December 2018

Still catching up on those blog posts I should have written some time ago…
so here’s a little post about the goings on in December. No use showing a picture of our Christmas tree anymore (it was small, but sweet) or our Christmas celebrations (again small, but sweet) but Christmas is also a time of exchanging gifts and gifts were exchanged.

Both Emma (click) and I had had birthdays recently so early December I sent a package to France with her pressies which included a little framed mini-mini top:

These are 3/4”  triangles, I used one of Jeanneke’s (click)  stamps to make this, a fun little project but I would not have the patience to make a quilt of this 😉

My Christmas present from my Mr. this year was this lovely little doggy pincushion, obtained from Dorry (click), I think it is supposed to be a dachshund but it think is looks just like Whopper!

There was a visit by Karen (click) and her very well mannered dog Freia, Karen is one of the busiest persons I know, she always has stories to tell and projects to show, at the time she was knitting pairs of Norwegian patterned mittens, yes pairsssss, one pair for each family  member of her family, and she had time to quilt too. All that in addition to running her own business (click)

As you can see, I worked on the circles of my Sugar Plum quilt, pattern by Judy Newman (click) , four more finished

And there was a really nice day in Amsterdam,  a Christmas holiday tradition for our family, it is always dark and grey when we are there around Christmas time and all the pretty lights make for such a special atmosphere:- 

Apropos, birthday presents….  you may remember I celebrated my birthday with Emma in France in October (click) during Margaret Mew’s (click) workshop in Emma’s shop (click)?
Emma thought of the most wonderful gift, unfortunately it got stuck at the French customs (think they liked it so much they would not let go of it!), by the time the package was released it I was back home in The Netherlands, so Emma brought it with her to Houston in November……the pattern and templates for Margaret’s Rosa Biddlecombe quilt a n d  starter fabric kits from Margaret’s own stash!

I always love going through other quilters’ stash, don’t you (is ‘stash-envy’ a thing?) and these fabrics are soooo beautiful!

A great project for 2019!

Phyllis

A bit of patchwork, a bit of culture and a few apologies

With the weather feeling like spring has arrived I spent hours gardening, (doesn’t a garden look like a mess at the end of winter? )but luckily there was also time for other things.

Time for some patchwork,  this is where I am at with my Feathergirls 2.0 quilt:

 

 

 

It may look that way but the top is not finished yet, am looking for fabrics for the borders at the moment.

 There was also time to for some culture:

 

The Late Rembrandt exhibition at the Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

 

 

 

 

Go to this exhibition if you can, unfortunately when we were there it was very busy, too busy to our liking, but still we were so glad we went.

I was really moved by this painting, one of the most beautiful (maybe the most beautiful) paintings I have ever seen, I could look at it for hours….. If this exhibition were in my hometown I would definitely go back just for this one..

This painting does not only show us this lady with all her life’s experiences etched in her face, I think it says so much about the Rembrandt himself, where he was in his life at the time he painted this, all the difficulties he had experienced. He could not have painted this lady in this way without that.

It was so special to be able to see it from up close, so close…..

 

After the exhibition time for some light heartedness, the ’12 – o’clock’(‘twaalf uurtje’) at our regular lunch restaurant when we are in Amsterdam

A walk through the famous ‘nine small streets’ (‘9 straatjes’)  of Amsterdam we came across a dog in a store who had made himself very comfortable! Easy to see which place this dog takes in his owner’s life!

And this place had just opened, the Nutella Bakery! Just filled with products made with Nutella. Death by Nutella, I call it…. I love Nutella!

 

 



A few days later there was this (some of you may have seen this on my FB page or IG feed).

I wanted to enter the Bijenkorf department store in The Hague when the revolving door suddenly stopped, causing me to bump into the glass with a bang. I know these doors and they are always rather irritating, but this was not normal, so I went straight up to their client services desk and complained. They apologized and offered me a voucher for free coffee and cake in their restaurant. Later on in the week they called me to apologize again and to inform me that the door was indeed faulty and had now been repaired. And then, a few days after this arrived:

Now isn’t that really nice and customer friendly!

Say it with flowers!

And enjoy this beautiful spring weather!

Phyllis

 



Some serious artwork

This week was a mid-term school holiday week, so while Eline stayed home with Whopper Onno and I got to spend a day together in Amsterdam. We went to the refurbished Rijksmuseum and it is a good thing we are early birds, because already early in the morning it was soooo busy!

 

We headed straight for Rembrandt’s Night Watch (which I had never seen before) and look at the crowd already there!

 

Eventually we did manage our way to the front, I have better pictures than this one, but this one – as it is taken from the side and it shows one of only two ladies guarding the painting (!) – gives you a good idea of the size of the painting.

 



Apart from the Rembrandt paintings also the Vermeer paintings drew real crowds and no wonder, from up close I loved these:

 

Another favourite of mine that day, the Threatened Swan by Jan Asselijn, apparently the very first painting the museum every acquired

 

And this, Festoon of Fruit and Flowers by Jan Davidsz de Heem





Also this selfportrait by Vincent van Gogh, amazing from up close

 



The museum has much more to offer than paintings, like the doll’s houses. The crowds over here made it difficult to make pictures, so I only have pictures of parts of one house. See that reception room on the second floor? Those walls were paintings made with oil paint! And those very small Delft blue plates in the kitchen on the ground floor!

Unlucky for me the library was closed, I did so want to see that (love libraries), so I could only take a picture through the glass door.

And those Delft blue tulip vases, I love these! Can you imagine these with red tulips in spring?!

Not only were the artworks impressive and so beautiful, so is the building itself (it was my first visit, I never went before the refurbishment)

The view from the restaurant

 



We had to laugh too, look at this Meissen porcelain monkey, who does it remind you of:

 



Yes, we named this the Miley Cyrus monkey!

And this drawing by Appel reminded us of …

Yes, Whopper!

And obesity….. not a 21^st century thing at all!

By 12.30 it had become too busy for (our) comfort, time to head out for a nice lunch at the Café Luxembourg

 



Home made tomato soup, veal croquet, home made Russian salad (huzarensalade) with fried parsley and some pickles, yum!

It was a very enjoyable day!

Quilt wise, I worked on Phebe ....after taking off some of the borders, redoing the dogtooth borders and reattaching those and the applique borders, she lies  f l a t !

So now finally I can go ahead with Phebe and give her applique borders more applique!

 

Phyllis