Parrots and a Surprise

You may remember this photo of a tapestry I saw in the Real Alcazar, Seville earlier this year. It was the inspiration for a stained glass window patchwork panel.

Yesterday I had a lovely day with six ladies at Tudor Rose Patchwork, and these are the results of a very productive day. 

 Cherry used some lovely batiks and great fussy cutting for her parrots

Margaret has used exciting patterned fabrics to great effect

Liz made a pair of bold parrots and started making her own bias binding for the 'leading'

Pat's fun pair of parrots are really taking shape. The colours work beautifully and the black outline highlights and makes them pop!

Anne's parrots are on a darker background which works very well. She has used the patterned fabric beautifully.

And Denise's parrots are a real fun pair which make me smile every time I look at them. The cloud patterned background is a good choice of fabric too.

Altogether they a wonderful fun flock of parrots and it was a pleasure teaching the class.

The surprise of the day was Pats crazy patchwork panel. She came to her first workshop with me last year and admitted that she hasn't stopped going to classes since.

This was a real treat for me to see. When you only get one day with students you are not sure if things will be finished. Pat has made a beautiful jewel of a embroidery and everytime you look at it you see something new.  I am sure you will agree that it is a wonderful piece.

Bev

A Celebration and Dog Sitting Part 2

Although this post is called dog sitting part 2 there will be little mention of the lovable Toby from the last post.

We spent a lovely couple of weeks in the Lake District and I am still catching up with things. Funny how a holiday can really throw things. So this is a quick round up of the holiday and then I will get back to all things textile related.

One of the things we did was to visit the new Lakes Distillery. As you can see it has not been open long so it will be a few years for their own whisky to be produced ( for those who like whisky I have to say I am not fond )

However I was taken with the wonderful iron gates and the Victorian model farm buildings. 

They also had llamas but I couldn't see the connection (but they were cute)

 We had wonderful weather and took the opportunity practice with the panoramic setting on the camera. Unfortunately I was wearing my sunglasses and didn't quite match it up. I added in more mountains on most of them.

This is a better photo my husband took from Whinlatter looking down at Bassenthwaite Lake

And of Derwentwater

I also said in the last post that I was expecting a new sewing machine. Unfortunately it has been delayed and is still in America. This is not the totally bad news you might expect, as we fell behind with the new quilting room. We managed to complete the new floor this weekend so the quilt table still needs to be reassembled. Hope fully it won't be too long before everything is done as I am itching to get going.

My new floor

On another happy note, three of my students came to my studio for a coffee and cake celebration. 

Congratulations to them all.

And now with new courses starting this month it is back to work.

Level 1 Patchwork & Quilting will be starting at Tudor Rose Patchwork, Oakley on Tuesday 22nd September.

Bev