Tuesday morning Pitch and Stitch - 10.00am to 1.00pm

Tuesday morning Pitch and Stitch - 10.00am to 1.00pm
This hanging from Annie Downs' Hatched and Patched book should be in every caravan as a cushion or decoration!

Saturday 29 October 2011

Forgot

Forgot to post this great picture of Katrina with her very successful square!

And these are the delicious quiches I warmed up as part of our lunch:


Shame I've only just remembered to take them out!!!  They looked soooo nice before....

Crochet Day

A great start to the day as I looked out and saw all the lovely Autumn colours
Looking out over the front lawn along the valley to East Garston and Goodings hill opposite

Now that a lot of the leaves have fallen, we can just see our last caravan down on the site.  The CL season has come to an end, and we will be re-opening next march.  Hopefully we'll get a lot more crafty folk next year!


One caravan hidden among the trees

The Crochet day was great fun.  Amanda brought a selection of wool for everyone to use
and then we all got stuck in!


By lunchtime most of us had little sample pieces which looked like worms or flower pots, but by tea time there was some pretty serious crochet happening, and a lot of talk of chains, doubles, triples and squares going on!


And some of us had even got a rhythmn going!

Thank you Amanda - a great class.  Only bad thing about it is that I've got out the blanket I started crocheting three years ago, and have decided to finish that instead of finishing knitting my poppy, my knitting sampler, quilting my trip around the world, stitching my Clare Kingslake sampler, piecing my jelly roll quilt.........

Monday 24 October 2011

Bo and Mattie

Clean (and very nearly naked!)

Jelly Roll Day

What a great day we had on saturday!  Six of us all armed with jelly rolls - some more 'handled' than others - Tricia's and mine were a disgrace, Jan and Yvonne had followed teacher Helene's instructions not to undo them before the class and hadn't even taken them out of the packaging!!
We all worked very hard, the only unpicking was when Jan lost the plot just before tea time and, convinced the teacher was wrong (there's always one) unpicked hers (surrepticiously, under the table) five times before realising that teacher was, in fact right, and there was no need to unpick!
By the end of the day we had made a very good start on our jelly roll quilts, and are all determined to finish them (hopefully I'll get forwarded some pics as proof!)

And it was really nice to welcome Anne and Barbara all the way from Maidstone:


Meanwhile - look what came through to the kitchen the other day - is it any wonder my knitting always looks a little the worse for wear?
 
Got my revenge this morning though - both Mr Bojangles (above) and Matilda are, as I write, being given a much-needed make-over by Sara, the best dog groomer in Berkshire!


If they look as beautiful as I hope they will, I may post a picture!

Wednesday 19 October 2011

Knitters let loose!

Well, the Monday evening 6 week knitting course has come to an end, and thanks to Amanda there are more ladies in the world who can knit, pearl, increase, decrease and cable!  On the final evening they learnt how to knit flowers, and are now ready to knit their poppies after making a donation to the poppy appeal through www.knitonthenet.com/poppy and getting their pattern.  I'm sure Sandra made one last year and I plan to this year.  The course was such a success that we plan to run another one next year, starting around April, when it's not too warm to be playing with wool but the evenings are lighter so the trek out to the farm is less daunting!

Amanda will be back a week on saturday to unravel the mysteries of crochet - having just bought the Crochet Bible I see that anything that can be knitted, can be crocheted - with the advantage of having to deal with just one needle!  There are still a couple of places if anyone is interested in signing up.

This Saturday is Jelly Roll day - I finally get to use up the jelly roll I bought about two years ago!  Again, it's not too late to join us if you want.  Below is the Ring of Love quilt I made for my cousin's wedding present:

More reasons to start quilting:  The Sunday Times Style magazine this week described patchwork quilts as the hottest news in bed linen - 'crafty, cosy and creative'.  It went on to say that the craft a lot of people are talking about is quilting, and the article opened with:  'You have left work late again.  It's already dark once your dinner is in the oven and you've begun staring at the tv in much the same way you've been looking at your computer all day.  It sounds bleak and unfulfilling...' and so it does!!   I have to confess that on evenings in I sit in front of the television, but in the 13 years or so that I've been quilting it's very rare for me not to be sewing a quilt at the same time, and annoying everyone by saying "what happened then?" whenever there's a break in the dialogue!!!

Finally, some good news for us - after a week of Jake, our old Collie Cross, being very poorly with Vestibular Neuritus, he is feeling a lot better.  He's able to get himself up now and stagger around the garden, so hopefully he will be with us a bit longer - at 14 he's no pup anymore!

Tuesday 11 October 2011

and...

Just found another photo of the beginner's quilts - and a better one of Sue's, I think
 and here's a couple of knitters concentrating on their cables!

Dunno how this guy got here

Saturday 8 October 2011

Beginner's machine quilting

- Or perhaps I should say, beginner's no more!  Sue, Amanda, Jo, Di and Helen have just completed the last day of their Beginner's course and I think they should all feel pretty pleased with themselves!
Sue, Amanda, Jo and Helen with their quilts
As per usual, my picture really does not do their quilts justice (even with art direction from Amanda!) and you can hardly see Sue's at the end which is a great pity because the colours are beautiful.  Jo is going to send me a picture of hers - the one in the picture is a small quilt she was free-motion quilting today with help from Ann.  Di has also finished the course but missed this last day because she had a wedding to go to - hopefully she will send me a picture of hers too.  Helen's quilt is HUGE and Amanda's is particularly poignant - she has made it as a memory quilt for a friend.
As ever, the group really bonded and there have been a lot of laughs.  And it's so nice that on their final day they have gone away with a picture in their head of teacher Anne Ray telling the chap who was servicing her Aga to whip off his trousers.......
They are all very keen to carry on quilting, and will be signing up for Anne's more advanced classes - the pictorial class in Novermber and more in the spring.  Other people who have attended the beginner's groups in the past may also be interested.

Sunday 2 October 2011

A busy week!

What a busy week - and it's been so hot!!
The garden, which I'd deserted in the belief that Autumn was just around the corner, looks a blaze of colour (from a distance anyway, - close up you see the millions of dead heads among the flowers) and our grey goose is still busy laying eggs.

The knitting workshop monday evening is coming along nicely - I've started making a patchwork blanket of knitting stitches.  I'm currently on the first square which so far is 2"x3" - but we all started somewhere!
Pitch and Stitch was good fun and it was lovely to have Sheila from Nottingham with us for another visit
Wednesday the workshop was bursting at the seams with everyone working on their Medallion Quilts with Lynne Johnson.  Jonathan was dagging sheep outside and he asked what all the laughing had been about.  We had no idea, we were all taking our sewing very seriously indeed!
Finally, yesterday, Clare Kingslake was here to teach us how to make her lovely redwork hanging:
Fay working hard and Anna doing what she did all day - laughing! Clare hid!
Jackie Breadmore called in to buy the pattern (She couldn't come to the workshop) and brought her beautiful 'Drying in the Breeze' quilt to show Clare:
A beautiful piece and Jackie's quilting is perfect.

And Helene brought her Jelly Roll quilt which she is doing a class on later this month:


I can't wait to finally make this with my jelly roll - it's started to fray because I keep handling it but not making anything from it!

I can't be at Pitch and Stitch on Tuesday because I'm working (Sandra's in charge!) - but I'm looking forward to the Trip Around the World workshop on Wednesday  - a brilliant way for beginner's to get their heads round rotary cutting and quick-piecing.

And Finally - best wishes to Sandra's son James, and Lucy, the new Mrs Kidwell, who got married yesterday!!