Embroidery Lace

This is one of my first efforts in making lace with my embroidery machine.

I was happy with the final doily but learned a lot - my next piece was much better - I don't think I had the water soluble backing tight enough on this one.

Made some lovely decorations for Christmas using the same technique and they turned out really good. Will post them later as some of the people who read this blog are getting some....BG

T'is the Season

I am in the middle of making Christmas cakes. Each year I make about 30 as I give them as gifts to my relations and close friends. This year I am a little behind but have finally got myself organised and began cooking.

This photo shows the fruit and nut mix that has a full bottle of brandy in it and the fruit and nuts have been soaking the brandy up for a few days. Also in the mix is water and golden syrup. For this amount there is about 3 cups water and approx, 250mls of golden syrup. This is brought to boil, heat turned off, then a lid place on it and left, stirring a couple of times a day.

I usual leave it for about 3 or 4 days and the fruit by then haas plumped up and is thoroughly steeped in booze - its ready for cooking.

Once the cakes have finished baking and cooled, I wrap them in silver foil and then once a week or every 5 or 6 days I pour more brandy, port, sherry in fact any grog over them - about a dessertspoon per cake and re-wrap them.

These cakes will keep for ages - one of my friends kept hers for a

Christmas in July party and it was perfect - maybe its the booze?

A word of warning - you will test positive to a roadside test if you eat a piece just before being tested - this is a fact because we tried it!

Embroidered Evening Bags

I have been working on some christmas gifts using my embroidery machine. I bought a CD of designs from Sue Box Collections and decided to make my DILs an evening bag each from the collection.

Just finished the embroidery part of the first bag and thought I would share it with you.

The photo doesn't really do it justice - got some serious flashback from the shiny fabric - satin backed shantung. Still you can get an idea of how it will look. Most of the threads are metallic, the butterflies have a white base with gold thread.

Still have the side gusset to embroidery and then make the other bag. I will line them in the same shade as the bags. The other bag will be a deep purple, hopefully the girls like them.

This is the bag flap design, it gives you a better idea of the details - as I said it is from Sue Box Collections - have a look at her website - she has some really beautiful collections available and also has some freebies for you to try. http://www.suebox.com.au/

Water Lily

Have been working on a design for my next quilt and researching water lilies. Thought this might be a nice wall hanging.

The leaves could be foundation pieced and the flower a mix of 3D and applique.

I bought some lovely fabric - fossil fern and handdyes with lots of different shades of each colour and I will fussy cut to get the colour variations I want.

Will keep you posted on its progress.

Of course I could get into some of those UFOs ....... nah!

Doggie Tales

Thought I would show you all a picture of Fozzie - some of you would remember when I bought him last year , he was just a bundle of soft fluff. Well he is all grown up now and a real character.


For those of you that don't know about Foz - he is a first generation Labradoodle - I bought him last July when we lost our wonderful male boxer, Harley, after 11 years. Our female boxer, Xena, went into depression and lost a lot of fur, wouldn't eat and wouldn't get out of bed. Harley and Xena were great mates. He just loved it when she came into our lives.

Fozzie and Xena were great friends and he actually got the "couch potato" to move about - she even lost some weight!

He was rather quiet for a while after we lost Xena but has bounced back and is now his usual cheerful self.

He loves to play with his ball but he really prefers to play with an empty toilet roll. He naturally loves to eat but strangely his favourite treat is a 'post it' note! I have had to hide them because he would sneak into my work room and pinch them. I have one of those pop up dispensers and he would just keep helping himself.

He and our cat, Sheba, have a love/hate relationship - she hates him and he would love nothing more than to play with him. He tries to corner her on a daily basis to play and she hits him every time. You think he'd learn but he is forever the optimist!

Embroidery Fun

I have been spending the last few weeks playing with my new embroidery only machine.

Once a month my local patchwork shop has a club for my machine and each month there is a different project to make. I have made some lovely lace and this month we learnt how to use our Gigahoops and make large designs.

At home I have been making things for Christmas. Instead of crackers this year I am making little stockings with the persons name on them and I will fill them with goodies - much better than a cracker than contains a tiny plastic toy.

I can't post a picture because some of my friends who read my blogs are earmarked to get one.