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Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Where have I been??

I really don't know.... I can't believe it has been a couple of weeks since I posted! I guess I have been pretty busy doing who knows what.... cleaning mostly, lol! We've had so many dust storms that it is driving me nuts! Cameron did go around some of the doors putting special foam tape to try to seal them a bit better, and I am hoping that will help.

We've also had a busy couple of weeks of school. I have been trying to sort out all the books and make sure we can find them easily again. I remember my aunt used to take photos of her bookshelves before she moved (they moved often to other countries) so that when she was unpacking the books could go in the same spots on the bookshelves. I used to think that was rather strange... but now I am thinking it would be a good idea! So much easier and quicker to find things! I think I am getting old, lol! Here are just two of the... ummm... er.... too many to mention... bookshelves I have been sorting:


The house we are living in is very big. The ground floor has a large lounge room when you walk in, then a dining area, then another large dining area, then another lounge room, and the kitchen. The reason there are two living areas like this is because the front lounge is for men, and the other one further back is for women. Since we don't have the need to keep the men and women apart, we have changed it around a little to suit us. We have made the back lounge room for women, our main lounge. We managed to find some second hand furniture... throw a few quilts over it and it looks like this:

(Note to my DMIL (dear mother in law) - see your rug?!!! Fits perfectly!)

This room actually has curtains that you can draw across for privacy, not that we have used them yet, but you never know, they may come in handy :)

The small dining area we have turned into a tv room:


This room is actually a walk through to the other living area, and since we don't need two dining tables... well, I think this is a good solution. And this furniture sort of matches well :) Also second hand. I think now we have found all the furniture we need... phew... shopping here takes a lot of time! I'll explain that a bit better another day!

I'll also show you photos what I have done with the front lounge room another day... and keep going with this little tour of the house....

The other thing that has been taking up a bit of my time and a LOT of Elizabeth's is:


Yep - a little ball of black fur, rescued from a friend's backyard. Its eyes were completely infected, and when we took it to the vet he thought she would lose one of her eyes. But he gave us some ointment, and with a lot of TLC and prayers, both eyes have completly cleared up!! She is quite a cutie. Her name is Ameera - Arabic for princess, and she already behaves like one :)

I have done a bit of sewing but I will save that for another post :) It is Thursday morning, weekend for us. Cameron has gone off with his mates dune bashing and I am going to head to the sewing room.... happy weekend everyone!

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Saturday at home...

Got a few things done around the house today. I took a photo of these chookies I finished on the weekend. They had been waiting for a few months for eyes :) They are all real chooks now, ready to sit on a cookbook and keep the pages open for someone.


Elizabeth baked yummy breadrolls. Last night I had made mini meatballs to put in them, and this morning she was up early putting the flour etc in the bread machine. She then shaped the dough around the meatballs, glazed them with egg wash and sprinkled sesame seeds on top. They turned out really well! And with flour so cheap here, they cost next to nothing (just the other day I bought 5kg of flour for only $1!!).


After the sandstorm and thunder storm everything was dirty, so the boys and I went to work outside around the house. We swept and then hosed down the area in front of our house:


As you can see, we have a little garden in the front:

A high wall surrounds our house (and everyone else's, for privacy). That door you see there is the gate to the world. As soon as Elizabeth and I go out that gate, we need to make sure we are covered. I will post a photo one of these days of how we look :)

We didn't get to cleaning the sides of the house..... they still look like this:


and even worse, this:


But at least we got the front done so that we are not constantly walking all the dirt in the house. It gets in enough by itself!

I managed a few minutes in the sewing room... to make another little 4" log cabin block:

Will they turn into chooks? Wait and see....

Tomorrow morning is class with my sewing ladies. We are going to pin and start quilting the table runners. One good thing about teaching a class and sewing alongside your students is that you end up with a FINISHED PROJECT! At least, you should...!!

Bedtime... have a lovely weekend everyone :)





Saturday, March 12, 2011

Camping in the Dunes

Last weekend we went camping, and I thought you might like to see a few more photos of this beautiful country.

We headed off on Thursday just after lunch in our car, all loaded up :

Our house is the one on the right with the palm tree... can't see it well, I know. Anyway, we met up with some friends and drove out of town for about an hour. Then we went off the freeway, let down our tires, and headed off into the sand dunes :)

Cameron had a specific spot in mind - the tallest dune in the range. So with the help of the gps and heading in the right general direction, we found a place to camp - behind this huge sand dune in a hollow protected from the wind.

While I worked very hard on my 'Tis the Season stitchery, the boys contemplated the tent:


Not quite sure what they were thinking, but eventually they got it up :) Now, can you see that little peak behind the boys? It is really, really, really high. Trust me. It is. Here, let me show you a bit more....

Cameron decided he'd drive up to see how far he'd get:

Aha! What a view! But it still doesn't show how high it is.... How about this one:


Can you see little people on the right there? That would be us fearful ones staying safe at the bottom of the dune.

Here you can see our little campsite from the top of the dune:


As you can see, we were in the middle of nowhere :) It was very quiet and peaceful... until some young hoons came to play on the biggest dune with their quad bikes! Boys will be boys everywhere in the world, and they spent quite some time showing off for us. I should have taken some photos, but we were trying not to encourage them :) Thankfully they eventually left us in peace.

We had a lovely bbq, and camp fire, and roasted marshmallows. Fun and yum!

The next morning we had a relaxed brecky and pack up. As we were driving out of our little sheltered spot, we bumped into these:

Didn't get any better ones because I left my camera at home and only had Cameron's phone to use. Next time. Can you believe they find things to eat in the dunes? They are amazing animals.

So that was our first camping trip and probably the last of the season since it is already warming up. This weekend we had a sand storm and thunder storm, so good thing we went last weekend!

Oh, I brought back a bag of sand to use in my sewing projects :) Handy living in a desert!

Weekend for all of you tomorrow, so have a good one!



Monday, March 7, 2011

Photos! Yay!

It seems that if I use Internet Explorer instead of Firefox the photos are loading... slowly! Not a very technical solution, but I will take it :)

So now I can show you some older photos that wouldn't go in the other posts. Oh, I also found the charger for my camera so life is good!

First of all, the quilt top with Kaffe Fasset fabrics:


I need to pin it and start quilting it soon. I already have a design in mind for quilting the white areas... do you like how it turned out? I do :) I can see a pattern release coming up!

Next, the "Bargello" water bottle cover, lol!


It went missing bottle and all yesterday.. in my sewing room... I was worried I had packed it away in a tub of Christmas fabric or something (I had been sorting the tubs, you see), but this morning I found it on a shelf - thank goodness! It must have blended in too well or my eyesight is really going down the drain....

So the table runner we are doing in Sunday morning class (remember, Sunday is the second day of the week here!):


Based on this pattern, I used a Nancy Halvorsen charm pack Alice sent me for Christmas. I like how it has turned out. Next week we pin and quilt it - I think I will do an all over pattern...

After I finished my top and waited while the ladies worked on theirs, I decided to play a little with the 1" strips... and started a little log cabin block which might turn into a chook... let's wait and see!


Now, for the Star!!!! As I already said to a few of you in emails, it is together but there is a slight problem:


Look close and you will see.... that it doesn't lie flat in the middle! Hmmmmm... I will take it to my friend's house tomorrow night and ask her what can be done. Other than that I think it is very pretty and I have discovered that if I drape it over my quilt frame you can't tell that it bubbles up, see:


It might just have to live there at Christmas time!

Now I am feeling like heading for my sewing room to do some more sorting and then some sewing. I need to make sure all children are going well with their school work first though. Wow, it is Monday already, the week is flying by! I am still getting used to the fact that Monday is the middle of the week, not Wednesday... I will get there I'm sure! To everyone else outside of the Middle East, have a happy first day of the week!


March Finishing Stitches



Unpacked a few more boxes today and sorted a bit more of my sewing room out. A good thing because I came face to face with all my ufos.... aaaaaahhhh!!! Now no one wants to know how many I have, do they? No, didn't think so... hee hee... I don't want to know either, but I think I really need to concentrate on finishing them this year! So, Finishing Stitches for March, here we go!!!

For February we had quite a lot of finishes, so well done ladies! Not bad for a short month! I will get back to posting pics of finishes and blocks, but not until I get my pic posting problems sorted out. Alice will be drawing a name soon for the winner of the Feb charm pack, so keep an eye on her blog!

I decided to make a page on JJ's for Finishing Stitches instead of repeating myself every month. So go HERE to see what it is all about and if you want to join in this month, leave a comment on this post. Remember, there is a charm pack up for grabs for one of the participants!

Sunday, March 6, 2011

Does it work?

I've been having trouble with blogger or the internet or something. Pictures still don't want to load and I have no idea why. It could be the internet here, not sure... but it is very annoying.

In the meantime, our container arrived last week... and while everything was there, some things were not quite in one piece... :( A bit disappointing, and means now we have to fill out paperwork for insurance claims. Still, it is all here now and I am busy trying to unpack and get it in some state of order!

In the meantime, I have also been teaching a beginners class which has been fun. We are making a runner based on this pattern Petits Fours. All the runners are turning out really sweet, and I am teaching basic patchwork and quilting techniques as we work on it. Next up, we'll do a real quilt :)

On Monday I went to a class myself... doing a Star Table runner. I'd wanted to learn this last time I was here, but never did, so I was quite pleased my friend was running the class again. Here it is part of the way done:

(oh!!! The photo loaded, yay!!!)

...... and that is the only one that wants to load.... so I shall go to bed and try again tomorrow. Have a great weekend everyone and I will be back :)
 

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