On the countdown

My how time flies when you are busy having fun, making and creating. I cannot believe it is 7weeks since we have returned from our holiday.  Our next holiday is being planned, we are off to Mexico and USA, ending our trip with 4 days in Paducah, Kentucky for the annual quilt festival. It will be wonderful to visit Hancocks fabric shop. In early June, I attended the Sydney Quilt show with a few friends. I must say the new venue at Glebe Island is very bright and loads of space, not sure but I felt that attendance was down in numbers as well as less stall holders.

This year was a red and white quilt challenge and lots of bright quilts were featured as well.

Below are just a few of my favourites.

This quilt was done by Merelyn Pearce, very intense stippling,also won the R &W category

Just love the redheads also, made by Colleen Harradine, so many others that were wonderful and hard to photograph all of them.

The Aussie true blue quilts were so creative and a pleasure to peruse.

Anzac quilt done by the Central Coast hand weavers, spinners and textile arts "Under pinned Anzac" won the group quilt.

Another favourite was "Round the Garden" by Wendy Williams.

There were many great entries, such a delight to look at and gather inspiration.

On the 5th July, my son Nigel and his fiancée Sarah, had a baby shower for our eagerly anticipated grandson, only 6 weeks to go before we meet our little man. I must say the baby shower was a great success and he will be one very spoilt little boy with all the wonderful gifts given by family and friends.

Both his parents are also getting very excited as the time of his impending birth draws near.

Kerrianne did a wonderful job of making the cake. The cupcakes were delicious.

Nigel and Kylie also shaped a fruit bowl into a baby, yummy fruit salad.

Not hard to guess what we are expecting in August.

With the impending birth of our grandson, time to whip up a few quilts, monkeys seem to be a favourite with the expectant mother.

Pinniocchio quilt

Beatrix Potter fun

Just a little red and white of my own, I bought this quilt top in Houston last year, circa1920-30's, I have just had it quilted to finish it off, I am very pleased with how it has turned out.

Great to own a vintage red and white quilt, a little history,  I Might call it " Lost Property "

Embroidery is stem stitch, and very nicely done.

Finally back from the quilters, continuing on with my normal tradition, not a small quilt, 2.9 metres long. This is my version of MSG "Anne Leven's quilt featured in Quiltmania 

Progress on my African quilt, modelled on Chris Jurds strippy sampler, I'm nearly finished.

What was that "!!!! I am finished, off to the quilters on Tuesday.

This one measures 3.3 metres long.

This was a challenging quilt with lots of creative blocks, a pleasure to sew and I must say I am happy with the overall effect. until next time!

End of our epic Journey, highlights recapped.

The YWith a few days rest in ultimate luxury, it is has given me some time to reflect on how fortunate I am, I feel that with all our  hard work and dedication all, that we have strived and achieved has paid off. DH and I Feel blessed, we have a wonderful marriage, two gorgeous sons, a wonderful daughter in-law and are 

soon to be grandparents. With the end of our seven week sojourn, it is time to step back into reality and get on with everyday life. In reflection of our holiday, a friend asked me to do the highlights of our trip. So with a few hours to spare, what I mention below is what has been most important to me on our trip.

What was so wonderful about travelling to our destinations, was to meet up with old and new friends, met either through travelling or friendships developed when living close and then friends migrate.

So the highlight for me was to meet and greet two friends in particular we met 2 years ago whilst travelling in South America.

In London, Allan Hymers and Jill, loved catching up with you both, a great evening, thank you Allan and Jill for a wonderful evening and your wonderful company.

The Churchill arms, a great night.

The V & A museum. London, Kensington South.

In Lisboa, Portugal, Teresa, great to see you and have you show us Lisboa from your perspective, thank you for a wonderful evening and your hospitality, very much appreciated.

Santini  ice cream.

This was an unfinished embroidery work, with beads and stump work, I could not stop looking at it.
Sintra Royal Palace. I just loved visiting this palace and Sintra is well worth a visit.

Gorgeous tiles in Portugal.

In between our UK tour, Spain, Portugal and Morrocco, we spent a couple of days with our dear friends from Australia, who migrated to Wales in 2010, we had a wonderful few days catching up on old times, sightseeing and washing. Joana knows me very well and tailored what exploring we were going to do, so I felt quite privileged to be taken to a flea market, quaint villages and world heritage sights.

Our enjoyable day in Llangollen.

Bridge with aqueduct.

Aqueduct.

Jo feeding the geese and chickens, faithful dogs following.

Thanks Jo and Allan for an enjoyable few days your generous hospitality and allowing me to do three loads of washing forever grateful. Next when we visit, we are now aware of a few travelling tips.

When in Spain, we visited the Sevilla cathedral with Christopher Columbus coffin, so ornate.

Cathedral Sevilla

Esplasa, Sevilla, amazing tiles and coat of arms for every city in Spain, well worth a visit.

The Scottish highlands was a great place to visit all being cold. just loved the highland cows.

The English countryside. the Cotswold, Bath and Chester in Wales.

Cotswold

Chester.

Bath, Jane Austin country.

Bath and shops over footbridge.

France, visiting Nantes and Paris was enjoyable, using the rail system was excellent 

Meeting authors of quilting books published by Quiltmania was pretty special, also seeing Di Fords Mountmellick quilt in the flesh was wonderful. it is being hand quilted..

Hand quilting Mountmellick.

Overall we had a wonderful time. Morrocco, was a disappointment, I am pleased that I visited, but also pleased to leave. Fez had a little more culture, but again, not a wow factor, my trip to Egypt was way better and more enjoyable. DH and I both enjoyed our cosmos tours, but felt that they were quite large, we had thirty people on our UK trip and fourtyfive on our Spain trip, everyone was punctual and the trips went generally well, but we are both used to doing a smaller group and will continue to do so in the future.

With our stay for three days in Abu Dhabi, we made the decision to rest up and enjoy our six star accomadation, did a little shopping and enjoyed some R & R.

My Surf and Turf meal at Jummeirah.

Some buffalo wings for starters and a ginger mock tail.

Our breakfast room.

Pool area.

Fountain, pool in foyer of hotel.

We finished off our holiday in Abu Dhabi with a little luxury and R & R, we chose not to do any more sightseeing as we were over it,  we took this time to chill,  last day of our holiday, our flight home Is tonight, home to family and friends.  We  finished off with a bit of decadence, high tea on the observation deck of Jumeriah at Etihad Towers.

Until next time....

Malaga, Granada and end of tour.

Our morroccan adventure ended in Fez. Tuesday we arose at 0500 hrs to drive 6 hours back to Tangier to catch our ferry at 1300hrs to cross the straight of Gilbraltar and land in Tarifa. We arrived in Tarifa at 12md  with a police escort, to get through customs and board the ferry. The tour group witnessed a  bit of excitement, just before we were getting of the coach, a morroccan youth tried to get under the bus to try to defect to Spain,that is the reason why we had a police escort to the ferry. On arrival into Taifa, we all disembarked, boarded the coach and drove another 2 1/2 hrs to Malaga, south of Spain, on the way we saw the island of Gilbratar.

Gilbraltar is an island shaped like a woman lying down and is under British rule, much to the disgust of Spain. Gilbratar is a well known tourist destination. Apparently only has one street of duty free shopping and not much else.

On arrival into Malagar in the south of Spain, we booked into hotel and went for a walk to the local shopping mall, after a bite to eat, time to shop.

Bought a couple of cushions, removed the stuffing to debulk, just loved this little shop.

Wednesday, we had a short drive to Granada and the Alhambra Palace, a few tour members opted to stay and go to the hotel, feeling unwell due to morroccan belly.

We spent 31/2 hrs in the Alhambra palace, the design was moorish and quite elaborate, apparently they get 7,000 people visiting daily.

Front entry to the great hall.

Inside the great hall.

Moorish tile design

Reflection pool

Lion fountain in the harem quarters.

Great gardens 

Fantastic view

The Alhambra place was one of the nicest that we have visited on this trip.

In the afternoon we went up to the top of the hill, quite an adventure catching the little minibus and jamming in 30 tourists, the view was amazing and we could see the Alhambra Palce from the top.

We also visited the St Nicholas church.

After our visit we all walked down the hill to the Main Street and perused the shops

Did some morroccan shopping at morroccan stores in Spain. Still could bargain...

More flamenco from street performers.

Icon...donkey and farmer.

Thursday we drove back to Madrid arrived early afternoon and had a farewell tapas dinner in the Plazsa Mayor

This ends our epic journey will be flying to Abu Dhabi for three days then homeward bound, back to reality. Our bucket  list has been shortened after this holiday, now to plan for our next. I cannot believe how time has flown, six months ago I had three trips being planned at once, now all completed.

Feeling grateful. Adios!