Janet Cooper Quilts

An unexpected free day, due to the cancellation of a Jelly Roll Workshop at Polegate near Eastbourne, which has been snow-bound today. So Alistair and I got to work putting some meat on the bones of my new Patchwork and Quilting information site - www.janetcooperquilts.com.

So far there is just basic information on patchwork, quilting, its history and explanation of some terminology, but we'll be continually adding other bits and pieces, including free patterns and guides on some techniques.

Ouse Valley Quilters

What a lovely bunch of quilters at Ouse Valley in Lewes yesterday evening. A huge room full of people that I was there to teach Foundation Piecing to. It was a bit manic, but great fun! Once they got started, everyone was working at a different pace so it was hard work to keep up with their progress and give them right instructions at the right time. I hope they enjoyed it as much as I did.
Meanwhile, Alistair was manning the 'Shop', which was busy, despite it only being a week since Ardingly.
As usual, they put on a lovely spread of cakes and savouries, so it was lucky we had skipped having dinner before we came out.

Sunny Sussex Countryside

No workshops on today, so after a bit of office work this morning we took a trip out to our local farm shop, Townings Farm, for 'supplies'. Alistair stocked up on flour from Plumpton Mill, since he's now got into a routine of baking bread or rolls once a week. The grain is grown at Plumpton Agricultural College on the South Downs and is then ground at the restored watermill in Plumpton before being sold through local village and farm shops.

We stopped to take some photos of our future 'dinners' on the way back.
I think this is an Aberdeen Angus-Longhorn cross (I'm sure Carole will correct me if I'm wrong!)

The dark sheep are the Hebrideans, with a few
(white) South Downs in amongst them.

Back to teaching

Finally recovered from a tiring weekend.
Straight back into it, with New Fabrics arriving on Monday afternoon.

Tuesday afternoon was Stitch and Chat at Partridge Green.
This morning I was choosing Moda Christmas fabrics for delivery in June and this afternoon I was back to teaching - Free Motion Machine Quilting.
This evening I have been playing around with some new metallic threads that I picked up at the weekend - mixed results. The Mettler metallic threads worked fine, with just a slight tension adjustment. However, I'm having real trouble with the Madeira Jewel (Holographic) threads. They give a great effect on the front of the work, but the tension is just not right on the back, especially when going round tight corners.
I'll experiment further, maybe trying a different bobbin thread; I'm loathe to resort to adjusting my bobbin tension, in case I mess things up for regular sewing.

Ardingly Day 2

Where was everyone today? It was a very quiet day, not just for us, everyone else said the same.
Still, it gave me a chance to do a bit of shopping myself. I bought some metallic threads, so I'm going to have a play about doing some fancy quilting using those - I'll let you see the photos of that when I'm done.
Also, stocked up on several pieces of cheap fabric to use as quilt backings.

Proof that we did have some customers today!

Ardingly Day 1

A really busy start today. I actually remembered to take some photos while Alistair was finishing setting up, before the early-birds arrived! Lots of familiar faces at the show and lots of new ones too. Thanks to everyone who came to see us.

Ardingly Set-up Day

Last minute preparations at home this morning, printing off flyers etc. Then loaded up both cars (having recharged the flat battery on the Mondeo overnight) and drove all of 15 minutes up the road to the showground.
We've gone for a slightly simpler set-up this year, but it still took us 4 hours to get everything laid out and organised.

Ardingly Quilt Show

Ardingly Quilt Show is coming up this weekend, so I'm spending all my time, between workshops, cutting up Fat Quarters and generally trying to get things organised.

Piles of bolts waiting to be cut.

Pile of cut fabrics waiting to be folded.

Thank goodness for Really Useful Boxes!

Cute or What?

Just running through my Bag making instructions for Saturday's 'Handy Bags' workshop.
I made up a miniature version, only 6" x 8". Very cute don't you think?
I was rushing it a little, so don't look too close, but I got this together in less than an hour!

Flutterbies

I've been working on the Butterfly block, which is the last block of my Foundation Piecing Block of the Month quilt. Here is the block on its own.....

...and here it is laid out with all the others.

Just the borders to get together next.

If you like the look of this, you'll be pleased to know that I'm working on getting it set up as a mail order / web-download project. 'Follow' the blog so you'll be the first to know when it's ready.

Alistair has been busy hunting round the web and finding lots of links to pages with FREE quilt patterns for you to print off or download. Just click on Free Patterns on the top Menu Bar to find a page with all the links built-in.

Ooh, and I'm set up on Twitter now too. So if you want more blow by blow updates of things as they happen, then look at www.Twitter.com/patchesbc.