Busy March

March have been very busy at Russellee.  We started the month with a Scrapping Retreat followed by a Quilting Retreat the next weekend and then a week to Queensland for my brother's wedding.

Twelve ladies attended the Scrapping Retreat.  As usual lots of great layouts came out of the weekend.  Our guest tutor was Kylie Symons from Tumut.  Kylie was going to do the class on Saturday night but as the weather was deteriorating she came out Saturday afternoon.  Her great class featured a lot of painting and doodling techniques.  This was a different layout then most of the ladies had done before and they were impressed with the results.  Thank you Kylie.

Kaye gave a great mini album lesson on the Saturday night.  This album consisted of three sheets of cardstock and bamboo skewers.  After the lesson several more of these albums turned up over the rest of the weekend.  Thank you Kaye.

In all there were three classes and three challenges.  It never ceases to amaze me how a group can use the same papers in different ways.

The highlight of the weekend was the road into town being cut by flood waters on Sunday morning.  This did not open again until Monday morning.  Lunch did not arrive from town and nine of the ladies were not able to go home.  The up side was that they had another night of scrapping.  I managed to feed all for the rest of the weekend including our missed lunch that was coming from town.

The next weekend we had six ladies (unfortunately three could not attend due to flooding).  The workshop for the weekend was a dragon fly quilt designed by Southwind Designs.  Most achieved in completing the centre panel with one outside boarder being started. 

This weekend did not go without its dramas with one of the ladies having an accident on the Sunday morning.  Three kangaroos hopped in front of her car hitting the car and causing her to run into a tree.  Luckily she only had a scratch on her arm but the car was extensively damaged.

The Tuesday after the Quilting retreat Pam, Tony and I headed to Toowoomba for my brother's wedding.  We went up early as I had to ice the cake.  The weather was not the best on the Saturday and the ceremony had to be performed inside instead of the garden.  However it was a nice ceremony and the venue was great.  The meal was beautiful.  Rennie and Elly are now in Fiji for two weeks.


Future Retreats

My next retreat is a UFO Quilting Retreat the first weekend in May.  The next Scrapping Retreat is the last weekend in August.  Both of these are almost at capacity. If you are interested in either of these contact me on russeldr@bigpond.com.

Our next Quilting Cruise is well into planning.  I have a guest tutor, Amanda Daly from Sydney coming with us.  This is a longer cruise and booking are already coming in.  For more information contact me.

Until next time happy quilting and scrapping

Dorothy

The time has come

After 12 months of planning and organising the time has come for our Australian Quilting Cruise next week. There are 34 ladies attending this curise. They are from Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia. It has been a challenge for me to organise the classes and pack all the kits. It has been a great learning curve.

We leave Monday on the beautiful Royal Caribbean ship 'The Rhapsody of the Seas'. This ship has a great conference room which we are using for our classes. In all there will be four classes with lots of additional kits available for those who want to keep quilting.

As well as the quilting there are also ports of call and a host of activities on board the ship. When we get back I shall put up a full report.

Russellee BnB is also having a Scrapbooking Retreat the first weekend in March and two quilting retreats. One is the second weekend in March and the other is the first weekend in May. There is also a group of quilters from Canberra coming in a couple of weeks orgainising their own retreat.

have a great week and until next time

Dorothy

Christmas is Coming

The Most wonderful Time of the Year is just around the corner. Still have a few things to get ready. time just seems to slip away.

We had the Scrapbooking Christmas party at Pam's last Saturday evening. Pam acted as Santa and did a top job. Not only was Pam a great Santa but she was a wonderful hostess as well.

My friends from Canberra called in for a couple of days and we did a practice Christmas dinner roast on the Barbque. It was a great evening.

We are counting down the days until the Scrapbooking Cruise. I actually have my photos ready. Looking forward to the cruise. Tony is going to be busy while we are away as we have a lot of bookings for the Bed and Breakfast. I sure he will cope with the help of the 'kids'.

Hope every one has a wonderful Christmas and may 2011 have many hours of Scrapbooking and Quilting.

Dorothy

June Scrapbooking Retreat

Eight ladies from Wagga Wagga, Gundagai and Tumut had a great weekend of scrapping at the June Scrapbooking retreat at Russellee.

The Scrapbooking Retreat focused on handmade flowers. The workshops incoporated different techniques of making flowers. It was great to see these flowers being added to layouts made over the weekend.

There were two challenges. One was a kit of four papers and the other was using a MLSB sketch and your own papers. Both produced excellent results.