Hi Everyone,
I am home from my trip to Morcambe, England, where I participated in a crochet event that had a two fold purpose. It was the "baby" of Pauline Turner, who does a distance learning course in crochet, and it was also the 25th anniversary of the Crochet Summer School in Morcambe. Pauline would like to bring crochet back to Morcambe, so she arranged this event, to coincide with the 25th anniversary celebration.
I arrived at my destination at 7 am Monday, on a cold, misty morning, the first to arrive. I was greeted at the airport by a driver who took me to my hotel in Morcambe, where I was met by Pauline . When I checked into my room, and looked out the window, the view was breathtaking. I was looking at this very large expanse of beach, the tide was out, and it was so stark and beautiful. I rested for awhile, then I walked down to the lobby, just as Susan and her Mom, Barbara were checking in (Susan is the list moderator for the International Free Form Crochet List). Prudence www.knotjustknitting.com arrived shortly thereafter, then we were 4. Mel, another list member, from Ct, arrived shortly thereafter.
The workshop was not to begin until Wednesday morning, so on Tuesday, the 5 of us took a day tour of the Lake District, and had a spectacular (but cold) day.
On the first day of the workshop, we walked into a room all set up with tables and lots of "stuff", we were told where to sit, then instructed to read our assignments for the day. My partner and I looked at our assignment - "oh my" - said I, we were to go out to the beach and collect three items. Then we were to crochet a piece inspired by what we had collected, and use all 3 items in the piece. I did not venture out too far on the beach, so I did not collect very exotic pieces, but I managed to find a few interesting rocks.
My rocks inspired me to start a piece that reminded me of the sea, so I chose a turquoise yarn, crocheted some swirls and twirls, catching my rocks into my work. In the afternoon we progress to a new table, and a new partner. This was very interesting, because we really got to meet and talk with each workshop attendee. For this assignment, we had to pick a name out of a bag, depict the word in our work, and work with very fine cotton yarns. My word was "Dolphin", so it seemed as if I was going to continue with my sea theme. I decided to work with that idea in mind. I had the beginnings of a project by the end of the first day. Pauline had lots of surprises for us each day, as we progressed around the room, working on our assignments. One thing that we worked toward was making different shapes that were going to come together to make one big piece. Very interesting and lots of fun. The first pictures above are the view out my hotel window, the second group of pics show all the things that students made during the workshop, the last few photos are from the event that took place on Sat and Sunday. There were some great pieces on display. The last two photos are works of Jeanne Taylor from New Zealand, whose work is so amazing. You can see some of Jeanne's work at www.crochet.nu/scrumblersgallery/gallery/jtaylor/index.html There will be many more photos coming soon.
Have a great day.
Margaret