Textile Art Fun

I'm Recovering today from my one day whirlwind trip to Brisbane for the Textile Art Festival. I had a really great time and will certainly go again next year. We all agreed that it had been well worth the trip, but I can honestly say I've never felt more tired and pleased to arrive home at the end of what was a really long day.

I was up at 3am after only managing about 2 hours of actual sleep time, (I must have been too worried about sleeping through the alarm to actually sleep), picked up a couple of friends on the way to airport for our 6.30am flight and didn't arrive home until 11pm after dropping everyone off following the long train, plane, bus, car trip home.

Reality really hit for all of us at around 4.30pm when the show closed, at this stage it would have been great to be home without the trouble of getting there. I got through it with a bit of a cat nap at the airport and again on the plane. I was too tired to even look at my wonderful purchases last night, so after a quick look tonight and a bit of planning it's off to bed for an early night.

The photos are of the bags I made for the Down Under Quilts Embellish a Bag Challenge. The challenge was to make a bag to certain specifications using the handles supplied. The bags were on display at the festival and looked great.

What a great show

I was proud to have been awarded a judges commendation for both of my entries in the Quilters' Guild of NSW annual show at Darling Harbour last week.

Dragonfly Dance has now been added to my workshop list and is one of a series of quilts featuring dragonflys, butterflies and lizards. I've been experimenting with positive negative designs for a year or two now and love them.

The Lizard of Oz is a further exploration of my fascination for reptiles and the colours of Australia. It was designed with the Fibonacci Number Sequence as a design aid and it will also soon be on my workshop list as one of the quilts offered when Fibonacci is requested as the main workshop topic.

I had a wonderful time at the show, buying heaps of felted wool for a future project and a pile of other miscellaneous goodies.

I had to hold back just a little so that I can buy more stuff next Sunday at the Textile Art Festival in Brisbane.

Multi tasking at its best

Hey, I'm a woman so of course I can multi task, but managing to combine mundane daily tasks is not really multi tasking at its best.

This is multi tasking to be proud of.

I play keyboard in our Aussie dance band "The Currawong Bush Band" Last night we played for one of the regular Bush Dances organised by the Bush Music Club, an organisation we've been a significant part of for years. I love playing, but always take something quilt related with me. Last night I had a copy of one of my favourite magazines "Quilting Arts" sitting on my music stand alongside my music. There are always a few minutes here and there inbetween pumping out the music. No one can see the magazine sitting there and if anyone was really looking I'm sure they would just assume I was studying music in the breaks between dances (not as obvious as sitting there piecing blocks).

I also had a copy of the new Aussie magazine "Embellish" with me and by the way eagerly awaiting the second issue of the other new Aussie magazine "Down Under Textiles". I love them both, have you seen them yet?

Never let a chance go by!

Accreditation finally

I've been an active member of The Quilters' Guild of NSW for years and teaching patchwork and quilting and in particular my own designs and my passion for Fibonacci for around 15 years. I've even been the coordinator for the teacher accreditation program for 3 years but only just got around to becoming an accredited teacher myself.

So now it's official. Accredited Teacher - Special Techniques

Do you belong to the NSW Quilters' Guild? If not, now is a good time to join, membership fees are $55 are are due at the end of June. Why not join at the quilt show at Darling Harbour 16th - 20th June. Held at the Exhibition Centre in Darling Harbour. You are going aren't you? I spend at least 3 days there, any less and I wouldn't get through it all.

There are many benefits to being a member of the guild. Meet some lovely people, borrow from a large library, attend workshops, regular meetings and weekends away, have your quilts valued, enter challenges, help with community quilts, receive a quarterly magazine "The Template" full of interesting stuff and you'll be eligible to enter a quilt or two in next years show... I'm sure there are even more benefits. Find out for yourself.

Typical behaviour

I quite often buy things on impulse, my husband is the same. We are not unhappy about this tendancy, but sometime a bit of planning would go a long way.

A while ago we were out shopping for a coffee table for the family room. We couldn't find one we liked, so on impulse we bought a very beautiful and very large octagonal table for our patio instead

It seemed like a good thing to do at the time. It fits beautifully into our patio and looks stunning. We love how it comfortably seats 8 and we can squeeze even more in if we need to, but it's really far too big for four and it's so wide we often have to rely heavily on the lazy susan my son in law built for us just to be able to share the nibblies. The seating plan is always an issue, as sitting four of us equally spaced around it (my husbands preference) makes us all feel too far apart and sitting on one side (my preference) does seem a bit unbalanced. If we had given it even a bit of thought we would probably have chosen something more versatile.
Of course it's not really a problem and it's easy to fix - just invite more people.

I bought an embellisher machine at the Quilt Show last June, it was about 4.30pm on the last day and I hadn't even looked at one before, let alone actually tried it out. I just walked past the stall and bought it. No pre-planning, no thought - just impulse.

It sat in it's box until last December, then it actually made it out of the box and onto the bench in my studio. I finally got around to plugging it in and trying it out a couple of weeks ago after spending a fortune on supplies while at AQC.

It's a bit like the patio table, maybe a bit more thought was needed. I'll try it again but I must say I'm not hooked yet - Must try some other raw materials and see if that makes a difference.

I like the spontaneous and impulsive side of me, it makes life more interesting and I need to come up with creative solutions more often.

AQC in a day !

Once Upon a Time. My entry in the AQC Remember challenge



The fruits of my shopping spree at AQC



I had an amazingly full and rewarding day at AQC in Melbourne. I flew down to Melbourne on the 7.15am flight and back on the 7.15pm.

I know it probably makes more sense to go for the weekend but it always seems just so much more adventurous when we do it in a day.

Joined by 5 friends, we got out of bed at around 4am and arrived home very tired indeed at around 10.30pm. We did battle with the Melbourne trams, saw some really great quilt exhibitions, shopped until we dropped, ever mindful of the 7kg cabin baggage limit and the need to avoid sharp objects, we bumped into people we knew and chatted with some we met over lunch, we even road tested the newly available HQ16, and yes I really do want one of these!

My entry in the AQC Remember challenge was there. I remember bedtime stories and had great fun arranging scenes from Little Red Riding Hood, Alice in Wonderland and other childhood favourites in my entry titled "Once Upon a Time". I loved the winning entry and the other 31 quilts in the exhibition.

A good day was had by all, though I slept fo 12 hours straight on Saturday night.

I have just a few short weeks to rebuild my strength for my one day wonder trip to the Textile Art Festival in Brisbane!

Simple Pleasures

I've been doing a bit of shopping therapy at Edo Arts again. I just love buying antique Japanese textiles and planning new projects to make use of my purchases.

They were a bit musty so I gave them the Shannon Lush treatment and misted them with a spray bottled filled with a few drops of oil of cloves mixed with water. Watching them swinging on the line in the gentle April sun made me feel very content with life. I even felt motivated to give some of my quilt stash a bit on an airing as well.

Don't you just love this time of the year? No more oppressive hot weather.

I feel so thankful for the simple pleasures in life -
Beautiful fabrics
My family and wonderful bushland home
Time to spend quilting
Lazy lunches in the autumn sun
Friends who love to share my passion - Fabric

Masquerade

We were are at a friends 60th birthday party last night and I thought the time was just right to update my photo. That's me without the beard!

Hubby also looks pretty dashing.

Amanda I don't make bags Daly

I've had a couple of weeks to settle into learning to say no, so now it's time to start a new challenge or two.
I love challenges and enter many of them each year. One of next challenges off the starting block for me will be a real challenge. Those who know me will know that "I don't make bags" is my middle name.
I now own a set of bag handles for the Down Under Quilts, Embellish a Bag challenge and as it's not due until mid May there is still plenty of time. Having plenty of time fits in nicely with my new lifestyle which is all about not trying to stuff 26 hours of living into every 24 hour day.
I'll be embellishing the bag by hand while I'm in Canberra enjoying the National Folk Festival and eagerly awaiting my visit from the Easter Bunny.

Learning to say no

I've given myself another little pep talk. It's long overdue really.

As usual I've taken on too much and I'm wondering why I feel so overwhelmed and perhaps why I feel a bit used and unappreciated.

As usual I leave most things until the last possible minute and pass this off by saying that I work better under pressure. I volunteer to help even when I know I really don't have nearly enough to time. I try to do it all and every now and then I have to stop, give myself a stern talking to and do a stock take of my life and my pressures and responsibilities and what's really important in life. If I'm not careful I'll forget what roses look like, let alone having time to smell them.

O.K. so enough is enough. I've wiped a couple of major items off my "To Do" list and I'm feeling better already. Yes I do have "To Do" list(s) and I even have a list to keep track of my lists. I definately fall into the Enneargram type one personaility box.

Someone told me recently that we can't do everything at once, but we can do something thing at once. At the moment I'm writing this blog entry, then I'll choose something else to do and stop trying to do it all at once. That something will probably be to sit down with pencil and paper (and diary) and make a new "To Do" list, a realistic one this time and promise myself that I'll try to stop acting like a kid in a lolly shop.