Willowberry Designs ~ Alpaca Softies

The 30th birthday - it's all about the cakes...

And what a gorgeous collection it was!  Lisa busied herself all day Friday baking and icing Amanda's birthday cakes (yes, plural) for her party yesterday.  Beautiful cupcakes with swirly pink, blue and lemon frosting, topped with little fancy sugar dusted '30' cookies on sticks.  AND a heavenly chocolate mud cake with malteser mousse filling, choc ganache icing and topped with more mousse blobs and whole maltesers........YUMMMMM, a real chocoholics chocolate fix. 

We had lunch at the local pub in Meringandan with about 35 friends and relatives (some travelled from Brisbane, that was special).  Lunch was great and then we headed back to our place for the afternoon.  I wish we'd taken more photos but we were too busy eating and drinking!

The weather was perfect and our birthday girl had a ball.  But, it's late again and now I need sleep.........no stitching tonight, my pillow beckons.

 

sneak peeks

It's late and time for bed so just a quick note tonight

Here's a sneaky peek at my latest doings - cute pink laces, china tea cups, little flowers, butterflies.......Yes another pattern is under way.

night to all,

cheryl xx

Fresh Hope quilts

It's COLD today and I hate cold.  So, the heater is on and cranked up to high and I'm still in my flannel pj's and bedsocks.  I should shower and get ready for my day.......  A quilting customer at 10.00am, some quilting till one'ish, call in to The Quilters Angel with some patterns for Marion, deliver the Fresh Hope quilts, drop the birthday notice in to the Chronicle for Saturday (complete with the obligatory oh so embarrassing photo) and then for the fun part.  Today I pick up my new Janome machine.  I think.  Depends on the treasurer and how much play money I can have today.  I might just have to be content to wait for another week.  I hate waiting almost as much as I hate cold.  Last job for the day is a visit to mum with a couple of 'leftovers' dinners.  I love leftovers. 

Buttons, beautiful buttons

Today was all about therapy.  Playing with buttons therapy.  I have some very old buttons in my collection and today I found myself rummaging through them, looking for a specific button for a specific project.  After about an hour of fossicking (and reminiscing about when the kids where little and I made all of their clothes - including their undies!!), I wandered down a completely different track.  I think these will be a perfect addition to the little bundles of goodies gathered as pressies for friends and others.

Lots of buttons to pack away before my man gets home from work....I'll grab the vacuum cleaner 5 minutes before he's due to arrive and he'll think I've been busy cleaning all day!  It's worked for me for 30 years (or maybe he lets me think that...)

happy stitching

Cheryl  xxx

Scrappy cabin blocks

Have you seen the scrappy cabin challenge at one of my favourite blogs?  I decided to make a little farm quilt using a fussy cut centre piece with a blue and green theme.  They are very cute..... 

Another busy week, I have some quilts to finish for Mary at Fresh Hope.  Just little ones so they won't take long.  Mum has an ultrasound appointment after lunch and then I'll pop in to the post office to send the parcels to Linda and Tina.  Watch the post girls, they'll be on their way today!

Friday night....YAY!!

A big thank you to everyone for visiting me this week and especially those of you who left a comment to be in the draw for my new pattern - Threads of Friendship.  The pattern is all finished and will be picked up from the printers on Monday.  So........congratulations to Linda April 12 at 11:19PM and Tina April 14 at 01:08PM.  I'll contact you by email to get your snail mail addresses to send your little parcels next week. 

It's been a hectic week, a huge charity quilt to finish quilting and loads of interruptions, not to mention that I'm being driven CRAZY by Monty our gorgeous cockatiel.  (As I type this he's letting me know the microwave is finished.  He mimics everything)  I've brought his cage inside tonight because it's a bit cold and he's been screeching outside all day.  Worse than a dog barking, I can tell you.  If anyone has any hints on how to keep him just a little bit quiet, I'd love to know.  (Now he's whistling his own little tune, a kind of cross between the national anthem and the adams family song - he's a mad bird).  Here's a photo of his visitor tonight.  Do you think Norman is asking him to be his friend or his dinner? 

He stretched his wings and went to visit my Leanne's house quilt hanging in the family room.  (bit blurry but you can see he's quite handsome and very proud of his tail feathers)

We'll be in the garden all weekend getting it ready for Manda's big 30th birthday bash next Saturday.  She's invited 'everyone back to the oldies to celebrate into the night'.  Should be fun!

til next time, happy stitching and thanks for visiting

Cheryl   

Everything old is blue again

Marion, a local quilter, made this quilt out of old denim jeans, doesn't it look great!  Bit of a challenge to quilt because of the thickness of the seams but an overall meander did the trick.  I used Signature variegated denim thread.

Don't forget to be in the draw for my new Threads of Friendship pattern.  Leave a comment on the previous post by next Friday and you could be one of the lucky ones............

cheryl

Giveaways......

It's rather exciting to finish a new project and take all the lovely photos

Threads of Friendship is finished - YAY - and I'm in the middle of writing the pattern which hopefully will be completed by Monday or Tuesday.  I'd love to share this one with my readers so if you'd like to win a free copy of my newest pattern, just leave a comment by next Friday to be in the draw.  (I'll have to find that random number generator thing).  good luck.......

My man and I went out to the Toowoomba show yesterday for the obligatory daggie dog and waffle.  Bit disappointing, couldn't find a waffle ANYWHERE, but maybe I just didn't look hard enough.  It was a good day, lots of cows and horses but only six sheep left in the sheep pavilion.  I guess the little lovelies needed to go back to their paddocks.  We strolled through the bird pavilion where every second rooster crowed every second minute.  Their little clocks were mixed up, it was two o'clock in the afternoon!  Tiny little bantam chooks were laying tiny little eggs...so cute.  I asked long suffering husband 'Can I please have that mother chook with the 16 chickens, they're only $45 for the lot...it's a bargain...think of how much we'll save...and how many eggs we'll have'.  No, was the reply, 'you don't have enough time to cuddle them all'.  Never mind, maybe another day.

We gave the daggie dogs a miss and had a hamburger and coke and left for home.  Not many local businesses on display, that was a bit disappointing.  The craft and cooking were nice, though.   

oh well, off to finish some stitching and watch the footy

xx cheryl

Bella bags

Today I turned this pile of yummy fabrics

- along with some pellon, a few buttons, some silver rings and a couple of zips - into these two great bags using Monica Poole's "Bella" bag pattern.    

I love this pattern..........

Norman is a compulsory addition, of course.  Every photo shoot needs a gorgeous model.

cya next time,

cheryl  xox

Cupcakes by Lisa.....

Yummmmmm.  Another batch of scrumptious cup cakes by our resident cook.  These were part of a special order of two dozen for a local business.  Lisa was born to cook.  She has a hundred cook books on baking, chocolate, cookies, cakes and everything else deliciously decadent.  When she's in the mood to cook, the kitchen becomes a whirlpool of delightful sounds and smells and things happen at a frantic pace.  And when the job is done, the cook cleans it all up without fuss.  Perfect! 

'Mum, do you want the beater and bowl?'

Oh YUM, I can taste it already, the taste buds start to tingle

'yes please'

She's much more generous than I was when the kids were growing up.  Back then, all the little dollops were scraped from the beaters and bowls and into the cake tins.  Lisa's beaters and bowls have LOTS of batter left on them.  I love it when she makes cup cakes.

And the feathered girls like cup cake batter too...........