Quiltbee at Yvonne

My project for the quiltbee

Patricia, Yvonne and Marne

What do I have so say more, Marne and I had a lovely evening in Katwijk at the Quiltbee from Yvonne.

We met most of the ladies last year, it felt great to see them again. And it's always to fun to look at 

their projects. Most of them are busy with the Dear Jane, a real challenge.

Rob and Elaine went biking.

But they have a very good way of doing it, they are using "vlies H520, trekvlies". You can buy it at the Stitchers Inn in Nunspeet. I'm not sure, I once started the Dear Jane but gave up after a few blocks ; ).

Trying to catch up

The last days so much happened. Holiday is over,  so monday it was back to work. I could do with another week ; ).

Tuesday, early up in the morning to get the house ready for the Seattle girls.

And of course play with George in the kitchen. The muffins were a little bit dry, you have drip them in your tea, but the lemon-mascarpone cake taste great.

Of course I had to hurry to be in time at the Airport! So only picture of the Starbucks, no time for coffee. When I'm busy with George I forget about time ; ).

At 12.45 they arrived safely at the Airport. Great seeing them again!!! They stay just a few days at our place before they start their biking tour through the Netherlands.

Feather Weight Day at Bep

With a hard wind blowing, showers of rain, no sitting outside, but all packed together in the kitchen.

How many quilters with a FW you can fit into Bep's house? I'm not sure, but I think there were at least 25 quilters. Thanks again Bep and Gerard for a lovely quilting day in your kitchen. And of course great soup again. Cu next time on the FW-day. You can count me in.

Do we have a new quilter in the family ...

.... well we wait and see but my niece Sophie (almost 9) likes to sew. She made an apron for granny.

Harvest in Gorssel

Saturday my mum and I made bike ride a long the old mill and enjoy the harvest. It always make me happy cycling around Epse, the small town where I grew up and lived till my 18th year, then I moved to Amsterdam and stayed in the west part of the Netherlands.

Loving old quilts and blocks

As you know I love old quilts, quilttops, blocks and fabrics. And with the help of my friends in Seattle and the USA I have enough to do a show-and-tell. But there are several blocks and tops still waiting in my cupboard to be finished.

What makes them so interesting?
Well they have something special, or mostly smell special ; ). But I love to finish those unfinished projects. Even though experts says that you have to leave them as you found them. Well I don't.
I love to turn them into new quilts.

Dating the fabric
The problem is that I often don"t know anything about the top or blocks.

So I have to figure out with my books and make a guess as good as I can.
 
 The nine-patch quilt

I sew the 12 blocks (each block was made of two nine patches and two solid blocks) together.

These blocks got my attention for some reason.  There is something strange about these blocks.

Not the pattern because that is pretty common. But then I thought I think the blocks are made in several periods. Maybe even made by two different persons.
If I look at the hand sewing the small blocks have smaller stiches then the big blocks.

The brown fabric seems to be older, coming from the period 1860 - 1890, the big blocks seems to be later 1910 - 1930s. Isn't that interesting.

Is there an quilters (expert) in the Netherlands who wants to help me to learn more about my quilttops and blocks?  And are there more quilters who just like me love to work with old blocks or tops?

Cooking with Caro ........

would that be better as "Quilting with Caro"......?

I was forgotten oh many time there is now I finished my study after three years. Maybe it's better to start studying again ; ).


Fruit is very cheap at the market here. I bought strawberries and prunes. The strawberries are turned into jam, the prunes are having their chance today. Making jam is a very easy process, it takes some time but it's really fun.

Choose your kind of sugar, I like this one, more fruit less sugar, but Rob prefers the one with mnore sugar.

I always add a lemon. Don't forget to cook all your bottles as well, to make sure they are really clean.

The fun part, stirring and cooking.

Fill the bottles as full as you can, put them up-side down for 5 minutes. 

 I promiss you tomorrow I will show you some of my quilting projects. I'm trying to finish some UFO's. Sunday it's Feather Weight Day at Atelier Bep.

Berries + sugar + bottles = making jam

We are enjoying our holiday at the Veluwe.

Although the weather forecasts aren't looking so good, we had another lovely day with temperatures between 17-19C. Ok, that's not warm enough to really live outside. But it's a good temperature to get busy. And we did.










Today we visited the farm "Pollekamp" between Putten and Ermelo. Here you can pick your own berries, and I can assure you we were not the only one. We picked about 3,5 kilos. So the rest of the afternoon I spend cleaning and cooking them. Now we have 14 bottles of jam waiting. Yammmie.

Globetrotters and girls days

Rob and Peter (15 years old son of my friend Yolande) started their cycling tour on friday morning (127 km, almost 80 miles) in two days.

Lucky guys, the weather forecast wasn't looking too good, but they knew to avoid all the rain.
The tour: Utrecht - Rhenen - Garderen. On sunday more though guy things: climbing.

And the girls? Well they had a lovely friday morning in the beautyshop.

Played with George in the afternoon, and had fun on saturday in the cookshop in The Passage and Dille-en-Kamille.

And don't forget the carrot cake ; ) on the "Plein".

George doing it again: lemon cake

 

This is me.....

with my antique quilts. I felt really proud to shown them to the other quilters.

Made by Jenny Lind Kamm, hand quilted by amish women.