MARCH MEETINNG CANCELLED!

 It is with heavy hearts that we have decided to cancel tomorrows meeting.  Yesterday, when the rain turned the snow to slush, we were hoping the bad weather had moved on, but no.  This morning is a fresh snowfall, and freezing temperatures are forecast for tonight.  A call from the speaker expressing concerns settled the matter, and so the decision was made.  Sod’s Law suggests that tomorrow the weather will be clear and delightful, but it’s not worth the risk.  Have a warm sewing day and we’ll see you in May. 

The wonderful Jennie Rayment

 Our February meeting was very popular and we had over 90 people attend it!  Luckily the hall can hold 130 people if seated round tables, so there was enough room for all.  

The morning was spent chatting, sewing, browsing the sales table and admiring the gorgeous cushions which had been brought along for our competition. 

Here is the winner, made by Gaynor. Beautiful.

Around midday, a representative from Zoe's Place, a hospice for life limited children, came to accept a cheque for £300, which was raised by last year's raffles.  

This year's charity is Rugby Rosa, a charity working with girls and women who have experienced sexual violence.  

Then we were delighted to welcome the entertaining and inspiring Jennie Rayment.  She was dressed in a smart patchwork outfit and was happy to wear our microphone and battery pack, which she clipped to the waistband of her skirt.

Look at the height of her heels! Gradually, a lacey frill appeared below her skirt.

Something was happening.

Oh dear!  Instead of clipping the battery pack to her skirt, Jenny had clipped it to her bloomers, which couldn't take the weight of the batteries, and started to descend!  

Jenny took it all in her stride, and eventually took off her outfit to reveal the bloomers, and then a cute camisole and french knicker combo! 

Jenny is such a class act, and her quilts, many tucked, pleated, folded and rolled are amazing.  We have booked her for a workshop for next year.  Don't miss it!

Mark Francis

 We were slightly concerned that people wouldn’t come to our September meeting, as it was only a couple of days after Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth ll had died.  In the event the attendance was very good and at lunchtime we had a minute’s silence in respect. This month’s competition was patchwork or quilted wearables, and we had an interesting set of entries. 

There was everything from coats, waistcoats, dresses, skirts, hats and knickers!  The winner was the gorgeous hexagon coat which was made by Paula.  The next competition will be a children’s quilt, so get sewing! 

Our speaker was Mark Francis, from ‘Sewing Bee’ fame.  He was a very amusing speaker, who brought some of his favourite ‘Sewing Bee’ garments, plus a behind the scenes view and extra gossip about Esmeralda and Patrick! 

Mark reassured us that he has had the same experience as lots of us in buying fabric from the internet and finding it not quite what you had thought.  This fabric looked a completely different colour and quality, although it looks fine to me. 

This garment was a challenge to make a garment from a tablecloth.  I think it’s pretty successful. 

Here is a very attractive track suit top.  

And here is a made to measure challenge to make a tea dress.  Great fabric. 

The bad news is that Kathleen Laurel Sage has had to cancel her talk for the next meeting.  She (and we) hope she can rebook in the future.  We will look to find another speaker.  See you in November. 

Update

 I can’t believe I have been so lax as to fail to post our Rocheberie activities for so long!  (Tough year for me, but that’s no excuse!)  We’ll, here is a round up of the last three meetings! 

In March we had a jeans bag competition, which went down very well.  As you can see, we had plenty of entries, and we decided the winner by giving everyone a slip to vote for their favourite.  Hard decision. 

Our speaker at the March meeting was Michelle Moody, who did us proud. The most popular speakers are the ones who bring plenty of quilts, and Michelle did not disappoint! 

Our May meeting was a Dresden Place competition.  Several people told me that they had never made a DP before, so it certainly inspired some people to develop their skills. 

As ever, there was a lovely selection of different ideas.  Our speaker was Carolyn Gibbs, who brought plenty of quilts with her, including several of her antique quilts. 

Heather and I were kept very busy as quilt-holder-uppers, and I forgot to take a photo, but here she is at Lutterworth Piecemakers with one of her antique quilts.  This one dates from about 1820.  

Our July meeting had a scrappy quilt competition. Lots of entries for this!  

It was very close, but the winner was the one with the beach huts on it, in the photo above.  The maker kindly donated it to Linus, which is so generous! Our speaker was Ami James, who told us how quilting had provided solace for her during some tricky times in her life.  We can certainly all relate to that! 

Here is Ami with her partner and their pop up shop. 

The next meeting will be a talk by Mark Francis, of Sewing Bee fame, and the competition is for patchwork or quilted wearables.  And before you ask, a bag is not a ‘wearable’! See you on Saturday. 

21st Birthday celebrations!

 Rocheberie Schoolhouse Quilters was started early in 2001 by a group of quilters, including Laura, Gaynor, Muriel and Cherry.  They met at Crescent School because Cherry worked there and it proved to be a popular venue, with a spacious room, good car parking and kitchen facilities.  Initially meetings were four times a year, but due to popular demand, there are now six meetings each year of this friendly and sociable group.  Due to the Covid pandemic and other considerations, the group has relocated to Dunchurch Village Hall, where we have been made very welcome.  

Our 21st celebration was well attended, and people thoroughly enjoyed the relaxed timetable. 

We had two workshops, the first a little felt needle case. 

Here are a few completed ones. 

This was followed by a little zipped purse, which was very cute. 

We also had two quizzes, a story to include lots of quilt blocks, which provided a lot of fun.  One table wanted to include ‘sex, drugs and rock and roll’ but were a bit hampered by the lack of quilt block names on those subjects! They did manage to include a murder though.  Poor Overall Sam was bludgeoned to death with a monkey wrench! 

Lynda brought her temperature quilts to show and tell.  The one on the left is for 2021 and on the right 1950.  It was an investigation into climate change, and certainly showed how2021 was overall warmer the 1950. 

Here is a gorgeous Harry Potter themed quilt (I love how Heather is having to stand on tiptoes. ) 

Here is a great Linus quilt featuring Kevin the carrot! Great fun. 

This beauty unfortunately hasn’t photographed well.  It is a quilt made from Sandy Lush candlewicking designs and is exquisite with.  It was made quilt as you go, which makes the back of the quilt very colourful. 

Our next meeting, on March 12th will be of the usual format, with Michelle Moody as our afternoon speaker.  Continuing to celebrate our anniversary, we will be holding a competition to make a jeans bag.  This can be a tote, a handbag, cross body or messenger as you wish.  Join in the fun and win a prize! 

Happy New Year and Happy Birthday!

 We are all geared up for our next meeting on 5th February, when we will be celebrating our 21st birthday!  We will have two workshops with free kits, two quizzes with prizes, bunting, chocolate and all the usual attractions!  You will need to bring a hand sewing kit with needles, pins, scissors and threads including some black, if you have it. Bring your sense of humour too, as it will be a blast!  

In other news, we are even more delighted with our new venue, as they have someone who is happy to put out the tables and chairs, and put them away again!  A small fee is involved, but that is nothing compared to the relief we feel at not having to wrestle with furniture before and after each meeting!  

First meeting in our new venue

 We were sad to have to leave our old venue of Crescent School, but we are delighted to have found another venue in Dunchurch Village Hall.  It’s quite easy to find on the main Rugby Road through Dunchurch and has great parking.  Phil was very friendly and helpful to us, and made us very welcome.   The main room was perfect and the whole place was clean, modern and well set up.  

We had a great turnout of about 70 people, but although it looks busy in this photo, we only had six chairs per table, and provided plenty of ventilation.  

Here is a different view of the hall, showing how spacious it was. 

Our speaker was Karen from Quilter’s Den in Warwick, and she proved to be an interesting and enjoyable speaker, with lots of lovely quilts to show.  

Here she is with her ‘pop up shop’ which was perfect for those of us who had been recently starved of retail therapy.  She had a good selection of fabrics and I managed to go home with a few beautiful designs. 

Unfortunately, Caroline was indisposed, but luckily Julie was able to step in and run the raffle.  The raffle, cake and magasines money all goes to our nominated charity, so. Is quite important! 

The next meeting will be on the 5th February, which will be out 21st birthday party.  We will have three different workshops and some fun games, as well as cake!  You will need to bring a sewing kit and a small wadding off cut, something like 6” x 8”.  I’m sure most people have that.  See you in 2022. 

So good to be back!

 It was so good to be back with our Rocheberie friends on Saturday!  We had been concerned about the parking, but in the event there was loads of room, both in the car park and on the road.  The venue was an ideal size for our first meeting (39 people came) and the kitchen and toilets were lovely! 

We limited the chairs to just six per table, and some people wore masks but because of the large room, and having the doors open, everyone felt safe.  

There was room for the Linus rummage box plus two other sales tables, and everyone enjoyed the familiar friendly atmosphere which always pertains at a Rocheberie meeting. 

We just had one demo, hexagon hedgehogs, which proved to be quite popular.  The show and tell was of the usual excellent standard, and so was the cake!  

The next meeting will be at Dunchurch Village Hall, on November 13th, and our speaker will be Karen McIlwraith from Quilters’Den in Warwick.  She will bring her pop up shop, so lots of chance for retail therapy!  

Meetings 2022

February 5th 21st birthday party

March 12th Michelle Moody

May 14th Carolyn Gibbs

July 9th Ami James

September 10th Mark Francis

November 12th Kathleen Laurel Sage 

We’re Back!

 It’s hard to believe that our last Rocheberie meeting was in January 2020, which is nineteen months ago!  Nobody thought the coronavirus pandemic would last so long.  Of, course, it’s not over yet, but we are starting to get back to normal activities.  Most people were aware that Crescent School were having difficulties accommodating us.  We understand that their priorities are education, rather than hiring out to quilting groups, but as we have been there for over 20 years, we were hoping to work something out.  We started to look for another venue which could accommodate between 70 and 90 people, had a kitchen and car parking and was in Rugby.  This proved more difficult than you might think, as lots of venues have weddings and birthday parties, sports clubs, dancing lessons or other regular activities on Saturdays, have in house catering, and the ones in the town have no decent car parking facilities.  However, the committee have decided to move our meetings to Dunchurch Village Hall, which should suit us well.  The only downside is that they are already booked for our September 18th meeting, so we will hold a one off social meeting at St Peter and St Johns Church on Clifton Road in Rugby.  We will open at 9.45 as usual and have demos, raffle, cake, sales tables and show and tell etc as usual, but there will be no speaker.  Here is a photo of the church, and we hope to see you there! 

January 2020

We were lucky with the weather this year - no snow and no ice - and so lots of people were able to come to our January meeting.  We were lucky enough to have the clever Sheena Roberts as our speaker. 

 

Her subject was one close to my heart.  Just because someone is a very talented person (quilter) doesn't necessarily mean they are a good teacher.  As a teacher myself, I have been appalled at the behaviour and reported behaviour of some well-known quilters at workshops, and am amazed that people pay good money to waste their time, and then never say anything to the person involved.  Sheena was very modest, and felt that while her work was not exceptional, the work she encouraged her students to do, lead them to greater creativity and achievement.  It was a very interesting talk. 

 This year we are thinking of ways to be green, so Caroline showed how to use confetti scraps to make new fabric using soluble Vilene.

Chris had brought sewing related items which had been donated to charity - a prime example of reuse. 

 Gaynor was manning the raffle, the prizes of which had been wrapped in newspaper. Our charity this year has yet to be decided.  Well vote for it at the next meeting.

Quite a few people entered our ugly fabric swap.  The idea was that other people's fabric is always nicer than yours, so by donating something you think is ugly, may well turn out to be useable to someone else.

 Here is the hall, busy as usual.

 There were members' sales tables too, so there was chance to bag a bargain from someone's cast offs.
Next meeting we will have a green 5" square swap.  Cut a green fat quarter into 12 x 5" squares and put in a named bag.  At the end of the meeting, your bag will be returned to you with 12 different green squares.  If you want to bring more bags, you'll get more squares!  there will also be examples of ways you can use your squares too!  See you in March.