Melbourne getaway

Well, I returned in the weekend from 5 days in Melbourne. I love this place. I took my 16 year old daughter there for her birthday and a shopping holiday!  We had such a great time. Lots of shopping. I found this great fabric store thanks to Rita and had a great spend up at GJ's Discount Fabrics.  We stayed at the Swanston Hotel which was perfect.  Right in the city so we could walk everywhere.

Love this busker who had his own
Eftpos machine just in case
you didn't have cash!!!

Hannah standing by the Yarra River

Hannah just down from Flinders Station

Flinders Station

Hannah just outside Chinatown. This was
opposite our hotel

A night at Dracula's

Finished my Birds and Bees quilt

I LOVE this quilt.  I adore the fabric, Birds and Bees by Tula Pink. I love the design and I love the way the colours all work so well together. I straight line quilted it following the outlines of the hexagons. I used a Deb Strain stripe for the binding which blends so well with the colours in the quilt.

My 3 favourite fabrics from the range. The Kona solid is Green Tea

The binding is a stripe by Deb Strain.
That's a spot of water from my roses on the top!

My hubby being a dick. He did have another pose,
but that is not for family friendly viewing.

And of course, poor Max wasn't even safe.  Tony is holding him so he can't escape, much to Max's disgust. He certainly didn't want to be wrapped in such a pretty quilt.

Bees all round and in a quilt!

I have finished up a few more bee blocks...this time for the girls in the 4x5 modern quilt bee.  I chose the Flutter block by Patty Young in the Quiltmakers 100 Blocks Volume 2 mag.

I always love working with different color groups that I have never put together before. Each time I made one, it became my new fav!

Now that my bee committments are all up to date, I have been able to piece something together for myself. I just LOVE Tula Pink's Birds and the Bees range and when I was lucky enough to win a jelly roll of it from the Fat Quarter Shop, I couldn't wait to start cutting into it. I am using a design from Jelly Roll Dreams called Dripping with Diamonds and I am loving how this is turning out. The photo was taken at night so the color is not the best and doesn't show off the vibrancy of the fabrics, but I will take a better one in daylight when I have put the borders on.

In about 10 days I am heading off to Melbourne for 5 days with my eldest daughter for a spot of shopping.   We decided to splash out so we're staying in the Swanston Hotel.   Hopefully I will find some good quilting shops while I am there ;) Unfortunately, she is not quite so excited about that idea!! lol

Today we were privileged to meet one of NZ's finest rugby coaches, Graeme Henry.  He was doing a book signing at the local bookstore and was so down to earth and friendly. He had taken the time to buy a raffle ticket from the Rose Society outside the front of the store before he went in and took the time to chat with all those he met on the way.

Sarah and Graeme Henry

Tony and Graeme Henry