Rhonda Bracey: At Random

I’ve been so focused on the school reunion the past 6 months that everything else has gone by the wayside, including writing a post on the quilting retreat I went to in August, the first I’d been to since early March 2020, just before the first COVID lockdown started. The venue near Toodyay we’d used for many years had sold in the interim so we had to find a new place—somewhere that had suitable accommodation, all meals, and a room big enough to hold about 20 people and all their sewing machines and gear, and not far from Perth. Our intrepid leader found a wonderful place in the Chittering Valley. We were there in mid-August when everything was lush and green and fresh. I think we’ve found our new home! The food was fantastic too. (However, I won’t be attending any retreats there in the summer months because of the bushfire risk—there’s only one road in and out and it goes through a national park for several kilometres, so the risk for me is too great.) By the way, the area is called Moondyne, named after Moondyne Joe, a notorious Western Australian bushranger who hid out in the area evading capture.

I’d pretty much lost my sewing/quilting mojo for the past 12 months, so this was a chance to see if it would come back, even just a little, and it did. That said, I haven’t touched what I made since I got home, but the reunion stuff has taken up an awful lot of my hours around my paid work. The reunion is next weekend, so my commitment will reduce to almost nothing once all the event photos are sorted out and shared.

Here are some photos of the venue (on about 1000+ acres, and overlooking the Avon River WAY down below; yes there are a LOT of kangaroos!) and the improv quilt top I put together over the 4 days.