Yesterday, I had one of the best sewing classes ever!
I left nice and early for my 1 hour trek up the highway to Millrose Cottage in Ballan.  The traffic travelling out of Melbourne was thankfully fairly light, so it was a very pleasant journey.
Once I'd unpacked, the very friendly owner of Millrose (so embarrassed here- I've got a mental block on her name- ? Sue I think), encouraged us to pick a fat quarter from a selection on the table.  What a welcome.
I chose this lovely pumpkin coloured  William Morris piece.

The class was run by Michelle Yeo , a very lovely and talented local quilt designer and maker.  We had the opportunity to make any of Michelle's designs.  I chose California Star, whilst the other friendly ladies in the class chose  her "Victorian Lace" and "Giant Dahlia" patterns to sew.

Unfortunately, not a very good photo, but you get the idea.
Michelle has her own method of paper piecing with freezer paper that doesn't involve picking the paper out of the block once finished- I'm a convert.  Very quick and easy.

A nice up close pic of the block.
I'm fooling myself by thinking there are only 4 large blocks in this quilt- how hard will that be to finish?  LOL.
Anyway, we worked away quite well, with morning cappucino's all around, until lunch time.  Then the next fantastic part of the day- Mill rose Cottage has a cafe attached.  The smell when we went in was delicious.  Lunch was included in the day!
I had delicious Pumpkin and Leek soup with house made bread.

Back to work and much more sewing ensued.  I really surprised myself with the amount of sewing I actually got done.

This all came home with me, multiple copies of each part to make up the one large block.  I still need to add a large pink triangle on to the pieces with the pumpkin colour.  It may not look like much, but lots of cutting, sewing and ironing for each piece.

All that hard work deserves a reward, in this case one of the best vanilla slices I've ever tasted for afternoon tea.
Sewing is such hard work.

All too soon, the day came to an end.  I never even had a browse around- I was so intent on my sewing.  Glad to say I'll be returning for another day to this wonderful shop.