Merry Christmas

This year I purchased a quilt in the SAQA Benefit Auction for the first time; Poinsettia by Canadian artist Anna Davison. I love it and it's hanging in our living room at the moment, next to the Christmas tree.

It's the perfect image for my last posting of the year as we are getting ready for our summer holiday at the beach. I would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas (or happy holidays, if you prefer) and a happy, healthy, colourful and creative New Year. Thank you for visiting my blog, I hope to see you back in 2014!

Take care,
Linda

Poinciana Seed Pod

Yesterday was a productive day: I played tennis, finished a book (Watching You by Michael Robotham - have read all his books in the last few weeks and loved them) and made this small quilt, my submission for the SAQA 2014 Anniversary Trunk Show (and all this while it's school holidays!).
I have used a Poinciana seed pod as a stamp before, to make fabric cards, and have wanted to use it in an art quilt ever since.



Here's a detail pic. I like the combination of the organic shape of the seed pod and the straight background quilting. What do you think?

Handprinted Schoolhouse Fabric and Postcard Giveaway

Ever since I made my hand-stamped Dutch Houses fabric I have been thinking about other designs to print on fabric. A while ago, it suddenly struck me that it would be fun to create a stamp of one of my favourite traditional quilt blocks; the Schoolhouse. And yesterday I finally found time to do it:



I started stamping, and really liked it:



Here is the first fat quarter of Little Red Schoolhouse fabric - now for sale in my Etsy shop:



I also made a fabric postcard (10 x 15 cm / 4 x 6 inch). Because it's almost Christmas I am giving it away to one reader of this blog. If you would like to win it, leave a comment here and let me know which quilt block you think I should make into a stamp next. I'll pick a winner on 5 January 2014, as we are going away to our caravan in Wooyung Beach this weekend for two weeks. Good luck!

Wordless Wednesday

Snakes and Ladders Quilt

Suddenly realised that I hadn't shown this quilt here yet! I made it for the kids' issue of Down Under Quilts. Of course my boys had to try it out first:



They approved of it, and it ended up on the cover, with their bears and tiger! The boys are very proud :-).



(Isn't that pink Kombi Van adorable??)

The quilt now lives in Kenya, where the boys' little cousins are having lots of fun with it. That's what we do it for, isn't it?

St Martin's Church (Martinitoren)

Lately the Wordless Wednesday photos are all there is on this blog... I'm busy making lots of stuff but can't show it here yet - so frustrating! Well, I'll just show you something someone else made. Ali made this gorgeous lino print for me - it's inspired by a 1950s photo of Groningen, the city in the Netherlands where I went to university and where I lived for 12 years.



Ali blogged about the process of turning this photo into a linocut here and about playing with the lino prints here and here.

Thanks again for this precious print Ali, I will treasure it!