Erica's Knitted Bag

Tomorrow one of Erica's best friends is having a birthday party. They are hiring a bus and going down to the Gold Coast for party games-what fun! Making a present for someone is always so much nicer than just buying one, so this week has seen Erica as busy as a bee with all her planning and knitting. Erica knitted a bag all on her own! It is gorgeous. Today I helped her line it, give it a strap and decorate it! She did the most gorgeous french knots up the strap, don't you love the little rose like knots? Then she threaded a ribbon and some wool through the stitching on the reverse and it looked so good that we reversed it and made the front the back and the back the front, back to front or is it front to back! Whatever it is, take a look...

African Love Quilt

1 Corinthians 13 (ESV)

The Way of Love

13:1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.

4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

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Aren't those words so exquisitely beautiful - the greatest love poem in the world!

The idea for this quilt emerged today at about 10o'clock. I could not get to start it until about 2 PM. And then it just did not seem to gel in my mind, It seemed slow in coming- partly because I was nursing a two day old sinus/migraine. So it really came together as I went along. Also, I had lost my 'print onto material' paper so I had to go and get some more. I landed up buying, washing, drying and ironing more material for the quilt too. Then I had a catastrophe of not knowing the new paper very well and I accidentally ironing the writing directly into a smudge, so had to start again. Any way despite all this I finished at 1 ish in the morning, and I am very pleased it will be done and ready for giving at the wedding we will attend tomorrow. The couple have been working in Sudan and have come 'home' for the Wedding, hence the African theme.

The boys are really pleased as the couple have said we can wear anything we wish to wear, "jeans will be warmly smiled upon!".

We are not meant to be giving gifts, so this quilt will have to be called a glorified wedding card! Will have to make an envelope for it in the morning!
Nighty nights!

Nativity Sewing

I am using the bean bag method for making these little characters. I just gather up circles. for the body, add a tubed strip for the arms and then add hair and faces, wings and halo's for angels- very easy - only fiddly and it takes a lot of time. I like the fact that with the soft material, I can mould them into characters with poise and movement! I don't think I will finish all I want to do this year. The baby Jesus at the end of this post was made years ago, so this is an ongoing act of love for my children. I feel very passionately about having nativity scenes that the children can play with and enjoy 'acting out' the Christmas story with.

Christmas Quilt done in under 24 hours!

Okay so I cheated....firstly it was a panel and secondly my lounge room looks like a bomb has hit it, ( apart from sewing, I did not do much else) and thirdly I only did buttons/knots instead of 'proper' quilting and fourthly I had two children helping me, Jo and Erica! (I pay my kids to help me sew as I am that desperate to get quilts done, what with my brain popping with ideas and all. My girls have had woodwork classes with the boys and the boys have learnt how to sew....Jo wants to make some easy money, so he will sew!) But despite the cheats we are still we are very happy with the results, take a peek at the details...we used bells to embellish and bunches of cotton on buttons to look like ribbon....






Thanks for a gorgeous panel, Nancy Halvorsen!

Table Mountain

Google Table Mountain , Cape Town , South Africa and you will find a zillion gorgeous photographs of this beautiful place. But try and find a free, not copy righted photograph, , clear, with no cloud ( table cloth) and it is like looking for a needle in a hay stack.

If anyone has such a photograph for me and you are willing for me to use it to develop a quilt pattern , than let me know! I am itching to do a landscape quilt of Table Mountain!

Joy'zown Dezign: Introduction, The Big Picture.

My first love is God, second is people - aren't those kids just gorgeous! And then I have to admit material comes in at third...YIKES, that sounds a bit scary but it does! But behind that statement is a bigger picture that has a lot to do with my love for God and people! Let me explain...

Sewing, quilting, patching, landscaping....for me it is all fabric art. I have a million 'dezigns'/ideas floating in my head and drawers stuffed with 'dezigns' on pieces of paper! And I have of course with 8 precious childrne and homeschooling, too little time to make them.


I am addicted to dezigning, despite my lack of time ( I just cannot help myself, my brain always has something new idea in mind) And I am passionate about creating, only as I am relatively disorganised it seldom happens, unless I make it happen.

I am hoping that if I try to blog weekly in this particular area, that I will be inspired to keep up with doing something little every week...well that's the plan at least, we'll see if it can happen?

My latest interest is landscape quilting....you can see the unfinished results of our recent class sitting at the front of my sewing nook in the lounge above: Mt Barney, Australia, designed by Priscilla Lawrence.

Priscilla also designed a postcard quilt for us, here - very nearly finished! I learnt such a lot from this class! And wish I was not so far away from the ladies and the Uniting Church in Ipswich who have helped me so much to enjoy sewing!








Here is Jessica busy at the sewing machine, getting tasks done for class, she thinks my machine sews much better that hers, so we had to take it in turns! It does have a nice SLOOOOOOW button which is great for control with tiny fine work! But Jessica has decided she prefers painting to quilting as it is more instant. Whereas I love the feel of the material in my hands and the slowness of it. I find it therapeutic if I am stressed, as it gives me time to meditate and think things through...ahhhhhh!

Why 'dezign', why patch, why quilt etc?

I love creating and although it is a bit of a luxury in some ways in my already busy life ....I feel it is one way in which I can reflect my wondrous creator in my tiny way. He is the ultimate artist, the lover of my soul, despite my tardiness in loving Him as I should. Each of my own original 'dezigns' that I do, I always try to bring across some Christan message for people to see. I like to make something of Christ visual. I like to make an impact to influence others to love this one and only wonderful God as well. For I feel Christianity is the only religion that offers a relationship, rather than a list of rules to go by. It is the only place where God does all in saving us and we just accept this gift. My God gives me life in all it's fullness and I aim to try and help others see how wonderful He is through my fabric art.

I have a bigger dream too, a dream of selling patterns as a business one day. Now I know I won't earn much money from that but I would also like to be able to set up a system where I can help ladies in third world countries earn a living. You see for us it would be pocket money but in a place like South Africa, it could be the bread and butter for as many as 8 people to one earner!

When I was training for Social Work in Cape Town, South Africa, I was involved with helping
start a 'self help' sewing group, near Stellenbosch. I wonder what has happened to my group of ladies and their children. One lady had twins who would now be over 20! In South Africa we called these sewing groups 'self help' groups, or co-operatives. Self help groups in the Western Countries are for Psychological problems like AA (Alcoholics Anonymous). But in South Africa, they are a group of people working together in order to find a way to earn a living.

Much is being done in South Africa as you can see from this web site , http://www.learntoearn.org.za/ But so much more is needed with the high unemployment rate but with the ever increasing widows and orphans issues, this need can only grow. I feel passionately that we need to all pull our weight as Christians and fulfill our Biblical calling to care for widows and orphans, as much as we are able to! I would like to somehow be able to help in a small way with my 'Joy'zown dezigns'.

Come and enjoy the journey with me!