Where do I begin?

I am still alive, all in one piece, and hopefully back to more regular blogging.  I can't believe my last post was in April.  I wrote a few posts on my other blog, about my very long vacation, but ran out of memory on my iPad so couldn't upload any more photos. I'm going to try to post more about my holiday on that blog, but I've been thinking about doing that for two months and it still hasn't happened!

It's been so long since my last post, and I've struggled with what to blog about.  There's so much that's happened over the last few months, it's been easier to ignore my blog rather than try to squeeze everything into the first post after such a long hiatus, or to even pick one thing to blog about.

However,  if I don't start somewhere I'm never going to start.  So here it is.

I've finally found my mojo.

It took months for it to return, but it's back, and I hope this time, for a very long time. I've also had to wait for my Quilt Holder Upperer to be home so that I could photograph the quilt and quilt top that I've finished.

Since I've been back from the vacation of a lifetime, I've finished McFlurry, and just in time for Christmas 2013.  Never mind that it was supposed to be finished for Christmas 2011.

The wonderful Fiona at Quilting Fairy, quilted it for me in an all over swirl pattern.

I used a panel, shock horror, in the backing as I didn't have enough backing fabric.

The back

I need to take some more close ups to show the binding and my favourite blocks.

I finished the Mystery Star BOM quilt top. Albeit with a few changes, as it was never going to be finished, if I tried to attempt all the blocks that the lovely Sheila designed for the BOM.

I'm really really happy with how this turned out, it's now about 60 inches square.  To finish it, I made an extra block, (the aqua/green/orange block in the top left quadrant), and whipped up some more braid strips to fill in gaps. I then made a narrow black and white border followed with a piano key border using lots of white and black fabrics, with the odd coloured key thrown in to give a bit of interest. The four corners are wonky stars finishing up as 3 inch blocks. More photos to come.


I've even basted a hundred or so of the 2 1/2 inch squares that I cut earlier in the year and I now have about 40 hexies sewn together. I changed my mind on the layout, of course, but it's starting to look good. (More photos coming soon.)

I started a Dresden quilt, finally, after three years of saying I was going to do it.   (Even more photos to come!!!)

I take a long time to get my a into g.

On top of all this my brain has finally gone full steam ahead and I keep thinking of ways to use my stash.  Why oh why does that happen a couple of days after I've just started a new project?  I spent weeks looking through my quilting books, Pinterest, Flickr, anywhere, trying to find inspiration and drew a complete blank.

It doesn't help when you live in paradise and all the days are like this.

Pyjama Party Sunday

It's Sunday so it must be time for a Pyjama Party.

It's late afternoon Sunday and I feel a bit like this.

Bailey

I haven't spent any of the weekend at all in my pyjamas and I haven't been the remotest bit crafty, but I've been having a ball. More friends visiting, more sightseeing, more eating and drinking, I love it. It's just not so great if you want to show any progress shots on anything resembling quilting or crocheting or hand sewing.  As a crafty pyjama party it was an epic fail. Never mind, there's no Pyjama Party police around here so on with the linky party anyway.

Photos of another sunset cruise, it's a great way to spend the late afternoon.

After a late night, this morning we went early to the local Farmers Market. The rest of today we have been eating, drinking, talking and sightseeing. It's been wonderful.

As I usually show something crafty for my Pyjama Party,  here are the only things that are even remotely crafty. Firstly Friday night, I almost finished another paper pieced flower, that makes three now, wow I'm so fast................ha!

It's a stretch referring to this being crafty, but,  I've enhanced my stash this week with some red and white fabrics. I have a plan for these...................... eventually, after I've finished all my WIP's and most of the things on my mile long want to make list.  I just couldn't pass up this lovely bundle from Fort Worth Fabric Studio.

So all in all a very unproductive weekend, on the other hand if you look at it from a different angle - eating, drinking and socialising, I aced it!!!!

I hope everyone else had/is having a fabulous weekend. Please join in below, grab the linky button, you can find it on my side bar, and share in the joy of Pyjama Party Sunday.

Remember pj's are optional!




Thanks so much to everyone who linked up last week, it certainly makes for a fun party, the more the merrier!

Favourite Things Friday

My favourite thing this week is something I have never done before. We just spent the most glorious late afternoon and evening with friends doing something really special.  I can't believe that I have lived here 12 years and haven't taken the time to do this.

A Sunset Cruise along the Noosa River.

It was fabulous, we had THE best time.

Warning: quite a few photos.

Today was one of those absolutely perfect winter Queensland days. Look at that sky. 23°C  (74°F)

We had a lovely day,

and then..........

 We had fun. We dank champagne, we ate.

We went past the Coast Guard, my dad is a volunteer there.

We looked at the view.

 We watched the sunset.

 We laughed and smiled.

We oohed and aahed at the colour of the sky.

We watched the ripples in the water.

After the cruise, we visited the bar/restaurant above on the left,
Sat upstairs...

We drank some cocktails.

Then we had dinner. No photos of that due to an abundance of the above.

A fabulous day, in fact one of THE best days I've had in a long time.


Hop on over to Shay at Quilting In My Pyjamas to see what fabulous Friday Favourites there are this week.

Lunch

I needed to get out as I was starting to suffer from cabin fever.  We had lunch along the river at Noosaville at a lovely restaurant, Sirocco. Guess where my camera was, so had to take these with my phone.

Salmon Fishcakes 

Pizza bread with labneh and mint, eggplant zaalouk (?), tomato relish and spinach pinenut and saffron dip

The pizza bread looks like it's covered in grease in this photo, it wasn't. The dips were very nice. The Salmon fishcakes were excellent too.

We haven't eaten out for ages so it was a lovely diversion from binding the quilt. 

The view to the river, sorry not the best, but look the sun was out down here even if it wasn't out at home.

Bitchypoo finished lunch with an Affogato.

Social butterflies

I have survived a whirl of social activities in paradise this last weekend.

The social outings began on Saturday. Bitchypoo and I had a very nice lunch with my mum and dad at the Boathouse Restaurant in Noosaville,  the view from the restaurant was just beautiful.  Look at that sky, I love spring, beautiful weather and not too warm or humid.

In the afternoon we went to see the new Lexus LFA. It was invitation only and guess who scored an invitation!!!

Now apparently this is a  REALLY REALLY REALLY BIG DEAL, just ask any testosterone filled car enthusiast.  It is THE latest Supercar.  There are currently only 6 LFA's in the world. This one is on it's way to Sydney for the Motor Show then off to Dubai to it's new owner. We weren't allowed to touch it, only look at it. Bitchypoo is a bit of a car enthusiast and thought it was "pimp", I assume that is good, she took lots of photos on my phone as we left the camera at home....again. It's worth, from memory, roughly $750,000 Aus dollars which is about the same $US  or approx 450,000 British Pounds.  I can think of lots of better ways to spend that much money. As you can guess, it didn't really float my boat, but now I can tell everyone I've been this close to an LFA!!! Ha!

On Saturday night it was a girlfriend's birthday get together. We had a really lovely evening with a great bunch of people.

Sunday we drove to Brisbane to go to the Brisbane Food and Wine Festival. You might remember I won tickets to the Cupcake Class and entrance to the festival. Of course as usual, I left my camera at home so only had my phone to take photos, and they are not very good. As it was I nearly forgot to take any photos at all.

 Cupcakes in progress. Neither of us were feeling particularly creative.

We spent the rest of the time at the show taste testing and sampling an awful lot of the products, entering competitions to win cars and all sorts of things I can't remember.  It was a fabulous day out and I'm going to make sure I go next year.

Sunday night we went to Ahmet's Restaurant at Southbank. It's a Turkish restaurant, the same one I went to a few months ago.

A couple more of these were consumed by me, (not bitchypoo). Turkish Delight Martini.

Monday morning we went to the GOMA (Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane) to see the Valentino Retrospective.  A fabulous display of Valentino gowns from 1959 onwards. There were some amazing creations in the display and some not so fabulous too!

All in all another great weekend, and I'm going to need the week to recover!