Virtual Class Samples

What a strange year. My teaching used to involve interractions with real life students and plenty of travel. Now I spend my time recording myself on my phone or teaching groups via zoom where I hear their disembodied voices asking questions from my laptop.

Not all of this is bad as I really don’t miss the travelling and actually love spending the days in my new schoolhouse on my own. But I could really do without the endless videoing.  It’s having to watch and listen to yourself over and over again that’s the worst bit.  I have had to do away with all vanity and accept the fact that I am no longer 18 and certainly don’t look it, that my hair always looks a mess unless I brush it before every take (and I never have my brush handy) and that my North London accent is actually much stronger than I thought!

The reason I have been away from this happy place for longer than I expected is that I have been very busy filming the 5 workshops (yes 5, what was I thinking?!) for QuiltCon Together, the tutorials for our latest Thread House Virtual Retreat and Club BOM blocks, AND a live workshop for Beyond Festival of Quilts!  This has taken so much of my time (along with regular secret sewing for magazine commissions) that I haven’t had a chance to write a blog post for 6 weeks! And obviously all my sewing has been for these virtual classes.

I can show you finished pieces for 4 out of 5 of my QCT classes. First up is my Avery Garland Class. This hand sewn block is made with both EPP and needle-turn applique and is very time consuming (though incredibly rewarding!). With that in mind I started work on the first class sample back in the late summer.  Trying to give this vintage style quilt a more modern look I used only solid fabrics and started 3 different blocks during the course of the video (one is still WIP). I hope to have the pattern for this quilt available next year some time and to make life easier for QCT students and future pattern buyers I have organised for Paper Pieces to produce packs of paper templates for the garland. These will be available very soon!

As with all my QCT classes you can still book places on this workshop for February 2021 by heading to the website here (even if you are not a MQG member). HOWEVER their registration site is going through a massive upgrade so is unavailable at this exact time – it will be back up soon though.

I had 2 half day hand sewing classes to film, Modern Crewelwork and Embellished Folk Embroidery.  The mini Pebbles Sampler I started for the class is very much still languising at the bottom of my work basket but I did finish 2 items with the Folk Embroidery, this cute felt pouch and another (and better) version of the giant pincushion I made as an original sample for the class. I really loved working with felt for the pouch and plan on more of this in the future (I just like working with felt full-stop).

Next up was Freehand Curves Landscape and as luck would have it I also taught the only ‘real life students’ class (since the pandemic started) in the same subject at around the same time.  My old shop myBearpaw had managed a short programme of socially distanced and very small classes (4 students) to help finish all the cancelled classes for the Spring.  I taught Freehand Curves Landscape in 2 morning sessions in November and it was absolutely wonderful to see 4 of my regular students (albeit behind masks)!

This class proved a nice warm up for the video, as this and the next class were much more challenging to film, the work being larger and more difficult to explain to a camera. I completed 2 new landscapes which brings my total to 15. I decided that once I got to 16 I would put them all together into a giant crazy quilt top, so watch this space!

My last class for QCT was the new ‘Journey to the Centre of the Earth’ which is a more advanced version of my Dandelion Clock Block. And as luck would have it again I had been asked to teach this class for a live Beyond the Festival of Quilts Masterclass a few weeks ago. This was to take place in a studio in Edinburgh and would be one of the first times I had needed to leave my house for months. And of course the weather was appalling – torrential rain and gales!  And to make matters worse the studio was surrounded with roadworks and traffic tailbacks and a lengthy and complicated diversion was needed to get into the building.  I had thankfully allowed extra time for the journey but my stress levels were very high by the time I finally got there!

The workshop was 90 minutes long with me talking non-stop to camera while sewing, cutting etc AND replying to students questions via a screen at the end of the table! To say it was an intense experience is an understatement but it seemed to go down well and I saw many finished blocks popping up on social media after the class which is the best sign. I also managed to finish off a new Dandelion Clock Block using samples started at class earlier this year. The class was recorded and can now be purchased ‘on demand’ for a short time only via their website here. 

This experience again acted as a nice warm up to filming the ‘Journey…’ class. You can read more about this class and the original quilt here.  I am now embarking on a new version of this quilt, larger and more ambitious but using this quarter block class sample as the starting point.  This delicious bundle of new Pop Solids by Dashwood Studio is being put to great use for this and I can’t wait to make some more progress over the Christmas break.

I am now ‘out of the office’ for a couple of weeks and am starting to finish off a whole heap of quilt tops ahead of my new Moxie Long Arm machine which is now arriving in January.  Read more about the Moxie here and just an update that Pinhole Quilting’s introductory offer has been extended till end of January! Check out the details on their website here and don’t forget to use my Moxie Mentor code  JA101 if you sign up for news and place an order 🙂

I’ll sign off with one of the finished Mini Snowman Hoops from yet another video tutorial, this time for The Thread House Winter Virtual Retreat. Despite everything I hope you all manage to find some peace and happiness this Christmas.