A very loverly quilt

 

 Hello peeps,

Earlier in the year I was asked by the lovely Cat from Wouldn't it be Loverly if I would consider making a custom quilt for her husband's 40th birthday.  I was flattered that she would ask (I've only finished 3 quilts so far), I consider myself a beginner quilter.   But.....I do love a good challenge and I want to improve my piecing and quilting, so I said yes (with much excitement) 

 

 Cat lives in Australia and I live in Hong Kong.  This whole quilt has been designed through the internet, with the help of email, instagram and pinterest (quilt design was inspired by this quilt)

I love the colour palette Cat chose - it is so different to my usual approach of use all the colours, all at once.

How wonderful is the solid navy blue binding?  At first I was unsure of this, but Cat knew what she wanted, and I was quickly converted to see how it works perfectly.

I loved this quilt right from the start, and fell deeper in love with it the more I sewed and the more time I spent with it.

 

It was such a pleasure to make this quilt.  It warms my heart knowing that Cat and her husband and their children will be snuggled under it for years to come.

It washed up beautifully, looking nice and quilty and snuggly (and very, very wonky, but wonky is good)

Yes, it is HUGE.

It is much bigger than my Grandma's quilt.

Thank you Cat, for trusting and believing in me, that I could make the quilt that you wanted.  I loved working with you.

Now, some time soon,  I probably should finish the three other quilts I have started.

Have a great day.

Cat xox

Blue Squared.

Hi peeps,

I thought it was about time I talked about life in Hong Kong. It is hard to believe we have been here for 10 months now, it has gone so quickly.  We are still loving this adventure.

We live in an apartment.  It is much smaller than our house in Melbourne, but we have adjusted.  It gave me a good excuse to de-clutter, and I did, but I am sure I could cull more "things".  It is a three bedroom apartment, with a combined living/dining room, a very small kitchen and two bathrooms.  Having two bathrooms makes such a huge difference.  There is a shower in one, a bath in the other, and each bathroom has a toilet.  There is no laundry.  This apartment has a balcony too (our first apartment did not), oh how I love our balcony.  If the weather is not too hot or cold, the girls play outside on their scooters or take some toys out and play on a picnic rug.

There are many water features and fountains in our apartment complex. Water is a symbol of wealth and prosperity in feng shui.  I have noticed that most of the apartments in our area of Hong Kong have one or more water features.

There is one I walk past every day, many times.  It has been windy this week, and some pretty things have landed in the water, waiting for me to photograph them.

This is what we have found this week.

Lonely pink flowers floating in the rippling water.

Water features on very windy days are interesting to watch if you are a two year old (I was holding her tight)

Pink flowers can be hitchhikers on bark boats.

Hi, there is my reflection.

Yes, I am still addicted to instagram.  You can see my images here, or in instagram, my user-name is raspberry rainbow.  Pop in and say hi if I have not found you yet.

Have a great day.  Cat

My Creative Space

This really should have been last weeks My Creative Space, but it was all secret squirrel here in the land of the raspberry rainbow.

My best friend Nell celebrated her birthday earlier in the week. We dont buy presents for each other anymore, but I wanted to make her some thing. She had mentioned months ago that she did not have an apron, so immediately I was on the look out for the right fabric for her and the right apron.

I really wanted to make up my own apron pattern, but that requires time and brain capacity for thinking, both of which I do not have much of at the moment. When I found online the Sew Liberated Emmeline Apron pattern, I knew this was the one, this was so Nell.

I found the blue and red fabric months ago and as soon as I saw it, I knew it was Nell. Then I forgot the pattern needed another fabric - as the apron is reversible. I found the blue trees fabric in my stash. As it turned out, both fabrics were from the same Keiki for Moda Collection, called Tweet Tweet. A little freaky.

I had to make her some hair clips to match too. Nell will be so well dressed in the kitchen now!

Happy Birthday again, hon! You really are the best, best friend, I am so lucky to have you in my life. I am going to miss you so much when we are off on our adventure.

Pop in and visit many more creative peeps over at Kootoyou.

Have a lovely Thursday.

Cat.