Well peeps that was a slam dunker of a little mini break. I’m sorry to tell you I have nothing at all even vaguely stitchy to report from it, I did nothing but swim and read and generally lie about. In order to relieve the fact that this post would contain nothing even vaguely sewing related, I will tell you that
DRUMROLL PLEASE….
The Stop, Thief! BOM started on Monday! We are making the outside borders of the quilt first, which is totally back to front from the way I would normally approach a medallion quilt.
I’m designing some new things over the next few weeks… would everyone be interested in my design process as I go along? That would include some posts about why I chose to turn Stop, Thief! inside out, and how these things come about for me in the design/construction/pattern writing pipeline. I’m assuming a yes but let me know what you think.
Some of the new things are for work, and some for play ( I don’t publish everything I design!), and one in particular is a quilt that I am making specifically as a quilt for shows. I very very very (very) rarely do that - my quilts usually have to earn their living by either by being commercial (a stand alone pattern, a BOM, a pattern for a class), or by being useful (for the bed or the couch, as a gift, to go into my one-day-there-will-be-a-grand-baby cupboard shhhhh don’t judge me). But this quilt got into my brain like a little worm and made itself comfortable, and I couldn’t get it out. I’m pretty excited about it. At the moment its just a sketch but I’m going to start it next week when all the Stop, Thief! launch bizzo has calmed down.
You can still sign up for Stop, Thief! BTW, the subscriptions are still open. You don’t have to have the fabric kit - there’s been a few people say they didn’t want to buy a kit so they didn’t join. And so just so you know, you NEVER HAVE to buy a kit for my BOMs, the only thing that’s compulsory is the pattern, and that goes for Big Woods too!
Well now that I’ve given you a little quilty taster, here’s a little bit about our holiday! The boat is called Oh, Bouy - you can check them out on Instagram if you’re so inclined, @_oh_buoy.
The boat is permanently moored like a little private island in Berowra Waters, which is about 40 km north of the Sydney CBD on the Hawkesbury River. I live on Pittwater, which is the flat water side (no surf) of the Palm Beach Peninsula. The Hawkesbury feeds into the top end of Pittwater, and both open to the sea.
Berowra Waters (pronounced buh-row-rah, row as in argument not row as in boat) has a big marina, so its quite busy. There are holiday houses and people who live there permanently too. We had to get the car ferry over to the marina from the road, which was fun, it always feels like a little adventure to put your car on a boat. The area is probably most famous for a restaurant called the Berowra Water Inn, which has been considered one of Australia’s best restaurants since the 1980’s. It’s only accessible by boat. It’s one of my favourite restaurants in the whole world, but it’s hard to get to and very expensive, so its a treat. Staying on the boat was a lovely excuse to go there and not have to work out how to get there and back, as they will come and pick you up from your boat if you’re staying in the area! Your own private water taxi.
Here’s some pictures from lunch, I don’t really go in for the photographing of all your meals but this is so pretty. Every course is like a little work of art.
The boat is owned by a lovely couple called Jess and Laurie, who rescued it when it was just about sinking about 5 years ago. It was all original 1970’s interior, lots of which had been painted or carpeted over, or built around.
They ripped everything back to the beginning and have lovingly restored all the wood and fixtures, and decorated it with all original 70’s furniture and crockery they have found around the place. Laurie is apparently the master of the roadside find, and they have done lots of the rescued pieces up themselves :)
The boat comes with a little orange 1970’s runabout off the back called Ginger, that you can pootle up and down the river in, or go over to the marina and have a coffee or lunch. It goes so slowly you don’t even need a boat license.
It really is a beautiful little gem. Also possibly one of the most Instagrammable places I’ve ever stayed!! I didn’t style anything in these pics, this is how it all was when we arrived.
When we arrived there was a lovely cheese board and a bottle of bubbles, and it was pretty tempting so we just opened it and played Canasta (you will be pleased to know that I have upped my game and am now kicking his butt regularly) and swam and ate cheese. If you look at my face you’ll see I’m pretty unhappy about the whole situation.
It was a pretty lux little holiday but we don’t holiday often, and when we do have a break it usually includes either staying with family or having family stay with us, so it was nice to have some time away just the two of us. We didn’t even take Chippie! Needless to say she was furious.
That’s it peeps, I’m crashing down from the holiday vibe and next week maybe we will dive into some process posts, yes? Keep cool/warm depending on where you’re perched
Sarah xx
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