I learned how to quilt in the Middle East. And I made friends with some wonderful quilters, including Alice and Jacqui. We all homeschooled, so at times we would get together to do school, quilt, sew, bake bread and do other crafty things. We also discussed making things to sell at markets. Alice was already doing this with making chocolates, and Jacqui and I thought we could add some other craft items to the table if we all did it together.

Just after this idea was born, Alice had to leave. This left Jacqui and myself to carry on the ideas. Without Alice we started JJ’s Gifts and Crafts, but in honor of her we made chocolates to sell and also sold “Alice’s Buttons” - buttons she sent us from the US. Alice also sent us other important supplies we “needed”.

Once we started, we got waaaaay too many ideas and didn’t have nearly enough time to do them all! But we worked at them bit by bit, and had quite a few successful craft stalls at the local markets.

Sadly, I moved away to another town and we couldn’t keep JJ’s going. On a more positive note, I met up with another great group of quilters there and we did lots of cool projects together until I left to go back to Australia. We met weekly at Craft Kingdom and quilted till we dropped (and had yummy lunches together!).  Nora has a long arm quilting machine and she kindly finished some of my quilts for me when we heard we were leaving.

Jacqui went back to South Africa, and is there now getting settled back into life. Alice went back to the US, but then her dh was transferred to Australia. So we’ve been sewing together again, which is wonderful!

Mostly this will be my blog about the things I am sewing. I could have called this site something else, but I wanted to keep our name going - for old times sake  (Maybe both Alice and Jacqui can still contribute every now and then!).

This is the place where I will keep all my quilting buddies informed and share our love of quilting, even though we are oceans apart!