Mystery item........

Can someone tell me more about this item? 

I bought it in France while on holiday. 

It is carved and made of MOP and very delicate.

I suspect it is a kind of spool to wind your threads on from earlier times.....

Thanks in advance!

A rainy day here in Holland today.
Just finished this ATC (Artist Trading Card) for a swap on Fibre Fever. 
Size 3,5 x 2,5 inch.
The theme this month is "Doors", think you guessed that already. 
It goes on it's way to Kim in the USA today.

It is been a long time since I wrote on my blog. In June I was on holiday in France and not feeling well at all.
When back home  I was diagnosed with a burnout. With a lot of rest things must get better. I haven't been creative for months now, so not much to show. 

I am participating in an ATC swap on Fibre Fever which started this August.
This months theme is doors.
I am still working on my ATC for Kim, but received this beautiful ATC from Marja. 
Before going on holiday I did finish my fabricbook, so I will show some pictures of that soon. For the rest I am enjoying my garden, this summer the weather is great here in Holland. 

Some more fabric postcards!

I just realised that I forgot to blog the last postcards I got for my birthday at the end of March.....

 The postcard with the paper fabric rose, one of my favorite flowers, is from Helina in Finland.

And the beautiful landscape is made by Maria from the UK.

And a great felted with free embroidery postcard from Helga in Germany!

                      Once again thanks for your lovely work ladies!

Back to blogging!

Last week we were in Aywaille, Belgium for a short holiday. The weather wasn't that great, it was cold but good weather to make some walks. It is always nice to see the goats climbing the hills but this year we have seen an animal in the wild we never saw before, 

a beaver.... He was destroying a tree on the other side of the Amblève river. The close up pictures aren't that good, he or she was a bit too far away..........

But it was great to see, although the people of the camping aren't to happy with the beaver as you can imagine............

I have not been blogging a lot since I am busy painting for the Art route here in town early June. Last week I could pick up the invitations and poster and my painting of a French cow looks great on it. I may not show more 

pictures of the paintings I made yet, will do that after the Art Route!

Je t'aime Paris block finished!!
The last weeks I have been working on Darlene's block and it is on it's way home now!

This is how it looked before I started working on it. There is a bit of difference in the colors of both blocks I show you, because one is taken in the evening and the other one by daylight.......

I tried to bring more harmony in the block by adding more pink, purple and black to the block. I added the crocheted flowers, the MOP buttons, the lace in the upper right corner, the boot next to Moulin Rouge, the word Paris and the tatted lace next to it. 

Also I added the crocheted salmon pink colored flower to the flower spray to repeat the color of the small roses above the lady charm. I embroidered several seams, decorated the corset and added the Arc the Triomph and butterfly charm at last.

I hope Darlene likes my work!

Kathy is now working on mine, she is really encrusting it, 

can't wait to see it back home.

Have a look at her website to see what she has done so far!

to all of you!















                Today pictures of other birthdaycards I received.

               This one is made by Janny from Holland, a colorful partly felted postcard.

Beautiful felted flowers made by
Marja from Holland.

 

Lovely experimental grey-silver card made by Birgit from Germany.



And a yummy paper/pieced cupcake made by Annet from Holland.

Thanks for all these lovely cards ladies!

It's a Saturday Sharing Day....
Yesterday was my birthday and I received beautiful creative postcards from the members of the Fibre Fever group I am in. Unluckely I can't show you all because the batteries of my camera have died again.........Next time more! 

Ati from Norway made this beautiful purple felted card.

From Margreet from Holland I got this wonderful knitted postcard in my favorite color turquoise. 

Ritva from Finland made this lovely Crazy Quilted postcard.

Evi from Germany made this colorful

free motion quilted purple and blue postcard.

Thank you so much for these beautiful cards ladies!

By the way, my DH surprised me with tickets for "the Wall" by Roger Waters in July, am really happy with that!

Also I got some Janet Evanovich books and pots with pansies, narcissus etc. from friends. They have to stay inside for a while since it is still cold here in Holland with nightfrost and some snow again this afternoon. This march was the coldest in 25 years and Easter will be the coldest in 50 years. I am really looking forward to Spring!

Also I'd like to share this colorful visitor this week in our garden!

Think I am gonna make a painting of him! 

                                 

Take a look at Thearica's blog what others have shared this Saturday!

It's a Saturday Sharing Day

To sell or not to sell, that's the question.....

Today I am sharing a picture of several vintage French tule laces, small and about 4" wide, I bought this week. The wide ones would be great to cover fabrics and bead in crazy quilts or for making fabric journals. I especially love the soft yellow one. Also I found some French monogram laundry labels and a lovely button cart, all to sell in my Etsy shop. 
I just love the button cart, it is from August 1952 and has 32 different glass buttons, isn't it a shame to sell them?
I could use them on my Crazy Quilts, but the glass buttons would also look great as fruit or candybowl in my dollshouse......
Here in Holland it is weather to stay inside, it is the coldest March in 25 years, so I hope to get some listings done tomorrow. Average temperature this month is 3 o C! 
I am very much looking forward to Spring!
Take a look at Thearica's website to see other participants blogs in it's a Sharing Saturday.

Back to blogging

The last weeks have been very busy with the move of my mother. She is now settled in her new appartment and very happy and we are exhausted........LOL  What a lot can you collect in 83 years!

Yesterday evening and a part of today I have been busy working on Darlene's block in the Je t'aime Paris RR. This is how it looked when I started, it isn't finished yet, hopefully I'll manage that in the coming week. I will show some pictures when it is finished!

Last time I told you about my new Etsy shop "a Crazy Quilt Journey", I will try to list some more items in the coming week. 
I already sold 18 items and am very happy with that! 
I forgot to tell you why the shop is called like that. I hope I can make a trip to the USA again to a Crazy Quilt Retreat in Colorado and try to earn some extra money, so I came up with this name!

A Crazy Quilt Journey......

is the name of my new Etsy shop. The last weeks I have been busy listing items. I am going to sell new and vintage supplies for sane and crazy quilters like laces, buttons, threads, fabric packages and handmade items.



Most items I found on brocante/antique markets and collector fairs, a lot of them in France. All items are from my private collection.You can find my shop over here:     http://etsy.com/shop/aCrazyQuiltJourney

More good news, my mother finally got an apartment in an institute for the blind after waiting for almost 1,5 year. It will be a great new home for her with a lot of activities and I am very happy for her.
My mother always was a very active woman, loved to quilt, read, travel, made beautiful postcards until she lost sight due to trombosis, which was very hard for her. Now we have to pack and clean, go shopping for curtains, carpet etcetera so I will not have much time to blog these weeks! Until later!

It's a Saturday Sharing Day on Sunday again.........



Not much to tell this week, have been to work like normally. 

I forgot to show you a picture of the block I finished for the CQJP2013 last week.
The poem on it is about Arnhem at the end of WWII and waiting to be liberated.

The week started with a lot of snow -once again- and ended today with a bit of sunshine at last, but temperatures will go down again next week.....can´t wait for Spring to start! 








The pictures I made in the woods close to my home.

Yesterday I went to a craft fair with a collegue, that is why I didn´t post. Must say that 90% was about cardmaking and scrapbooking but luckely I found some charms for on my Crazy Quilts!
Have a look at Thearica´s blog to what other people are sharing!

It's a Saturday Sharing day again 

Today I am sharing my favorite colortheme with you......

I love blue and turquoise colors, just bought myself a little bit of spring....... 

I am collecting Depression glass and use them also for all kind of purposes. 

I don't like to put things in cabinets, just to look at them! The little vase is from around 1930. Everywhere in and around my house you will find items in these colors, even my curtains are turquoise! 

            This collection you can find in my garden....

These chickens in my kitchen were the last items I bought for my collection, aren't they beautiful?

I also like to use these colors in things I make, here you see my first quilt made around 1990:

And yes, I like a challenge and started with a Mariners Compass........LOL

Even our Harley Softtail from 1993 is turquoise!

                  Read more shared stories on Thearica's blog!

It's a Saturday Sharing Day

I decided to join another round of the CQJP this year. CQJP stands for the Crazy Quilt Journal Project and is an initiative to promote the art of Crazy Quilting all over the world and to expand the individual artistic creativity of the participants. Last year I challenged myself to work with novelty fabrics who are seldom used in Crazy Quilting. All blocks had the theme "Memories". When you scroll back to my blogpost of January 1th, you can see all the pages I made in 2012. I am now busy with making a fabric book of them. This will take some time because I want to make a back for each page with a little story about the trip or person the block is a memory of.

This year I am planning to make a Crazy Quilt about Arnhem, the town I was born and lived in for 52 years. The middle part of the block will have a picture of an old postcard or a poëm of Arnhem. This is the block I made for

January:

The text on the postcard says "Arnhem, Stadhuis" and is a picture of the old townhall build in the 16th Century, called the "Duivelshuis" (House of the Devil). It is called like that because of the satyrs above the entrance. 

In 1980 DH and I got married in this townhall.

Have a look at pigtaleandquilts, to see what other people are sharing on this It's a Saturday Sharing Day, or share your own work over there!

WIP Wednesday
Today I want to show you a Work In Progress (see Sharon's website). It is not a crazy quilt but a scrapquilt I am working on now and then already for about 10 years......

This quilt is stitched by hand and made of mostly reproduction fabrics, I love the colors of it. I keep on adding and adding, don't know when it ever will be finished!

It's A Saturday Sharing Day on Sunday.......LOL
Just as I decided to join Thearica's It's A Saturday Sharing Day my Internet refused to work! So now I will show you what I wanted to share yesterday. I have been working on a Crazy Quilt block that has to become the front of a bag.
A bit of a challenge, making the crazy quilted front isn't a problem but I never made a bag before! I always see beautiful examples of CQ bags on the Internet, so I wanted to give it a try also. I only wonder when I can use it in a climate with a lot of rain like here in Holland....Here a picture of the front:

I only still have to add a spider in the spider web, but can't find the right beads for it at this moment....

Now I have to decide what fabric to use for the bag, I have an old dark brown velvet jacket or an old jeans to cut up for  it, maybe I can use both?????

Also have to find a pattern for a suitable bag!

                  Je t'aime Paris Round Robin
Today I want to show you pictures of Cathy's beautiful block that I have been working on. The block has a lot of round curves and looked already beautiful without it's decoration. Theresa and Kathy did some awesome stitching before me. I love the way they used all these little flower beads on it, it's a pity such things are not available in the shops over here.....

When seeing this block I immediately knew that I -once again- had to stitch an Eifel Tower. The spot on the lower left corner was just perfect for it! After that I added the sheaf stitches in dark purple with little white pearls to balance the dark purple in the block. Than I made the cream cretan stitch and extended it with lilac lazy daisies. At last I added the spray of spiderweb roses in lilac River Silk above the Eifel Tower, made some leaves of fly stitches and silk ribbon and the little seam treatment with the double buttonholestitch in creme above them. Think Cathy will love this block!

Je t'aime Paris Round Robin

This is the second block I received in this Round Robin. It is from Theresa in the USA. Kathy started with making the beautiful flower arrangement beyond the Eifel Tower and the flower cart and did the 2 pink seams with sequins. Being in Paris you always see people stretched out on the grass in front of the Eifel Tower, so I decided to embroider the lady after a pattern I found in the magazine "Il etait un fil" that I bought in France last year. After that I added the word Paris and the pink lace with lazy daisies and perles in the upper left corner. Than I added the black feather stitch in the lower left corner. Now it is up to Darlene and Cathy to finish the block!

A change of style.............

For this new year I decided to change my blog into a new style, decided for other colors and font for my header. Now I am writing this post and have no idea how to change from "trebuchet" in "coming soon" since I can only choose for 7 styles of fonts when composing this post... Could someone help me with this?

I always love to look at the "buttonfloozies" blog which is devoted to buttons and the women who love them.

When I started Crazy Quilting I also started buying buttons to make button trails, you can read more about them on Block talk with Gerry. Now I have collected lots of vintage and antique buttons.............Now and then I will show you pictures of them! Here the first one, a little collection of Czech glass buttons!