The story so far.....

I started my City and Guilds Level 3 in Patchwork and Quilting in September and have just completed my first module - Line.
I am studying at Craven College in Skipton North Yorkshire which is a 100 mile round trip for me - but this was actually the nearest course for me.
We meet one weekend a month, Saturday and Sunday and so far we have met twice and covered 8 topics.
There are 7 of us on the course but as with many other similar courses we are studying alongside an embroidery group and there are 2nd year students and the level 4 students all studying at the same time - a mammoth teaching task for our tutor and her assistant. There are actually 8 courses running at the same time - 4 patchwork and 4 embroidery.

I have been doing embroidery for many years but am relatively new to patchwork and quilting, having made my first quilt in 2003. Quilting has become an obsession and for the last few years it has been my goal to complete the City and Guilds.

The following photos are of the samples I have already completed and I hope to post them as I go along in future. I have also completed my first resolved piece but I am not going to share that until I have checked that I am on the right lines as I have never done any artwork before this course. But more on that later....

This is my first City and Guilds sample which is English pieced over papers, appliqued onto a background and hand quilted. It is based on a paperweaving of a magazine photo of a garden.

The next topic was strip piecing and for this we used a sample of transfer printed fabric which had had a leaf placed under it before ironing to give the effect.

This is my more traditional strip pieced 12.5 inch block using the colour palette of my original photo.

Our next topic was trapunto which we did using our own original silk painting. Mine is based on a photo of an orchid. The drawing for the design was the most scary part of this but I was very pleased to accomplish it.

I also used trapunto on this transfer printed sample which has voided ivy leaves. The leaves are outline backstitched in gold thread and after stuffing they were embellished with sequins and beads. I really enjoyed doing this one!

This sample is another silk painting done from my own drawing of runner beans climbing up a pyramid of canes. It is hand quilted using a thick gold thread. That's the first 4 topics but as it is getting late I will post the second 4 samples tomorrow.
So glad to have got the blog started!