Maritime Fibre Arts Retreat 2013

A view of the main room.

The Maritime Fibre Arts Retreat was held at the Atlantica Hotel, Oak Island last weekend. There was well over 200 quilters, knitters, stitchers, tatters, lace makers, spinners and rug hookers there. What a gathering! The noise level when everyone was in the room was quite something!

Pre dinner gathering.

Several of us went a day early to relax and chat and sew a little. By Friday the rest of our group arrived and in all there was 20 of us from the Mahone Bay Quilters Guild and the Quilt Mafia and several other quilt/fibre friends.

I couldn't begin to count all the different varieties of spinning wheels!

The days just flew by, there was lots of visiting back and forth, new friends made and old friendship rekindled. There was lots of laughter, lots of shared stories and lots of sharing of techniques and advice. I am so grateful for all my fibre friends. They are all so talented, so gifted and so wise. I think we could have solved all the world's problems!

Sharon Orpin is our faithful organizer, she and her husband Richard have taken on this role and they do it so well. We are all grateful for her dedication and determination to bring us all together. My room is booked already for next year - can't wait!

I posted lots more pictures on my Flickr Photostream here.

A Kindred Spirit

I had a kindred spirit, a soulmate, a very good friend in Cheryl Hughes. We met over 30 years ago when she came to live in Halifax with her husband Peter. They were posted here on a transfer with the British Navy for a few years and Cheryl wanted to learn how to quilt - she came to a Mayflower Quilters Guild meeting and thus began a 30+ year friendship.

Cheryl, Peter, Rebecca and Ian (2006) at Fox Point

While Cheryl was here she became a wonderful quilter, a stab stitch quilter and a respected member of our Guild. She jumped in and volunteered at every chance she could. When she moved back to England she was instrumental in starting a Guild there near where she lived. It is still going strong today. She has taught at many Guilds in England, a teacher by training she excelled at teaching patchwork and quilting.

We visited back and forth over the years, we mourned together the loss of our parents, we celebrated the birth of her two children and our 5 grandchildren, we mourned the loss of our grandson, we celebrated the wonderful accomplishments of all our children. We have been through a lot together but the last 3 years and her battle with breast cancer showed me a courageous side of her that I will admire for the rest of my life. She fought this disease with strength, courage and dignity but she left far too soon. I wrote a bit about our last visit together here. I will miss her immensely, I will cherish the memories.

"Friends are like stars, you don't have to see them to know they are there".

Quilt Mafia Meets Again

Fifteen of the Quilt Mafia gathered at Laurie Swim's in Lunenburg this week and we had a great day of sharing, talking and eating! As always the conversation was varied and interesting, the food delicious and the quilts/knitting/works of art that everyone was working on or had completed were fantastic. What an amazing group!

So many were wearing hand knit socks! This wasn't all!

There was some conversation around "should we or shouldn't we be known as the Quilt Mafia"? I don't have a problem with it but then I was around when Polly's Dan first started calling her quilt friends "the quilt mafia" and it just stuck! I was surprised the other day when I found out by searching google that we aren't the only ones who use that term. The Fons family of quilters - Marianne, her daughter Mary also refer to themselves as the "quilt mafia family". It is found here as "fabric mafia" in a conversation with Lynne Edwards. Just googling the term brings up other links! Who knew we were so ground breaking way back then?

It was wonderful to be surrounded by Laurie's art quilts. You can read/see more about her here. I especially loved her new series, yet to be named but using the image of the fish stores in Blue Rocks.

Here is a picture I took a few years ago of one of the fish stores in Blue Rocks, near Lunenburg.

I think Laurie captured it perfectly.