What's happening round here?

Well the truth is, I hardly seem able to come up for air these days. I know I'm not alone - the constant daily, weekly grind of school, homework, activities, work, housework, kids not sleeping, kids being sick, me being sick, husband being sick. Arrgghh!

There is light at the end of the tunnel though. I'm planning on finishing work around the middle of November, and having at least all of next year off. Time to breathe. Time to spend with the kids without being in a rush and thinking of what task needs to be done next. Time to enjoy the things we enjoy doing together.

So enough of my life philosophy for now! A few things to share with you today. I recently received three quilts back from Jeannette, an online friend who I've now met in person a couple of times and she's lovely! And she's also a long-arm quilter! Many of you will know her from her wonderful blog Gone Aussie Quilting. I set about binding them straight away. I was never a big fan of the hand-sewing part of binding, but I tell you, I think I'm converted! Loved it! What a lovely way to spend the evening, snuggled on the couch, under a quilt that you're sewing the binding down on. Perfect :)

First up is Swoon - if you follow me on Twitter (I'm @petitselefants) you will have seen these pics multiple times by now. I do apologise. I'm bloody proud of this quilt. It's a monster at 80 inches square. That was fun laying it all out on the lounge room floor, let me tell you!! It's so big I've realised you only really get to see two stars in full, the rest are squished over the sides of the bed.

Unless you have been living under a rock, you'd know that Swoon has pretty much taken over the online quilting world, spurred along by a Quiltalong started by Katy on Flickr. You can see all the amazing variations of the quilt in the group here. The pattern is by one of my favourite designers, Camille Roskelley. And I did actually buy the kit from Fat Quarter Shop in Bonnie and Camille's Ruby line. And I did have it quilted with baptist fans. So, yes, my Swoon is almost identical to Camille's original. What can I say? I love it!

The other two quilts I still need to take some photos of so I will save them for a later post.

Meanwhile, this little birdie has gone to its new home in England. You can read all about it here. I'll be going to visit it (and its new owner) later in the year!

And in other news, a couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to attend the Sew It Together bloggers conference here in Canberra! A fun-filled day of chatting and crafting with fellow bloggers, including meeting some lovely girls who I'd been chatting to online but hadn't yet met. It was fabulous to put faces to lots of names. Unfortunately, I was completely useless when it came to taking photos, and it seems, even more useless in trying to upload other people's photos of the event onto my blog. One day I will actually get it together. But in the meantime, please go and visit Bron's lovely blog where you will see the name tag I made for her and the one she made for me (it's so cute!) as well as a number of other pics of the day. Oh, and the other exciting part of the day was that I learnt to crochet, thanks to my lovely friend Suzyhausfrau! More on that another time.

My little one has just learnt the thumbs up sign and is proud to show it off at any opportune moment. Just thought I'd throw that in because I can't resist a cute photo.