What to do with 409 yards of fabric?!

Today I received the 409 yards of PFD Fabric that I ordered from Robert Kaufman....yes 409 yards!

It seems like ages ago that I did anything creative or productive and I can't wait to get some dyeing done!

Not that I haven't been doing anything....

Christmas season is always busy with visitors and I also spent some time in New Zealand with my family.  My sister that lives in Mexico came to visit and I haven't seen her in 5 years so this was a good time to go home and catch up.

It was great to go home and experience summer in NZ - considerably cooler to the 32 degs celcius that we are used to in Singapore.....

My next post will be my 200th post so watch this space for something special!!!!

Happy Quilting

Marianne

More fabric Landscapes

Yesterday I found a matt and frame for my landscape picture:

Island Bay Beach, Wellington, New Zealand

These are photos printed onto fabric then machine embroidered

.

Today I started on another one - also a scene from New Zealand:

Mt Ruapehu, New Zealand (original pic)

I have started embroidering the snow and am now working on the tussocks in the front of the picture.
 (Check out that BEAUTIFUL BLUE Sky!!!!)

More photos of progress later

I have been looking for something more "Singapore" but its hard to find a picture that doesn't have buildings.  Maybe a nice orchid??

Oh and here are the two traditional  blocks I made for a friends birthday and a friend leaving:

Alisons Birthday Block
(made with my hand dyed fabrics)

Mels Block

Yesterday I also cut up one of my hand dyed fabrics and had a "play".

Not sure if I like this yet........

Happy Quilting!

Landscapes

I have been taking a break from dyeing fabrics (ended up with dermatitis and had to explain to my bewildered doctor why my fingers were a strange shade of purple! ) and have been making some (gasp!) traditional blocks for friends that are having birthdays or leaving.  Don't get me wrong I like traditional blocks and I admire those that make them - I just don't make them well....I will post the pics tomorrow.....

Yesterday I decided to play around with landscapes and here is the picture so far....

This photo is of Island Bay in Wellington, New Zealand which I took in 2009.

I have been busy machine embroidering all the details in.  Just need to do the sea and the sky.  I think I will frame this and hang it on the wall at home.  Speaking of walls....my walls at home have been very bare over the last two months with my quilts hanging in the exhibition at Chinatown.  The quilts will be coming down shortly so if you still want to have a look they are at:

The Loft Cafe
1st Floor
cnr Smith St and South Bridge Road


Happy Quilting

1 sleep to go!...More Fabric Postcards

There is only 1 more sleep until the British Club Quilt Challenge and I have been busy making the last of the fabric postcards, christmas tree tags and hand dyed fabrics.
Here are some of the Singapore fabric postcards that I have made using photos taken by my friend Kim (with her permission of course!)

I also had some dye and a couple of fat quarters of fabric left over from last weeks dyeing session and so I dyed another couple of pieces of fabric.

Multicoloured Hand-dyes

In total I now have:

137 Fat Quarters of hand dyed fabrics

3 x 1/2 yards of hand dyed fabrics

69 Fabric Postcards

43 Christmas Tree tags

All of this was made in between watching the World Cup Rugby games.

Congratulations to the "All Blacks" of New Zealand for winning the Rugby World Cup 2011!!!!!

Blue skies and clean green air!

The last 10 days I have been in Wellington, New Zealand visiting my parents and to celebrate my Dad's birthday.  It was a very busy 10 days but it was wonderful catching up with family and friends.

This is a picture of Mum and Dad's motorhome but what I really want you to see is that BEAUTIFUL clear blue sky!  Oh how I have missed clear blue skies, fresh clean air and hillsides covered in native trees! 

Here is a view from Wellington Harbour taken from the Maungaraki hills.

There was major Rugby world cup fever in New Zealand and rugby was everywhere you went.

I am back in Singapore now and enjoying being back with my own family and the warmer weather.

Somehow though, I will always be a "Wellington Girl" at heart!


Marianne

Christmas is coming!

I heard that there are only 116 sleeps until Christmas so today I spent the day in the sewing room making Christmas postcards as well as a few others.
Here are todays postcards:

Fashion Chic

Postcards from Home

Sanddunes 2

Xmas Trees

Snowflakes
(still needs some "bling"!)

The last card is still a work in progress.  I think it is in need of some "bling" to make it nice and sparkly!

p.s I have also listed some of my cards on the website "Felt" which is a Handcrafting website based in New Zealand.

Check out my shop at:

www.mariannebos.felt.co.nz 

Happy Quilting

Culturally confused?

Here are my latest fabric postcards:

Singapore River
(original photo by me)

Haere Mai

Hmm anyone get the feeling I'm a little culturally confused?

Check out my other cards on:
http://www.mariannebos.etsy.com/

Happy Quilting

Today's Postcards

Not a lot of sewing happened today due to having to take kids to the doctor (nothing serious!) but I did manage to finish a couple of postcards.  I hope you like them:

Pretty in Blue

New Zealand 1

I really need to get my photography skills up to scratch as these all look crooked when they are straight (I PROMISE!)

check out my etsy page:
http://www.mariannebos.etsy.com/

Back in Singapore and back online

It has been ages since my last blog and that is not to say that I have been idling away the time.  The kids went back to school  last week and my mum in law left on Sunday night back to Holland so I am finding the house rather quiet during the day.  It's back to just me and Misty!  Misty has not been her usual bouncy self  the last couple of days and I suspect that she is missing Oma.

The last couple of weeks were busy with the kids in NZ (Brrr) and settling back into a normal routine in Singapore. While in NZ I took the girls to the bead shop in Petone and they spent a couple of hours making necklaces, bracelets and earrings.  It wasn't really Luke's thing so we went out for a drink at one of the nearby cafes. 

Making jewellery at Bead store

Celine managed to go horse riding again while we were home.  Sadly that is something that she is not able to do in Singapore so it was great for her to brush up her skills and even managed to do some jumps.

Luke spent an afternoon at the H20 pool with his friends Tim and Tim.  He also had his first ever sleep over at my sisters house and the next day she roped him into playing hockey.  He really enjoyed the game even though he wasn't really sure what to do and the other kids in the team were so supportive and encouraging!
It was great to watch him on the field although by the end of the game I couldn't feel my toes anymore due to the cold.

While in NZ I discovered the Edmonds Magic Pavlova mix.  It comes in a small plastic egg and all you have to do is add water and sugar.  Surely it couldn't be this easy?  Yep it was! and it was really yummy. I have bought a couple of them back to Singapore and I baked one up on Sunday.  Yum yum! Ok so the picture below is not actually the one I baked but I bet it tastes every bit as good!

Last week I also took Gysje to the Pottery Jungle here in Singapore.  If you are into pottery then this is the place to go. 

Today was the first time since June that I have been able to get behind the sewing machine to work on the Geisha quilt. My mum in law and I went to the quilt shop last week to pick up a new background fabric as we didn't like the one it came with. Hopefully it will get finished in the next week as I am looking forward to starting on something new. (and more exciting?!)

Well thats about all from my for now.....Happy quilting

Visitors from home and our dyeing frenzy

The last two weeks have been pretty busy with my parents visiting from New Zealand and the kids having started school holidays.  It was great to be able to show my parents where we live and a little bit of Singapore.  The 9 days that they were here just flew by and there are still so many things that I want to be able to show them.  I guess they will just have to come back again!

Mum and Dad in Chinatown at the Buddah Tooth Relic Temple. Afterwards we went to the Chinese Heritage Museum and then enjoyed a lovely lunch at the local hawker centre.

My parents also bought some origami papers with them and it kept my children busy (and very quiet) the whole afternoon!

We had a lovely dinner with them at the Brazilian BBQ place before they left.  It was fantastic!

The last couple of days I have been busy dyeing more fabric.  Celine has been helping me make some of the more "interesting" pieces.  We have been laying the fabric onto a piece of plastic sheeting on the deck, then adding our colours.  We added another piece of fabric on top of the first to soak up the excess dye.  Strangely enough the top piece (which ended up yellow and green)  turned out quite a different colour from the bottom one (purple and orange)  Not sure why that happened!  Any suggestions?  We still have some resist to try out and want to try our hand at marbelling fabric with shaving cream.

Will post some photos of the finished pieces soon. 

We have also been busy stocking up on winter gear for our "summer holidays"!  Ski jackets and beanies for our trip home.  We are all soo excited about spending some time at home and catching up with old friends and family. 

On Wednesday Celine and I are going to a new painting group.  She is very excited.  Will keep you posted.....

Happy New Year

Happy new year to you all and we wish you God's blessing on you and your family for the coming year!

We have been home in New Zealand for just over a week and this last week has been action packed! My "to do" list seemed very long but we have managed to most things that we needed to. It's been wonderful to catch up with all our old friends and its been nice being back in familiar territory and the lovely weather here has just made it extra special. My parents and sister arrived back on Saturday from holiday and we had a lovely dinner together on Sunday. This is a photo of our old house. Very spacious and Luke has been playing cricket on the lawn. Very kiwi!

We also stayed a night at Paraparaumu Beach at a friends house (they were on holiday and offered us their house). It was lovely walking along the beach and eating icecream.

The girls are away at camp for the week in Cambridge (just south of Hamilton) and Luke is loving all the attention he has been getting. The kids have all had the opportunity to catch up with old school friends. I am looking forward to going to the Wellington Quilters Guild meeting on Thursday night. I have really missed my quilting friends here even though I have made new quilting friends both in Singapore and via the internet. (You can never have too many quilting friends!)

Its hard to believe that our time here is nearly over - two weeks seems incredibly short. I guess we can't stay on holiday forever and coming home for a few weeks was just what the doctor ordered. I am starting to miss the warm weather and especially my dog Misty. I hear she is having a great time at my friends house and that is nice to hear. I do hope she will still want to come home! The kids have all had a wonderful time here. Well thats all from us.

I wish you all a prosperous and blessed year for 2009.

regards

Marianne