A Dream Weekend!!

WHAT a weekend!! I'm absolutely exhausticated, footsore and sleep-deprived ... but BOY! did we have fun! Tee! Hee! Hee!

As I've been telling you for a little while, this weekend was the annual Stitchers' Dream Day Out hosted by Marion and Steph of The Quilter's Angel ... and it IS a stitcher's DREAM day out. :0) It was a busy, busy weekend, all in all ... you know ... getting the grown-up chores done early so I could play for the whole weekend, tidying the house to welcome visitors ... and of course, playing with all those other keen stitchers! :0) I was fortunate enough to have two good friends travel from Brisbane to join me ... my Bestest-Buddy-Since-We-Were-Nine Lynette and fellow-designer Toni Alexander of the Red Boot Quilt Co. YAY!! :0) Things were all set for FUN!!

Now ... there are quite a lot of photos to follow, so perhaps you need to grab a cuppa and a little snackie, get comfy and settle in for a read and a peek at our weekend of fun. Sorry Chooky ... no way to make this a short post! Tee! Hee! Hee!

The hall was decorated beautifully as always, in keeping with this year's theme, "LOVE". Do you see those helium filled heart balloons? I spent a lot of the weekend feeling a bit like a navy warship dodging mines! They seemed to jump out at me as I went past! :0)

This is a photo of all the ladies ... taking photos! :0) Before the stampede began, everyone was keen to get photos of how gorgeous the room looked ... and look at those lovely giftie bags!! Oh yeah ... we were SPOILT! :0) The guest designers for this year's event were Rosalie Quinlan, Debbie McGee and Ella Madsen ...

Look at these GORGEOUS and inspiring women!! Ella, Deb, Rosie and Marion. It was wonderful to catch up with Deb again ... she's such a sweetie! :0) And lovely to chat with Ella and Rosie, too, as they are both designers whose work I have admired for many years. Each of the girls were given two bundles of fabrics and asked to design two projects for the weekend ...

Deb's first project was this SUPER cute handbag-shaped pincushion. This was so darn cute!! It's a great size so you can't misplace it on your sewing table, has a handy pocket on each end for pencils, rotary cutters, scissors and needles, the front flap lifts to store needles and the handle makes it very handy to transport for those sewing days with friends.

Deb's second project was a sweet sewing pouch in funky black, red, brown and pink with a stitchery on the front.

This was one of Ella's designs ... a knitting bag featuring one of her crinoline ladies. Ella loves to research the history and stories of these ladies of yesteryear ... and some of them were just a little bit RACY if you know what I mean! Tee! Hee! Hee!

Ella's second project was an elegant iPad pouch with the theme of this year's event stitched on the front ... this is the project I started stitching ... and no I'm not going to show you how much I didn't ... er ... did get stitched for the day! :0) I was severely sleep-deprived ... that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it! :0)

This is one of Rosie's projects ... a pretty stitchery which has been combined with a stitcher's hoop to make a wall hanger. Rosie's other project was a sweet bag featuring half Dresden plate paper-piecing ... but I forgot to take a pic of it ... Oops!! Check out the Quilters Angel blog to see it.

Here's some of the gals from the Friday night stitching group I meet up with once a fortnight. There were LOTS of goodies in the giftie bags! :0)

And speaking of gifties ... Donna and Ruth (Friday night gals) attend one of the Stitcher's Dream Day Out days each year together and they exchange gifts that carry the theme of the day. Ruth made this GORGEOUS framed scrap-booking project ... and the pretty matching card you can see on the table. Donna's gift to Ruth was a set of three little boxes filled with pretty bits and pieces that featured 'love'. What lovely friends to have! :0) There were lots of other friends enjoying the weekend ... as well as some Mother/Daughter combos ...

This lovely Mum travelled from north of Cairns to join her Brissie-based daughter to come and play. This was the first stitching for our dotty-dress-wearing-daughter ... and she FINISHED the stitchery for her project! WOW!! She was showing us all up! :0)

Another Mother/Daughter team ... we nick-named them the 'Overachievers'! :0) Miss Daughter on the left travels from Mt Isa each year to play with us and she ALWAYS has projects from the previous year all finished ... plus a few extras! ... to share during show and tell. I didn't get a good pic of their shirts, but they showed the swaps and changes that we had with the date for this stitching event thanks to our 'wonderful' past prime ministers.

Throughout the weekend, the lovely designers shared lots of tips, tricks and mini-demonstrations. Everyone was enthralled and listening closely ... or were they?!?!?

The Fabulous Fiona of Bubz Rugz ... it's always the quiet ones you have to watch out for! :0 There's one on every table, isn't there?! :0) ) Or in our case ...

... perhaps there were TWO!!! :0) My Bestest-Buddy-Since-We-Were-Nine Lynette decided her stitched swirls looked a little like a moustache. Are you guessing which table we're talking about here??

Yep ... Table Two AKA "The Naughty Table!" :0) Here we are in all our glory ... though, to be fair ... Lyn on the left was lovely and quiet, stitching away while the mayhem went on around her! :0) That's Toni holding our table number. We had a wonderful time of catching up, chatting, being spoilt and LAUGHING!! Oh ... and apparently some people STITCHED! :0)

A HUGE thank you to Marion and Steph and their band of merry helpers, the clever-clogs designers Rosie, Deb and Ella, to all the lovely ladies who joined in the chatting and laughing. It was so much fun to catch up with some of the gals I'd met at previous Stitchers Dream Days and Girls' Stitch In, not to mention blogging buddies ... Hi Cheryl and Lynda! :0) If you haven't managed to attend one of the Quilters Angel's special stitching events, I would HIGHLY recommend that you do!! You not only enjoy a relaxing day with great company, you get SPOILT!!! :0) I can give you a little whisper about next year ... Christmas is coming early next year ... in April!! I'll share more details with you once they're finalised ... promise!! :0)

And now ... we're all catching up on some sleep and getting ready for this coming weekend when Creative Fields kicks off ... pop over to the Quilters Angel to get the details. Anyone would think Marion and Steph have way too much free time! Tee! Hee! Hee!

Hope you've all had a fabulous weekend and that your week is off to a wonderful start. Til next time ...

BEAR HUGS!

CHEERS!
KRIS