Another busy session......

While our friends and families back in the UK are having wet and very cold weather while reading this week's blog, here we have had a rise in temperature again, but this didn't prevent twenty five members from coming to our Tuesday meeting.
The cakes left over from our stall at Saturday's Fiesta de la Pasa in the village, were quickly snapped up with donations swelling the takings from Saturday to over €75 which along with donations we already have from sales of fabric etc, means we can present our favourite local charity Anne-Axarquia with just over €100. So a big thank you to everyone who came along and supported our stall by buying the cakes, and thank you to all the members who made and donated cakes and biscuits.

Margaret and Jan manning the tables at Saturday's Fiesta

As always there was lots of activity in the hall this week, with members continuing to work on existing projects and discussing ideas for new ones, and it was good to welcome Shirley back after an extended visit to family in the UK.  Shirley has been working on a knitted  layette set for a Spanish friend and is now knitting a bright jumper for the same friend's daughter.

Louise, below, has finished the knitted baby blanket she has been working on for the past few weeks and has started a new knitting project

and Maureen is putting the finishing stitches in this warm crochet and woven blanket, while Cath and her friend Jill, who visits the group occasionally, were doing some hand sewing.  Cath is making heart shaped pincushions and donating them to the charity that Pam is collecting for.

Sue on the right, brought along her friend who is visiting from the UK for a week.  Sue's friend enjoyed the day with us, and showed us the cross stitch banner she is working on for her local brass band.

Annie only has one more week with us before she travels back to her home on a boat off the coast of New Zealand, where she spends much of the year.  I wonder if there are any other groups who can boast a member who travels quite so far to stitch with their friends!!

It was good to see Helen again , seen here working on her latest gold work embroidery, and it's unusual to see Carole, below without her sewing machine.  This week Carole is working on another padded etui box.

Above, Margaret is working on a fabric shoe caddy this week, which will hang behind a bedroom door and below are Carol, who is adding embroidery stitch to a piece using silk paper made in a previous Diversity group "play-day" and Yvonne, who I'm sorry but I don't know what she's working on, but looks as though she's having fun!

At the end of the room which seems to have been adopted by the sewing machinists, there were only four members this week, Linda and Pam above, with Ann below

and Eloise who is seen here with Vanessa who is working on a cross stitch project. Vanessa told me a sad tale which will be familiar to many fellow quilters the world over.  At last weeks meeting, Vanessa was at the stage of squaring up her quilt top ready to add the binding.  She trimmed it and intended going home to add the binding, but when she opened up the quilt it was horribly lopsided and she promptly burst into tears.  Vanessa says she should never  have attempted it as she knew she wasn't feeling well that day, and she wasn't concentrating properly.  After little sympathy from her husband, she went to bed feeling low about the situation, and woke at 3am still thinking about what she could do to rectify the problem.  She had no more of the same fabric which she had bought a while ago, but she did know the maker and name of the fabric line, so in the early hours she searched the internet for a supplier for the smallest piece she could find.  I'm pleased to say Vanessa was successful, though it's a bit of an expensive solution, as the postage is costing more than the small piece of fabric needed!  But Vanessa says she would never be able to live with the quilt if she just finished it as it is, so it will be worth it in the end.  I did reassure her that she is not alone in learning the hard way, many many of us, me included, have been down this road before and we hopefully rarely make the same mistake twice!  We look forward to seeing the finished project soon Vanessa.

I too am learning by my "mistakes".  I have a new pieced and applique project in mind, and decided I would dye my own fabric for the background  and use up some of the smaller pieces of fabric which I had previously dyed as part of the Diversity group play-days, for the applique motifs.  I decided to dye a large 2 metre piece and tray-dye it so that it would have lots of scrunched textures in it.  But it seems after discussions with other group members sitting at the table below, that I used  too small  a tray which resulted in the fabric having too much white left in it where the dye couldn't penetrate as it was scrunched too tightly.  So now I have a choice of whether to over-dye it, or dye a new piece of fabric in a larger bucket to try and get a more overall scrunched effect but in a solid colour.  In my case, it was a happy mistake, as I love the textures and colours in this fabric, and I'm sure I will find a use for it in another project.  So one way or another it's back to the dye bucket for me!

During the early part of the meeting I received a text from Helen Pegman, who was delighted to have just received a parcel from the Diversity group members, containing postcards made by members to show her we are thinking of her.  Now that Helen has received these cards, next week I'll be able to show them to you, so make sure to come back and have a look at them and more work from the thriving Viñuela Sew and Sews group.

For members who are waiting for the link to be able to subscribe to this blog by email...... I'm sorry but after spending another couple of hours last night trying unsuccessfully to fathom out Feedburner, despite what I thought were very clear instructions from Carol, I gave up!  So Carol I'll be ringing you for your help in the next day or so I'm afraid.

                         Rachel