Purple Haze

 My purple clam shells are finally finished.  This quilt started way back in May 1993 when I attended the 5th National Patchwork and Quilting Symposium in Upper Hutt.  This was a very exciting time for New Zealand quilters.  Big name American quilters like Caryl Bryer Fallert and Ruth McDowell were taking classes, along with Australian and New Zealand tutors.  Sadly, I can't remember the name of the tutor I had for the clam shell class.   We were shown how to cut out the clam shell shapes with an acyclic shape and a small rotary cutter, and how to stitch them in rows.  I had selected a range of purple fabrics, and wanted to arrange my rows in  lights and darks.  I got this far, and then it got put away, lost and forgotten for many years.

I made a start way back when

The  bag of purple clamshells finally surfaced and I decided to  just get on and get it finished.  Needed lots of pins to get those curved pieces in place before I stitched.  This must be why the project got put aside, presumably.  But I persevered, and slowly, row by row, the clamshells were stitched in place.

I needed plenty of pins

In between times, I had lots of other stitching taking place.  The monthly Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks to make in the nominated colour of the month, the monthly Chook Shed Challenge, donation quilts, and knitting to do.  But I pushed on with the clam shells, finally completed the top, and added a light border.  As for the quilting, what to do?  Big stitch hand quilting, I decided, was the way to go, and I used a variegated pastel thread.  I don't do a lot of hand quilting, but really enjoyed working on this quilt.

Big Stitch hand quilting

Stitching the binding down, and adding a label is always the best part, in my view.

Binding time

Finally, I added a hanging sleeve, and there she is all done, hanging over the sofa.  What's 32 years in the scheme of things between starting and finishing?

Purple Haze, 32 years in the making

Slow Stitching and Knitting

It's about time I worked on my purple clam shell quilt again, goodness knows when I last got it out of the bag.  This project came with me to a monthly craft group I recently joined.  We can take anything we like to work on,  there was knitting and crochet happening, needle felting and one lady was setting up a hand loom, that looked rather tricky to me.  After doing big stitch hand quilting around all the clam shells, I'm now up to the borders.  I won't tell you just how old this project is, but believe me, it's elderly!

Hand quilting the borders

It's about time I got on with my pink sock knitting too.  The sock yarn was a gift from my daughter Nicky back in Christmas 2024, and it is lovely wool indeed.  Not too far to go on these, I'm up to the foot, not too far to the toe shaping.  As I'm sure I've mentioned before, I knit my socks flat, two at a time, then sew a seam up the side.  None of those tricky little double pointed needles for me.   I pleased to say my daughter Nicky is knitting her very first pair of socks, using my pattern.  She hasn't knitted for years, and is doing really well.  I wouldn't be surprised if she completed her socks before me.

My pink socks are coming along well

Sunday Slow Stitching

Today is a great day for some slow stitching.  It’s cold and windy outside, a typical Spring day, just the right sort of day to stay inside and do something creative.  I’m working on my rather old clam shell quilt, started quite some years ago.  It had been tucked away in a fabric covered hat box, a gift from my daughter.  Of course, I knew it was there, and occasional got it out from time to time, just to check and fondle the fabric.  Finally I decided, why not just get it out and finish it!  So I did, and now I’m big stitch hand quilting around the clam shells.

Purple clamshells

Remember my mystery knitting project from a couple of weeks ago?

What was I knitting?

It’s now finished – and is called a Bunny Blanket Buddy.  Nice easy knitting with a stuffed head.  This was knitted in quite thick acrylic type yarn, and will be added to my Foster Hope donation box.

Who is a cheeky bunny?

Teddy Darling

I’ve been slowly working away on my Teddy Darling stitchery, which was a pre-printed gifted panel.  Teddy was stitched, the flower garlands were done, and then I big stitch quilted along the blue dashed lines.  Added some simple wavy big stitch quilting in the floral borders and I was almost there.

Quilting in the borders

Binding was next, and I had just enough of a pretty soft pink stripe to do the job.  There, all done.

I’ve so enjoyed all the time I’ve spent “slow stitching” this little treasure.  It’s a small little quilt, only 25 inches square, and the panel was a gift from my quilting penfriend Carol from South Dakota.  Must admit I've had it tucked away quite some time before I finally started stitching it.  And of course, after all my hand work, I’ll be keeping Teddy Darling at home with me, perhaps one day we will welcome a little great grand-child into the family.  Won’t that be wonderful.

Teddy Darling

Aotearoa Blooming

This wall hanging was actually completed just prior to Christmas, so I can claim it as a 2020 finish, just didn’t have time to blog about it during the Christmas rush.  Aotearoa Blooming features nine stitchery blocks, adapted from Jenny Hunter’s applique patterns, which were printed in the New Zealand Quilter magazine in the late 1990s. 

After bookmarking these patterns in the magazines for such a long time, I decided that I would prefer to do them as stitcheries.  The first of the prepared blocks came along on our 10 week South Island caravan holiday back in early 2018.  There is nothing nicer than sitting in a campsite, enjoying the fresh air and stitching away.  The first block completed was the Pururi Wreath.  I decided to use the same dark green thread in all the blocks, and it was my mission to call into several hand craft shops as we traveled around, looking for more of this particular colour perle thread.

Pururi Wreath

This was always going to be a slow stitching project and I mainly stitched these blocks while away on caravan trips.  When all the stitcheries were finally completed, I assembled the quilt top, adding borders using cream fabric printed with New Zealand flowers for the borders.  Then I decided that as the blocks were all hand stitched, I should hand quilt this project as well.  So I did, stitching away from time to time, in-between other projects..  Finally, I was finished, added the binding, the hanging sleeve, and a label.  All done!

 

Front and back

Hanging in place

Aotearoa Blooming was a joy to stitch, one block at a time. Trees and flowers featured are puriri, puawananga clematis, poroporo, kowhai, pohutukawa, alpine buttercup, Chatham island forget-me-not, karaka, kotukutuku.  Many thanks to the very talented Jenny Hunter for her beautiful designs.

In case you are wondering, Aotearoa is the Maori name for New Zealand, meaning “Land of the Long White Cloud”.

Hello Santa, Train Ride, and a little stitching

Santa and his Elf friend came calling while we were at Pauanui, weren’t we lucky he knew just where to find us.  Guess the pair of us had been very well behaved this year as our names were called up to go and sit on Santa’s knee.  Poor Santa, we didn’t really want to cause him an injury, so just gave him a cuddle instead.

So nice to see you, Santa

I had a mishap in the caravan when we first arrived, tripping and falling and giving my jaw a great whack.  So spent the rally sporting  a large bruise, which seemed to get darker and more purply each day.   I’m sure the club members were looking at the pair of us sideways, wondering what on earth had happened, but rest assured, Robin was completely innocent, I managed to do it to myself.  Not a pretty sight at all, but luckily nothing was broken.

At the end of the rally we oved on to Coromandel, named after HMS Coromandel, which arrived to pick up a load of kauri timber, just the thing for ships masts.  Down by the waterside is “Ship in a Bottle”  by Rebekah Pearson to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the anchoring of British Naval Ship HMS Coromandel off Colville in June 1820.  It really is a beautiful piece of sculpture and only completed this year.

Ship in a Bottle

Right at the top of our “must see” list during our short stay in Coromandel was a visit to Driving Creek Railway.   Last time we were here, about 25 years ago we reckon, the train tracks only went part way up the hill, and now go to the top.  If we had stopped to think what the name “Driving Creek” actually meant, I’m sure we wouldn’t have worked it out.  It refers to the early days of kauri logging, much prized by the British Navy as masts and spars.  The loggers built dams across the creeks which slowly filled up, and the felled logs were placed in the dams or in the dry creek bed below.  When the dam was full, a rope was pulled, releasing a large wooden gate, and the water drove the logs down to the harbour.  So ingenious, but this practice also carried much silt and debris down too, causing them to start to silt up.

Potter Barry Brickell purchased 24 hectares of hilly scrub covered land in the 1970s, which just happened to have plenty of clay needed for his pottery.  The idea of the railway came about to transport the clay down the hill, plus pine to fuel the kilns, but has come into it’s own as a tourist attraction.  The narrow gauge railway winds up through the hills, with steep grades, curves, tunnels and viaducts.  As New Zealand’s only narrow gauge railway the track also has zig-zag sections for gaining altitude within a limited space.  All the trains have been purpose built in the workshop to Barry’s designs.

The scrub covered hills have been replanted over the years with native trees, tree ferns, kauri, totara and rimu much in evidence.  The story goes that Barry swapped large quantities of  his famous home brew for thousands of young trees, with are thriving on the hills.  Quirky pieces if pottery are placed by the track, and the areas of clay digging are much in evidence.

On our way to the top

We chugged over the viaducts, through several tunnels, reversed into the switchbacks, stopped while the driver jumped down to change the points, and climbed ever higher.  One last tunnel, and what a beauty it was.  We had reached to end of the line.  The view from the top was amazing.  The bush clad hills were covered in flowering manuka, ferns and native trees, hard to imagine this was once scrubby farmland, with the coastline in the distance.  This wonderful area is protected in perpetuity by a QE11 Trust Covenant.  Barry Brickell died in 2016 at age 80, and is buried on his property.  He truly was a man of vision, combining his love of art, conservation and engineering.

View from the top

We are now back in Taupo and the weather has turned wet, cold and miserable.  But there was a definite bright spark to the morning today when we called to see Linda and Peggy, my Colourpoint Cat quilt was finished and waiting for me.  I’m only giving a little sneak peek at the moment, and it goes without saying I’m thrilled with Linda’s quilting.  When we return home next week, this will be top of my stitching list, to get the binding and hanging sleeve applied, and then I will show it in all it’s glory..

Colourpoint Cat

So what else have I been doing?  A little more hand quilting on my teddy bear cot quilt, and some knitting on another baby beanie.  Plus another laundromat visit, but that really goes without saying.

Stitching and knitting

Tomorrow we are driving over the Napier-Taupo road to see my sister Kathleen.  She is not well and is scheduled for an operation soon, so we want to take this opportunity for a visit before we make our way home.  The Hawkes Bay area, where we are heading to, usually has warm sunny weather so we are looking forward to a change of temperature, after several cold days.

Where are we Now?

Leaving Taupo behind we spent the next night out in rural Paeroa.  You may remember that we had discovered that the young Lone Pine planted behind the  National Army Museum had originated from seeds collected in 2012 from the Turkish red pine growing at Paeroa Golf Course.  We were so close – of course we wanted to see this famous tree.   So we drove off to see if the staff at the golf club could help us in our quest.  They were so helpful and we were kindly escorted over the greens to see the tree and the accompanying plaque.

“There’s some more info upstairs in the club room” we were told, so we trudged up the stairs to see a framed newspaper article about the famous tree.  How kind of the manager to go to all this trouble for us, we think he was pleased that the “famous in Paeroa tree” was getting the attention it deserves.

At Paeroa Golf Course

There was one more photo to take while we were in Paeroa, one of the famous “big bottle”.  Lemon and Paeroa drink is a New Zealand favourite, also known as L&P.  Created in 1907, it was traditionally made by combining lemon juice with carbonated mineral water from the town of Paeroa, but is now owned and manufactured by multi-national Coca-Cola.

L & P, world famous in New Zealand

Our next overnight stop was the NZMCA Park at Waihi Beach.  It was such a lovely afternoon that we drove down to check out the beach.  People were in the water, sunbathing, and generally having fun in the sun.  The sky was a beautiful shade of blue, and the beach looked so inviting.

A beautiful day at Waihi Beach

Then we drove to Pauanui to meet up with fellow club members for the ICA Christmas Rally.  The holiday paradise of Pauanui is a resort town designed and built with relaxation in mind  for the wealthy, it seems.   Just how many places have an airstrip for those private planes, with hangers built into the homes?  Certainly not something we see in our hometown.  It’s not just airplanes which are catered for here.    There is an area of exclusive real estate built around a series of canals, with private moorings for each home owner. It’s certainly rather posh here in Pauanui.

Room for private planes and boats

I’ve had a nice time sitting outside under a shady tree doing a little hand quilting.  Not fine quilting by any means, I’m using Perle cotton and following the blue dotted lines on this panel.

Time to make a start on the hand quilting

Gemma helps out with the blogging too, she likes to curl up in the computer case to make sure it can’t escape.

She’s a big help

Unfortunately we had quite a fright with Gemma just after we had arrived here.  We were sitting outside enjoying the sunshine and Gemma was with us, sniffing around the grass and trees while safely on her harness and lead.  Another camper’s dog, running loose, came barking and running over to Gemma, baled her up against the fence  and goodness knows what would happened if we had not been outside too.  Luckily Robin intervened, shouted out to the owner about his dog running free, managed to pick the dog up by his harness, and gave the owner a piece of his mind, as I did too.   It was all rather upsetting, and I did feel that I had behaved rather like a fishwife, when it was all over.  But all campers should be aware of the rules which clearly state all dogs should be kept on a lead and under control at all times, as we do with our cat too, no excuses.  This incident left us feeling quite shaken, and it could well have ended badly for Gemma if she had been attacked.

Will we - wont we?

Here we are camped in the little town of Takapau in the Hawkes Bay where we have been for a couple of days. Other than the caretaker, we ae the only ones staying here, so had the choice of where we wanted to park.  This is a very reasonably priced camp, and we are nice and toasty with a power site, plus our cozy diesel heater too, keeping us warm.

Staying at Takapau

The weather started out fine, but rather chilly, probably because of the snow on the Ruahine Ranges.

A little snow on the Ruahine Ranges

Our trip to Hawkes Bay was to attend a family 21st Birthday on Saturday, but things are a bit unsettled at the moment.   Unfortunately, after 100 plus days of nil cases of Covid 19, there have been a cluster  of cases detected in Auckland.  The Auckland area is now at Alert Level 3 in the meantime, many workplaces closing and only those returning to their homes can enter or leave this area.  The rest of the country is at Alert Level 2, and we are all waiting to see if we go up a level as well.  Further plans will be announced on Friday evening, then we will know  if the family party can go ahead, or will have to be cancelled.  So it is “will we, won’t we?” at the moment.  Just as well we have a nice pleasant place to stay here at Takapau – there is no point heading into the Napier NZMCA Park just yet, as we had planned, till we know for sure what will be happening.  We are thankful that the Health Department and the Prime Minister are acting decisively to nip this outbreak in the bud.

In the meantime, I’ve been doing a little knitting, and  hand quilting around the cute little girly teddy on my stitchery.  Then I will be doing big stitch quilting with Perle thread along the dashed blue lines.

Hand quilting around the teddy

While we are waiting to see if we will be driving up to Hastings or not, we have been doing some exploring.  Takapau is quite a small town, but must have been rather prosperous in it’s time.  In fact, the caravan park where we are staying used to be quite a busy sock manufacturing business some years ago.  The local hotel is now closed, but is still rather a handsome building.  It doesn’t look derelict, so I do hope someone is living in it, and taking care of this building.

The Takapau Hotel, no longer trading

I wanted to have another look at Onga Onga, founded in 1872 by runholder H. H. Bridge. Like other runholders who founded towns, Bridge built a school and church and provided land for a recreation ground.  These days the small village draws admirers to view the wonderful historic buildings dotted along the main street. The Coles Brothers building is the jewel in the crown.  The category 1 listed building was built in 1878 and housed the Coles Brothers’ various businesses including carpentry, surveying, interior decorating and even coffin building and the local undertaker business.  Fund raising is taking place to help with the restoration of this wonderful old building.

Coles Bros building, Onga Onga

 

Another interesting building was the recreation of a bush settlers cottage.

The weather then changed to rain and a marked drop in the temperature.  We went for a drive this morning and called into the sleepy little village of Ormondville.  For those train lovers amongst you, Ormondville Station is “a modified Vogel Class 5 station building, the only surviving Class 5 station left on the operating system”.

Historic Ormondville Station

Next stop was Norsewood, which together with other southern towns emerged in the 1870s from the bush that covered most of southern Hawke’s Bay. This was burned and felled by Scandinavian immigrants who were brought to New Zealand in 1872 to clear and farm the land. The process of transformation from forest to farmland was a huge task, which took decades.  We called onto New Zealand Natural Clothing, formerly Norsewear Factory Shop.  This must be the right place, just look at those signs.  It was lovely and warm inside, with the wood burner giving out plenty of heat.  Lots of knitwear to check out, but interestingly enough, Robin was the one who came out with parcels, not me!

Norsewear – now known as New Zealand Natural Clothing

While we were away, Gemma kept herself occupied with catching up on her beauty sleep.  Cats have a really good life, don't they!

Gemma snoozing again

There will be a news briefing given by the Prime Minister and the Dir Gen of Health early this evening to inform the country what further steps need to be taken to deal with this latest Covid outbreak.  Then we will be able to plan the rest of our weekend, whether we travel on to Hastings, or go back home.

Where has the Week Gone?

It’s been a busy old week, as they sometimes are, with Sew Wots on Tuesday, a trip to the hospital on Wednesday for Robin to get a knee assessment, a Birthday Lunch on Thursday, and friends around on Friday to help with a job on the caravan.  So not a great deal of stitching got done, unless you count the mending, that must be worth something, surely.  I darned a small hole in one of Robin’s good woolen jerseys, perhaps not the best darning job in the world, but it got the job done.  Then I took up the hems on a new pair of winter trousers for myself, and altered another pair of trousers.  Mending is something which always seems to get put aside, but its so good when it’s done.  And it doesn’t really take that long at all, once the decision to start is made, I find.  Don’t ask me how I’m coming along with that blue sock!

Now it’s Sunday and its our family tradition to enjoy a cooked breakfast.  Bacon, tomato  and eggs for breakfast, cooked by Robin – with the addition of mushrooms as well today.  With such a hearty breakfast, it was just soup for lunch.

Sunday breakfast

Our weather is just glorious today, in my part of paradise.  The sun is shining, just a gentle breeze, the birds are chirping, so it’s hard to believe we are in mid winter here in New Zealand.  I took my hand stitching outside this afternoon and sat under our handy Arch Gola on the patio.  It was so pleasant, and I enjoyed doing some more big stitch quilting on my New Zealand Botanical quilt.  It was a game of “thread chicken”  as I came to the end of the pale green thread on the roll.  Didn’t really want to go and buy a whole new roll at this stage.  Luckily I found some other thread in my bag which is very close in colour to finish off the quilting.

Luckily I had a similar thread to finish off the quilting

Gemma joined me outside too, happily snoozing on the wooden bench.  She likes being outside with us, there are always things to sniff and look at, then jump up on a seat for a rest.  When she has had enough, she walks to the sliding door and  asks to go back inside.  Cat’s have great lives, don’t they.

Gemma came outside too

There’s a bolar roast cooking away in the crockpot, the veggies are prepared, as is a boysenberry crumble (cobbler) for dessert, so I’m well organised for the evening meal.  Must be time for a cuppa, I think.