Melly & me

Too short

We had such a lovely weekend in Townsville but only wished we could have stayed a little longer.  On our afternoon off on Friday we managed to go for a nice long walk along The Strand and enjoyed all of the different sights and sounds that Townville had to offer

It truly is amazing how you can be in the same country yet all of the nature, wildlife, sounds and climate can be so extremely different.

We walked along and enjoyed every little different thing that we found and the noises of the bird-life was just amazing.    

We were very thankful for the water park that we found along the way for a much needed splash and not far on from there we found a great little restaurant to enjoy a meal overlooking the ocean.  Needless to say at least one of these had to be ordered....

And of course enjoyed...

On the Saturday my day of designing did not come out quite as intended but I did have a good day of rest as I ventured for a good long walk and lazed about the beautiful hotel we were staying in.  Rosie had a lovely time at the retreat and I am sure she will post all about it soon on her blog.

We only wish that we could have had another day to discover Townsville but if nothing else it was a good taste tease to encourage us to return really soon!  Hope you also had a lovely weekend full of new experiences!  Melly & Rosie

We're back - part 2!

We begin this post with an apology for subjecting you to our holiday slide show.  Yes, this will be one very long post!  You may like to get a cuppa or a glass of white (like we are drinking while producing this post). 

After almost no sleep from the time we left Melbourne to the time we left Houston, we have no photos to show you of our one day in Frankfurt as we slept the whole day away.  On our first day in Holland our Uncle Klass offered to take us to Brugge in Belgium for a day trip.  We were so excited and we had the most delightful day in a beautiful old city.   By the way, did we mention that Brugge is the Chocolate capital of Belgium???  Enough said.

On day 2 we set off on a scenic tour of Holland to reach the KreaDoe fair in Utrecht (we say scenic as our train line was closed and we had to make alternate arrangements involving every form of public transport known to man).  We met up with Daniella of Hip Handwerk who had filled her booth with gorgeous samples of our flossies.  Of all the stalls at the KreaDoe, hers stood out as the most gorgeous, fresh and well planned - true eye candy!

Daniella was gorgeous and welcoming and gave us a huge basket of dutch treats and this lovely traditional Dutch fabric.  Her support means the world to us.

We were also so delighted to meet with Sonnja from Beertje Zoon.  She was so welcoming and we had such a great time talking and sharing morning tea with her and her husband Richard.  She also brought along the beautiful bears that she had made from the fabrics we donated - just too cute.  Make sure you take a look at her site and consider donating some of your spare fabric to this very worthy cause.

Daniella was selling the most beautiful book from Tilda's Huis and we bought the dutch translation.   On returning home we said to Leanne "wait until you see the gorgeous book we bought in Holland"  She said, "no,no wait until you see the gorgeous book I bought in Norway!"  It turned out that we had each bought only one book while in Europe and it was the exact same one.  We want to share more of this exquisite book with you in a future post.

Though we spent most of our time with our fabulous Aunty Yda, Uncle Ad and their gorgeous girls, we spent one day with our Uncle and Aunty from our Fathers side.  We had a delightful day touring around their part of Holland.  We went to a five acre orchid greenhouse which had to be seen to be believed.

 

Here are two of our favourite photos of all!  An evening spent with our beautiful Oma Hilly.  Though half a world separated us, our childhood was filled with the love of our wonderful Grandmother.  Just sitting on the couch or sorting buttons from her collection were moments that we will treasure forever.

After our plea for photos from Houston the fabulous Kim from The Fat Quarters in the UK generously emailed us this great shot of her and us in front of our booth.  We are sorry that it is still not a full photo of our booth, but hey, it is the best we have got.  We had so much fun with our UK and NZ customers.  We hope to visit and maybe even get a teaching gig with these gals some time in the future - you can only dream!

This trip was fantastic, enthralling, hilarious, touching and inspiring.  We had the time of our lives!  Coming home to those we love was equally precious.  There really is no place like home. - Melly & Rosie

We're back!!

We do not know where to begin!  We have been on the trip of our lives!  Houston was incredible - what an experience.  All of our fears were blown away as all of our best expectations were exceeded. 

All of our flights went to plan, the hotel was great and the people welcomed us with open arms.  Nothing like an Aussie accent for instant acceptance! 

The one low point of our Houston experience was that Melly's camera was stolen on our last night and we have lost ALL of our photos of Quilt Market.  We cannot show you our booth but hope that there might be someone out there reading this who took a photo or two they could share (please!!???)

Thanks to Di Mill and Anne Sutton we have a few shots to show you.  Here is Rosie with Anne at the "Bunny Hill Designs" booth.  One of the cutest booths on display!  Note to Di Mill - Yes, I am wearing crocs, just to make you jealous!!

Here is Di and Melly in front of Rosie's new quilt.

Our highlight was sneaking in early to "Sample Spree" with the help of someone who shall remain nameless (you know who you are!!) 

Here is half of our Sample Spree booty - there were lots of giggles and much fabric fondling that night!!

We also managed to sneak a quick look around Quilt Market and Rosie could not resist these pretties.

We also met with Holly Holderman from Lakehouse Dry Goods who generously gave us this beautiful fabric.  Rosie has a top secret project that she plans to use this fabric for (more on that later...)

We shared some beautiful meals with a few of our customers from around the world (Just for you Jenny - Who does number 2 work for??!!)  We also shared a beautiful meal with one of our idols!!  Yes, we met quilting royalty!!  Pam Holland!  She was beautiful and generous with her advice and stories - what a blast we had!

That pretty much wraps up the photos we have available from the first part of our fabulous journey.  It was such a brilliant experience.  Our booth was very successful with plenty of new customers in the US and around the world stocking up on our patterns.  We hope that the orders will continue and that more of you will be able to find our designs at your local patchwork store.

We made so many great contacts, had so many laughs and throughly enjoyed every second - we could barely sleep from all the fun and excitement!

Stay tuned for "We're Back - Part 2"

Still recovering,  Melly & Rosie.

Good-bye Flossies!!!

Off we head bright and early tomorrow morning!!  Have a great two weeks and we hope to have lots of photos and news to share on our return!!  Thank you all for your kind wishes for our trip.

May the floss be with you,  Melly & Rosie.

Sew little time...

We have been very quiet, haven't we???  Yet, ask that same question to our families and you would get a resounding NO!  Last night we had a great night getting together for the first BBQ of the season and a bit of a get together before the trip.  Rosie and I have definitely got into the excited "sillies" now as we tortured those present with our lovely voices singing 80's karaoke.  There were many groans and the worst part is that I think some of it may have been captured by video on one of the Flossie's mobile phones!  I am sure that this will come back to haunt us one day, but it is worth it - because we had so much fun!

Last week I made up this new version of "Black Forest" and I am still deciding whether this is my travel bag (since it has so much room for extra hand luggage) or whether I am going to keep it nice and new as a sample at Quilt Market. I do love it and am thinking the former may eventuate. 

After this was finished Friday morning I decided to pack away the sewing machine, this was such a relief and I have to say I was quite excited to put it away for it's little holiday and to be able to focus on other tasks.  Then on Saturday we decided to round up all of the samples and it turned out that we could not find "Wally & Wristy"!!  I tried to convince myself that I didn't need to make a new one but then I realised we have already sent some of these patterns to Houston so I kind of had to!!  I am so glad that I did in the end as I think I love my new Wally & Wristy even more than the original. 

But I AM packing the machine away today!!!

Also I thought we should let you know all about where we will be and when for those that are going to come to visit us on our travels!!  On the 27th, 28th and 29th October we will be at stand 1405 at Quilt Market Houston.  We are right near the central entrance and right next to the new product preview - please come and see us!! 

On Saturday the 3rd of November we will be going along to the KreaDoe fair in Utrecht, Netherlands.  We will be visiting one of our customers, Hip Handwerk who is going to be vending at stall 1420.  We will not be at the stall the whole day (as we will be like kids is a lolly shop and want to have a good dose of retail therapy!!) so have decided to say that we will meet anyone at Hip Handwerk at 11:00am and 2:00pm.  We hope that we will move on from there for a nice cuppa and a chat if you have the time.

3 more sleeps to go and I hope we will have the chance to do another quick post before we leave bright and early on Thursday!!  Today I am going to start packing!!  How exciting, it makes it feel so real!

May the floss be with you!  - Melly & Rosie   

Stitcher's Dream Day Out

I have had the most fantastic weekend in Highfields, near Toowoomba in Qld! I was lucky enough to be invited by Marion Marshall of "The Quilters Angel" to be one of the tutors at her fabulous Stitcher's Dream Day Out.

I was honoured to be in such fabulous company with Lynette Anderson, Natalie Bird and Leanne May - some of Australia's leading designers!

My good friend Gail Pan (another leading designer) was in Highfields and also spent the day with us on the Sunday. It was so good to rekindle friendships with many of the women who came to the event and to meet many gorgeous stitchers for the first time. I felt so blessed to travel and teach and meet you all! (have I ever mentioned that I love my Job!!!)

The theme was friendship and that certainly describes the feel of the day.

Here is a look at my project "Springtime".  A little sewing bag and needle case with punch-needle design.  Look out for the pattern at your local patchwork store soon.

As much as I loved being away, coming home to my new home was very exciting! I have just completed the finishing touches on my new "Rosalie Quinlan Designs" block of the month - "Home Is Where My Heart Resides". Here is a first look at it, remembering that it has not been quilted yet!  

It is off to Melinda's at "Around the Block" quilting this afternoon.

By the way, this is our 99th post!!  Can't wait for the next one!

Don't forget there are only 5 days left of our Etsy Sale!!  For the remaining 5 days there will be a gift with every purchase.  There are still some great things to be had. 

Only 4 weeks to Houston, scary :-}

May the floss be with you - Rosie x x 

Quilt Hanging

What a great day it was yesterday in the gorgeous, sunny township of Loch, surrounded by delicious pieces of workmanship at the annual Quilt Hanging.   

Thanks to all of you who came and introduced yourselves and said "hello" it was so great to meet you all!

A great time was had by all, it was truly a beautiful day.  Thanks for the invite Quilter's Barn!

Also, for anyone out there who has been hoping to grab some of our patterns there is a great special deal running at the moment here and here.  (please note all prices are in $NZ)

We hope that you all had an equally fabulous weekend. - Melly & Rosie

We've gone dotty!

What a fun day we had yesterday going for a girls day out to one of our many favorite patchwork stores in Loch, Victoria.  We went to the area for an old church auction and a couple of markets and of course it was such a convenient location to spend a couple of hours fondling gorgeous fabric just arrived from Japan.  While there we saw all the posters for the up-coming Quilt Hanging that the Quilters Barn hold annually.  We have been offered the chance to hold a stall at the quilt hanging and made our final decision to do so - why not? it's not like we are busy or anything!!!!!  We both arrived home and began madly sewing flossies for the event.  Rosie made three of these cute little bunnies last night and Melly is madly sewing up a number of kittys that will also soon be in pattern form.  If you are interested in attending the quilt hanging it is held on the 4th February and involves the whole gorgeous township of Loch in Victoria, Australia.  We would love to see you!!  Of course any unsold flossies will make their way to our nearly up and running etsy shop.

A tale of two Silly Bunnies

(A long, long time ago) Pirate Crazy Kitty buried his treasure on a beautiful, remote island. 

(present day) The locals enjoyed frolicking and sun bathing on the beautiful, remote island.

The mysterious arrival of a tall, dark, handsome stranger...

The locals greeted him with enthusiasm and joy....but none so much as Silly Bunny who felt a flitter flutter in her heart to have found another of her kind.

Love blossomed, they built their dream castle in the sand.  Their luck knew no bounds as they discovered Pirate Crazy Kitty's gold in the foundations of their love nest.  Life looked wonderful until.................

...the arrival of the giant sea monster...  

..their love nest destroyed...

they gathered their gold and sailed off into the beautiful, blue yonder.

The End.

I'm back!

At the risk of being in very poor taste, Here are the photos of where I have been.

As you can see, I had chaperones! 

I tried to talk them into taking my place but they wouldn't hear of it!! I wonder if anyone else going through this stuff finds humour everywhere? I really do laugh at the most inappropriate things.... I think I may need a psych assessment when it is all over.  Anyway, we are all going back again on the 5th of December, Melly, myself, my better third ( i'm a bit larger than i used to be), silly bunny, silly bunny, crazy kitty, mad mozzie and the yet to be seen fat butterfly. This time we will bring party hats and lolly bags as it will be the last time! By the way, we also had a very good excursion to the "make poverty history" concert at the Myer music bowl! Highlight of course being Bono, the edge and pearl jam singing "Rocking in the free world" I almost felt young again! What a night!

We also received our swap from salvagesistas today. I drove straight round to Melly's to open it. We are so happy with our lovely things. They made us wonderful, funky jewellery and really cute cupcake pin cushions. They gave us hello kitty chopsticks and a pencil case and lots of yummy goodies. We are so lucky! - Rosie.