Friends

I heard from Hilary who is co-ordinating the Celebrating Diversity quilt that my 'In an English country Garden' quiltee would be in time to be considered for the compilation quilt so I have my fingers crossed for being selected.  The finished quilt will be displayed at the Quilt Museum in York and at the Festival of Quilts at the NEC in Birmingham in August so I shall get to see it in one location or the other, if not both.  I'm pleased to say too that Mum loved the quilt I made her and has taken it back to her care home.

Yesterday I had a wonderful day meeting up with two blogging friends whose blogs I have been following for some time and who I met very briefly at last year's FOQ.  Sadly we all failed to take a group photo to mark the day so I have been very cheeky and borrowed one from Maggi (sorry I didn't ask first Maggi, I'll take it off if you would prefer).

The other lady in the photo is Linda who blogs as Blue-Eyed Girl and it was Linda who had planned the intinerary for the day.   And what a day it was!  After picking me up from the train station we went to The Beetroot Tree which is owned and run by Alysn Midgelow-Marsden who is well known for her work with metals in textiles.  She also wrote the book 'Between the Sheets with Angelina'.  The Beetroot Tree is a wonderfully inspiring creative environment also a very tempting place for shopping!

I very naughtily couldn't resist the beautiful shot velvets in my favourite sea colours and Maggi gave me some tips on how to burnish the stainless steel metal fabric to change its colour.  I can see a use for the metal fabric and the embroidered silk in the piece that I should be cracking on with for the International Quilt Challenge (only 23 days till the deadline!).  I have plans for that little piece of embroidered silk in the project too.

Next it was on to lunch at a lovely cafe and foodstore in nearby Breaston called Anderson's and then more cups of tea and a visit to Linda's home and art room.  It was really great to see Linda's beautiful embroideries in the flesh and to meet her gorgeous cat Peachy who took to me because I had been eating a tuna sandwich and the smell was still on my hand :-)  It is well worth clicking the link higher up to visit Linda's blog and see her beautiful work and to meet Peachy, he's a very cheeky cat!  Linda and I share a love of St Ives so you can catch up on a few views while you're there.

 Before Maggi drove me back to the station for my train we went to Pear Tree Yard, a craft warehouse which was more like an Aladdin's cave!  Fortunately we didn't have too long to shop but I did buy a couple of things,

I was really pleased to get these gel stamps which are a series of circles that can be used in many ways and combinations.  You can split up the larger circles and use the middles separately.  When not in use they store conveniently in the tin.  I'm hoping these might come in useful for the Archi-Texture project too.  

I had taken Linda and Maggi a small gift of mixed fibres and fabrics as I knew they both have embellishers but they had both brought me a proper gift. 

Linda gave me the decorated book with her very pretty digital and textile collage on the cover and Maggi gave me the gorgeous wallet which shows off her very skilled machine embroidery. 

We were talking about being of an age to benefit from a Senior Rail card and once I get to my 60th birthday later this year I shall be using this wallet for my card and travel tickets.  It will save me grovelling through my handbag and panicking for my tickets!

My busy day yesterday took its toll and I have been very lazy today, although I have done a little bit of dyeing with onion skins and, after chatting with Maggi about collage yesterday, I've made a couple of small collages which I'll photograph tomorrow.  At the start of the year I had planned to do a collage a day but so far haven't done any so maybe I should start now.  I may even use Linda's book as I like the square format.

Thank you Maggi and Linda for a great, fun day out and I hope we can get together again soon.  It was great to spend time with like minded people and we never stopped talking, did we? :-)