Wishing all my friends ....

Chatterbox, The Professor and Little Person

would like to wish you all

a very Happy Christmas

and a wonderful 2011

and so would I.

So what did the Piggy say?

You know how there's always a wonderful "moment" in any child's school play?  Well, this is what happened at Little Person's play last week.

Narrator: "... and the Piggy said ...."
Piggy: " ... ermm....Moo?  Baa?   No, OINKK"

I do so love these plays and performances.

Thank you ..........

......... to Mary at Quilt Hollow, who sent me this:

 I love these snappy bags, they are so useful, and Mary also included a lovely pattern for a quilt which I absolutely must make soon.  This package arrived some days ago, and I have been very slow to show everyone how generous she was.

Then yesterday I got another package which I was not expecting, from Amy at Mamie's Quilts.

4 gorgeous fat quarters, which will be made into a table topper soon.  Aren't the colours lovely and soft and "spring"-like?  Amy also included a lovely handmade card.  I think she made it herself, and if I'm right, she should give up the day job, as they say, and go into making cards professionally.

 Aren't blog friends just wonderful?  Thank you both so much.

So now I'll never know ....

.... why there is a scientist in the nativity play!

Today and tomorrow Chatterbox's school were performing their nativity play, and  Chatterbox was playing the part of a scientist, complete with white coat and safety gobbles (as he used to call goggles when he was little).  Sadly he has managed to develop a really awful cold over the weekend, and didn't go to school today.

I'm also due to go down south on Wednesday for Little Person's first school play, but listening to the weather forecast for the last half of the week, there is a serious risk that if I go I might get snowed in, so I am paying far more attention to the forecasts than I usually do.

We have a winner ...

... of the fabulous calendar.  That person is

and who is number 123?  Well, it's me of course.  Aren't I the lucky one?  It is a great calendar with 12 wonderful projects in it.

No, OK, I'm only kidding, I am not the winner, I am going to be posting this off to Janice at Searchfamilies.  Please contact me with your address Janice so I can get this in the post to you in plenty of time for Christmas.

Thanks to everyone who entered.  I wish I could have sent a calendar to every single one of you.

On her 30th birthday ....

... Abbe from CopperPatch had a giveaway to celebrate, and I was the lucky winner.  The prize was to choose something for myself that I really wanted, and she would pay for it.  Well, I can tell you, it took me about 2 weeks of window-shopping to choose, but I finally made a decision, and yesterday this is what arrived in the post. 

 The template is one which will let me make quilts with tesselated windmills, and there is a beautiful charm pack and some yardage of Bliss, which I think is a gorgeous fabric range.  Now I can hardly wait to start playing, but I MUST finish off one or two other things first.

So thank you Ab for a wonderful prize.

Don't forget, you've still got a few hours to enter my giveaway, here.

First it looked like this

and now it looks like this

 BRRRR!!

Don't forget to enter my giveaway, here by Tuesday 7 December.

I'm giving away .....

This giveaway has now closed.  Thanks to everyone who entered.  You can see the winner here.
 
... a calendar. (It's the first day of December today, so does that make it an advent calendar?)

Anyway, thanks to the wonderful people at Martingale (well, I have to say that don't I?  Guess who's publishing my book?)  I have got this fantastic calendar to give away to one of you.

Every month there is a picture of a great quilt, like this,

or this,

or this,

but the really cool part is that you also get instructions to make each quilt.  So now you could be organised, you have something wonderful to look at each month and you have loads of new projects to work on.  There are applique projects, there are piecing projects, and for those of you who can't make up your mind which method you prefer, there are even projects with both piecing and applique in!  As well as the instructions for each quilt, there is a useful section on general techniques such as making bias strips, preparing pieces for applique, etc.

The other thing I think is really good about this calendar is that the quilts are photographed so beautifully that you can even see how they have been quilted.

So, what do you have to do to win this?  Simply leave me a comment on this post. Yep, that's all.   You do not have to be a follower (although new followers are always welcome), but if you are, leave me a second comment telling me that you are and you will have a second entry.  If you are a no-reply person, please leave me an email address so I can contact you if you are the winner.  You are welcome to enter wherever you live in this world or in any other universe!  This giveaway will be open until Tuesday 7 December at midnight (GMT) and the winner will be announced the following day.  That way I will have time to post it to the winner so you receive it in time for Christmas.

She's got it ...

... "Who's got what?" you may be wondering.  Well, Paulette's got her quilt back.  You remember the one we did a skills barter on?  (For anyone who's still wondering what I'm wittering on about, you can find out here.)  I sent the finished quilt back a couple of weeks ago, and yesterday it was delivered.  I was so excited to be sending it back that I forgot to take any photos of it, apart from these

so I've taken these from her website, I hope she doesn't mind.  Paulette says she thinks she got the best of our barter but I don't agree.  I just love my penny rug, which sits on my dining table and looks wonderful. (So wonderful in fact that I almost have to search Mrs Nomad every time she leaves after a visit cos she loves it too.)

To all my American friends ...

Lucky, lucky me ...

... a couple of weeks ago I told you all that I seemed to be on a winning streak as I had won several great giveaways.  Well just look at what arrived in the post today from Ruth at Country Log Cabin.  I knew I had won the charm pack and some co-ordinating fabrics.  What I didn't know until I opened the box was that there was also going to be a fun hanging ornament, a gorgeous little chicken pincushion, which is far to cute to stick pins in, some wonderful blingy buttons and a notebook which becomes two photo frames when I've finished the pad of paper.  I know what I am going to do with the fabric, and can hardly wait to get cutting, but I must finish off one or two other things first.

Now you understand the title of this post?  Thank you so much Ruth, I loved everything you sent.

Yoohoo, Paulette.....

.... here it comes ....

This is what you've all been waiting for ...

The names of the Christmas Quiltalong winners.

I'm sorry it's taken me so long to post the names, but here they are finally.  Both Grand Prize winners and the quiz winner were all drawn using Random.org, but I haven't shown the screen prints this time.  I have saved them on my computer if anyone wants to see them.

I put your name into the draw once for each time you took part in a Christmas Quiltalong Day for one of the grand prizes, and so, without further ado,

the person who won this lovely little box by Dave at Quiltboxes, is number 54 Pattilou of Pattilous Quilts

The lucky person who won tthis Lollipop kit so generously donated by Sharon at Daisy Cottage Quilting,  is  number 38, Elizabeth from Sand and Sunshine







The winner of the quiz this month, which was more difficult than previous quizzes, is Janet from Caribou Crossing and I have awarded the Brain Teaser prize to Ann J, who sent me an electronic Christmas card with the answer, which I thought was very clever, and great fun.

Finally, because this is my party, so I'm allowed to do these things, I decided to award one additional prize, just for making me laugh, which goes to Sewali, for her answer to the quiz question  "In the Ukraine, what does it mean when you find a spiders web in the house on Christmas morning ?"  Sewali's answer was: "someone spent too much time quilting and didn't do the housework."

Please would the winners contact me with your addresses?

Thank you everyone who joined in with the Christmas Quiltalong this year. I've had a lot of fun, and I hope you have too.  Don't forget that Cathi and I are going to hold Quiltalong days evvery month next year, so keep checking back on our blogs for more information.

I promised you some exciting news a couple of days ago, so here it is.  SewCalGal has offered to sponsor a competition for all the Quiltalongers. I will give all the details next week, but wanted to share this news with you all now, isn't it great?  Thanks so much SewCalGal.

I heard it on the grapevine ...

... actually I didn't.  I heard it from SewCalGal, that some people who are entering quilts in the Christmas Quilt Show, are set as "no-reply" bloggers.  Now this means that if you win one of her great prizes, she can't get in touch with you, which would be a great shame, so, if you enter a quilt, do make sure she can contact you, just in case she accidentally pulls your name out of the hat instead of mine!  Ms SewCalGal has even made it easy to do this, by posting instructions on her blog here and here (you need to scroll down to "step 3" on this page).

I expect you're really here to see if you've won anything from the Christmas Quiltalong aren't you?  I'm sorry, but I've been having trouble with Random.org this morning, so I'm going to do it later and post all the results tomorrow, although on second thoughts, I might not do it at all, and just keep the prizes for myself.  Nobody will mind, will they?  No, I didn't think so.  Tomorrow I will have another exciting bit of Christmas Quiltalong news.  So be sure to come back.

Christmas Crackers Edited to add something important

You all know how I can't resist entering a quilt show on-line, so here I go again.  SewCalGal is holding a virtual Christmas Quilt show, and I reckon there will be hundreds of entries which means there will be loads of eye candy for us all.  Anyone is welcome to enter (there's all sorts of prizes if you do,) but even if you don't want to enter, do go and make yourself a coffee then settle down to enjoy the show here.
Edited to add that if you enter and you are one of the people who took part in any of the Christmas Quiltalongs, please mention that in your post and SewCalGal is going to give you an extra chance to win in the draw for all those wonderful prizes.  If you don't want to mention that, don't worry, I've just made up a new rule, which is that I'll have your extra chances instead.  (I'm sure that's OK isn't it Ms SewCalGal?)

My entry is a quilt I have called Christmas Crackers.  I  have always wanted a red and gold Christmas quilt and this year I decided it was the year to stop wishing and start making.  It is my own design, and I made it during one of my Christmas Quiltalong days.

Then I long-arm quilted it, and finished the binding on last night so I could show it today.  (I am great at leaving things to the last minute!) When I took some close up photos of the quilting I realised the gold/red/gold rectangles outside the pinwheels looked a bit like Christmas Crackers, and so this quilt got its name.

Before I finish this post, I would like to thank SewCalGal very much for hosting this show, which I know is going to be another cracker!

Night night everybody

I'm signing off now for tonight.  Tomorrow I'm looking forward to visiting everyone and see what everyone has been doing.

Don't forget to enter the Quiz and the Brainteaser - there are prizes!

I hope you've all enjoyed yourselves today, and don't forget that Cathi at Shakerwood Quilts and I are planning to continue holding Christmas Quiltalong days right through next year.  We will post more details on our blogs soon.


Night, nights, everybody.  I'll come visiting you all tomorrow so make sure you've put your names on the Linky whatsit here and the eggnog's ready and the mince pies are warm.

Progress report 2

It's now 7.30 pm for me and these

              plus these

have become these

Eight great little bags.

Now I've settled down to do some hand sewing in order to turn these

into something useful.

I hope you're all having fun, and getting lots of things done?

If you've only just joined the party, I would love for you to add your name on the Linky-thingy here so we can all visit each other and see what we're all up to.

Another little brain teaser ....

... I don't want you all to get too bored sitting sewing all day, so here's another little bit of fun.

Solve the puzzle before bedtime on Monday (you've got an extra day for this one) and email your answer to me and you could be the lucky winner of another prize from me.

Just find the letter referred to in each line.  When you have them all, they will spell out a well-known phrase.

My first is in hop and also in hope,

My second is found at the start of always,

My third and my fourth both rhyme with tea

And my fifth is in Yule and also in year.

My sixth is in cherry and also in cheery,

My seventh is exactly the same as my first,

My eighth will always be found in a rhyme

And my ninth is in this but not in that.

My tenth is in silver but never in gold,

My eleventh is in a nice cup of tea,

My twelfth is seen at the beginning of me

And my thirteenth is always the first letter you see.

My last is in is and also in was,

And my whole is a wish from me to you all.

Traditions

I was just sitting sewing strips together for binding, which isn't exactly demanding, and my mind started to wander.  (Yes, I can hear you at the back there muttering that that's nothing new!).  In our house we always have a Chinese takeaway on Christmas Eve with as many of the family as we can gather together.  It's great fun, and usually noisy.  The big advantage for me is that I don't have to cook it.  Oh, and there's very little clearing up/washing up to do afterwards.  The takeaway that we go to usually gives us a nice desk calendar too, so there's an added bonus.  So, do any of you have any Christmas traditions?

Mr Linky can be found here if anyone is looking for it to add their name or just so they can go visiting.