BQL Bag Challenge

April Bag - Each month of 2008 via BQL there is a bag pattern for free use (sorry the challenge is closed now!) this month's bag has an interesting gusset - and should have had 3 fabrics, I decided to use just 2 and to take the leaf and seed pattern from the main fabric and FME/FMQ the design on the gusset - it worked out well. This is it in progress.....
Main body fabric -before
after the FME

I decided that the Ikea fabric looked a little flat against the scrafito style of the FME on the gusset so I went over the design in black thread in a very loose way to relax the design a bit - I like the effect. That's another half meter of fabric used up from the stash......

This is excess from the piece I got last summer that I made into a table cloth and napkins.

23 Nisan

April 23rd is a national holiday here in Turkey - Ataturk created the first Childrens' day in 1920 -and it's celebrated each year on the same day, different things are organised for children - our pre-school decided to have a holiday - so we went to the local shopping mall where the stores had organised things for free - face painting - drawing - the toy shop had a trampoline - a bouncy castle - mini-golf for bigger children out side were all sorts of money eating machines that they enjoy. We had a nice (uneventful) lunch out and came home to play in the garden.
The garden is looking beautiful at the moment - Istanbul has glorious long springs that heat up to the summer.
This Ranunculus has naturalised - they do far better naturalised though flower later than the potted ones - this one started out in a pot a couple of years back.

Dotee Finished

Lots of beading, some sequins and french knots later - the dotee and her fraternal twin sister are done - the one on the right (detail at the bottom) with the stars has gone to Keri. The other stays here with me.

I found some metal sequins at the local bead store - they don't look different here - but it'll be interesting to see if they rust or change colour at all, they were heavy though. Am still waiting for my dotee to come.

Wisteria

This wisteria hangs over my neighbours wall - it's humming with bees and winged things. I never realised it smelt so delicious until I took this picture.

Emirgan Park

We tried to go to Emirgan Park last weekend - only to be turned back as it was full. Each year it has a spectacular display of tulips - the flower of Istanbul and of Turkey, tulips have a fascinating history and are native to this part of the world.

The park rises above the Bosporus shoreline and is wooded sufficiently to be cool in the summer with municipal planting in between.

They have a couple of new playgrounds that T1 and T2 went to check out, baby sat in the stroller and watched - we met friends and had snacks under a tree and bumped into some folks we knew - a good day for all.

Quince

The quince tree blossom is starting to fade, it was the last fruit tree in the garden to flower - but is is really worth the wait. Huge blossoms, pale pinky white.

There have been high winds at times over the last couple of days shaking the fading petals from the tree like confetti at a wedding.

WIP - Same Cloth Dotee Swap

I saw this swap on Swapbot - and it appealed - each trader was sent 2 pieces of the same cloth with which to make a dotee - it will be interesting to see the doll that comes my way.

I followed Dot's original tutorial as this is my first foray into dotee making - a trip to the local bead store and of course the stash of threads and stuff...... then did I it upside down

The twin dotee will be similar - lots of work left on the first one though

Why Blog?

Well.....

everyone else seems to be doing it
to show what I am doing - a kind of online show and tell
to share what my life is like

because I want to.......