day 3 Dolls in the Attic

What a beautiful day today, making a beautiful doll with Patti
Culea.

It was a relaxing day and we were able to take it a bit slower.



an evening relax with friends was in order afterwards and a walk along the beach was a delight.






Tonight we dine at Gloria's home with our doll club members which we're all really looking forward to.

until tomorrow. enjoy Ann

Location:Anuuka Resort Coffs Harbour

Day 3 Dolls in the Attic continued

I just love these photos






it is a beautiful part of the world.

life is precious enjoy Ann

Location:Anuuka Beach Resort Coffs Harbour

day 3 Dolls in the Attic

A blue day today

a morning walk along the beach


my paper doll from Betts Vidal's class. what a beautiful day



a beautiful sunset



classmates and wonderful dollmakers
Jenny, Betts, Sanya, Heidi, Narelle, Sharon, Marjorie with Jo and I in front



I am in awe of it all

have fun Ann

Location:Anuuka Resort Coffs Harbour

Day 2 Dolls in the Attic

Wow an amazing day with Barbara Willis today:

delightful dolls and delightful colour. A walk along the beach at lunch time.






Diggers Beach is beautiful. It is deserted pretty much at this time of year so Jo and I had the beach to ourselves.

We talked about what it would be like to feel sand through your toes for the first time. how easy it is to forget these simple pleasures.

here is a banyon tree growing along the beach.



and here we all are after class - a lovely group of ladies and great dollmakers



our project today was to work on Barbara's amoire and doll. I bought one of her dolls at the tutor's bazarre last night so I have a lovely momento of the week and especially Barbara. Here is a teaser of the project. The doll l bought is this gal's sister and just as beautiful.



We are truly blessed to have this opportunity with 5 amazing and very generous tutors.

have fun. My wish would be for everyone to have the opportunity to share a wonderful time with like minded souls at least once in their lilfe.

enjoy! cheers Annie

Location:Anuuka Beach Resort Coffs Harbour

Day 1 of the Dolls in the Attic Symposium

What an amazing day. Jo and I travelled by car up to Coffs Harbour for 5 days of fun and friviolity with like minded souls. We are so very lucky.

My day started finding this quote: "Clean out a corner of your mind and creativity will certainly fill it" by Dee Hock. how very true and now I am on holiday I can feel this happening.

It was a lovely trip. it took us 8 hours to get here but it went so quick. We picked strawberries at Riccardoes at Port Macquarie and met up with shannon, connie and jackie for lunch.



We arrived at Anuuka around 5.30 to be greeted by Gloria and our lovely tutors who have really excelled themselves with this amazing project. 2 pages and a doll each to the theme Dolls in the Attic. it was great to hear their attic stories and the reveal was a wow moment. did I say we are very lucky. And dessert and coffee at fins just topped the day off.


I met up with lots of friends not seen for a long time. it was a fun night and about to be a fun 6 days.

and to top even the dessert an amazing moonrise over Diggers Beach.



till tomorrow... hugs Ann

Location:Anuuka Beach Resort Coffs Harbour

Today's the Day

Today marks the culmination of 18 months work. Our medical practice is being accredited against the hundreds of RACGP standards. We have to pass each one.

I feel elated it's almost over, terribly nervous I'll freeze when asked questions, and curious not having been through one before.

Gosh it is nerve wracking though

So a lovely pic taken from the thread studio facebook page to relax me today




Enjoy your day. Hugs Ann




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A good mornng

We have had absolutely beautiful clear cold sunny days of late. These kind of days delight us.


Our sunrise silhouette this morning was lovely.

Our day has dawned and it is a yellow day today. A beautiful yellow hue lights up the valley. I wonder what it will bring?

Enjoy your day. Hugs Ann

And number 3 - it's orange

Today I am working on our practice manual. It is hard yakka! So having a break decided to write on my blog

I am so inspired by my beautiful home in winter. It is a rainy day today but all so very orange! I've had rainbows and rain and the sun is really trying to peak through. I love the photo of the early morning spider web and I actuallly managed to capture the rainbow on my trusty lumix. We have had hundreds of oranges which Greg juices each morning. Sadly I can't eat them due to allergies, but they sure do look amazing!











Every time I see a rainbow it reminds me of my dear granddaughter, Gwenhwyfar. I used to ring her every time I saw one, "can you see it Gwenhwy?" Poor kid she's 2 hours away, so how could that ever happen? smile!

So here it is Gwenhwy. I can't resist!

Enjoy!

beautiful irish crochet

My friend Erica, fondly referred to as Madame Google, shared a link to this amazing site.

Here is an amazing garment by Elena Statkevich on the Irish Crochet Lab Website




I just want to sit and do this for the rest of my life. thanks Erica

have fun crocheting hugs Ann

A new doll

It has been an exciting time for our doll club. We are helping Gloria prepare for our 20th anniversary retreat in August at Coffs Harbour. This is so exciting. 5 days of dolls with some very talented US doll makers. Can't get better than that! smile!

At our last doll club meeting last Saturday we had the unveiling of our challenge dolls inspired by the santos cage dolls.

You can see the dolls here on our Hello Dollies Blog

And here is my doll. My shrine to crochet. I love crochet and really enjoyed making her. She is all cloth with crocheted motifs. The base was a light casing I bought at a nursery. I hope you like her.



have a lovely day Annie

My jacket shawl if finally finished

I love this time of year, today we had a gentle wind and beautiful sunny sky. It was really magic watching the knee long grass gently blowing in the wind. A gentle undulation and most meditative to watch. How magic. I wish I had taken a photo. The colour of my day was a gentle orange of the grasses, the new oranges on our citrus trees and new bird of paradise stems standing tall. The orange against the green is a beautiful contrast.

I have finally finished my shawl jacket from Nicky Epstien's book block by block and love it.

it is worn off the shoulder and hangs quite low at the sides and off the arms.

Here are some photos of front, back and the complete jacket. I'm not sure if I'll sew up the sides but it sure does look fabulous. The pattern has knitted in sleeves but being a woman of a certain age, I think I'll make some arm hugs instead which are easily removed.



This is the front



This is the back,



and this is the complete jacket. Buttons just need to be sewn on and it's ready to wear.

It's great to snuggle into.

Otherwise I'm madly working on producing my rpl for my diploma of practice management. I'm reallly enjoying this.

The other thing I really want to do is make some crocheted flowers for my new meditation buddah. He holds a large flat dish in which they would sit beautifully.

Until next time. have fun and enjoy Ann

A beautiful weekend

I had a lovely mothers' day weekend. My sisters and I took mum to see Eurobeat at the Joan Sutherland performing arts centre in Penrith. It was a fun, funny musical comeday, a takeoff of the eurovision competition. We all really enjoyed it and it was a first for mum, she hadn't seen anything like that before.



Mothers' day breaky was at Magenta Shores, then catching up briefly with my sister Lorna. This gal is an amazing inspiration to me.



I did make her a bracelet for her 50th birthday. It was fun watching her trying to work out how it was made. It is made from buttons with shanks removed, then glued onto a bracelet using the strong E6000 glue. And thanks to Gloria at Annes Glory Box for these wonderful buttons. I made myself one too.


Then we drove up to Allworth for afternoon tea. Isn't this a lovely pic of me Gwenhwy, Griff and Olive.



Sadly Chris and family couldn't make it as Chris was working but we'll catch up soon. He hadn't seen daylight for a week as working underground. I don't mind, I am so lucky. It's like mothers' day for me every day when I see my kids and grandies.

The green jacket is coming along wonderfully, I'm up to the front bands. I've decided not to knit in the sleeves but to make some arm warmers instead which will look like sleeves and are able to be taken off when I only need warmth around my chest. Pics next time.

I've been enjoying The Voice. Gosh there are some amazing singers this season. My favourites have to be Luke, Harrison, Celia and Miss Murphy. Let's see how they go! smile!

I've also started to upgrade some qualifications and am madly working on my RPL for Diploma of Practice Management. Wish me luck!

Have fun and enjoy every moment

hugs Ann

What a week, we are so lucky

It has been an up and down week.

Yesterday Chris and his children were in a car accident and luckily everyone is ok. It was a real wakeup call. We truly are so lucky and blessed. He rolled the car in thick fog and noone had any injuries at all. It is surely a miracle.

It really helps to talk about it. I guess that is an important part of dealing with trauma. Seeing the car upside down with stuff everywhere was such a shock. But they're ok. I'm not religious but at times like this I really think there must be someone who looks after us. thank you, thank you, thank you.

On a creative note, on Wednesday mum and I went to see War Horse at the theatre. The puppetry and puppeteers were amazing. The whole show was wonderful. The set was so simple and amazing. Mostly drawings computer projected onto an undulation of fabric across the back of the stage. I loved it.

I'm knitting again and it is my meditation. Greg says if I'm not knitting I'm asleep, how true!

Here is my neck warmer just finished using a 50:50 wool acrylic called Splendour. It is so soft and knitted up lovely. I did undo it 4 times to get it out of one ball. Pattern, yarn and needles were a lovely birthday present from Lesley last year. what a wonderful present.




When in Sydney I bought a passionfruit macaron kit from Andriano Zumbo at Star City. I made them up and they worked. woohoo! they were so delicious.



And finally, yes I am so very luckly. Here's my view from my breakfast area this morning. A beautiful crisp slightly foggy Autumn morning in Broke. We don't get any colour change sadly, but it is still beautiful. Yes I am very lucky indeed.



have fun Ann

January and February babies

We had lovely birthday lunches for Zac, Ashleigh and Harper in January and February. I love it that my grandkids all love each other and are having so much fun growing up together.

Here's Zac now a very grown up 14

And Ash a beautiful 12 year old

And Harper turning 6 with her cousins

and having fun with the camera

Gwenhy, Ash, Olive, and Griff in back row

and Brooklen, Zac and Harper in the front row

 

I am truly blessed

A Ladies Who Lunch Day

I had a lovely friendship day today with my friends from LWL.  This is a great group of gals who meet monthly, to support each other, talk about all the crafty things we'd love to finish, and eat and eat, and eat a beautiful lunch.

Although on saying that we do have some amazing show and tell at tmes from some very creative women.

Fay and Ali both made an amazing neckpiece each. Good luck Ali in the Easter Show, your piece was a stunner.  No photos yet as for exhibition but hopefully later.



Here is Collaroy Beach from Ali's verandah and an amazing reflection of umbrellas and beach trees in her front window. I love going to Ali's home, it reminds me of days in my youth spent with my nan at Dee Why and Auntys at Avalon and Dee Why.  Our old stomping ground and wonderful memories.

We also gave Fay her lovely LWL field of flowers rug, just for being herself, a wonderful woman.  She does so much for us all and we really wanted to give something back to her.  Here it is shown in it's beautiful box, overflowing over the edges. Fay also holds it to give you some idea of what it looked like and size.  It was indeed a beautiful field of colourful flowers and would look fabulous draped over a lounge or bed or just to snuggle up in.  We made her some flowers using 3 shades of cotton.  And a big thanks to Toni for putting them all together for our dear Fay

ahh life can't get any better

have a lovely Sunday

Ann

It's a green day

I love colour. All colours, but especially green and am surrounded by it on a daily basis.

The hunter valley is so very green at the moment. We've had lots of rain, the vines are vigorous and a riot of green leaves. Most grapes have been picked and the leaves will soon start to turn yellow. So I am enjoying our morning drives through the gloriousness of green knowing it won't last too much longer.

This is a lovely lake we drive past each morning. It does look more brown than green but just wanted to share the view. You can see the vines on the hill.



I bought some beautiful green yarn a few years ago from Jane Slicer-Smith to knit her swing coat, but sad to say I have lost interest in the pattern so am putting it to another use.

I love Nicky Epstein's books and discovered in my library her book on knitted blocks with an amazing project called the sweater shawl. I've started with my green yarn and it's wonderful. The book has over 100 blocks, uses lots of advanced techniques I've never used before. Here are a couple of photos. The shawl part is made from 8 strips of 3 blocks. Im just starting my 4 th strip and love the whole project. The tree block and embossed rose block were really exciting to make.

This project is amazing. I love making my own fabrics and the texture you can get with a knit and purl has given me lots of ideas for other projects.


Here are 2 strips blocked



This is the third being blocked. I pin them out and then put a damp towel over the top to dry. It blocks them beautifully

Enjoy the colour of your day

Regards Ann

Gosh it's all happening in my studio

I'm embellishing again and finishing some projects.  It's very exciting especially as I've never finished anything in the many years I've been doing this.

Here's my crazy patched sewing bag!  woohoo! My favourite embellishment things to do are ribbon work and working with buttons.  I'm not an embroiderer but give it a go! I was thrilled with this effort.

And here is my beautiful daughter. This photo was taken when she was 14. With a girlfriend they took themselves off to what was then Grace Brothers and had some studio photos done. They were wonderful. It was a surprise but I had to buy them!  smile! 

So I crazy patched around the silk fabric photo and then highly embellished it. 

I made that! smile!

I gave it to her for a Christmas gift and we had tears all round, she loves it.

 

And finally I have put a memory piece I have done of my mum into the framers.  It's going to be wonderful and I can't wait to show everyone at February embellishment!

 

Have fun creating

Ann