Sewing Tote

This is the sewing tote I made for Kylie for the Friends in Stitching (Online Group) Christmas Swap, it's one of my favourite patterns! I won the fabrics some time ago, don't you think they were perfect for this project.

I haven't been into my craftroom since I tidied it, the last two days have been spent helping hubby with renovation work and putting up cornice...still more work to be done yet :-(

Santa (aka Peg) has been and gone

These are the remainder of the chrissie pressies from Peg.

Little purse for the hands,

Something for the table (12" mini quilt)

and something for the tummy was shortbread biscuits but they're all gone now!

This is the main present, a gorgeous table runner

Thank-you Peg!

I spent yesterday in the craft room having a good clean up as I couldn't see my cutting table and there was stuff piled high around my machine and lots of stuff sitting on my computer desk too.

It's now ready to tackle some projects, I have plans to practice a bit of machine quilting and finish a quilt or two!

Counting down to Christmas

My Friends in Stitching online group are counting down Christmas. Peg put together my gifts, I'm so lucky!

So far we have opened 2 pressies, firstly a gorgeous white tin tree ornament, 

followed by 2 fishy wall art pieces.

Hopefully they can embellish a spot in my garden, as long as the Heron don't try to steal them. The Heron has a fond taste for goldfish, especially those in our fountain.... we don't have many left!

Thank-you Peg, I'm looking forward to opening the next one!

I put together a package for Kylie  The guidelines were something for the tree, something for the hands, something for the tummy, something for the table, something for fun and a main gift.

UNI results are in

Uni results finalised today, 3 High Distinctions and 1 Distinction, I really surprised myself!

Reindeer Noses

No reindeers were harmed in the making of these.

Sarah gave me the link to the tutorial here.

For the Australian version we used Maltesers and Jaffas!

Altered Art Swaps Keep Coming

This week I received two parcels, one from Ana for The Altered Papers Alphabet ATC swap, Letter D and the other from Diane for the Once a Month Tag Swap 'Christmas'.

Diane's tag has the cutest snowman on it, he looks vintage, love him! Thank-you Diane

I love Ana's packaging

And the ATC 'D for doll' is very clever

Plus Ana sent me some fantastic papers and a feather for future projects!

Thank-you Ana!

Xmas Tag

Christmas Tag for Denise @ .Denise's Delights in her Coffeeberry Cottage. I loved playing with glitter on this one!

Back on the bike!

Yes, I'm back, on the sewing machine that is!

 Took a little bit of encouragement to get me going, thanks Barb!

This is the result, almost finished, just need to add some template plastic inside the face, add some eyes and a hanging loop, the body is a pouch, ooh he needs a shiny red bell too!

Just made him for a bit of fun!

RED for Daniel

Every Australian knows the name Daniel Morecombe and the torture his family faced over the last 9 years of not knowing what happened to their little boy.

Today his family will shortly say their goodbyes and lay their beloved son to rest, my heart goes out to them.

 I like many other Queenslanders have worn something red today as a mark of respect, even though I have never met the Morecombe family I will never forget you.

RIP Daniel xxx

I'm thankful for getting my ME time back!

I haven't heard from my swap partner to say whether she has received this tag yet but I'm sure she would have received it by now.

I paper pieced the little turkey, don't you think he's cute!

So talking about thanksgiving, I am thankful that UNI has finished, yippee! So far I've received all High Distinctions but I think my over achiever status ended with the last subject, it's somewhere between a credit and a distinction.

So you know what that means? Watch out craft room here I come!!

I look forward to catching up with some serious stitching, there's lots to do!

Thank-you to all my readers that have hung in with me while my blog posts were few and far between, 2013 will definitely be a more blogolicious year!

A Recipe for Dreaming

A lovely gift from Teresa @ All Things Vintage

My favourite author who sadly lost his battle with Cancer...RIP Bryce Courtney

Thank-you Teresa, it's one book I have not yet read and I look forward to it Monday night after I hand in that final Uni assignment Yippee!

Everyone loves a hand me down

I made this quilt for a dear friend for the birth of her 1st baby eight years ago, it is now being used by her 2nd little cherub. I wonder how long this quilt will last. Will it be handed onto future generations? Do you ever wonder what will become of quilts you have made.

A Stitching Affair

I bet there's alot of stitchers out there who would love to spend 3 days with Helen Stubbings and Gail Pan in the most gorgeous surrounds. Well you can, next June, in Tarraleah, up in the Tassie mountains. 4-5 star accommodation, stitching around wood fires, eating fabulous Tassie cuisine and maybe even spending a bit of time in the spa! Well if this sounds like you checkout The Stitching Affair  . Numbers are limited so you can imagine you'll get plenty of time to chat to both Helen and Gail plus you'll get full kits for all the projects. I'm going, hope to see some of my blog friends there too!

D for Dressform ATC

Here's my latest creation for The Altered Paper's ATC Alphabet swap

D for Dressform, made for Ana @ Scrap da Ana Caldatto
I used a chipboard precut dressform and made the stand from wire.

Apology

Apologies to everyone who copped spam from me, looks like my email has been hacked again. Delete the email!

Three little blackbirds...

...not baked in a pie but in a nest in my backyard. I'm lucky to be able to watch them grow a little more each day. These babies are now 6 days old and snuggly warm, Mum must be off looking for food.

Letter C ATC

This is the Letter C ATC I made for Joanna @ Gracious Rabbit Bones in a monthly swap hosted by Tee @ The Altered Paper

Letter C ATC

Pinwheeling it!

24 pinwheels, ready for the next border! 

I still love the Bliss range of fabrics 

ATC, TAG AND FLOWERS

I haven't dissappeared yet, Uni has been taking most of my craft time but it's nearly all behind me now. The last lecture is complete and only 2 assignments to go and I am done...Yippee!

I have squeezed in a little papercraft and even a bit of stitching but I can't show you the ATC and tag I made as my camera has been taken away to the west coast gggrr. I did however get some snaps of what I received....

Blogscraping

Have you heard of Blogscraping? Well it's time you should. There's unscrupulous folk out there stealing blogposts and putting them on their own blogs to make money! Karen @ Sew Many Ways has experienced this first hand and has written two posts, one here to explain what it is and one here on a solution.  I will in future be truncating my posts to ensure the protection of my content and also my own reputation.
Update: I did a google on blogscraping and there are programs available to do the searches. They work by looking for exact word matches, thankfully i didn't find any of my blogs but it' s not a full search you'd have to pay more for a more advanced search. Here's the link here

Fingers crossed they haven't used your site!

More altering swapping

This months ATC letter was B and I made this for Marilyn @ The Tarnished Rose

B for Balloon!

Marilyn sent me B for Bird

plus all these wonderful extra goodies

Thank-you Marilyn for being a terrific swap partner! I'll get hours of fun creating with these goodies!

Now to spooky matters, Tee @ The Altered Paper also hosted an Denim Pocket Halloween Swap and I was lucky to have Tee's mum Frannie (No Blog Yet) as my partner, I sent Frannie all of these goodies

My altered pocket filled to the brim with ribbons, stickers, buttons, fabric, skeleton plus..

an altered tag...

and a handmade black cat (these are so quick to whip up!)

Frannie did the most amazing job altering a pocket for me, I love all the halloween diecuts 

Front 

 and back

and inside was filled with awesome goodies

 plus a vial of walnut crystals, perfect for staining ribbons, lace and just about everything!

and a spooky skeleton!

Thank-you Frannie, I feel very lucky to have you for my partner in this swap!

No stitching has been occurring around here lately as Uni and work have been swamping me. I've got 4 assignments left to do and only one two-day workshop to attend and then Uni will be over. I drove home Saturday night from the last two-day workshop and it was snowing at Spring Hill, it was almost a blizzard and in my little car it was a bit scary, so I took it slowly and even pulled over a couple of times. The flakes were nearly 2" in diameter, the biggest I've ever seen.

So to all my stitching friends I will be back stitching by Christmas and hopefully there'll be some of my own designs being released in the new year.

I love Fall in the Springtime!

Well it is Spring here but I’m celebrating Fall with our friends in the Northern Hemisphere.

Tee @ The Altered Paper hosted another Tag of the Month swap and Fall was the theme.

My partner Carol (no blog) sent me two of the cutest tags .... 

 and some lovely goodies....

I looked everywhere for a maple leaf stamp and look what Carol sent me, she must have a sixth sense!

And here's the card I sent Carol, little hearts falling..

I sent extra goodies too but I forgot to take a photo :-(

Thank-you Carol for being a wonderful swap partner!!

The gorgeous spring weather on Saturday got us out of the house and upto Repulse Dam for a lesson in fly fishing, my son picked it up easily but no fish were harmed during the lesson ( i.e we didn't catch any)

Isn't the scenery beautiful?

...and even Lucy enjoyed a little dip in the freezing cold water

I wish everyday was a beautiful!

Bags and Paper

Remember this swap I took part in a few weeks ago here? Well it's about time I share a photo of the sweet bag made by De for me

(Photo bloglifted from De's Site)

A lovely spotty tote, with a doily embellishment and the cutest flower trim from Inn Country, one of my favourite shops. Thank-you De!

This week saw me posting packages to the US including one for an altered denim pocket in a Halloween theme and stuffed full of goodies, plus an Alphabet ATC for "B" and a Tag for the tag a month swap in a Fall theme. I can't show you those yet as they're a surprise.

 Also last week I received an extra Alphabet ATC from a new comer to the group, Kamali, look at her lovely work

Thank you Kamali!

And also my "A" ATC from Amy Arrived in a gorgeous Alice in Wonderland Theme

plus Amy also included a bundle of extras, these will not go to waste! 

Thank you Amy!

So what's installed for me for the rest of the week?.... an assignment, I'll get through it eventually.

Happy Stitching and Scrapping everyone

Hugs

JO xxx

ATC extra A

Tee from The Altered Paper asked if I could make another 'A' ATC for a new gal who wanted to join the monthly alphabet ATC swap. This is the card I created except just before I posted it I added the word 'wings' under angel

This went to Kamali (no blog) , I'll show you next time the gorgeous card Kamali made for me.

It's absolutely freezing in Tassie tonight, i wouldn't be surprised to see snow in our backyard in the morning. Perfect weather for locking myself away with my computer to do a uni assignment which is due next week, so no distractions please, don't go posting beautiful pictures, I need to focus!

Fee's Shabby Shack

My gorgeous friend Fee has an exciting new business opening today.

If you love all things shabby you must go check it out, and you might even win a little prize over there if you do!

So click HERE to find out more! 

Tea Towel Bag Swap

Here's a bag I made for a Fiona @ Dragonfly Crafts in an online swap. We had to use a tea towel so I chose a white one and stamped it with Fiona's favourites, paris and butterflies and then chose a purple fabric to compliment it, another of Fiona's favourites.

The pattern is by Monica Poole of Moonshine Designs called the Bella Bag, I love the shape of this bag, very cute.

(Photo taken by Fiona)

I haven't opened my swap yet from De @ Re-de-zines, so I'll show you what I receive another time.

....and even more altered goodies!

In an earlier post I mentioned I had joined The Altered Paper's Tag a Month Swap, my tag made for me by Mercedes @ All Things Pretty arrived and it's gorgeous.

The Theme was bathing beauties and I love Mercedes take on the theme, if you look closely there is a crab pinching the girls bottom! 

Her package also included other ephemera, some that I don't think I could ever cut into they're so pretty! 

Thank you Mercedes!

Mercedes creates many beautiful things and I spent ages on her blog looking at all the eye candy.

For those of you who are asking what I do with my tags and ATC's, some are just hanging around the place, some of my ATC collection are in folder sleeves, the kind that sportscards fit into and some are in boxes. They're a good size little project to work on and be creative.

If you're interested in monthly tag swaps just pop over to Tee's blog @ The Altered Paper and if you join in you could win a monthly prize like this one that I received for August. 6"x6" paper pad full of the prettiest papers and some of Tee's handmade goodies.

Thanks Tee!

More ATC Swapping

My partner in the The Altered Paper's Face Only ATC Swap was Olivia @ Olivia's Creative Quest. Here's the lovely card she created for me...

Olivia also included some extra pieces for crafting with and a gorgeous handmade thank-you card....

.... with the cutest little stamp on the back

Thank you Olivia for being a lovely swap partner.

And I have to mention another angel in my life and that's Kerri, she's so generous, look at the gorgeous bundle she sent for my birthday last month.

Kerri and I were introduced by blogging, what a wonderful tool this is for creating friendships.

Thank-you Kez!! Love ya lots!