A visit to Lanyon and a completed herringbone quilt

Hi,
I would like to share some photos with you of a garden fair I attended at Lanyon Homestead recently. The area I live was settled in the 1820s. Shortly after Federation, the area surrounding Canberra became the Australian Capital Territory. In fact, Canberra just celebrated its 100th birthday.
There are several old homesteads remaining from the sheep farming days. Lanyon has been preserved intact as a museum, and is still run as a sheep and cattle station.
It is a popular venue for weddings, school formals and a place to go for a country outing. Even though it is less than five minutes drive from the nearest supermarket and McDonalds, being surrounded by green paddocks and hills makes you feel as if you are a world away.

The house is surrounded by gravel. The driveway is long and lined with old pines. Little outbuildings stand nearby. The garden is maintained in the style of the 1850s. You can read more about Lanyon here, and even go on a "virtual tour" http://www.museumsandgalleries.act.gov.au/lanyon/

The approach to the house. That's my husband and daughter in the right hand photo - They did not really want to come but I made them.

A succulent display from the cactii and succulent stand

I would love some of these metal sculptures for my garden.

the floor of the stables is made from logs.

A hawthorn tree with berries for autumn

this lawn looks down towards the river.

Various fruit and nut trees grow in the orchard.

flowers in the picking garden

Vegie patch

There is a lovely view from the vegies down towards the Murrumbidgee River. 

 

 

Some autumn crocus and cyclamen.

 

Here is the quilt that I have been working on. It is the herringbone quilt, made with this tutorial from Maureen Cracknell. http://maureencracknellhandmade.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/a-herringbone-quilt-tutorial.html 

I highly recommend this tutorial, the quilt is easy to sew and doesn't take long. It's my first attempt at "Quilt as you go". Basically, all the strips were cut at 2.5 inches wide, then were sewn right onto the batting, which was cut up into long 7.5 inch strips. I was able to use all batting leftover from other projects, I needed to sew several short lengths together to make long strips, and I have a variety of fibre contents. Once I had a long skinny section I sewed it to another one, with the stripes going away from each other to form the herringbone effect. Then I did a tiny bit of wavy line quilting, using some pretty variegated thread.

I found some flannel for the backing, and sewed right round the edge, right sides together, leaving a gap to turn it out. Then I quilted it by top stitching around all four sides and then in straight lines along the long rows.

There were a few bulgy bits but overall it turned out well and it was much much quicker than making and attaching binding. This technique I found in this tutorial here at Made by Marzipan http://www.madebymarzipan.com/?x=5235  

My doggy thinks I'm going to come out from behind the quilt and throw her a stick

I'm going to give this to my friend who is getting married this weekend. I made it couch sized so they can cuddle up under it on the couch, but it is just about the right size for a single bed too. 

Yay I am a winner!

I received a lovely surprise in the mail on the weekend. I had entered a blog giveaway on Creativity Unmasked
The prize was a pair of earrings handmade by Laura from Etsy shop Moags and Smeet
Check out some of her fabulous creations:

Doesn't she do a wonderful job photographing her products? I wonder what her secret is.....

Laura sent me an email to let me know I had won. Wow!
She asked me which earrings I would like, and I said she could surprise me.


Well, I certainly got a surprise. She included not one but TWO pairs of earrings, one a lovely shade of dark red and the other turquoise.
Thanks Laura!

I thought I would take a leaf out of her book and practice taking some artistic product shots to show off my new earrings. Let me know which one is your favourite!

Earrings arrived on a card.

tree stump

This is a casuarina, or she-oak

stuck on some bark on an old gum tree

 I tried hanging the earrings off this wattle tree, but it kept blowing around in the breeze! Absolutely full of bees

Here on a young gum tree, with wattle in the background. 

I think this one is the best. The branch matches the earrings!

On my way back inside I found a few more rocks to add to my rock collection. I am mulching my cactus bed with quartz. Sorry about the weed :(

And here is an "action shot" of the earrings. It is hard to take a photo of the side of your head!

This is not the first thing I have ever won - a few years back I won a raffle put on by the Bellingen CWA. The prize was this lovely green and pink quilt, and it is still on my bed. Here are some photos of the Pickle who was then aged four. I sent a a thankyou card to the CWA ladies with one of the photos, so they would know their quilt had gone to a good home!