A print of one of the many excellent printing blocks. After the Quilt Symposium I travelled over to the South Island by ferry from Wellington to Picton where I was met by my mateys Denise and Christine. It was soooo good to see them again.  I had the day off the next day to mooch about with the girls then I launched into a 3 day workshop based on The Journey. It is my favourite workshop and so good to be able to spend 3 whole days on it.   The Pelorus river from the Pelorus bridge. While we were mooching we crossed the Pelorus river and the girls said I had to see the view . . . I think you can see why?   The group starting The Journey. The workshop hadn't been advertised, it was an informal meeting of some of the Blenheim Creative Fibre ladies that I met when I first taught in New Zealand 3 years ago. It was great to see them again. The group of 15 was made up with friends and other textiles enthusiasts. On the first day we got down the black and whit

 The tutors had a short bus ride to the symposium every morning - we decided the group name for a gathering tutors should be a cacophony.  Can you imagine why?  The Quilt Symposium 2015 Palmerston North was a brilliant event. I have never been part of something so large and so very well organised. It was VERY impressive. I taught 5 one day workshops. All my workshops were full which was very satisfying - you never quite know when you are an international tutor, has anyone heard of you?  The first workshop was A New Starting Point which I wrote about in the previous post.  So - to continue . . . . The second workshop was Transforming Transfer. We had great fun painting papers with disperse dye (transfer paint) and then transferring the designs onto synthetic fabric. You can achieve fabulous layered effects with this process.  Some of the group getting stuck into painting the disperse dye (transfer paint) onto paper ready to transfer onto synthetic fabric.  Playing

A detail of 'Off the Floor' by Gael O'Donnell. So - here I am in Palmerston North teaching at the Quilt Sympossium. It is easily the largest event I have ever been involved in and it is running like clockwork. The organisation required in an event such as this is mind boggling. There are 32 tutors and around 1200 students - amazing. Yesterday we were setting up our classrooms and also had a chance to get a good look at the fabulous exhibition - Growing the Passion. As most of you will know I am not passionately interested in quilting, I admire the craft but  . . .  However, the quilts on show were just fantastic. A fabulous array of different styles and such skill - it was very interesting to see the variety. Here are my favourites . . .   'Off the Floor' by Gael O'Donnell. 'Is it Art?' by Melanie Martin - my favourite. 'Nightwatch' by Anna Prussing. 'My Kind of Garden' by Sheryl Anicich. You are g