Ahhh, Peaks. We walk through the door to our new venue of Patchwork in the Peaks and sigh deeply. It’s easy to leave all your worries on the doorstep as you push that heavy wooden door closed.  Straight inside to the large workroom with panoramic views of the peaks just across the valley. Sit down and Lovely Tea Lady Dani offers you a cuppa. Ahhh yes. Welcome to Peaks.

Our new venue is  spectacular. A large open grand salon with a fireplace gave us plenty of room to set up the individual tables. This was good as our first exercise was to assemble the personal workstations. The joys of Ikea flatpack. 🙂

After some assembly, it was time to get our stations organised. Who’s going to sit where? Where is the kettle? Where is the wine? What time should dinner be ready? All the important questions. An hour later and there were squeals of joy with each new arrival, barely in the door before wrapped in hugs. More cuppas, staking out a table, a short toast to the start of a Peaks 2, and the machines started purring. Another hour and Lovely Dani came to say “Dinner is served”. More squeals as we jumped up to go into the dining room next door for the first of many delicious meals that weekend.

Taking our glasses of wine back into the main room, we gathered round the sofas to do a bit of show and tell. So many wonderful PhD’s (Projects half Done) in the works! After catching up, it was time to get back to the machines or to strip cutting. Worn out by the excitement of the first day, the lights were out by midnight.

Friday dawned and we all leisurely made our way downstairs to the nice continental breakfast laid out for our convenience. A cuppa with some yoghurt & muesli & I felt awake.  Some were stitching in their pj’s, which is highly acceptable (encouraged even!) at Peaks. By 9h30, we were ready to begin with the Fast Friday Project, using the classic Double Hourglass block. Not a difficult block but what a time-saving technique! Loved seeing how each one would turn out in the different colourways.

 

Peaks 2 Quilt Retreat - Double hourglass quilt

Double hourglass quilt

 


We were SO well looked after at Chalet Ste Marie! The double rooms really are this quaint. 
And this is the dynamic duo who looked after us. Lovely Tea Lady Dani & Chef Joe worked together seamlessly to create an atmosphere of total content. Dani saw to it that the rooms & baths were tidied every day, table laid, cleared, and laid again, and probably a host of other things that went on in the background that we never knew.  Chef Joe worked out from the first evening just the right portions of fantastic food. The creations that came from the kitchen were very well prepared and artfully arranged so each meal was a culinary delight. He adjusted to special dietary requirements with no problems and we all left the table happily satisfied without feeling overstuffed.

On the Friday night we all worked on the Scrap Attack Mystery Project. These projects are chosen with The Stash (my scrap stash) as the source for the fabric choices. As everyone loves to dig through The Stash, this time we decided to mix things up a bit and everyone brought a bit of THEIR

 

Peaks 2 Quilt Retreat

scraps too. The project this time was a mug rug. For the uninitiated, mug rugs are basically little placemats for your cuppa & a little snack. Quilt Fairy Gina took the lead and showed everyone how to do mug rugs Ticker Tape style, inspired by Amanda Jean Nyberg’s Ticker Tape quilt.  The additional contributions were made to The Stash and the digging began. This is The Stash before we tidied up. 

 

 

Here is one of our guests with her new mug rug. The main objective of the Mystery Project is to have a new technique (for most peope) in a small, manageable, project.

 

 


Peaks 2 Quilt Retreat

 

There’s never a problem figuring out who’s cup belongs to whom but you can also see what else is important. 🙂

 

 

 

 

This was our view from the hot tub. Add to that nail and massage services and it’s a wonder any of us came home.

 

 

We give thanks once again especially to the Fat Quarter Shop for having such gorgeous things to choose from and giving the ladies a discount with their orders.  Mountain Moments can expect us at Chalet Ste Marie in April for Peaks 3. The focus activity is going to be cold water dyeing! What fun we’ll have using our very own dyed fabric in a project especially suited for using these types of fabrics. I can hardly wait.

Click here to see the highlights from all Peaks, or  here for retreat overview, and come join us in the Peaks! 😀

 

Peaks 2 panorama
Peaks IV ~ 3 – 6 October 2013               Click photo to go to overview

 

 

 

 

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