An Grianan weekend

Some more photo's from the An Grianan weekend. Here's Ann holding up one of the fabrics that she dyed:

Tracy and Meg looking very scientific as they prepare to dye fabric

one of Ann's fabric postcards on the theme of the Burren.

After dyeing my fabrics, I spent the rest of the weekend working on my sketchbooks and altered books.

At last I have figured out how to upload photos, so here are a few from last weekend when the Genesis group joined other contemporary quilters at An Grianan for a weekend of total immersion in sewing and dyeing with some wonderful, stimulating company.

Above is Claire, starting to dye fabrics.
above are the dye buckets Meg and I were using along with some space dyed pieces I was working on.
Here is Ann, really delving into some intense space dyeing.
Here is the group of friends at An Grianan, unfortuanely Paula had left by this stage, but clockwise from the left: Claire, Meg, Irene, Ann, Margaret, Ann, Mary, Helen and Rose with Tracy behind the camera.

the weekend was great, the drive home horrendous due to the rain, but well worth it. I felt I'd had a much longer weekend and a very satisfying dyeing session.

Burren research road trip

Burren Field Trip

4 members of the Genesis group took a field trip to the Burren, Co. Clare on Sunday 4th September. The 5th member (Ann) unfortunately couldn't make the trip.

We had a great day back at the Burren - luckily we missed most of the showers, apart from our last stop of the day where we got soaked!

Lots of photographs were taken as research for our next group project which is going to be a group quilt, to enter into next year's Festival of Quilts competition.

We visited holy wells, portal and wedge Tombs, ancient churches and abbeys etc. so covered a lot of topics.

And also passed a very interesting garden near Carron.

Festival of Quilts

At the Festival of Quilts 2011, the Irish Patchwork Society had a stand to celebrate their 30th Anniversary. Quilts were selected from their recent Branching out exhibition. Two Genesis quilts were selected "Spring Growth" by Claire Lynch and "Genesis: First Growth" - the 1st Genesis group quilt.

Paula Rafferty was also one of the designers representing Ireland in this years Fashion Sans Frontier event at FoQ

Genesis Meeting 31st July 2011

Genesis had a group meeting on 31st July 2011.
Swap Bag 2 projects were supposed to be finished on this date, however only Claire and Tracy had finished theirs! Swap Bag 2's contents were organised by Tracy, it consisted of blue and white organza.

Tracy made a book cover using the fabrics:

Claire made 4 postcards (2 fabric and 2 paper based) and a book cover for Meg (not pictured here).

Plans were made for a field trip in September to the "Burren". This is get photographs and inspiration for our next group project.

Ann, Meg and Paula are to have Swap Bag 2 items finished for the 4th September. Paula will have Swap Bag 3 ready for this date.