Button Cushion for Barbara and Bill

Barbara and Bill are caravan club friends. They recently celebrated their Golden Wedding Anniversary on Armistice Day, and I wanted to make them something special.  Barbara loves buttons and has a huge collection in many beautifully shaped glass jars.   I made them a cushion featuring a jar with a red lid and stitched a selection of buttons inside the jar. The brown fabric used is particularly suitable as it is printed with little jars of buttons with red tops.  I gave them their new cushion at our weekend caravan rally.

Bill and Barbara with their new cushion

Barbara and Bill were very touched with the gift, and Barbara spent a lot of time looking at all the buttons I had stitched on. She proudly showed it off to the other caravan club ladies, and I know it has gone to a good home.  It will find a place on the couch amongst the knitted cushions Barbara has made and decorated with some of her own button collection.

Jar of Buttons cushion

The caravan gets a Christmas touch

We are off this weekend to our Caravan Club Christmas Rally, so it was time to get the caravan looking Christmassy.  Being such a small space, it really doesn’t take too much effort.  Over the last few years I have stitched away and made several “red work” Christmas cushion covers.  The existing covers come off, and the Christmas ones go on, it’s that easy.

Three Christmas cushions in the caravan

One more cushion and Santa Bear

While I had the original covers off, it was time to give them a good wash and hang them out to dry, making them fresh and clean for another year of caravan adventures.

  Cushion covers on the clothesline

Then a few Santas stand to attention on the shelf above the door, and up goes my red work Santa wall hanging.  That didn’t take too long at all, did it?

Six assorted Santas

Christmas has arrived at our house!

It always takes longer than you think, doesn’t it?  I’ve been busy bringing out the Christmas quilts and other decorations.  Some time ago I read a good piece of advice – to make sure the Christmas decorations fit into an existing space.  So…… I take a picture down, and put a quilt up in the same place.  Then after Christmas all the festive stuff comes down, the original stuff goes back on the wall, and the house returns to normal. 

I have made something new this year, not a quilt, but a Christmas tree, and I’m really pleased with it.  The pattern is “Tree of Christmas Cheer”, designed by Ami Downs of Hatched and Patched.  The simple stitchery panel  really sets it off, and tells of:

“Mistletoe and eggnog, plum pudding and turkey, family and Christmas cheer”.

Although the pattern used a multitude of fabrics in all different colours for the tree, that didn’t appeal to me, as my tree had to be green!  I had a dark green fabric pattered with gold  coloured fir branches tucked away in my Christmas stash which was perfect.  The tree has a pouch of plastic pellets in the base to make it more stable, and is stuffed with fibre-fill, and I found a gold star button for the top.

   Tree of Christmas Cheer

The tree joins a couple of other trees and a few Santas in front of the gas heater.  No, they won’t get singed, as down here in the Southern Hemisphere we celebrate Christmas in summer. 

Trees and Santas 

The top of the heater has been cleared of brass ornaments and replaced with some of my Christmas collection.  Pride of place goes to “A Stitch in Time”.  Here’s Santa sitting at the sewing machine busy repairing his Santa hat before he heads out on the big day delivering all those presents.  This was a gift from my pen friend Carol, of South Dakota.

A Stitch in Time

And standing on the hall table is a mixed selection of “gold” trees and roly poly angels, a couple of Santas and a snow man, a snow globe and two lovely Jim Shore ornaments.

An assortment of ornaments

This Jim Shore piece came from Gail in  Canada

Now that the house is all Christmassy, I’ll have to turn my attention to the caravan – but that won’t take too long.  It’s our Caravan Club Christmas Rally this weekend, so we’ll have to make sure we take our Santa hats – ho, ho, ho! 

Friendship Group Christmas Meeting

It was the last meeting of the year for my Friendship Group, and as it was December, of course there was a Christmas theme.  We meet monthly for a stitching evening, and work on our own projects, and occasional group projects.  Show and Tell is always a fun part of the evening.  Debbie couldn’t make our previous meeting when we had our Christmas Decoration exchange, so she was thrilled to receive her hand made gift this month.  A beautiful stitched panel covered a wooden cotton reel (the wooden reels are hard to find these days) and the decoration was finished off with dark red glass beads.

Debbie’s Christmas Tree decoration

Helen is a wonderful cook who is so generous with her baking and often brings along a plate to share at our monthly meetings.  In appreciation, Margaret presented her with a special award, a pretty little cup cake mug mat.

  Thank you to Helen

Everyone had brought along a gift and placed it in the basket.  After an hour or two stitching and chatting we were asked, “What shall we do first, presents or supper?”   Presents first, we all decided, and Maureen, as our oldest and wisest member, was asked to walk around the table and hand the gifts out.  My gift contained some yummy Russian Fudge, think I’ll save that till we go away over Christmas. 

Maureen is being Mother Christmas

My gift

The supper was delicious.  There were savoury muffins and pikelets, cup cakes, sponge drops (just like my nana used to make, one of our members commented).  Chocolate cake, slices, brandy snaps, and more.  Everyone really excelled themselves.

Christmas supper

Thanks everyone for your company and friendship during the year.  I have certainly enjoyed our monthly get-togethers.

Hoffman Challenge Quilts

The annual Hoffman Challenge quilts are touring the country, and luckily for me, were just around the corner at Thimbles and Threads.  I took my friend Dot with with to view these works of art.  The chosen fabric for this year was from Hoffman’s Penny Lane collection, with a flowing paisley design in rich hues.  As always, the quilts for this challenge had to be less than one metre in any direction, and be neither square nor rectangular.  “Ride with Me”, by Joanne Mitchel won both the Best Overall Quilt, and Viewers Choice.  Featuring a prancing white carousel horse, with an ornate saddle and livery, the quilt was harbouring a little secret.  A sensor starts the lights to flash and the carrousel music to play when someone walks close by.  I had to agree with the judges that this quilt deserved it’s awards.  The front horse is beautifully done, as are the background details.

“Ride with Me”, by Joanne Mitchel

The iconic Combi van has been a favourite with young Kiwi surfers and campers for many years.  This one, stitched by Wendy O’Neil, was sporting  paint job straight out of the swinging sixties. 

“Hippie Wagon”, by Wendy O’Neill

“Indian Chief War Shield” by Jenny Scudder was a little piece of calm amongst the riotous colours of the other items on display.  We had to really look to see the challenge fabric hidden under the feathers and clothing.  This little gem was very well thought out and executed and was my second choice.

“Indian Chief War Shield”, by Jenny Scudder

Another small offering which took my eye was the little “Indian Elephant”, by Brenda Reading.  This lovely little elephant was dressed in a pretty cover, finished off with beading.  Quite simple, but very effective.

“Indian Elephant”, by Brenda Reading

The award for Best Contemporary Quilt went to Cindy Watkins for “Masquerade”.  The young lady’s face was peeping out of an extravagant mask, as she fluttered her matching fan to great effect.

“Masquerade”, by Cindy Watkins

The Barn Embroiderers of Chesterfield, UK, worked together to make “Ladies Day at the Races”.  This group of embroiderers were unaccustomed to quilt making and they had to think completely “out of the box”, they commented.  Inspiration came from ladies attending Ascot Races.  I think they did a marvellous job working together to create this beautiful quilt of a lady at the Ascot Races sipping on her cocktail  under her shady hat..

“Ladies Day at the Races”, by the Barn Embroiderers

It is always a delight to view the Hoffman Challenge, and it was interesting to take a non quilter with me and watch her reaction as she studied each quilt. 

First day of Summer at Stonestead

Today is the first day of Summer and what a glorious day it was, so nice and warm that the Stonestead Stitchers sat outside in the lovely garden, instead of meeting upstairs as we had done over the colder months.  We dragged one of the large timber  picnic tables over to join two up together to give us a bit more room.  Luckily there were nice big sun umbrellas shading the tables, and Kevin from Stonestead also provides the much needed insect repellent.  Another quilting friend, Jenny H, came over to see what all the noisy chatter was about, and kindly took a group photo for us.

Stonestead Stitchers working in the garden

We all worked on our own individual projects, and the conversation ranged over all sorts of topics, Christmas of course, and family and food got a mention as well.  I was working on a Christmas project, and put the last few stitches in, I’m pleased to say, and will show it closer to the “big day”.  Ruth had brought along her lovely piece of Mountmellick embroidery.  This is a long term project and she is making good progress with it.  She hastened to add that she has also been working on other projects too.

Ruth’s Mountmellick embroidery

Dorothy was adding green hexagons down the side of her Grandmother’s Flower Garden blocks.  This popular pattern is made with in the English Paper Piecing method to ensure accuracy, and seems to be enjoying quite a revival lately. 

Dorothy’s pretty flower blocks

Pretty little gift boxes seemed to appear like magic from Vicki-Ann’s talented fingers.  She makes lovely cards too.

Vicki-Ann making gift boxes

Christmas must have been on Cheryl’s mind, as she had brought along two Christmas quilts to work on.  This lovely large Christmas quilt was a “block of the month” and Cheryl button hole stitched around all the appliqué blocks.  She has now machine quilted around the blocks, and still has hand quilting to do in each block.  It’s a big quilt, so that will keep her busy for a while, I expect.

Cheryl’s Christmas quilt

Cheryl had brought along another projects “just in case”.  She is making this Christmas wall hanging as a gift for her SIL, and just has the binding to complete.

Christmas wall hanging

Now it is December, we just have one more fortnightly meeting of the Stonestead Stitchers before Christmas is upon us.   Hope it is another lovely fine day so that we can enjoy sitting in the peaceful garden again.

Lovely Lemons

Although I’ve got quite a sweet tooth, I just love the sharp citrus taste of lemons, and I’ve been given a whole heap of them lately.  So I’ve done a bit of baking and my favourite lemon recipes at the moment are lemon muffins with sugary lemon juice drizzled over the tops while just out of the oven, and lemon slice, made with a crunchy base incorporating rolled oats.   Kept telling myself that I really must have a go at making lemon honey, but I was a wee bit worried about how to do it.  I’m pleased to say I finally got around to trying it.  It’s such a simple microwave recipe, that I really don’t know what I was worried about.  Just sugar, eggs, butter, lemon juice and lots of lovely little curls of rind using my very handy little lemon zester.  Here it is just about ready to go in the hot sterilised jars.

My microwave lemon honey

It just needed another short burst in the microwave and then I poured it into the jars.  These microwave recipes don’t make a huge amount but there was enough to fill two medium sized jars, (plus a little for me to enjoy straight away).

Doesn’t it look yummy?

Luckily for me, Robin doesn’t really like lemon honey that much, so it is “all mine”.  It’s so delicious on a piece of toast for breakfast, wish I’d made some years ago.  Thanks to Dot for sharing her recipe with me – I’ll be sure to make some more before too long.