quilts in the vines

A week has already flown by and only now have I had a chance to write about  last weekend, when  I was lucky enough to join Bernadette and several like-minded quilters at the first (of what we hope to be many) Quilts in the Vines retreat at Bathurst in the central tablelands of NSW.

After a week of truly awful weather in Sydney, Friday dawned with torrential rain. Trips to the car to load supplies had to be timed carefully. By 9 we had the silver bullet packed and my car buddy Laurel and I set off for a quilt-shop-hop through Sydney and over the Blue Mountains where we rendezvoused with the remainder of the party at Leura for lunch and a little shopping.

A rather gorgeous silk scarf from Rhajistan selected me as her new owner...

By late afternoon Bathurst approached with crystal clear skies. Our accommodation was  located right on the famous Mount Panorama race track, (which outside two weekends a year is a normal road with a 60kph speed limit and amusingly we witnessed a few rev-heads who couldn't resist hooning around the track channelling Jack Brabham).

Lovely large, very comfortable and warm rooms.

After pre-dinner drinks we popped into town for a pub-dinner, then a little night cap in Bernadette's room before we called it a day.

Saturday started early with a brisk walk up Mount Panorama. Being a qualified Personal Trainer Bernadette put the rest of us to shame, barely raising a puff (must be those long legs) whilst striding up a long killer hill. By mutual consent Jean and I instigated a quiet mutiny and elected not to climb the second half of the "hill".

Beautiful views... we actually walked to Algona, the vineyard venue where we would be sewing for the next 2 days.

The facilities at Algona were excellent. Abundant space, light and tables a-plenty. Unending coffee and tea, sumptuous food from our in-house chef and rather lovely people.

Our tutor Marg Samson gave an overview of the quilt we would be creating over the weekend, based on Mary Jane Hannaford  (see my previous post for photos of MJH's quilts), however we would be interpreting her style in our own ways.  An integral part of her quilts are little scrappy strips of fabric appliqued to the quilt in lines, diagonals or circles, so we set-to cutting scraps and sewing them into long 2" wide strips.

 

Jean and Elaine being industrious at the cutting board

 

Sue wrangling 2" scraps

Soon little washing lines of scraps were emerging.

And soon little strips began appearing on backgrounds.

 Sue's watermelon linen background looks delicious

 Laurel went with the Aussie coat of arms

Our tutor Marg's , she had a head start...

Later that afternoon, we visited a charming and inspirational shop in Bathurst, The Home Patch. Jean has a lovely post on her blog, so pop over there for more details. Needless to say a little bit of shopping occurred.

Next post - Day 2..