A slice of Mary's particularly delicious lemon cake. Alison arriving with a box of lemon drizzle cake and banana and toffee muffins. Rachael arrived with a box of Rice Krispie cakes and Mellisa brought in a box of dairy free chocolates. Session 5 of Experimental Textiles looks at Constructed Textiles. Knit, weave and felt. We also look at working in 3D. But first we look at the homework . . .  I am currently teaching two groups of Experimental Textiles. One on Thursday and Friday. The other on Saturday and Sunday. The course is taught over nine months, from June to March, one two day session per month. This post shows a mixture of images from both groups. This was just a small part of Kate's homework - she created several fabulous pieces. A ripped up painted still life, reassembled and decorated with hand stitch.  . . . Another from Jane . . .   . .  a detail . . . Marlilyn missed the 4th session but created her own still life and executed

 part of the courtyard garden at La Verderie I have this week to catch up with myself and write a few new workshops ready for next year. I know many of you out there in blog land are interested in many crafts and skills, not just my kind of madness. I was chatting with my good friend Sue Culligan who lives in France yesterday. Sue is the owner of the knitwear mail order company Kangaroo . I am nipping over to see her and her husband John for a few days in May to work out some dates for me to teach over there - but more of that later. While we were chatting it struck me that some of you may interested in the workshops Sue runs in France. Sue has been running workshops at the local Chateau for the last few years with great success and has now decided to open up her home in France for more intimate creative retreats for up to five students at a time.    free form crochet  learn to work with different colours The new residential  'Back to Basics' workshop (dates below) will be