flowers to knit and crochet

Mom had noticed how much I enjoyed making the granny blanket.Therefore she brought me a present she thought I certainly would like. The book '100 Flowers to Knit and Crochet' by Lesley Stanfield.It's a lovely book filled with challenging knit and crochet flowers.
 Beautiful flowers in red and pink


white and yellow
 Flowers to use for decoration
 I got my cotton ready to get started. But first I've to figure out how to read a crochet pattern!
 Thanks mom, you're right..i love this book!
Groeten,

this and that

Thank you so much for your kind birthday wishes.
It's almost a week later now and I've been so busy with work.
This is my first day off and I finaly had some time to catch up with blog reading and to post.
February the 6th was a happy cake eating and gifts unwrapping day.
This book was one of my presents



It contains some wonderful stitchery projects.
Like this needle book, I love to make this sometime.,



Heleen spoiled me with this most gorgeous bag.
Lucky me... to have a sister who can make such handsome bags!



This morning the streets were snowy white and a bit slippery, again!
I can't wait til this winter is over. I just about had it with the cold!
To keep warm I even added an extra quilt on the bed with the tacking cotton still in it! Wouldn't it be great to be able to quilt, stay warm and rest underneath it at the same time! It certainly would solve some time problems.



This dutch folklore only needs one side of the binding sewn on.
I can do that this evening.



But....I'm off to the supermarket now, buy some ingredients to cook diner for my family. Groeten,

p.s. Dear swap friends,I find it so lovely that some of you write emails back and forth and become swapfriends. How neat is that!!

Sunday inspiration

I went shopping yesterday and brought the new Marie Claire idees back home.
This issue is really, and I mean really beautiful. It's packed full with the most wonderful inspirational idees.



I've taken some pictures to show, so you can see for yourself.



I love the paper made ornaments.
They look so simple and yet so very pretty.



Cute deer ornament.



And don't you just adore this sweet crochet pink teacozy!!



There's so much more. I better hide this magazine from 'moi' before I start making more and more ufo's! I'am the queen of ufo's, you know!
 I start machine quilting the Christmas quilt. And as you probably see it looks terrible. So I removed all the stitches and decided to hand quilt.



But I make large stitches with a large needle so that works real fast!This way I hope to be on time for the contest.


Groetjes,
ps. If you like 'speculaas' go over to my sisters blog. she is holding a yummie giveaway!

Sunbonnet Sue

Some days you don't feel like doing anything. And today is just one of those days. Due to a lack of motivation I picked-up some magazines from the shelf. You see, browsing true old magazines always works for me! It gives me new inspiration and new inspiration means I have to do something. So, while browsing I came across these sunbonnets



The magazine is a Japanese quilt magazine from 2002. It contains an article about 'Sunbonnet Sue'. To bad I can't read Japanese. They refer to the book A meeting of the Sunbonnet children by Betty J. Hagerman. I also found an illustrated history of Sunbonnet Sue here.



This quilt is so beautiful, i love the flowers in the border.



Oh, wouldn't this bag be a pretty one for carry all my stuff around?



I believe some creative sparks are bubbling up inside of me, time for some action!
Have a wonderful day!

Redwork

There's a research book on the shelf in my craftsroom that's absolute one of my most favorite books! Red & White: American Redwork Quilts and Patterns written by Deborah Harding. I had it on my wishlist for a while before I purchased it from Amazon.com. I made a good deal, especially now with the low dollar against the euro it's very lucrative for us living in Europe to buy books in the US!



It's a cardboard box that contains two beautiful bound and wonderfully illustrated books. The first book features the history of redwork embroidery along with illustrations of exquisitely executed quilts. The second book supplies instructions and a lovely collection of redwork patterns.
It's one of my goals to one day make a redwork quilt!



I choose some gorgeous redwork photos from Flickr and made them into a redwork mosaic to inspire me.
The work on the photos is made by others, very creative people....just click on the titel below for further information.


1. REDWORK friday, 2. redwork birdies drawstring bag, 3. Redwork girl & boy dancing, 4. ratinha1, 5. February Valentines, 6. redwork doll, 7. Redwork linen cloth, 8. environment friendly giftwrap - detail, 9. Redwork, 10. Redwork, 11. Stickerei, 12. Lou's Redwork Quilt, 13. Stickmustertuch, 14. QW0004-01, 15. redwork 1, 16. redwork (1)

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

inspiration

There is a book on my shelf I absolut adore! The book is called, 'De regenboog'. The rainbow, if you Translate it in english. It's a Russian folk tales book illustrated by Joeri Wasnetsov and published by Radoega, Moskou.





On the left side of each page is a song or a poem printed, very lovely but I've got the book mainly for its illustrations.



The beautiful illustrations inspire me! I like the style, very suitable to translate into fabric, applique and embroidery, I think.




The pigs in the tree...so funny!

50th post

Well today is the day....Today a little milestone, my 50th post! If you would asked me a year ago what a blog was, I would say; "excuse me...a what"? It was purly a coincidence that I discovered this amazing world of blogging! And I never expected how much fun it could be! I've met some wonderful new friends and recieved the most warm and supportive comments.
Thank you, thank you'll for that.



So....for celebrate my 50th post I have wrapped a little present for a lucky winner. Just leave a comment and I'll draw out a winner next tuesday.

p.s. I would also like to invite the non comment readers to feel free to join in too!

I finish this post with a wonderful book I want to share.
It's published in 2003, but I just recently found it!
The ISBN number on the back is: 2-84831-004-9



It's full with the most gorgeous quilts and quilting projects.







Lots of pages full of inspiration! Myself....I like the teapots applique!