All About Quilting!!!

Friday was the Pretoria Piecemakers get together. We met at Sakuras home. She is a delightfully, warm and sweet person. She always arrives at all the meetings with food in hand, and so far I have enjoyed every bite!!! I would love to get to know her better. But alas she will be leaving in September too. For our lunch she make a seafood Risotto and a huge tossed green salad.

front-Sakura, Mishi (Agnes' son) & Lea
back-Agnes, Marian, Jan & Dee

Agnes will also be leaving too, (Sunday). We met at her home for my first meeting. She served some awesome foods too. I am sure we will miss some of the treats when she leaves as well. Agnes has a wonderful sense of color and texture and made a wonderful necklace from beads at the last bee.

We have been asked by Jan, (she will be returning to the States soon too), to bring 5” squares of fabric to trade. Of course I don’t have any suitable fabrics with me… so I will need to purchase some. I think the swapping of 5” charm squares will become a tradition among the Piecemakers.

Earlier this week -(Tuesday), a neighbor lady stopped by to say hello and welcome an American Quilter to South Africa. She brought with her a piece of Shwe Shwe, (sha way sha way), a piece of South African fabric, with a note attached with her phone number and an invitation to drop in sometime for a chat. Talk about a small world… she lives on the same street (see below about the street), as I do. Her name is Susara, and used to live in the house that used to be on this lot, while waiting for their new house to be completed. She belongs to the Pretoria Guild called the Jacaranda Quilters. She got my name and address from another lady that also belongs to the Jacaranda Quilters that I have been corresponding with via email since I first landed here. Her name is Corrianne and I will be meeting with her soon too. Susara hosts a small bee that meets on Wednesday evening and I have been invited to drop in next week!!! I I sure do wish I had something work on. I suspect I will be done with the Snap Sack project soon.

The street we live on used to be a circle… enter on one end and loop around and exit on to the same street you entered from a little further on. Well at some point the Homeowners on the loop, decided to make it a gated community, so only one end of the loop is open to traffic. The whole loop is about ¼ mile in length. You must enter through a boom gate with a guard, and visitors must fill out an entry into a log book. So, we feel very secure in our neighborhood, between the community gate with a guard and our own gate and sentry!!! Speaking of guards, while Jan and I were out and about the other day, they came and posted the ‘Guarded by’ signs in the compound.

I have found an interesting design inspiration… on my outdoor table. Can’t you just envision this design quilted?

As Always, there will be more later!!!

Beth