Meet Froggie

Meet Froggie. He came to life in the week before Christmas. I 'just happened' to be walking past a most beautiful fabric shop when the thought 'just happened' to enter my head that Daniel must absolutely have a handsome new froggie to replace his current, grubby-looking favourite. Fabric was purchased, and patterns were drafted, and here he is, an early birthday present for an almost-one-year-old. I thoroughly enjoyed making him, too! Unfortunately, though I don't think the grubby frog is going to be handed over any time soon.
I want to thank you all for taking the time to read along this year! I wish you all the very best for the new year! I am eagerly anticipating the new year with the comforting knowledge that God who sees and knows all things has the whole world in His hands.

In summary

I hope you had an enjoyable Christmas. We led up to Christmas with the kids by reading 'The Jesse Tree' during the month of December, as well as enjoying a Christmas concert and an hour of Christmas praise at church. Christmas weekend was enjoyed in Albany, with a family potluck lunch after church on Christmas Day (and leftovers for the rest of the weekend). The kids got their beach fix, and now we are settling back into our at-home routines.

God has blessed us all in so many ways this past year, giving us so much for both body and soul. We are thankful for the happy, healthy family we have been given, and for the things we have been allowed to do and enjoy together this year. We have had opportunities that other people may only be able to dream about (I think especially of our housebuilding project, and my quiltmaking experiences). We trust that God will also give us what we need during 2011, and pray that we may live in a way that brings Him honour.
As far as my sewing goes, I've been spending some time making plans for the new year - setting priorities and goals, and mapping out how I might achieve them.
This includes things like:
- revamping my website
- maybe setting up an online shop (bigcartel?) through which to sell my work
- working towards an exhibition of my childhood quilts (starting with submitting an exhibition proposal to my preferred galleries)
- entering my quilts into art exhibitions

On top of that, I have calculated that I need to sew about 40 blinds for the new house, along with a range of cushion covers, and pouffes. Then there are six pieces of furniture awaiting reupholstering, and a whole lot more wanting to be sanded back and refinished (painted or stained) in some way. So I'm sure I'll be keeping out of trouble for at least the next year or so.
I'm looking forward to it. Getting stuck into it all, that is.

And if I do maybe get a bit carried away with it, there are these four little darlings to give me a daily (hourly?) reality check.

Can you hear my cheese eating?

I think we have mixed messages reaching that little brain up there. We are trying to teach Caleb to eat with his mouth closed, but he seems to consider it an accomplishment if we can hear his cheese eating! Hmmm...

Writing stones

There has been all manner of sewing and making around here in the last month or so, but I haven't been so diligent about sharing it with you here. One project I really enjoyed was these writing stones. Hannah is enjoying the challenge of learning to read, so it was the perfect time to make these. The idea comes from somewhere on The Write Start (check out her Writers Workshop), and I love that these look beautiful even just sitting in a bowl. (They are made by putting alphabet rub-ons onto river pebbles, and sealing with varnish).

Teacher totes

I made tote bags for Aaron and Hannah to give to their teachers to show appreciation for all their work this year. I figure extra totes never go astray around here, so hopefully they'll find a use for them too.

I started with 'I like my miss because...' and got Aaron and Hannah each to finish the sentence off for their respective teachers. I particulary like Hannah's statement, below: (The bags are lined to hide the back of the embroidery).

Stitch, stitch, chatter, chatter

Caleb and Aaron have had itchy fingers watching Hannah stitch away. So we remedied that - access to my pins, for Caleb.....and a nice red toolbox containing good quality pins, needles and scissors for Aaron.
They have all sorts of grand stitching plans for the summer holidays!

The point of no return

I did it. That series of five quilt tops which I wasn't entirely happy with (shown all nicely stacked, above) now looks like this:
and this:Only the first cut was difficult. After that it was all systems go. Hopefully there will be further progress to show you next week.

21 months on

I'm currently working on this quilt as I contemplate drastic action on these, and it occurred to me that I have been working on it for around 21 months. I started drawing it when Caleb first started playing 'peekaboo' with us, uncoordinated baby style. And this week we snapped Daniel, 21 months younger than Caleb, playing peekaboo at the dinner table for the first time. Still a bit hit and miss!These are quite timely really, as I need to do some sketches for stitching into the background of this quilt.

A note for Aunty Arls

Dear Aunty Arls, thankyou for your parcel. Mummy made us wait till Daddy came home, to open it, but it was worth the wait. We are all very excited about our treasures. We love you, and look forward to seeing you at Grandma's house at Christmas! Love from Aaron, Hannah, Caleb and Daniel.

Someone should learn to control her kids

I took a sanity break this afternoon. Meaning that I sat onto the couch for fifteen minutes with a cup of coffee and a magazine and tuned out. That was after trying in vain to get both of these two monsters to take a monster-sized nap. They've been doing really well until today. Naturally - because today I really needed them to sleep, so that we can all go to see Aaron and Hannah perform in their school Christmas concert tonight. So here you see them both, sleeping like babies while I rest on the couch......or not...On the bright side, I was just wanting some handwork for travelling and so on, and this non-ball of twine should keep me occupied for many more hours than it took Caleb and Daniel to unravel! :(