Workshops here and there

After a good drive down to Abergavenny (Y Fenni) for a talk and workshop with Cibi Quilters, I am packing up ready to go to Denman College, the WI's special residential course venue near Oxford, later this week, where I am teaching a four day sashiko course.

Cibi Quilters are quite a new and very enthusiastic group. Of course, when I arrived, I recognised quite a few of the quilters straight away, as we had met before at Malvern (Quilts UK and the autumn quilt festival) and Festival of Quilts.

Jenny D introduced my talk as the first of the Liz Kettle Memorial talks. Liz was instrumental in starting their group but sadly died before it could become established. Apparently, one of her tried and tested means of spotting fellow quilters was by looking for their patchwork bags! So it seemed very appropriate that the first talk supported by her memorial was "Travels with a Bag Lady" - me and my bags. It would be nice to think that she would have enjoyed it as much as the group. We probably met at Malvern sometime.

In the afternoon, we had a mini workshop, where the quilters learned how to mark and stitch the four patterns from my "Sashiko & Tsumugi Cushion" design - shippou (seven treasures), nowaki ("grasses"), fundou (balance weights) and seigaiha (ocean waves). I had remembered the camera, but we were so busy marking and stitching these designs, I forgot to take any photos! I hope the group will send me some pictures of their finished panels, whether they make them into cushions (as I did with mine), bags or as the beginnings of a patchwork and sashiko quilt.