And Sew to travel

Our recent overseas trip was just over 6 weeks in duration. I didn't have time to organise myself a hand sewing project to travel with. The time leading up to our departure was taken up with sewing items and getting organised for my stall at Comic Con which was immediately after our return. I'd posted a status on my FB page stating the number of projects I had completed and was promptly bombarded with requests to see the items. I was delighted to oblige although it necessitated the photographing of all the items and loading them up on facebook. That was followed by a flurry of orders from my friends (and their friends) for various things which I then had to package up and send off all over the country.

That's a long story to say..... no hand projects. I was content though. I had a project to do on my computer - (well my husband's computer since I didn't take mine) - sorting and labelling a bunch of photos that I had scanned from my mother's negatives. That would entertain me sufficiently I felt on the long flights we were undertaking. 

So I had resigned myself to 7 weeks of not sewing at all. 

However - that was not QUITE the way it turned out. Our first stopover on our trip was with our Japanese host son Sho and his wife Yuri (and our beautiful host granddaughter Suzu). 

In the corner of their living room I saw a treadle sewing machine. 

Yuri's treadle machine. It was a Janome. I have never seen a treadle Janome before. Usually the machine was  kept packed away because of their 2 cats whom they felt might damage it.

Yuri had bought it second hand because it was such a beautiful piece of furniture. She had sewn a couple of things but during our stay asked me to help her sew something for Suzu. A dress perhaps she suggested. Now I am not much of a garment sewer and wasn't sure that we would be able to manage it in the time we had available but was game to have a go. However Yuri saw the photos of bandana bibs that I had made for stalls and we decided to have a go at those. 

I love those bandana bibs. They are simple and affective and quick to sew. In about half and hour we managed to print the pattern, cut out the fabric and sew them up. 

Yuri did the machine sewing and the ironing and I did the hand stitching - sewing on the press studs and sewing closed the opening left to reverse the bibs. 

It was perfect and so much fun to sew with her. The memory still makes my heart sing.

And of course the model was extra beautiful!

A few weeks later we were in Norway, visiting the home of our host son J and his brand new wife (we had attended the wedding just days before) M had a sewing machine but it wasn't sewing properly. She had hand sewn her wedding gift (called a Morning Gift in Norway) for J as her machine wasn't working. 

J is wearing the apron that M had hand sewn for him as a Morning Gift.

 Fixit Guy had a look at the machine.

 It was all siezed up. A trip into the city to buy machine oil and he had it running again. I then had to take over. It wasn't sewing properly but after I found that the machine needle was in backwards all was good. 

It had gotten too late to do any sewing by the time we had the machine operating properly but since our return home I have been sent a photo of M using the machine and the message that it is working beautifully.

Back again

Hello! And I am back! Its been a while hasn't it! Since I last wrote we have been overseas for 6 weeks. I had planned to write whilst away but I didn't take my computer with me and decided it was too hard to write on my ipad (which I took with me specifically to write blog posts) so that was pretty slack of me but I am in truth rather unapologetic.

We had a brilliant time overseas. I outlined our travel plans in a previous blog post here and I can now tell you that our plans worked out perfectly and we had an absolute blast. We got to meet our Japanese host son's wife for the first time and also our beautiful granddaughter. 

Our barge boat cruise in the Czech Republic was so much fun. We made some good friends and really enjoyed the daily cycling. I managed all the rides without any problems.. well I did walk up a couple of hills but so did a lot of people. Mostly the ride was alongside the river and was pretty flat so easy riding. I did pike on 2 rides. One was on our rest day. 

There was an optional 50km ride (25km out and back) but I took the opportunity to explore the town of Litomerice that we were moored beside. Fixit Guy rode it. We had done a 10km ride in the morning, into and around a nearby town of Terezin, so I wasn't completely slack. The other ride I didn't do was the last ride back into Prague. It was raining and forcast to rain more. I chose to stay on the boat but Fixit Guy and one of our new friends braved it. They got thoroughly soaked so I felt justified in not riding.

We had a lovely time in Germany with our host daughter from 2006 and her family and then had a weekend in Amsterdam en route to Norway. 

The reason for our trip was to attend the wedding in Norway of our host son from 2005 and that was a wonderful experience. We spent a week with him and his family and fully immersed ourselves in the whole event which was just wonderful.

The final leg of our trip was 12 days in the UK, mostly spent exploring Scotland. We were able to catch up with some of FG's extended family ( An aunt and cousins on his dad's side). 

Whilst we were in Scotland we got the news that our Japanese grandson was born. I couldn't resist this treasure from the Edinburgh Castle gift shop

After almost 7 weeks of travelling we arrived back in Australia. Tired but thoroughly delighted by our wonderful time. I have lots more photos and experiences to share but for now.. this will have to do it.

Thursday Thoughts Part 2: Comic Con Sewing

I have been sewing madly the last few weeks trying to get things finished off for the convention. I had finally decided that I was done and posted on Facebook the following post

Did my comic con stall stock take 6 laptop bags, 17 iPad bags, 44 cosmetics purses, 37 pencil cases, 44 earbud/round pouches, 29 zipper coin purses, 29 tissue packet covers, 4 hanging towels, 14 pot holders, 9 hair scrunchies, 5 bandana bibs. All made from geeky type fabrics (Pokémon, doctor who, StarbWars, batman, Wonder Woman etc) I am done now. It's 2 weeks till I leave for overseas and the convention is a week after we get back. I have to tidy my sewing room before I go so need to stop

I was basically having a little boast about what I had done. What I didn't expect was for my friends to start asking about stuff and wanting to buy from me. It started with one friend asking about the iPad bags so I posted her photos of all of the different ones 

Pokemon iPad messenger style bags

and a couple of people asked if they could buy them. Someone asked about the cosmetics bags so I photographed them and posted the pictures 

 Doctor Who Cosmetics bags

and sold 4. Then someone asked about the scrunchies... 

 I didn't mae any more of these - these are leftovers from our Christmas market

and someone about the coin purses... 

Batman and Star Trek teeny tiny zipper coin purses

 I ended up photographing everything and putting them into an album on Facebook 

Ear bud pouches, these ones with periodic table and formulas

Betty Boop pencil cases

Bandana bibs for babies

Space Invaders tissue packet covers

I have been selling things from there. (still have to photograph the laptop bags, the hanging towels and the pot holders but you get the general idea)

The album is actually public if you want to have a look. Comic Con Sewing Album 

I have a page on this blog that I put items I had made onto (so the Comic Con selection committee people could have a look and see what sorts of things I have made/could make) I will load the photos onto that too... eventually.

Thursday Thoughts Part 1:- our travel plans

Did I tell you we are off overseas at the end of this month? Well we are... we leave here on Tuesday 25th and fly out of Australia on Thursday 27th. We have given ourselves a day extra in case something goes wrong on our drive to Brisbane. Its 900km and we regularly do it in a day and rarely have we had anything go wrong... but, since we are retired and have the time we have decided to have the extra day just in case. So... we leave in 12 days time.

We fly to Japan first off for a week to visit with Sho, our host son from 2004. He lived with us for a year and this will be our 3rd visit to see him. This time we get to meet his wife and baby daughter so its very special. We will also get to visit with his parents and perhaps see some of his siblings.

From Japan we fly to Frankfurt (via Dubai and a 5 hour lay over at 3 AM... blergh) and from there catch a train to Prague where we will be joining our week long Barge Bike tour. Then its back to Germany (by train) and 4 days with our host daughter from 2006 Lena and then train to Amsterdam for a long weekend. From there we will fly to Norway and have a week with our host son Joergen (from 2005) and will attend his wedding whilst we are there. Then we fly to Scotland, hire a car and have 12 days driving about UK (well Scotland and England) catching up with some of Fixit Guy's cousins and his aunty Joyce. We arrive back in Australia on the 12th September. 

We won't be coming straight home though. We have volunteered to help out at a conference in Brisbane - serving on the Handmade With Love stall for Our Rainbow House at the Australian Pricipals Association conference. Our group has been making lots of items out of the fabric from Zambia especially for the conference. 

The Brisbane Comic Con is only a week after that - the one that I am hoping to share a stall with my son's partner Earthyyu of Earthyyu Drawstuff  I say hoping to, as we have applied but have to be selected and we don't hear until the day we leave Emerald... so we are assuming we are in and I will take all the stuff down with me. Its too far to come home and then drive back down for the conference so we will stay down. (well I will anyway. Fixit Guy is still debating)

Then my daughter is going to be heading down to Sydney Comic Con the following week. She is going to be driving down for it and I have decided to go with her. It will give me a chance to see my mum again (she turns 95 the day we fly out of the UK) and also my sister who has been diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease. It will also give Fangirl company on the drive and I will be her off sider at the convention. 

So I won't be home till early October... and then we are planning a trip down to Melbourne in November to catch up with our son down there for his 30th birthday.....

Its all very exciting and hard to get my head around. 

WIP Wednesday

Wow I am actually getting a WIP Wednesday post written and its only 7 mins past Weds. That is a record for me for a few months.

This week I have been working on some of the Comicon sewing I am doing for the stall I am hoping to have at the Brisbane Comic Con in September - I will only hear if I get in at the end of this month. Here's hoping (We have to apply for a stall and wait to get selected) I am planning on sharing the stall with my son's partner that I have been calling Gamer Girl on this blog. She is now using the name Earthyyu Drawstuff ... so I am going to swatch over to that. You can see some of her stuff on her Facebook page here.

This last week I have been making some Easy Cosmetic Bags (from Sew So Easy) - by some I mean I made 25 this week in a variety of Pop Culture fabrics. I now have a zipper bag in every one of the pop culture fabrics that I have. I have also been working on some Teeny Tiny Zipper bags, using up some of the scraps of the pop culture fabrics. They are a variety of sizes as I was just working with the size of the scraps. I realised that I was out of the lobster clips I usually put on the zipper bags. I have ordered some split rings and will use them instead. It is a bit frustrating as I am sure I have some somewhere here at home but can't locate them. Now that I have sewn the bags I won't be able to use them on these as they are sewn but the split rings will be good. 

I have completed putting all the photos from my mums negatives on facebook. My mum loved taking photos, mostly of her kids (she had 8 so lots of practice). In the 1950s women were kept in hospital for 10 days and it was the only time my mum got to sit and stitch. She worked on a supper cloth over several babies. Just recently my sister who was in possession of this cloth passed it on to me. I was delighted to find that my mum used it in this photo of one of my siblings (I suspect its my brother Frank who was born in 1952 but not sure.)  

 

The Hiatus Continues

I seem to have lost my will to blog... not my will to live but my will to blog. I can't believe that in 2 months this is only my 2nd blog post. Not sure why and I am sorry for my loyal followers who will now have given up on me and gone to places else where for their blog fix. 

In the month since I last wrote my main creative input has been in scanning, editing, labelling and posting on Facebook my mother's negatives. She was an avid photographer although not necessarily proficient she was prolific. We children were the main subject for her photography as she documented our growing up.

My Uncle's family (on left) and our family on right. I am the little one in the pram near my dad. Its my siblings up to the tallest girl and the other side is my Uncle Jack's family. They lived a hour or so away from us at this time. 

I have now scanned all the negatives. It was quite a process. The 35mm ones were simple enough as I had a small scanner, given to me by my daughter several years ago. It scanned the photo and converted it to a positive digital image that I was able to edit quite easily. The black and white negatives from before she acquired the 35mm camera were harder. I had to scan them on our flat bed scanner, then use another program to convert the negative scan to a positive image, and then edit and enhance the picture using one of a number of programs. The flat bed scanner didn't always do a great job and I am seriously considering getting a special photographic scanner to redo the negatives to get a clearer image. but that won't be till Christmas. Anyway - its been an interesting going over the photos and trying to work out where they were taken and why and sometimes who.

My dad and me. I was named after him so it Philipa and Philip

My main way of identify the people and the occassion has to been to put them on facebook where my siblings and cousins can see them and work with me. I am the youngest in my family of 8 children as well as being  the youngest of the cousins on Dad's side and the 4th youngest on mum's. 

This photo really amused our family. Its the 5 youngest children. There was obviously a litter of kittens and puppies at this point on the farm but some how my youngest brother (near dad) only got a cut apple to hold. He looks somewhat bemused by this

It has illicted a lot of discussion amongst us all which has been great.

Our small community used to have a Fancy Dress ball for the kids each year. With very little money but lots of imagination mum would manufacture costumes for us all. This year (the earliest one I can find photos for) I was about 3 and went as Old King Cole. One of my sisters was  the pipers that he called for (mum didn't realise that the pipe he called for was his smoking pipe.)

Old King Cole was a merry old soul
And a merry old soul was he.
He called for his pipe and he called for his bowl and
he called for his fiddlers three

This has taken up a lot of my time - time I would usually spend sewing. I haven't missed my sewing time which is really weird for me. I feel like I am still in a bit of a hiatus or waiting time. I wonder if my excessive sewing over the last year or so has burnt me out. I have finished off a lot of quilts and other projects and thoroughly enjoyed my time. Now might be just a time of rest and recuperation.

My 2nd eldest sister Joy holding me when I was about 5 months old

I have done some projects. The Twilter group (on Facebook and Twitter) has been working on a QAL using a pattern called Layer Cake Explosion by Angela Gross from Quilts Bayou. The pattern is a free one from Craftsy but the instructions are fairly minimal as it was designed to be a class pattern, that she explained in the lesson. Daisy (from Laisy Daisy Quilts and Reads blog and podcast) is running the QAL on Facebook and she is writing the more detailed instructions for us. I happened to go on a retreat a couple of weeks ago and took it with me. I hadn't really started the QAL up till then and went from the beginning right through all the steps, using the pattern and managed to get in a muddle at one point as... well I was ahead of the game. Daisy kindly helped me along but the putting together clue is not being explained till the proper time.

So yes... I went on a retreat. I have been going to this particular retreat since 2002 (I think it is) I've missed a couple of years for various reason but have attended 11 or 12 times by my reckoning. The retreat itself celebrated its 30th birthday this year. Our theme was Pearls (for 30th anniversary) and the dinner theme was Pearls or T for thirty. This is the first year I have taken a friend with me and it was extra fun because of that. In the past, whilst people are always friendly and many of them I have known for the 15 years I have been going and some from before that even, it was nice to have someone who was MINE so to speak. We shared our accommodation, shared the same table group, sat together at meals mostly etc. It was lovely.

I made a couple of mug rugs for the swap we did on the weekend, worked on the mystery quilt and made a heap of hanging towels for Handmade With Love. It was productive.

I really need to get on with my Comic Con sewing as I have just over a month till we leave home to go on our trip to Japan, Europe and the UK. Once back from there it is just 10 days till the event. (I thought it was going to be 3 days and had timed it perfectly but Comic Con is a week later than I thought. Glad its not a week earlier) So I will have a bit of time to sew once we get back but not much.

Since the retreat I have cut out about 25 Easy Cosmetic zipper bags (from the pattern by So Sew Easy) The stiffening has been ironed on and I have started inserting the zips. Hopefully I will get them all done in the next few weeks. I have scraps and can sew more of the ear bud pounches and the teeny tiny zipper bags too. I am not sure if I will make any more of the laptop or iPad bags at this point. Will see.

I am sorry that I have been missing in action. I am trying to get myself motivated and back on track but its a bit of a hard slog. When I am travelling I will try to use my blog as my travel diary and so will be more prolific... which is great if you like travel stuff but for those looking for Sewing inspiration... yeah not so great.

An Unexpected Hiatus

After the full on nature of the A to Z challenge I have found that I haven't blogged for a whole month. This is the only blog post I have made for May. This was totally unplanned and unexpected and I can't really explain it.

The A to Z challenge was full on... but I have participated in it for 3 years now and have previously maintained by usual blogging during the challenge or resumed it straight after it. This year I did make the blocks I blogged about so that was a bit of extra pressure but I had them done well and truly before the challenge started and had the quilt mostly put together as well. 

The challenge was organised differently this time - you had to post your blog post link to the various forums (the challenge web page, the facebook group etc) each day - there wasn't a master list of blogs to follow. As well I posted my links to Twitter each time... so it was a bit more work. And I tried really hard to keep up visiting other blogs, which were a bit harder to visit with the absence of the master link.

So that all added more stress to the challenge of the Challenge.

Yet again for the Challenge ie the month of April we were travelling - its always harder to do stuff away from home so there was that too. I don't know why we always seem to travel in April... I'm sure we didn't until I started to do the Challenge. In 2015 we were in Malaysia, in 2016 we had 2 weddings and a trip to pick up our caravan in Melbourne 

This year... I went to Brisbane to go to see My Fair Lady with Fangirl (our only daughter), and stayed on. Fixit Guy  (my husband) joined me and all the family gathered in the beautiful Tambourine Mountains (hinterland of Gold Coast) for Easter to celebrate Fixit Guy's 60th birthday. It was lovely for the 8 of us to be together and just hang out. We played board games and card games, talked ate, drank, went for walks, had family photos taken and generally just hung out. Our oldest son (known as The Beast) and his girlfriend (Beauty) flew up from Melbourne to spend the time with us too.

The following week we spent in Brisbane, splitting our time between Fangirl's home and the Town House that our younger boys share (Known as Kombi Boy, his partner  is Gamer Girl and youngest son Boyo). On the weekend I went to Supanova for the day to get an idea of what that was like. Fangirl has a stall there (that Boyo helps on- he's her minion) and in September Gamer Girl and I will share a stall at Comic Con.

The day after we went to Comic Con Fixit Guy and I drove south to Sydney and environs where we spent time visiting my siblings who live there and my mum. (I am the youngest of 8 and 6 of them live in and around Sydney). On the day of his actual birthday we went out to dinner with my siblings and their partners which was a lot of fun.

We were still in Sydney at the end of April, travelling home in the first week of May.

I did do some sewing whilst away - My first project was the Labyrinth Quilt. I had it all cut out and the pieces all in little ziplock bags to make it easier. I managed to get the top assembled in my first week in Brisbane.

 I'd prepped a lot of projects for my Handmade With Love stall at comic con and I sewed them whilst in Brisbane (although I didn't take them up the Mountain with us for Easter) and also whilst at a couple of places we stayed in Sydney. I visited a great quilt shop in Sydney and bought myself a few yards of fabric.

And this brings me to another reason I have been blogging. I have always enjoyed tracking my stash usage - ever since I started doing it. But I have lost track this year. I finished off some quilts and gave them away and forgot to measure them beforehand - and then I bought fabric and used it or put it away before I tracked it as well. I kept thinking I will do that... I will write it down before I forget... but I have forgotten and the sense of not doing it properly has weighed on me. Guilt is a really bad thing for creativity.

Since we got back from our trip - 3 or 4 weeks now - I have done very little sewing. I seem to have lost my mojo. I have several mystery quilts/QAL that I am supposed to be participating in but I just haven't gotten my act together and got myself sorted. I have to fix some of the projects I worked on whilst away - a few mistakes and it just puts me off doing any more since I have to fix them and I can't get my act together to fix them. I have been going to Handmade with Love weekly and sewing or cutting out or doing what I am told rather than sewing any of my own projects. I have also been going up to our own patchwork group but with that I find I am going late and leaving early. But I am still going. Mostly I have been organising myself for one of the Mystery Quilts.

Next week my good friend Lyndi and I are off on a 4 day quilting retreat. I am trying to get myself organised for that... need to get those QAL, Mystery quilt and projects organised to take so I can sew away. This is the first time I have taken a friend to Patch n Piece. I have been going for close on 15 years (all my quilting life) and have gotten to know people there who have become good friends but this is the first time I have taken along my own mate. It will be so fun.

I haven't been idle whilst not sewing. I bought home from Sydney with me a box of my mother's negatives that one of my sisters has had for 10 years or so. She has scanned all (or is in the process of scanning all) mum's slides but wasn't up to tackling the negatives as well. About 2 weeks ago I started the job and man is it absorbing. I have scanned all the 35ml negatives and this last few days started on scanning the negatives that are older and bigger. Its super time consuming and the results aren't always the best but it is lots of fun. I have been putting the scanned, enhanced images onto facebook for my siblings and cousins and families to enjoy and they have been a source of great enjoyment and discussion.

So... this was just to check in and let you know I am still here and still intend to blog... just lost my mojo for a little while. I will be trying to be more regular. 

this is me as a 3 year old, dressed as Old King Cole for the Fancy Dress Ball held in our community each year. About 1962