More celebration

My second year of blogging has started out with so many lovely comments to my anniversary post. Thank you so much! I have said it more than once – you are all a huge part of what makes blogging so enjoyable and worth the time and effort I put into the blog. Meeting new friends and making connections across continents, ages and styles is amazing and educational and inspirational and just plain fun. I also get to improve my writing, English and photography skills – all great accomplishments.

So, I’m sitting here in my old and somewhat cluttered house (uuuum; fabric, thread, batting, projects, quilts, magazines, books…) in a town that most of you probably never heard about before, just doing my thing and writing about it on my laptop. Imagine my delighted surprise when I received a mail from a fellow blogger and reader, the lovely Darlene of SewCalGal, who offered an additional prize for my 1 year anniversary celebration!

Here it is, part 2 of my 1 year anniversary giveaway: 60 delicious pink 5” charm squares donated by Darlene. We all know how the shipping rates are these days, so as she is located in the US, this is open to US readers only.

To enter this giveaway, please leave a (one, uno, une, en) comment to this post and I’ll draw the second lucky winner on the last day of the month, August 31. If you haven’t entered the first part of the giveaway yet, you’ll find it here.

Thank you so much for your generosity and support, Darlene, and good luck to you all.-)

To answer a few questions to yesterday’s post – I majored in finance (feeding my gigantic inner mathematician) and marketing (couldn’t decide on one, so like Winnie the Pooh I took both) in college (now University of Stavanger). I went back to school at the age of 40 and took project management, leadership and group psychology. In my teens I wanted to study genetics and to be a concert pianist, so there are still things to explore when I’m in my 50ies or 60ies – if I ever get tired of quilting…

Sorry, the giveaway is now closed!

Sunday stroll

Yesterday brought us the 10th summer day of the season and we took a little stroll around campus at University of Stavanger. It was such a beautiful day and so peaceful being Sunday and all. The campus is lovely with lots of green and even some cool artwork.

This artist knows how to rust stuff; maybe I should contact him before I plan my next erosion bundles. I love the simple gigantic female shapes!

My gym is also part of campus, so this is where I do my 3-times-a-week-workout/voluntary-torture-classes.
This ivy covered (not Ivy League though) school was the reason why I moved here 28 years ago. I was supposed to stay for 2 years, but never really wanted to leave. Inside this building is the cafeteria where I spent many many (oh so many) happy hours during my studies.

Oh so many happy memories…

1 year celebration

Today it’s my first blogging anniversary. It’s hard to believe it was a year ago I was sitting here playing around with the settings and writing my first post. On the other hand I feel like I have been doing this for ever.

I started blogging without any point of reference or vision, but I knew it would be personal. My work is personal and there would not be much point blogging about it without sharing some of the stories. I actually share more about myself and my work here than I do in my “real life” (I know; quite an honor for you).

I was of course planning to make something for my anniversary, but if you’re a regular reader you already know that I’m having a dry spell sewing wise right now. The good thing is that I’m back at shopping after 3 Make Do Months so I was able to hit the quilt shops.

This is my gift to you for my celebration; I went out of my comfort zone and got green

The cutest fabric I have seen in a long time with 3 coordinating fabrics (I love them so much that I bought the same fabrics for myself)
Little embellishments to go with them, some ribbons
some felted decorations, hearts and a frog
a roll of cute tapeCoordinating napkins, a non-coordinating thimble with the Norwegian flag and my pre-diabetic poison of choice: milk chocolate.

If you would like to win these items, leave a (one, uno, une, en) comment to this post. I’ll draw one winner on the last day of the month, August 31.

Good luck to you all; I‘ll be celebrating the day drooling over the milk chocolate while I’m eating my apple of the day.

Sorry, the giveaway is now closed!

More pleasant surprises

I received another lovely surprise in the mail today; a package from my wonderful blogging friend, Deborah, who was the first friend I made out here in blogland. Deborah does all her work by hand and adds so many details that it was a real treat to finally see some of her work up close and personal.

She made me an embellished cuffand a little quilt accompanied by a hand embroidered table cloth, doilies and a beautiful handmade card which I believe is made by her daughter. For now I’m sitting here fondling my new treasures and looking at all the details; I’ll figure out where to display them later.

Thank you so much, Deborah; I love it!

Pleasant surprise

This lovely little surprise was waiting for me when I got home from our holiday; a bright and cheerful quilted thank-you postcard from Janet who won my Happy May House giveaway. Thank you so much, Janet, it brightened up the whole family at 2 a.m. after a 13 hour travel and continues to do so as it’s now proudly displayed in our living room.

I don’t know what’s wrong with the picture; the postcard is perfectly straight around the edges.

Blank

My mind is totally blank; there’s nothing in there and I just want to sleep. I have been dragging my lazy body and soul to the gym the required 3 times this week though, the Monday Zumba class, a Basic Pilates class and a Makeover class. The Makeover class was one of the most exhausting, painful and fantastic hour I have spent sweating this year, and I’ll definitely be back in spite the fact that I’m sore pretty much everywhere today. If I’m not mistaken I’ll feel even worse tomorrow so I’m really looking forward to that.

I made it through three Make Do Months minus 3 days before I cracked. Why I couldn’t wait for 3 more days I do not know, but I believe it was a massive attack of post-holiday-restlessness or stress (whichever sounds like the best excuse). The first buy was fabric I need for some new class samples, but as soon as I broke that barrier I could not drive fast enough to my favorite thrift shop and get lost in the table cloth/fabric/ linen department. Oh well, almost 3 months of no shopping is worth celebrating with a little shopping, don’t you agree? I’m not done with the Make Do Months though; just taking a little break.

Hope to be back with some more brain/hand activity – soon…

Easing in

I’m easing back into the creative world after my break, not quite ready to take on any big challenging creative decisions yet. The dresses from this post which actually should have been made into a finished quilt weeks ago (we have all been there, right??) are fused on a white on white background fabric.
I had to replace one dress with too much white in the fabric. I tried several background colours, but this one worked best.

I appreciated all your comments on yesterday’s post so much; they made me laugh as I do about the whole messy holiday ordeal. At the end of the day there’s no one else I would rather spend 10 rollercoaster days with than my family; they are just amazing. Fortunately we have the ability to see the humor in most situations, and I would probably have gone even if I had known what would happen. I might have brought a box of elephant tranquilizers, but still…

Summer days

Ok, so this is where I have spent most of my break; two weeks at a fabulous hotel on Gran Canaria which is one of the Spanish Canary Islands on the North West coast of Africa. We have been there several times before, but not at this hotel.

Now, I don’t have big expectations regarding holidays; I don’t envision us all laughing happily together 24-7 like some crazy sitcom family. Our everyday stress is our everyday stress, but going away will at least get us additional sunshine, swimming pools and a change of scenery, and I don’t have to cook every day. What’s not to love??

The first 10 days of our trip were a challenge (read crap) with people getting sick and having to stay inside for several days and way too many problems popping up back home. Usually I handle stress very well and I’m not proud to say this, but on day 8 I snapped, crackled and popped (not a pretty sight I’ll tell you) and for a few hours I wanted nothing more than to go home. Fortunately most of the problems were fixed by day 10; a visit to the doctor’s office, several trips to the pharmacy, a few phone calls and a couple of hours on the Internet do miracles. The last days were wonderful starting with a visit from my sister and her big family who also were on holiday on the island, and we had such a great time including a totally chaotic lunch with 11 people around our little kitchen table.I’m so glad we got the bad stuff out of the way during the first part of the holiday and got the great days at the end because these days are the ones we will remember. I’m happy to be home and celebrated the last day of our summer break taking grandson out for lunch on Sunday.

Now husband is back at work and grandson in kindergarten; daughter has another week or so before Uni starts up again and joined me at my Zumba class yesterday. I haven’t been exercising for two months as I sprained my knee cap and couldn’t do anything. Life is good.-)

Erosion Bundle Project, Take 7: Projects

Hi there, how are you all doing? I am back from our holiday, but as it is the day for revealing the results from the Erosion Bundle Project, the summer holiday stuff will have to wait.

As you might or might not remember, I did not have much erosion in my bundles, just a pile of mismatched and blah fabric scraps (now, wouldn’t that be a great name for a fabric line? We give you “Romance and Butterflies” using Mismatched and Blah from Drab & Dreary).

This is the first project, “Stainless Summer” from this post.It went together in no time and is made from the fabric strips in my bundles, one of the white wrappings, the jagged turquoise Kona cotton and a few scraps cut into shape. Everything was covered with a layer of turquoise organza, pin basted and straight line quilted. The binding is leftover binding scraps from my Big Box of Binding. For the backing I have used a piece of thrifty cotton canvas which actually shows a bit of wear and tear.

I still had more wrappings and scraps, so starting with the black & white scrap; I made “Fabulous Summer”, a lady just enjoying the sun and water.Except for the black & white, which is used as it was, everything is free form cut with scissors. That was so much fun! The scraps were covered with a layer of the same turquoise organza and free motion quilted. I added a little string to the water and a scrappy binding.

I still had two more wrappings, lots of string and a few small scraps, and they were made into the Prayer flags from this post. They have been hanging outside since June 30 and are slowly changing. All the rain and wind this summer has left the edges more unraveled and threads and strings tangled. I had to untangle some of them from the branches for the pictures. I will leave them out there to watch how they change through the fall and winter. There will probably not be much left by next spring, but what do I know…

Thanks again to Kris Henderson for arranging this project! I have enjoyed every step of it, and would happily join in next time if there should be one.

Fabulous summer

I’ll be taking a blogging break for a couple of weeks and will be back no later than August 1st. I’ll be recuperating, rejuvenating (no plastic surgery or Botox, I promise), relaxing, renewing my creativity, refocusing my energy, recovering after a long year, reconnecting with loved ones that I don’t get to spend enough time with, and, last but not least, resting.
We’ll start our old fashioned (i.e. computer and sewing machine free) family time as soon as husband is back from a business trip. I’ll have to fill up my iPod to the last byte with my favorite podcasts before I put the computer away though and dig out any novels I have bought on a whim for the last few years. With any luck there will be a few fun and lighthearted chicklits between the murder mysteries so I don’t miss out on my much needed sleep. My plan is to rest both hands and mind, but we’ll see. I bought a box of Plus-Plus on our trip, and I see lots of building stuff in the future as all 3 generations are totally fascinated with these brilliant little plastic blocks (you can even design quilts with them, but don’t tell).

We’ll also be meeting up with the younger sister/best friend combo for a couple of days. Grandson had such a wonderful time playing soccer with my 3 nephews last week and is still talking about "the boys" (they are 7, 10 and 13, he's 3), so that will be fun for all of us. My dad is doing fantastic by the way; he was actually released from the hospital the day we arrived at their house, one week ahead of schedule. Thank you for all your well wishes; you see - they work!!

I wish you all lots of lazy lovely sunny days, and I’ll see you all back here at August 1st for the big Erosion Bundle Project reveal (of which you can see a little sneak peek above). The prayer flags are still hanging outside, a bit more tattered by the wind and rain. I’ll include new pictures of them on the 1st...