Marg Low Designs

The Friday Girls and Christmas

This last week I've been working on the Friday girl's gifts. I can now show you the finished decorations as we swapped gifts today.

Yes more of Barb's tags. I've lost count of how many decorations I've made so far so I guess that's a strong indication of how much fun I've had (and am still having) playing with them.

The great thing about these is they are just the right size to slip inside a Christmas card and post.

And I've had lots of fun combining the tags with fabric from the stash and new purchases.

I have so many ideas about what I'd like to do with the buttons and tags, I'm not sure where to stop! 

It's so exciting when something as simple as a beautiful button or tag can provide the inspiration for so many decorations.

I'm sure I need to make another one using the stripe in the background.

This is a set for my brother and his family. Named so there can be not disputes about which one belongs to who.

The labels are simply tea-dyed cotton tape (because that's what I had in the cupboard and it was the first thing I pulled out) written on with a pigma pen and attached with cross stitches. I used my aplique board (A4 size board with a sheet of fine sandpaper glued to it) to prevent the tape from slipping. 

Theodora Cleave & the Friday Girls

Remember the lovely parcel I received from Barb the other week. I promised myself, the first chance I got I had to play with them. Each Christmas I aim to make myself a new decoration/s and I've just decided these will be it.

 Sewing was at my house today and I managed to make two of them. Not a bad effort, considering we had show and tell, swapped recipes, chatted and ate way too much yummy stuff (well I did).

I've aways loved Barb's buttons but this is the first time I've  incorporated them into one of my designs. They are lovely to work with and I already have another one ready to sew. The rusty bells have been in the cupboard for ages (years) and are now finally being used. I'm sure you all know just how satisfying that is.

 

red, white & blue

Last Friday, Sue-Anne arrived with the magazine CountryHome. I fell in love with the red, white & blue decorating style and had to buy a copy.  

It's obvious what colour scheme I was subconsciously thinking about when I went shopping for nothing in particular on Saturday.

I was showing Jan my fabric purchases today and straight away she recognised the paisley print as being designed by Polly Minick & Lauri Simpson. The red, white & blue collection I found so inspiring belongs to Polly Minick.

It all makes sense now!

a quilt top and birthday

My week started with a great burst of activity and it looked and felt like I would achieve many things and now it's Saturday! I feel sure Wednesday and Thursday must have been half days.

I did manage to put together this quilt top. You may remember a few weeks ago I made a brown and pink dolls quilt. The first blocks I made were too big, so rather than leave them sit in the cupboard for well, ever, I decided to make a few more and turn them into a throw size quilt.  I've even made the backing.

And I had a birthday. I was truly spoilt.

Sue-Anne stitched this beautiful key keeper for me.

 

Jan made this gorgeous dolls quilt, from the book Childhood Treasures, p107.  Helen gave me a gift voucher to my favourite patchwork shop - what more could a girl want? Plus fabric, soaps (Bec asked me if my friends were trying to tell me something), hand made tags......

Then Brownyn dropped in after work with this lovely 1930's tray and accessories; a perfect match for my Nana's jewellery box.

I feel very fortunate to have such wonderful friends! Thank you for making my birthday so special.

a birthday gift

It seems like ages since my last post, but it's been one of those weeks were you need to keep working away steadily at everything or find yourself swamped.

I've decided after 5 years it's time to revamp my pattern covers. So after much agonising and deliberating I finally made a decision and took myself off to the printers.

Then it was onto a project for Homespun. Now the project was easy in comparison to the photo for the profile. Let's just say my daughter had a good laugh, and so did I!

No sooner was that posted off, than I had to make a start on Sue-Anne's birthday present.

And this is how it turned out. A small bag, needlecase and pincushion.

And a matching tag.

Then I had a wonderful weekend attending a workshop with Sue Ross. The workshop was organised by Murray River Quilters for members and non-members, but more on that later.  

friday sewing

Sewing was at my house on Friday. Jan had been to the Sydney Quilt show and brought some gorgeous bits and pieces for show and tell.

Sue-Anne had been to A Patch of Country in Wangaratta and spied this on sale. Sorry, the photo is a bit of a tease. I think its single bed size. I wasn't paying too much attention as I was busy thinking about how soon I could make a trip to Wang on the hunt for a similar bargain. Would it have been impolite to tell the girls there was salad in the fridge and help yourself to lunch, 'I'm off to Wang'!

The pattern is 'Brick Garden' from the book Daylily Days by Need'l Love.  Sue-Anne loved this quilt when she first saw it and purchased the book and fabrics to make it.

If your anything like me you'll have a list a mile long of quilts you'd love to make and own one day. Here's a way of achieving it, if only we can be as lucky as Sue-Anne.

Now I'm not the only one who enjoys sewing at home. Azzy loves having visitors especially if they're coming for lunch. The performance he puts on would lead you to believe he hasn't been fed in a month. He cannot control himself when it comes to food. And it doesn't have to be 'food' food. Fabric, tissues, paper, I even caught him eating some spilt potting mix the other day.

I've come to the conclusion he needs more supervision than a toddler. The moment we realise we haven't seen or heard him in awhile, we start looking. Experience tells us he's usually doing something he shouldn't be. Like the time he jumped up on a bed and gobbled down two packets of throat lozengers, wrapping and all. The label carried the warning an adult should consume no more than one packet in 24 hours. He'd eaten two in less than 15 minutes. I find it difficult enough to consume one lozenger they taste so awful.  Perhaps they taste better with the wrapping on! We didn't know if we should ring the vet or just wait and see. We opted for the latter and he showed no ill effects from this impromptu snack.

Here he is trying to get my attention as I work away on the computer. Looking at him who'd think he'd have such bizarre eating habits. Now I would like to point out that we don't deliberately leave 'food' lying around within his reach. He has an uncanny ability to locate unusual snacks.  An unzippered handbag is a picnic hamper, my basket of fabrics a smorgasboard and the soles of Bec's workshoes (from the bakery) a tasty treat.

For the moment, he's on the couch, sound asleep and staying out of trouble.

a birthday present

Last week it was Helen's birthday. Jan made her a gorgeous bag large enough to fit a cutting mat, ruler and all those other bits and pieces we have to carry around with us. (Just realised a photo would have been nice, sorry!)

There was fabric left over and Jan suggested I could make a matching ruler cover and rotary cutter case.

Now you know I love fabric, especially scraps, and nothing makes me happier than laying them out and deciding which one should go where.

Plus it gave me a chance to check over the pattern I'm writing for them.

But the best thing was a beautifully coordinated gift for a very special friend.

Dear Jane its almost Christmas

One of the lovely things about sewing on Fridays is the chance to catch up on what each of us has been doing during the week. Now we can always rely on Sue-Anne to have something for us to ooh and aah over.

And today Sue-Anne brought along her Dear Jane blocks. You can already tell its going to be very beautiful.

For the rest of us - well I don't think we're ready to make the committment to such a long term project. We'll just sit back and enjoy Sue-Anne's efforts instead and offer words of encouragement like 'Not many to go now!'

What I love most about stitcheries is they are so portable. I can still go to sewing but keep 'working' at the same time. Here's a sneak peek of one of the projects I'll be teaching at Temora in July. Just two more borders to stitch and then I'll be finished - well almost.

Why I like Fridays

There is only one good thing about the week flying by; Friday comes around sooner and I'm sewing with the Friday Girls again.

They've all been so busy and creative over the past couple of weeks.

Helen has been working on this lovely quilt designed by Susan Smith, Patchwork on Stonleigh (sorry I've forgotten the quilt's name). Helen, has used the Fat 1/16's from the Patchwork on Stonleigh Fabric Club for the large stars. Don't they look fantastic! Helen's making this for a wedding present.

Jan made this gorgeous chenille cushion from fabrics purchased last year (or maybe the year before) from Sarah London. These fabrics and the backing fabric all came from her stash. Much too beautiful to have hidden away in the cupboard.

Brownyn enjoyed making Jan's Spot the Yo Yo quilt so much she's made three! All in different sizes and fabrics. How stunning is this! And all finished now. Bronwyn stitched the binding down on this quilt and another small quilt.

But I think Michelle was the most productive. Not only did she serve up a scrumptious lunch she started and finished this bag. Yes, some of you will recognize it.  You know how it is. Sometimes you see something made in certain fabrics and its hard to imagine it in anything else. And this City Girl fabric is gorgeous. The lovely green buckle, from Jan's stash of all things beautiful, is just perfect. Michelle is not keeping the bag. It's a gift for a very special Aunts 60th Birthday.

A bit of frivolity

Sewing was at my house yesterday. Sue-Anne turned up with a beautiful new black handbag, which prompted Jan and I to recall handbags we'd seen and reluctantly decided not to buy.

Now there's nothing like a friend with a new handbag to make you want one as well, especially if you've already got one picked out. As soon as they left I hopped in the car and went straight to the bag shop and Jan did the same thing. Jan's is the tweed bag and was asked a number of times at quilting today if she had made it.

These were not our only purchases. Kathie mentioned a book called Childhood Treasures: Quilts by and for Children, and before we knew it Jan and I had both placed orders for it. But there's more, we also spotted the book Childhood Treasures: Handmade Gifts for Babies and Children by Caroline Zoob. We've all wanted this book for awhile now, so yes, in went the order for three copies.  I don't think we should sew at my house again!

During the week I finished the pattern for my bag "The Garden Sampler".

I have a copy of this pattern to giveaway. To enter the draw, simply post a comment telling me which is my new hand bag! The draw will close next Saturday 12 April.