Central Plateau, North Island

Central Plateau, North Island
View from a friend's farm

Tuesday 29 September 2015

Springtime is Blooming

 

The gardens here and elsewhere are in full springtime swing, with tulips, Sparaxis, pansies, freesias, azalea bushes, and more, all in glorious colour.

Yesterday Joyce came home with these gorgeous flowers from Daphne.I tried to photograph them  against the wallpaper, but decided  that was not the best angle. The freesias have a perfume that is so individual to them, the tulip opened today, as did one darker Dutch Iris.  They are beautiful, how lucky was I ??

Flowers from Daphne #2

In our garden more bulbs are flowering, the delicate bluebells scattered  among iris, Dutch Iris, and daffodils, dainty little flowers.

One Bluebell flower

Purple  variety of Sparaxis

On the quilting program, I have taken on another new project, the Midnight Mystery Quit, (( OOPS, that is meant to spell “ Quilt”  )) with

Meadow Mist Designs

Cheryl, another very talented lady ,  is sharing her skills with us. Generous, helpful, lovely comments that make us all feel so good with fabric choices and squares finished, suggestions, and so much more. There is a Facebook group, and we share our photos there.

This is a lengthy assignment, over many months, and as I joined in late, have fast-tracked August and September, to finish in time!!!

Whew, a huge relief all round, as I was down in the office, roller cutting, ironing, then back to the trusty Bernina for some hours on end. Maybe it was a miracle that Hugh had his dinner on the table!!! I am using the batiks from my stash, and slowly it is getting less and less. So much so, I had to use several different fabrics for each of the 4 colours. These are the first two sets. Flying Geese, then Square in a Square.  The purple is the same in each of these, but I used maybe 6 different shades of blue. And with the squares, 2 different greens, and many more of the purple/pinky/orangy colours.

Flying Geese in rows

Midnight Mystery Flying Geese

midnight Mystery geese and sias

Midnight Mystery combinations

Mystery Midnight blocks #1

Geese and squares in a circle, squares by themselves, and  squares combined with a goose!!! I work better when I have a deadline to meet, the next set  will be published on October 1st, down here it will be the 2nd, and we are all waiting to see what comes next. I need new roller  cutter blades, I  might order them online,  as they are a lot  more reasonable in  price than the original Olfa or Fiskar ones. ( 10 NDK blades 45mm for $22.70)  Do you know, do the brand ones last longer, or do you re-sharpen your blades?

Quotation of the day, author unknown

“ She who dies leaving the most fabric

is not sewing fast enough”

Greetings from Jean

18 comments:

eileeninmd said...

Hello Jean, your spring flowers sound wonderful. We are seeing the leaves dropping quickly around here now. Your flower arrangement is lovely, I can just imagine the fragrance. I love the pretty quilt, it will be beautiful.
Have a happy day and new week ahead!

Kate said...

Lovely flowers. I also liked the quote. Good luck with your mystery quilt, it is looking very good, so far.

Leeanne said...

Spring has sprung! Magic flowers. Whoopwhoop you put 'our' mountains back on your header. Your flying geese look pretty good to me.

TexWisGirl said...

neat designs! i like geese in a row and circle. :) lovely blooms, too. happy spring to you!

Barb said...

Jean, you are a busy bee going into spring. The blooms you've shown are gorgeous - I can almost smell them. Here, the leaves are blowing down from the aspens. Your materials for the quilt are so pretty!

Mystic Quilter said...

Aren't the Spring flowers a delight now! I do like the batiks you're using in your Mystery and ill be waiting for posts as you go along. Blades - I have only replaced my Olfa with the brand blades, and this has been done ever so infrequently. I think over the past few years with my present cutter I have had two or thee replacement blades, one was my fault I ran over the ruler!

camp and cottage living said...

Jean
I can't wait to see your quilt finished!
You sure have a beautiful array of Spring flowers.
It's so hard for me to imagine it will be eight months before
I see any here again.
Take care-Kim

Carol Mattingly said...

You are a woman on a mission Jean. Keep on sewing. I love the pink in the fabric. I steer to the pinks and oranges and greens. So happy you are enjoying Spring's bounty. Carol

Georgia said...

I love Batiks! Yours remind me that I have some similar in the closet. I have to admire your perseverance. So happy you're moving into spring. We're promised humidity down below 60 this weekend!

KB said...

The flowers are spectacular! I'm so glad that spring is arriving for you :)

Julie Fukuda said...

Those batiks are just lovely and the piecing so far looks terrific. It will be fun to watch the progress ... along with the garden progress too.
I am not much of a cutter expert but I love Olfa products. I use their craft knives for teaching whittling, and though the blades are replaceable, they can be sharpend and used over and over for years.

Lorna McMahon said...

Your lovely flowers look so pretty, Jean. Here we are heading into fall and the crops are being taken off the fields. You are making great progress on the Mystery quilt. What beautiful batiks!

What Karen Sees said...

Hi Jean, thank you for your nice comments on my fall aspen trees. When I opened your blog to see snow and more snow, and you say spring in now blooming, it is obvious you live nowhere near my 'neck of the woods'. Where do you live?? Your flowers are lovely here and so is your quilting. I am an inactive quilter. I used to quilt a lot with my trusty Bernina, but some time ago I decided I just didn't have time for two hobbies at once, and my first love is photography so that takes up most of my hobby time. But for some reason, fall and winter bring on the urge to quilt, probably because I can't be outside photographing as much do to weather. And now I'm expecting my 13th grandchild in a few months so that is great incentive to design a baby quilt, which I have done for each grandchild.

Jim said...

Jean, what a wonderful bouquet to arrive! And your blooms look very springlike......appropriately so.
Another project for you and I look forward to following this one to its end.

Allie-oops Designs said...

Your flowers are beautiful!! And I love love love what you're working on, the colors are just stunning. I don't buy my rotary cutter blades at regular sewing stores - there's a tool store here called Harbor Freight, and they sell "carpet cutter" blades which are exactly the same thing for so much less!!! And I do mean exactly the same thing. Seems you can charge so much more just by putting a quilting stamp on something, lol.

bj said...

O, my....this is so beautiful and it looks soooooooo hard to do. I would be bald by now, pulling my hair out. I CAN make a simple quilt top (I used to quilt them on my mother's olden Singer but it HURT...hurt my arms..my back...and hurt my feelings. LOL

Fundy Blue said...

It's lovely to hear you bubbling over with enjoyment of life and it's pleasures, Jean! I was laughing at the antics of your teen-aged Boris. You have to let them go sometime, even if they're cats. Your new project looks lovely; I'm vicariously living my quilting dreams through for now. I do hope that Hugh is progressing well. thanks for sharing your springtime world! I'm scuffing through fallen leaves here! Hugs!

Jenn Jilks said...

I'm happy for your springtime! Keep up with those lovely heart-warming photos!!!!