…. after my 18 day adventure in Australia! I arrived home last Wednesday evening after a 38 hour door to door journey. Needless to say I was very tired and the jet lag has been ghastly but I also felt overwhelmed. Overwhelmed that I had been invited to teach a couple of workshops on the other side of the world and overwhelmed by the visual overload from all the places I visited. It’s going to take me a while to come back down to earth!

I shared lots of photos via Instagram and Facebook whilst I was travelling and will write a series of posts over the next couple of weeks sharing lots of them with you. But this first post is a thank you post.

Thank you to the receptionist at my hotel in Melbourne who took one look at me when I arrived late in the evening, gave me my room card and let me check in properly the next day - small kindnesses mean a lot when you can barely stand up straight let alone fill in a form!

Thank you to Glenys Mann and her team for inviting me to teach a five day workshop in the Fibre Arts event in Ballarat. Thank you to my amazingly talented Ballarat students; Julia, Fiona, Gina, Myra, Ange, Leslie, Lisa, Rae, Mardi, Lynne, Lyn and Jeanette. The gin was fabulous darlings! An especially big thank you to Fiona who supplied all the equipment I needed to teach the class, helped me set up before the workshop and helped me clear up afterwards - couldn’t have done it without her!

Thank you to the other tutors and students in Ballarat - I meet so many lovely people from Australia, New Zealand and beyond. Our textile community is a special one.

Thank you to Roz for meeting me at Hobart airport and to Ann and Michael for letting me use their beautiful apartment. It was a great base for my stay in Tasmania although the hill it was on was a killer!

Thank you to Chris and Roz of Stitching and Beyond for inviting me to teach a three day workshop in Hobart and for doing such a good job supplying everything we needed for the workshop. All those sauce bottles! Thank you to another set of talented, enthusiastic students; Chris, Leanne, Karen, Lesley, Margaret, Sue, Robyn, Roz, Jen, Lisa and Sally. You all did an amazing amount of work for a three day class. An especially big thank you to Robyn and Sally for buying the colour references and my printed fabrics and for Jen for passing the money onto local charity Loaves & Fishes.

Thank you to Stephanie at Can Do Books for agreeing to stock my Simply Screen Printing book in Australia which will save buyers lots of money on shipping. You can email her via the website if you want to be put on the waiting list.

And finally, thank you to my family for ‘coping’ while I was away …… it was very nice to come home to clean house.

Leah x