Artistic potential

Our eighth reveal for Viewpoints 9 group is on from today. I conscripted my grandchildren to help bring my message to life. They are super young artists. More on www.viewpoints9-2.blogspot.com
 

Merry Christmas

Thank you for following my blog throughout this year. I have enjoying writing of the big and small happenings of my year and hope you will join me in 2015 for more adventures in travel, sewing and anything else that comes my way.
So I wish each of you and your families a very Merry Christmas. We are having family time with a few days north of Brisbane in the Maleny/Conondale area and then going way down south to Melbourne, so I'll be quiet for a few weeks.
I hope 2015 is joyful, peaceful and quite marvellous for you xx

Some photos of our patio set for a colourful celebration.

Intriguing

These feather headdresses or dhoeri were made by George Nona and form a wonderful display at the Queensland Art Gallery near the water mall. Each is subtly different.

The gallery is open each day but closed for Christmas and is often nice and quiet at this time of the year.

Christmas time

Always nice to celebrate Christmas time with good friends. Our Mexette gathering on the weekend was fun and these colourful mug rugs were made by Marcia.

This was my oven baked Barramundi on risotto cake with vegetable tart lunch. The Grand View Hotel at Cleveland for those interested. 

Cherries

The abundance of cherries made it possible for me to buy a box of these yummy sweet fruits, something I have never done before. And with so many to eat I decided to make some cherry topping. Can't call it jam as I wasn't prepared to boil it for that long and I made up the recipe as I went along. First to pit the cherries.

Cut the cherries.

Simmer with lemon juice and lemon rind.

Add sugar and simmer further.

My secret ingredient! And the result tastes wonderful with yoghurt.

Did try some fabric colouring but the colour wasn't set in the cloth so washed out to leave brown stains.




 

Sad times

Australians are in shock and mourning for the victims of the Sydney Lindt Café hostage situation which developed yesterday. Thoughts and prayers for the victims and their families.

Lest we forget

With many celebrations planned in 2015 for the 100th anniversary of world war, you may want to be part of a quilt tribute to Anzacs. Small 25cm square quilts are called for with further information on www.lestweforgetquilts.com.au


 

In Chinese

When we were in China in 2006 I had a chop made with my name. Having forgotten about it for many years, I was happy to use it for the back of these postcards.

I have once again recycled a few bits and pieces with a lucky Chinese cricket in the mix too.

Printing again

The clean up after a colourful printing session.

And happy with the result after it has been quilted. I'm enjoying seeing the possibilities of weeds!

 

Colourful fabric

Picked out this colourful, fun fabric covered with fish, crabs, starfish and jellyfish as my birthday fat quarter from Sunnybank Quilters. Luckily I have the brights in my stash and will probably make something for the Melbourne grandchildren.
 

The solution

Yes Rhonda P, a bit of fabric painting over the quilting to bring out the texture and distinguish the design from the background.

I was happy with the result but then found the transition zone between the trunk and canopy too stark.

Before

After

Lace offcuts I'd kept from a formal dress I made for daughter Rita, many years ago, have been put to good use.

 

 

The tree trunk

I free motion quilted the tree trunk and chose a different pattern from the background quilting, however the overall effect was still bland. The photo above is of the quilting in progress.

But I had a solution and this detail photo is the before. Tomorrow I'll have the after shot. 

Art gallery fun

The Gallery of Modern Art in Brisbane has a room for children's activities and the current Journey to Fantastic Lands is fabulous. The interactive animation is so much fun for young and old alike.

You get to choose your story and there are different outcomes for each decision along the way.

I couldn't resist having a turn.

And how appealing are these fantasy worlds?

Quilting

How do you mark circles for quilting? I assembled a number of plates and bowls, of varying sizes and they worked well. The green soap sliver was my marker. These circles are machine quilted.

I'm using some bridal silk that has been printed with rusty bits I inherited from Bob's Dad's collection. The theme of my quilt is 'recycle' and I'll be combining hand stitching and machining. 

Inspiration

It really is a matter of looking, when out and about, to see inspiration in our surroundings. Here at the Garden City shopping centre you wouldn't think there would be much inspiration apart from the interesting window displays in some shops, but this 'living' wall is wonderful, if a little hard to photograph!

And this cladding on some unopened retail space changed from the detail above to......

the eyes have it! Many more layers added, reminding me of clever artistic design.
 

Work on quilt number 7

As we welcome the final month of the year and for those of us with birthdays in this month- yeah!! finally, I am working on the seventh quilt in the Seduced by the Imperfect series. I printed varying intensities of black and grey leaves and began stitching around the edges to make them 'pop'.

I used black thread for all the outlining.

Straight and zigzag stitches in a lime green followed. It's not as visible as I'd like, but I'll consider further options later as the quilt evolves.