2013!

Listening to John  Lennon’s Imagine on one of those Top 2000 things on the radio 2012 passes through my mind. Like every year 2012 had its ups and downs. Some downs more serious than average, some ups really memorable.

One of the ups: I started this blog and apart from the fun of thinking up and writing blog posts it also brought me new friends in the quilting and blogging community, which I greatly appreciate.

Another up: the arrival of Whopper in our country and in our family. He brings us so much love and joy every day, it is difficult to imagine daily life without him anymore.

And let’s not forget a wonderful holiday to the US, New York and the great state of Texas and a few months later my trip to the Quilt Festival in wonderful Houston.

So while I get to choose which one of these gifts to put in the fridge for this evening

I would like to wish all of you: a healthy, happy, wonderful and inspiring 2013!

Phyllis

Merry Christmas!

It is finally here, so enjoy! Have the most wonderful, warm, cosy, cheerful and happy Christmas you can possibly have!

I took this picture in the rotunda of the beautiful, classic, covered shopping area called De Passage that was built in 1885 in my hometown, The Hague. It must be one of the loveliest settings for a public Christmas tree in my country.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Phyllis

A break from Christmas preparations

Getting away from the Christmas preparations we had a bee-away-from-home-day last Monday in Delft, where we rented a space for the day. Unfortunately not all the girls from our bee could make it, but those that could got a lot of work done.

Like my fellow Feathergirl I took my featherweight (The Duchess) with me, I worked on my Jacob’s Ladder and finished some more blocks. This is what it looks like now. Since these are only 25 blocks and I am planning to make 63 blocks (7 x 9 blocks) I don’t know how I am going to fit it all on my design wall and make pictures of in the future, but we’ll see.

It was really nice to work on The Duchess and do some patchwork again.

Have a good weekend,

Phyllis

Xmas finishes

 

At Dorry’s Christmas party last Saturday we were given a pincushion kit to work on featuring a snowman. Because I was in too much of a partying mood I did not do a lot during the party itself, but I finished it this week. And I finished my knitted Xmas ball, it wasn’t easy, but once I figured it out I enjoyed it.

 

Dorry’s choice for a snowman was a great choice, because this holiday season I have fallen head over heels in love with snowmen, because of this… the best Christmas commercial   E V E R …

 

Enjoy (it’s only 1,5 minutes)!

Phyllis

 

Getting into the spirit of Christmas

Saturday evening Hubertine and I went to Tilburg to enjoy Dorry’s brand of southern hospitality during her wonderful Christmas Party. In her cosy and beautifully decorated home we were welcomed by a nice warm fire and Christmas music by Dorry’s husband and daughters (and a proud grandmother in the front of the picture!)

 

 

With some warm gluhwein we were given a seasonal pincushion kit to work on, but give me some wine and good company and my work ethic is out of the window, I will catch up this week :-) !

Even Mr. Bingley was dressed for the occasion

Dorry & helpers made us a delicious Christmas dinner

Oh, and that dessert, applecrumble with warm vanilla sauce, mmmmm!

For me it was a wonderful, warm way to start the Christmas season, thanks to Dorry, her family, Jose, Dorien and the great company of the other ladies for a memorable evening.

‘The hostess with the mostest’

No rest for the wicked as they say, Sunday afternoon I was off to the Wassenaar Library for a workshop by Wieke van Keulen: knitting Christmas balls, made famous by the book by Arne and Carlos

We received a bag with knitting needles, some nice wool (exactly the colors I would have chosen!) and the pattern. This time I did work hard, it was not easy. I had to start over and over again and again. I was not the only one, all of us found the start really hard so Wieke and the lady she brought with her to assist her, literally had their hands full. Although in the past (loooong time ago) I did a lot of knitting but never with 5 needles before. Near the end of the workshop we did all get it, phew, that was a relief!

Busy week ahead of me now, trying to finish these projects and decorating my own house for Christmas.

Phyllis

Phebe .... we have a problem

Phebe is what I have been working on, here is an update:

The centre piece is finally ready, with the first dogtooth border.

That means the garland applique border is next.

The way I do my applique placing is by drawing the pattern on see thru plastic foil. I can place that on top of my fabric and then place the prepared pieces underneath. I learned this method from Nanny de Haas and I really like it. Apart from not needing one of those light boxes underneath my fabric to be able to place the applique pieces correctly, this time I there was another – unexpected – advantage.

Parts of the Phebe pattern when you buy it are in pieces because of the size of the pattern – this garland border is copied on various sheets of A3 size paper – you have ‘complete’ the whole pattern by drawing one A3 piece next to another one, next to another one etc. So I did this on the plastic foil and hung the result on my design wall.

Then I noticed that contrary to the original quilt where the garland is in one piece, continuous, going anti-clockwise, here there are two garlands (or one, broken in two) each flowing in another direction, meeting at the bottom right hand corner. Below is a picture I took from the picture in the pattern (sorry about the quality), this is the original quilt by Di Ford, do you see the difference in the garland below and above?

I checked and checked again, but I did draw the pieces of the garland as indicated on the pattern.

So what to do? I really do want one continuous garland, so…….  I have some pattern adjusting to do, I guess. Hope I can make it work, back to the drawing board, as they say…

Phyllis