Success and Celebration

Hello everyone, it's time for another ramble, sorry blogpost...

Here we are in April: a month of sunshine and showers; a month of new beginnings, and a time for change and making new plans.

Today though, I want to concentrate on and celebrate the successes of the past few weeks...

March/April 2024 will be imprinted in my mind and have a place in my heart forever!

The Quilt Festival at Duxford, the Sew Along at Red Lodge and the Textile Fair at King's Lynn have all been wonderful, for similar and different reasons. This is not about me I know, but I have enjoyed opportunities and experiences that I've never had before.

Let's show you a few photos of the events

The Duxford Quilt Festival was both fantastic and frantic! There were so many people, so much to see and all in the best of venues. We met lovely friends, chatted with traders, made time to browse the stands and eventually ate lunch late in the afternoon. To say the event was a success is rather an understatement. We sold out of lots of items and spent the evenings packing more to restock.

The highlight of the weekend though was meeting up with old friends. Some of them we'd never met in real life before, some we'd only spoken to via email or message, but all friends nonetheless. So, who were they? Well they were you: Lizzy's followers; members; customers, and supporters. We hugged, laughed and chatted with upwards of 30 of our members who sought us out at the stand. This was what put the capital S in Success for both Lizzy and me.

Were we shattered after the weekend? Of course we were. Were we on a high? Oh yes! Would we do it all again - well we did!

The Sew-Along-A-Quilt day was the best day ever. I suppose there were about 20 of us, some on the floor, some sat at sewing machines, some under lots of wadding (Sue), some making drinks (thanks Angela), some ironing, some supervising. ALL focussed on working as a team to help raise money for the East Anglian Childrens' Hospices. It's been a very long time since I witnessed such camaraderie, spirit of fun and flat out hard graft. Some of the ladies of the Red Lodge Quilters group helped with the stitching and one lady at least, took some sewing home with her. Lots of our little group took some home too so that they could finish what they'd started.

Let's not forget though that without members from around the world (yes, Canada, America, France, Mexico to name but a few) sending their patchwork blocks to Lizzy, there would have been no quilts, no need for us to get stitching, no need for such a fabulous event.

The icing on the cake of this fund raising activity though, must be the over £2000 that has been raised for the children and families who have been, are currently and who will be cared for through the wonderful work of EACH. And the donations are still coming in!!

So after all that, Lizzy and I still had some energy left. Lizzy stocked up on more 50 Mini Makes books, spent loads of time cutting and making up kits, stitched butterflies and baubles into the night and prepared 2 workshops ready for The West Norfolk Textile Fair.

The stand at King"s Lynn, I think you'll agree (photos above), looked awesome.

Again, we met lovely friends, we made new friends, we laughed and even tried to steal fabric from the stand next to us (well that was me, sorry)!

The other traders were brilliant, everyone took care of everyone else. Lizzy's workshops went down a storm. I spoke with some of those who had joined in and they loved it. Books were sold, kits were snapped up, USBs with Nicola's wonderful samples, were like "hot cakes". All in all, another success to celebrate and a time to look back on with joy.

If there's one thing I would like to impart to you in this post, it is that teamwork is key. Celebrating success is to celebrate people and the Team. One of us can achieve loads if we put our minds and energy to it. However, when we all pull together, we are unstoppable and the successes are enormous. We may still face challenges, we may have to adopt change, we may still have to get down on the floor like the ladies in the photo and graft, but the celebration of our success is so worth all the work we collectively put in.

Have you had successes to celebrate recently? Have you been part of the success we've been celebrating here today? Are you working towards something that will give you cause for celebration? Add a comment to this blogpost. Let's all celebrate together, we deserve it.

Until the next post, take care, celebrate well and happy crafting.

Kath x