Today was voteing day for our Federal Elections…My Sister and I drove out to the National Tally Room but it seems everyone else had the same idea as there was a long que to get in, so we came home and watched it on TV…The result, after 11 1/2 years, we have a new Prime Minister.
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To Finish the patch with the gold design I added 2 extra pieces in the middle so the the design has a continuous flow from top to bottom.
 
To add the extra parts to the gold design I cut around parts of the gold design from the unused fabric, backed the cut out pieces with fusible webbing, ironed them in place on the patch and did a few stitches with a gold thread to reinforse the fusible webbing.
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This is an Up and Down Buttonhole Stitch trimmed with beads.
Holiday Snaps Day 25
and Day 26 home
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Dentists aren’t commenly connected to crazy quilting but for me they are or at least one is…Visits to the dentist with my daughter used to be Very traumatic for both of us until she started seeing Dr T and his assistant E, 2 very special people, they talked to Jessie about things she was interested in and got her confidence so she didn’t mind going which took the trauma out of going to the dentist…and as they got to know us and what I do they started saveing the little bottles for me and every visit they would give me a few…we haven’t seen them for a while and the today I was in there to see another dentist but we passed Dr Tang in the corridor and he said Hallo, and could I wait a tic because he had something for me, he went back to his surgery and came back with a bag of little bottles, he is still saveing them for me which I think is really lovely…These little bottles from the dentist are my favourite bead bottles.
I clouded and/or scratched the plastic of a few bottles trying to remove the labels from the round ones, in the end it turned out easy to remove them the trick is to soak them in soapy water, overnight so that the water can soak in under the plastic coating, then let the labels dry before soaking them again for a few hours after which the label simply peels off.
My Bead Storage is based on small bottles including purpose made bead bottles, my dentist bottles, perfume bottles, medicine bottles and any other odd bottles.
Originally I stored the bottles in chocolate boxes, they are now stored in stationary draws…There is enough flexability in the plastic to pull the draws out of the unit, I use plyers to snap off about half the little plastic bits that are there to stop the draws coming out, leaving just enough to catch so that I know the draw is nearly out but allowing me to keep pulling so that the draw comes out as a tray.
I line each draw with cotton batting so that the bottles don’t rattle about when I am using them.
Holiday Snaps Day 24
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 As Sharon suggested, Thorn Stitch, this weeks TAST Stitch, makes good trees and I have used it to make a Christmas tree on a stocking.
I started with a brown Stem stitch for the trunk and worked the Thorn Stitches close together…The red metalic thread, that didn’t work for Chain Braid Stitch, did make nice tinsel on the tree, I also used gold metalic thread, petit gold beads and a gold star bead for decoration…a Satin Stitch pot completes the tree.
Holiday Snaps Day 23
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Doing some TAST stitches catch up…The Stitch for week 27 was Chain Braid Stitch.
I Started with a thick metalic thread, almost impossible to pull through the fabric and it snagged on itself forming the twists and I was having trouble forming the stitch and have ended up with individual knots.
For my second attempt I chose a thinner, smoother metalic thread and had no difficulty stitching with it but whereas I had thought that it would hold the stitch shape well it actually slipped pulling the knot down to the bottom, so again I have something different to what I thought I would.
Third time lucky! Using a size 5, cotton perle thread I tried again…I was starting to think that I really didn’t like this stitch but by this stage I had worked out how to do the stitch and with the suitable thread I enjoyed doing the stitch.
Holiday Snaps Day 22
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This afternoon I looked out the window just as it started to rain, as I watched about a dozen Galahs landed on the Electricity wires and started to do acrobatics, swinging upside down with there wings spread, they were obviously enjoying the rain.
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 Again I have changed my mind mid seam…I chose to do a ruched ribbon because I wanted to cover some parts of the gold design on the fabric…Next I was going to add beads as I usually do to the ruched ribbon…But the reason for covering parts of the gold was to show off the shapes of the gold design and beads would have been to close to the gold and be distracting.
I thought about leaving it with no further embellishment but it didn’t look finished, I was a bit flumaxed as to what else I could do until I looked at the other seams that border the gold design…that was it a little repetition would work…I found the fabric and cut out a couple of extra bits of the design, because they are small pieces as well as putting them on with fusible webbing, I used a gold thread to stitch them on.
Holiday Snaps Day 21
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 After doing Herringbone Stitch and Colonial Knots on this seam, I looked at it and thought a thicker thread would have looked better because, when working in monochromatic colours, it is the texture of the stitch against the surface that I look for…I thickened the thread by overlaying the first row of Herringbone Stitch with a second row worked over the threads of the first row.
Holiday Snaps Day 20
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When I started this seam it was going to be the ric-rac held on with herringbone stitch and trimmed with french knots…
With a loop on the right so the I could poke the end of the ric-rac under itself…
When I made the loop I thought instead of cutting it short I could twist the ric-rac for the length of the seam…When I started twisting the ric rac I thought umm if I can make a loop at the end I could maybe make extra loops along the length…I liked the shape that it formed and kept the trim simple, using each loop as a background to a pink crystal with green seed beads.
A very different seam to what I started to do.
Holiday Snaps Day 19
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