangipani....

That's about all the colour there is at the moment... we have lost a lot of plants … raindrops makes it all look good

The drought is by no means over, and there are lots of farms that still haven't received any rain....

Meanwhile the hot and humid has meant I have done lots of hand sewing....

I have been focussing on the United Stitches blocks 

Whenever I have had the chance for a few stitches 

… still have a few more to go..... 

I took a short break from them to hand sew down the binding of this quilt when I spent a day with a friend.... 

…. just a little quilt so not really an impressive amount of stitching (there was an impressive amount of chatting)

sweet little star fabric for the back....

My friend is a great crocheter and she gave me these cotton washcloths... so handy with the circle at the top to hang by.  I have actually used the bigger one as a hand towel as it is just the right size for the bathroom....

I am still trying to sneak in a bit of me time machine sewing so this week I added that mustard border onto Wings and Pretty things....

The next round is more of those elongated hexagons.... which I will do once I have finished off the United Stitches blocks....  I love this quilt so I am itching to get back to it even though EPP is not my favourite thing....

This week we went solar powered..... woohoo...…  It was such a hot muggy day I felt so sorry for the guys on the roof.....

so now we are self powered (mostly!)

Righto, Gotto Go....  the day has begun and there is coffee to be drunk....