Whale of a Time

 I attended my quilt club''s monthly stitching day on Saturday, its always a nice relaxing kind of day.  Morning tea is provided and we take a packed lunch along.  One or two of the members take their sewing machines, but I don't bother, it's much too difficult for me to unhook my machine from the cabinet, and it is so heavy to carry into the hall.  So  it's always a hand stitching project for me.

We hadn't been in the hall long, and had  barely got settled when we heard an extremely noisy "whup, whup, whup" overhead.  It was a large grey helicopter and we watched as it hovered then landed right on the large grassy area outside the hall.  What on earth was happening?  It seemed there was a Search and Rescue taking place, several people with high vis jackets and back packs ran across to the helicopter and climbed aboard.  It took a while for them to be buckled up, and eventually the helicopter door closed, and it took off into the sky.  That was an exciting start to the morning.

Excitement out the hall window

We finally settled down and got on with our sewing projects.  The iron was plugged in for those who wanted to use it, and there was the hum of a sewing machine.  A couple of the ladies took advantage of the rotary blade sharpener which the club has purchased, so they had newly sharpened blades to work with.  

 Busy working

Elaine was slicing away, cutting strips for an African quilt, she is making this in memory of her recent African Safari holiday.  And Jude was busy cutting out pockets for the Advent Calendar she was making.

The start of Jude's Advent Calendar

What was I doing?  Doing more slow stitching on New Zealand Land and Sea panel.  I hadn't worked on this project for a while, but that's OK, it was always going to be a long term project.  I spent some time happily stitching around a large whale.  Oh look, there's a giant squid swimming close by.

Hello, whale

The helicopter arrived back, and the Search and Rescue team disembarked.  As there was no ambulance waiting for them, and no one offloaded on a stretcher, we presumed it had been a training exercise.  We stopped for lunch then back to our various projects.  Susan had a finish, this lovely blue and green donation quilt.  Simple but very effective, an ideal combination for donation quilts, I always think.

Susan's quilt

We finished our stitching day at about 2.00pm, and all helped tidy and pack up the equipment, before heading off on our way.  I do enjoy these stitching days, working away in a comfy room, with pleasant company.  And it is always so interesting to see what the other ladies are working on too.

More Black, and RSC Quilting

 I've had another busy week, and got several more black drawstring bags completed, using donated fabric.  Plenty for the  boys this time, featuring ghostly heads, aeroplanes, and baseball.

Then several more were completed, an arty one, funky cars and two musical bags, from donated fabric again.  I'm pleased with them, being a good assortment for boys to choose from.

Four more black bags

Then with the black bags completed, I turned my attention to a RSC quilt top I had put together in 2025.  The blocks came about when I found a bag of 2.5in squares, and decided to stitch them up each month into four patches in RSC colours, and then I put borders around them.  Then I put this girly quilt top together, and pinned the three layers, and left it on a chair in the sewing room.  Looking back on my blog it seems I stitched enough for two quilts using these blocks.  You know what that means, there is another similar block set lurking away in a crate in the wardrobe, waiting to be discovered again!

Folded up and waiting on the chair with other quilt tops for a long time.

I had forgotten what the blocks looked like

How to quilt it?  No surprise that I used my favourite Serpentine stitch again.  I like to use plenty of pins in each quilting row.

Pinned and ready to go

This is a single bed quilt so there is still quite a bit of quilting to do to get it finished.  Gemma discovered it when I had finished quilting for the day and decided it looked a nice place for a snooze. It doesn't seem to concern her that  I've put pins in the next couple of quilting rows.

Laying on the quilt, pins and all

I've got a busy week coming up, but hopefully there will be time for more machine quilting.  Wonder if I'll get the binding stitched on too?  I'll just have to see how the week goes.  With projects, every bit helps.

Two Gingers Stitched

There has been a bit of slow stitching going on, working on a couple of small Christmas Stockings.  These came to me in a package sent by Jo (ButterZ) from Australia a few months ago.   The package included about a dozen small felt stockings, cut out with the decorations fused, waiting to be stitched together.  Jo told me she had them for 10 years or so, and was more than happy to finally pass them on.

Christmas stockings from

 There was no promise made that these would be finished in time for Christmas 2026, but I would work on them now and again.  After all, these things take time, and I have to be in the right frame of mind.  But two little gingerbread men took my fancy, they shouldn't take too long, I thought.  The blue one first, giving him eyes and mouth and adding a button to his tummy, and I completed him a wee while ago.  Not sure if I'm doing the blanket stitch correctly, perhaps not as neat as it could be, but overall I'm happy with my effort.  So cute, I love his happy smiling face.

Ginger on blue

Then I worked on the pink stocking over the last day or two, this one had two tummy buttons.  I do have a bit of trouble finishing off then joining in a new strand of Perle cotton, but hopefully I'll get neater at that.    Another happy smile looking at me.

Ginger on pink

I think they must be brother and sister gingerbread people.  Don't they look happy together. 

  

Hello Gingers

I keep all the pieces together in a pretty blue and yellow draw string bag, and have decided I will probably stitch two at a time.  What two?  Perhaps the top two, then there will be no arguments on who or what comes first.  I know there is another gingerbread man hiding in the bag somewhere.

And there is a little secret stitching happening too.  My quilt club is having a Christmas Stocking Challenge, which must be completed and brought along to the November meeting, where they will be displayed and judged without knowing who stitched each one.  This stocking will not be donated but will come home with the owner.  I'm really excited as I've never had a Christmas Stocking before, so I'll be keeping this one for me.  I'm working on mine, but it has to remain a secret till mid November.  

Black stitching for RSC

 It's black and neutral sewing month, or catching up with projects,  for Rainbow Scrap Challenge, and I'm delighted that I finally found the missing bag containing everything I need for my final selvedge double handed oven mitts.  I stitched a whole lot of these last year, using up all my selvedges in the recommended colours most months, except for the few last remaining black ones.  And I hunted high and low and just couldn't find them anywhere.  Does that happen to you, as well, put something away safely then have no idea where it is?  I eventually found them tucked away, so now is the time to make the last remaining oven mitt - and the last of the selvedges.  I made a start on the hand pockets first.

Pockets - done

Then I stitched the base, using two layers of hessian/sacking, good, that's the last of that gone.  Then a layer of Insulbrite, topped with a layer of plain black cotton.  The last short lengths of selvedges were stitched across the middle, then rows of stitching across to hold the layers together.  The pockets were added, a hanging loop, then the binding, using up a random length of left over binding in my basket.  Hand stitching the binding through the hessian was a bit of an effort, but I soon had it done.

Binding clipped and ready for stitching down

I'm really please that I've made the last of the oven mitts, and have emptied a bag.  There is a small packet of Insulbrite on the shelf in the wardrobe, just in case I get the urge to make another, sometime.  

The final one - for a while

Continuing with the black theme, I stitched up three little drawstring bags for foster kids.  Mary had given me a bag of Australian fabrics, including two blocks bordered in black, and I found extra fabric to complete the bags.  And the six patch with cheetahs, had been waiting a long time to be made into a bag too. 

Three drawstring bags made

I really enjoyed another novel  by Karin Slaughter, who writes about two of my favourite characters,  Will Trent and Sara Linton.  Girl Forgotten features a new character, newly minted Marshall Andrea Oliver.  With a  bit of help she solves a 40 year old murder case while experiencing plenty of danger along the way, as she is part of a team protecting a threatened judge.  Once again, the murderer was not whom I was expecting, guess those Marshalls are much cleverer than me!  You would think that with all the murder mystery books I read I would be pretty good at picking the baddy out by now.  It was interesting to read what the US Marshalls duties cover, including protecting the judiciary from threats.  I'll be checking the library for more books about this interesting new character.

Another enjoyable read

Movie Time, and Books

 I was really keen to go and see the movie "The Heart of the Beast" and my daughter Nicky said she was interested too.  She drove down to Levin, collected me from home, we had time for a quick lunch at the movie complex, with the film starting at 1.00pm.  This was the first time I had seen a Brad Pitt movie, but after seeing the shorts on TV, decided I really must go and see it.  The story is set in Alaska, but it was filmed in rugged parts of the South Island, New Zealand.  And the German Shepherd dogs in the film, Dad and sons, were New Zealand born and bred too, so there is quite a NZ connection. 

"After a harrowing plane crash, Special Forces Officer James Belmont and his combat dog Odin, find themselves stranded deep in the Alaskan wilderness.  Together, they are forced into a brutal fight for survival against the elements.  From acclaimed film maker David Ayer, Heart of the Beast is an intense adventure thriller that explores the unbreakable bond between a man and his best friend as they face their greatest battle yet".

I certainly did enjoy this film, as the pair face wild animals, the unforgiving and dangerous terrain, and their own demons.  

I always like to have several books waiting for me to read, in fact I get withdrawal symptons when I run out of books.  I found a Vera book I hadn't read, they are always interesting, and just like the TV series, always have a twist in the story.  I hadn't worked out who the murderer was!  And I love anything to do with Tudor times, and have a book here at home by Alison Weir about the Tudor Queens.  But is is non fiction, and a bit dry to read.  Alison Weir has now written this series of novels about the Tudor Queens, and this one is about Katherine Howard, a young girl who becomes wife number five, whose past comes back to haunt her and  sadly didn't last very long at all.  Really enjoyable, so now I will have to find the other books in the series at the library.

I love books!

Spring Forward, and a Knitting Finish

It was time to turn the clocks forward last weekend for daylight saving.  Luckily the lap top, tablet and cell phone are clever enough to do it all by themselves.  That left the bedside clock, my watch,  and the wall clock in the kitchen for me to deal with.  The clock in the car doesn't get done, much too hard for me, and I decided not to change the clock on the stove, I don't use that to check the time at all.   Down came "Welcome Winter" and up went "Hello Spring" it it's place.  The Spring season is very changeable here in New Zealand.  Yesterday was a horrible cold wet day, just right for soup for lunch, and sitting inside with the heat pump keeping me warm all day, doing some stitching and knitting.  But today was warm, calm and sunny, such a difference, nice enough to hang the washing outside in the sun shine.

Hello Spring

I started knitting my summer cotton jumper late last year, after finding four balls of pretty slub cotton knitting yarn.  With just four balls to work with, I purchased a couple of balls of pale pink cotton to add as stripes.  After knitting part of the back four times in various widths of stripes to make sure I had enough of the slub cotton, I settled on two rows of each.  Finally, I was on the way.

Two rows of each yarn

I've been knitting steadily over the year, putting it in time out  to knit baby hats and socks.  Then it was a last push to knit the short sleeves, sew the shoulder sleeves up, and knit the neck band.  Then sew the other seams.  Not easy with some of those nobbles at the ends of the rows.

Pinning and stitching, matching the stripes

Finally my summer jumper was all finished, I'm really pleased with it.  Not an easy knit at all, there is no "give" in cotton yarn, unlike wool, so I don't plan on knitting a cotton garment again.

All done

This was knitted with quite a loose tension, so I'll have to be very careful washing and make sure I dry it flat so it doesn't stretch at all.  I'm looking forward to wearing my new summer top when the weather warms up a little bit more.

I have to take my own photo in the mirror these days

Chook, Chook, Chickens

Some time ago, when I had my wardrobe malfunction, I came across a bag containing two long forgotten projects, neutral strings and chickens, and decided that I would deal with these as soon as I could.  The string blocks have been stitched into a quilt and donated, and now it's time to work on  those chickens.

Chickens and strings

The chicken panel was given to me quite some time ago by my friend Eileen, and had been hiding in a bag in the wardrobe, until it all came crashing down last year.  It is really meant to be a stuffed toy, but I decided I didn't want to do that.  Oh, look, she's called Henny Penny, how sweet.  How about a cot quilt instead?

Henny Penny and her chickens

So I cut around them, adding some visoflix to the edges, and machine button hole appliqued them onto a white background. 

Hello chickens

 And made the binding, luckily I had a FQ that toned in with the chickens.

A donated piece of rather wild looking red, blue and yellow low stretch fabric was used for the backing.  I have used stretch fabric before on the back of quilts, and never had a problem.  How to quilt it?  Stitch around each of the birds, then lines of  serpentine stitch side to side.  Finally, I quilted through the birds feathers. 

Machine quilting

The binding was attached, clipped down, then folded up waiting for the final hand stitching.  Gemma decided I must have put it there just for her.  

So comfy, thanks Mum

After a pleasant couple of hours sitting and stitching on a nasty rainy wet afternoon,  it was finally done.  The rain showers had stopped, so I raced outside for a quick photo shoot.

Hello, chooky

This will probably be a donation quilt,  but I think I'd like to keep and admire it for a while.  Now it is Spring it will look nice hanging on the quilt ladder for a while, it's time to change the quilts with some other lighter seasonal quilts.  

The backing is a bit wild, using what I have

With this one finally finished, I'm aiming to work on  some Rainbow Scrap Challenge projects.  There are such a lot of block sets from previous years, all sitting in a crate and calling me.  But I'll probably start with one which is pinned up on a chair in the sewing room waiting to be quilted.  Wish me luck, I've got so much to choose from.