September knitting retreat

On Wednesday we took Clare and Irene down to Bordeaux for their flight home, allowing time for a visit to La Droguerie the wonderful yarn shop in the centre of Bordeaux. Elke and I bought large safety pins for shawls, buttons and leather bag handles and Irene bought some patterns and various accessories.

Some nice crochet cushions in Zara home!

Cakes!

One of the amazing fountains in Bordeaux

Elke's shawl pin and buttons

I left Frank and Elke to explore Bordeaux while I took Clare and Irene to the airport.
Thursday was Frank's last day of woodturning with tutor Roger, so Elke spent the day relaxing in the garden with her knitting.

Frank and bowl

Frank arrived home clutching the gorgeous bowl he has made, a fantastic effort (but sadly for Elke not a yarn bowl)! Tutor Roger and his wife Pam joined us for supper, it was still warm enough to eat outside so we enjoyed a few glasses of wine, antipasto for starters, beef braised in red wine and golden croissant pudding.
Frank and Elke set off after breakfast on Friday to spend a few days in their little caravan on the Ile d'Oleron, I hope they are OK as we have had thunderstorms and torrential rain all weekend.....
Another great week with some lovely people.

September knitting retreat

Today we went to visit Irene's friend Lena who lives in the Charente near Rochefoucauld. Irene and Lena are into dyeing yarn using various forms of funghi and the results are absolutely amazing!

funghi colour

funghi stash

paper made from funghi and a mushroom

a mushroom wall hanging

a piece of woven fabric using yarn dyed by Lena

more mushroom fabric

a bag made from mushrooms

funghi shades

Lena took us on a tour of her workshop (where everything revolves around mushrooms and funghi in various forms and shapes), showing us yarns in the most beautiful shades, there were 6 balls of mohair that I was very tempted to slip into my bag unnoticed....

on the right, the mohair shades I want!

more funghi colour

After drooling over the colours and learning a lot about dyeing we went into Rochefoucauld for a lovely lunch at 'Chez Steph'.

Chez Steph

a huge dessert

Then admired the beautiful Chateau from the outside (sadly closed to the public on Tuesday's) then back home to cook supper for Culli and Frank who had been slaving over a hot lathe all day.

Unfortunately Elke's dreams of a useful knitting related wooden gift from her husband seem to have gone out of the window, Frank has started work on a huge chunk of Olive Ash which sounds like it is turning into something far larger than a yarn bowl................., we are looking forward to seeing the finished project on Thursday. It is Irene and Clare's last full day, Clare has finished her crochet cushion, just the sewing up to go and has made good progress on her knitted bag. Irene's jacket is starting to take shape and the cable pattern looks lovely.

Irene's cable jacket

Clare's Lopi bag

September knitting and crochet retreat

It has been a wet and windy week, on Friday I headed off to Bordeaux to pick up Clare and Irene, two regulars from my old knitting group at Kangaroo, just as I arrived at the airport the sun came out. It was great to see them both again and catch up on all the news!

We spent the whole of Saturday sitting in the sunshine with our knitting. Clare has brought two projects with her, a bag knitted in a gorgeous Lopi wool she bought in Iceland and Jane Crowfoot's beautiful zig-zag crochet cushion cover from Kaleidoscope. Irene has started a cable jacket knitted in a yarn that she has spun and dyed herself. She is cursing me for making her knit a tension square, but it proved that the original pattern she chose just didn't work with the yarn, so she has started another one and it is growing fast.
I am struggling over an idea I have for a lacy top for a magazine design, I can see it in my head but just don't seem to be able to make it work.
On Sunday morning Clare, Irene and I went for a wander around the food market in Saintes, buying seafood for lunch and some gorgeous ripe figs. Then a trip to the huge brocante at Hyper U, there were too many stalls to visit but we found a few bargains and I managed to resist increasing my stash of vintage linen sheets!

In the afternoon our other two guests, Elke and Frank arrived from Germany. Elke is here to join us for a bit of knitting, bringing with her a selection of projects for scarves, shawls, a jacket and some fingerless mitts, her husband Frank is doing a woodturning course with Culli and tutor Roger Slater.
Monday is another beautiful day with clear blue skies and a light breeze, we spend the morning alternating between the garden and the barn depending on how hot we get in the sun. Frank is doing well with the woodturning and has produced a dibber by the end of the day.

It is warm enough to sit outside in the evening and enjoy a supper of chicken tagine and chocolate torte.

May knitting retreat

Anne in the studio

The last two days of the retreat have been very lazy. Yesterday and today are public holidays in France and true to form it's raining! Sad for all the brocantes as the morning was a total washout, however, we had no plans to go anywhere. Anne was on a mission to finish the back of her sweater (which she did) and Pat was happy to finish her sock and search through more of my magazines for inspiration. We spent most of the day in the studio, which is proving to be a fabulous workspace, it looks like a woolly whirlwind has gone through it but that is fine, I don't need to tidy up every day!!!

Anne with the back of her sweater completed

Pat's sock

The sun came out briefly in the afternoon allowing for a short walk around the vineyard before supper of garlic and ginger prawns, chicken and fennel cassoulet and pears poached in red wine. Today it was raining again. Anne made a start on the sleeve for her sweater so that I could help with the decreasing around the top and Pat started knitting some i-cords to make a necklace similar to my design in Vintage Knit Knacks.

After lunch we waved goodbye to Anne as Culli took her off to Angouleme to catch the train back to Paris, she seems to have gained a lot from the week and I think is confident enough to carry on with her knitting on her own, hopefully she will be back for a workshop next year. Pat and I spent the afternoon knitting and reading, she is off first thing in the morning for her flight from La Rochelle to Stansted. It has been another great week, with two more lovely ladies who I think will be back.
Tomorrow I have to do a quick blitz on the house ready for the painting and woodturning course at the weekend!

Painting and woodturning workshop

the painters

We had our first painting and woodturning weekend at La Verderie and it was a great success.
Painting tutor Pamela Slater coped well with 5 participants working in different mediums. Jen chose to work in acrylics, Moira oil and Sue, Frances and Pirette all went for watercolour. Everyone went away happy feeling that they had achieved something. I even had a little dabble in oil painting on Sunday, which I really enjoyed and it has inspired me to have a go at some more.

samples of Roger's beautiful woodturning

the woodturning workshop

Steve and Jim clutching their finished bowls

Woodturners Steve, Jim and William were overjoyed with their results, under the careful supervision of tutor Roger Slater they turned a dibber each on the first day of the course and a bowl each on the second day. It was an intensive couple of days and everyone went away exhausted but there were mutterings of looking for lathes on ebay so I think that at least two of them are now hooked!

The next painting and woodturning weekend will be on 11th and 12th May and is open to residential and non-residential participants for further details visit the Art in France website.

Thanks to a cutting error on the glass at Bricomarche Culli and Steve didn't get the front of the barn finished until Monday, however, it looks fantastic, just needs the painter (me!) to finish it off, but that will have to wait until after the Mystery Blanket workshop as I have 12 bedrooms to prepare before next week!

my new studio

I am afraid that we won't have the weather for the knitting workshop that we had this time last year, it is starting to warm up a tad, but has been very windy and there is more rain forecast for next week. Never mind lots of knitting in front of a toasty fire.

The cranes have been migrating the last few days, you can hear them coming before you see them, it sounds like a flock of demented chickens and then you see hundreds of them gliding along on the thermals, an amazing sight.

New studio for craft workshops

We must have picked the coldest week of the winter to finish off the barn at La Verderie. However, in spite of snow and freezing temperatures yesterday Culli, Steve and Roger managed to get the doors on the front of the barn.

Today it is still cold but sunny so hopefully they will get it finished by the end of the week just in time for the first painting workshop this weekend! It will make a fantastic studio space for workshops and will also double up as a gallery and great party room!
For details of the painting and woodturning workshops visit Art in France, for knitting and crochet visit Knitting Holidays in France