Silver Threads & Golden Needles!

Last weekend I was lucky enough to spend 

three days in Ballarat attending the 

Silver Threads and Golden Needles Sovereign Hill Retreat 

hosted by Chrissie of Chrissie's Timeless Treasures 

with my sister-in-law Silvia.

 

We received two kits to work on.

  

The first project was a Christmas bag. 

My bag is the one on the right.

 

 The second was a pins and needles case. 

I managed to get the stitching part done.

  

My finished pins and needles case.

 

 In between stitching, we would explore 

different parts of Sovereign Hill.

 My favourite place is the Criterion Store. 

 

There were so many lovely goodies here.

 

 Silvia and I thought it would be fun to 

have an old fashioned photo taken. 

We just had to pose stitching!

Don't think I'd really like to wear 

these dresses everyday!

We also made some little lavendar bags like 

they would have made back in the day.

I celebrated my birthday on Saturday 

and Noel surprised me with a special 

delivery of these beautiful flowers.

 

I was also lucky enough to win this sewing case 

(on my birthday too!), together with a toffee 

apple that are a specialty at Sovereign Hill. 

Mitchell has claimed that! LOL!

Before dinner on Saturday night, we walked 

the whole way around Lake Wendouree.

For my birthday dinner, we decided it 

would be nice to go to 

Craig's Royal Hotel which was built in 1853.

How beautiful is this staircase!

They were booked out for Saturday 

night so we went on Sunday.

Ballarat has beautiful gardens along the 

main road. I really liked these butterflies.

We had a fabulous time.  

There was lots of laughter, chatting, eating, 

exploring and shopping and we even managed 

to get some stitching done too! 

I'm actually surprised with how much we actually 

got done as we kept wondering off.

Friday Night Sew-In On Retreat!

  

After being cancelled last year and postponed twice this year, 

Melody and I were finally off to NOTYQ retreat at Myrniong! 

Friday morning we headed up to Ballarat. 

We had our lunch at the Gatehouse Cafe at the 

Ballarat New Cemetery, "new" even though 

it was established in 1867! 

We were both good and had the healthy cauliflower stew. 

It was delicious.

 Then we went to visit Morgan at our favourite 

shop in Ballarat, The Crafty Squirrel.

 I forgot to take a photo inside on this visit.

 There are so many unique and gorgeous things inside.

We made our way back to Ballan and visited 

Chrissie at Chrissie's Timeless Treasures. 

This photo is actually from a visit there a couple of 

weeks ago when we made a quick decision to go to 

Ballan for lunch after we came out of lock down.

We also went to Mill Rose Cottage. 

These Tilda fabrics wanted to come home with me!

Next stop - retreat! My spot all set up for stitching. 

  

There may have been a champagne or two over the weekend!

  

And scones of course!

 

It was so wonderful seeing everyone after all this time.  

We all had so much news to share from over the

 past 18 months or so. There was such a feeling of excitement 

on Friday and by Sunday afternoon when we were leaving, 

it felt as though life was "back to normal"! 

I know it isn't but that's how it felt.

 

Friday was also Friday Night Sew-In with Wendy.

I finished stitching the binding and rod pocket 

on Lillian Elizabeth's Kitchen quilt. I've even got the label on! 

Will do another post on the finished quilt.

Friday Night With Friends At Retreat!

 

 I got a very early start to FNWF as Melody and I headed off to 

our yearly NOTYQ retreat. We take all day to get there (it's only an hour 

and quarter from home) but we stop and visit lots of lovely shops. 

Here we are in Ballan where the town was yarn bombed!

 My first project I worked on was to finish stitching the binding 

on a new baby quilt. It is very dull here today 

so I'll do a post on it when I can get better photos.

Saturday I started working on block one of Jenny's

Phyllis May's Kitchen BOM. Not an awful lot was stitched as 

there was too much time spent talking and eating!

But unfortunately, there was a mishap and red wine was 

spilt over my stitching. My dear friend was so upset but

accidents happen. We did try getting the wine out with 

little success. I'll just make another one!

So onto block two. 

I need to get more of the thread I had chosen for outlining 

the apron in chain stitch as the skein of green also got wined.

 Saturday night Melody and I found something 

new to play with - Instagram! 

We had so much fun playing with the filters. 

There was an awful lot of laughter happening!

We had a fabulous weekend with stitching friends.
I didn't get as much stitching done as I planned but retreats
are more about friendship and having fun.

Thank you to Cheryll for hosting us. 

You can see what others got up to here.

Friday Night With Friends On Retreat

Friday saw Mel and I head off to our annual NOTYQ Retreat at Myrniong. So our Friday Night With Friends was also Saturday and Sunday With Friends! 

 

First stop - morning tea two minutes down the road from Mel's place! We visited a few shops along the way and we both were very good and didn't really buy anything. Just one of those "nothing jumped out" days.

This was the project I started on Friday night. It is "My Time, My Place Caddy" by Anni Downs of Hatched and Patched.

 This is my first attempt at needle turn applique. For over twenty years I have always done buttonhole applique. I managed to stitch the first two trees Friday night.

By Sunday afternoon I had finished all the applique. 

Now I've just the stitchery part to go.

It was so lovely spending time with Mel as we hadn't been able to catch up since April! We had a wonderful time. 

Speaking of Mel, did you know she has a new blog? 

It is called Melody Matilda and you can find it here.

You can see what everyone else got up to for FNWF here.

2016 NOTYQ Retreat

I picked up Mel and we loaded up the car. 

Good thing I have a station wagon!

First thing we did was have a cuppa so we could decide which way we would head to Lake Dewar Lodge in Myrniong for our NOTYQ Retreat. We had both been so busy we hadn't had a chance to plan our adventure.

We decided to head off to Fairfield and went to GJ's (forgot to take a photo there). Next stop was The Cutting Cloth owned by Kellie. This is such a beautiful shop.

 We made our way up to Gisborne and had some lunch at the 3 Little Pigs Cafe. The two of us both had the homemade Beef Goulash Pie. It was delicious!

Of course, we had to go to Patch n Quilt. 

Who should we find there but our lovely friend, Margaret. 

We also met Gabbie (in the green) who was best 

friends with our late friend, Tania.

Next stop, Mill Rose Cottage. Here I am measuring my Double Wedding Ring Quilt. I have decided I just don't like the backing fabric I had and as I am unpicking the quilting I have already done (although not that much), it was a good chance to purchase something I would be happier with. It is now going to be quilted by the lovely Leanne.

I found the perfect one. This is so close to the corner stones I have on the front of the quilt. Not bad since the fabrics I used are 17 years old. I also picked up some lovely red check and a Cottage Garden Thread just because!

This is the project I worked on on Friday night. 

My Naughty and Nice List!

I appliqued the centre onto the background.

Stitched the name tags. Now to put everything together.

On Saturday, Jenny from Gemelli Girls 

gave us a lesson in fabric colouring.

All I need to do now is stitch the outlines and make

 my cute little teddy bear into something.

Saturday night Mel and I may or may not 

have drunk a bottle of champagne!

The rest of the time I worked on my hexagons.

Three rows of my first panel are now put together.

Thanks Mel for being such a wonderful 

partner in crime over the weekend!

And that's another NOTYQ retreat over.