Wrapping gift

As usual, you made my week great by visiting and leaving a comment. Thank you all!

Again, the week went by very quickly.
We are under a wave of cold, almost all France is under snow, and we have rain and low temperature. The perfect weather to stay in my sewing room.

I recently revamped this sewing room. Not only is it looking nicer and bigger, but I'm also more stash-conscious.

With Xmas in a few weeks, I'm facing a recurrent problem: I'm not good at wrapping gifts, sigh...
As I said above, I've had a good look at my stash, and at those lovely bits just waiting the opportunity to step into the light. There are even orphan blocks waiting for their day. So I decided to try another method: bags.
I made them very simple, raw edges, quick seams, and here they are:

Now is the time for a nice cup of hot cocoa!

I wish you a very good week! Take care!

Amaryllis

They don't have leaves, but surely they will bloom. Two buds on one, three on the second!

Sunday

Hello to all!
It has been a 3-days weekend, since I had some overtime to convert into free time. I was lucky on Friday, the weather was gorgeous and I went for a walk in the hill:

A bright blue sky over a still green hill, with almond, fig and olive trees

Eh wait, those are supposed to bloom in spring!

Red Valerian found in the hill

and spent the rest of the day gardening.
Yesterday was completely different, heavy with rain, and today was a mix of the two. This did not upset me since I wanted to play with needles. Indeed, when I saw Etta's Santa in Quiltmania by Sandy Gervais, I just wanted to make my own. And here it is:

Naive Santa appliqued on a dark background, with destructured house

I saw another Santa by Sandy Gervais in the winter issue of Quiltmania,  I'm just as eager to make it...sigh...

Let's get prepared for the coming week. I hope yours will be good.

Long weekend

Thank you all for your comments on my last two posts.

Regarding the photo book, if you are tempted to make one, don't hesitate. I'm sure you can find one company near your place, and they are really fun to do. I have my pictures showing on my PC as a screen saver, so I can enjoy them without printing them. But I also like the book, it has a "heirloom" feel...

Regarding the scarves, Emilie was glad to receive her, but even glader that the weather here did not allow her to try it yet :-) But, I'm sure she'll enjoy it once she is back in Paris tonight... For those interested, they are easy to make. You knit a long scarf (about 6 feet), fold it in two, and make a seam from the fold, for about 1 foot. It is that easy.

You may remember I won a charm pack  from Confessions of a Fabric Addict? It arrived safely at the end of the week. Aren't those fabrics gorgeous? Now I need to find a project, not necessarily for this XMas, though...


It was a long weekend in France, so I had the pleasure to have Emilie with me, and as usual, we went for a shopping day to Marseille. Then she went to see some friends of her. And I went on with my Xmas sewing:


This is a gardening set.
I still have a few stitches to make, but the sky is getting dark, and it was my last chance to get a decent picture!

Let me finish with a give away notice, at  Live a Colorful Life.

Progress of the week

Last week, I've been working on the jeans appliqué. I'm out of my zone of comfort regarding colors, but I think I like them.

and finished those two hooded scarves. Just in time for the cold...




Take care!

CEWE - livre photo - photo book

For once, this post is meant to my French friends...
I've had the opportunity to test a photo book, and here is a report about this test.
I was not paid to make this test, I was only given a voucher to pay for the cost of the book and the postage.

Pour une fois, un billet plutôt destiné à mes amis français.
Un peu par hasard, j'ai eu l'occasion de tester le livre photo CEWE http://www.livrephoto-cewe.fr/ pour le compte de TRND http://www.trnd.com.
TRND pratique le marketing participatif, via des tests et aussi un blog qui annonce des nouveautés diverses et variées.
Pour le test du livre photo CEWE, j'ai reçu un bon couvrant les frais de fabrication du livre et les frais de ports, pas d'autre rémunération, et je n'ai pas d'intérêt particulier à vous faire acheter ce livre photo plutôt qu'un autre.

En revanche, si l'expérience vous intéresse, je peux répondre à vos questions, et j'ai quelques bons de réduction à distribuer (dans la limite du stock disponible, bien sûr) . N'hésitez pas à me contacter!

Le livre photo CEWE présente plusieurs avantages:

• disponibilité sur plusieurs enseignes, soit par Internet, soit par des magasins tels que Super U, FNAC, etc, ce qui permet de le commander de chez soi, ou en "vrai", sans passez ses coordonnées bancaires sur internet, par exemple.
• plusieurs possibilités de livraisons, retrait dans les enseignes, ou livraison par la poste.
• on télécharge le logiciel sur son ordinateur, ce qui est à mon avis le plus pratique : cela permet un accès facile aux photos. (Bon, c'est vrai, j'ai essayé aussi d'autres marques, dont une qui propose l'inverse: on télécharge les photos sur le site, et on utilise le logiciel sur le site. C'est galère quand on s'aperçoit qu'on a oublié de télécharger une photo.) Ici, c'est facile, les répertoires photos apparaissent sur la gauche, et on navigue facilement de l'un à l'autre.
• Les photos utilisées sont repérées par un petit sigle, bien pratique.
• Toujours sur la gauche se trouvent les outils de mise en page, habillage, etc. Tout se fait à la souris, c'est facile, clair et rapide.
• Les mises en pages sont bien pensées, les plus fantaisistes ne le sont pas trop.On peut mélanger texte et photo.
• La navigation d'une page à l'autre est rapide.
• On peut même sélectionner un nombre de photos, choisir un nombre de pages, et laisser le logiciel faire la mise en page tout seul.
• Bon choix de fond de page.
• 
  Bref, facile et agréable d'emploi.

• On peut sauvegarder le projet en cours et le reprendre quand on veut.
• Passer commande est facile également. J'ai choisi de le faire directement par internet, mais on peut aussi graver un cd et l'amener en magasin. Par internet, la transmission des images a été rapide.
• Le suivi de commande est bon, accusé de réception de la commande, avertissement de l'expédition du livre, emballage discret et parfait.

Et voici le résultat quelques jours plus tard:

A noter qu'il existe plusieurs formats avec plusieurs options chacun, de quoi satisfaire tout le monde!

Am I developping a new addiction?...

This has been a long weekend, with Friday afternoon off, and Monday a holiday.

On Friday, I had a quick lunch at home, and rushed to enjoy a long walk in the hunter-free hill, under a beautiful sun. Then I made myself and Choupette comfortable in the couch, with a nice tea pot, and woke up two hours later (I had not slept too well during the week...).
As promised, the weather changed to gloomy and rainy on Satturday. I mangaged to walk to the market, and to have a short walk on Sunday, eagerly waiting for the weather improvement forecast for today. Only to find that it was still raining... And I, the couch potatoe, decided to ignore the rain, took my umbrella and switched my Ipod to an album by the Wolfe Tones, and went for another long walk early in the morning. The Irish songs matched the wet and green hill perfectly. The landscape did feel very Irish, indeed.
Clearly, this walking thing is become addictive :-)
At some point, I saw a blue dot in the sky, but it did not last, and rain prevailed for the rest of the day. Perfect to do some applique, comfortable in the couch, with Choupette on my lap, watching Jurassic Park, with the teapot nearby.
I took some pictures with my phone, but eek, are they ugly! I've deleted them right away.

On the whole, it was a good weekend, I did some gardening, mounted the embroidered XMas postcard, prepared the Kokeshi quilt sandwich, and started the applique on the next quilt. And I read Gone Baby Gone by Dennis Lehane.

I must remember that they are working on the heating at the office this week, so it will be moist and cold. Argh.

I hope that you had as nice a weekend as I did, and that your week will be a good one.