Fiji and Daku Resort

What a week, I started to melt down a bit realising how busy I would be when I returned home- packing, throwing things out, organizing 1,000 or possibly 1,000,000 details!

Friends came to the fore and spent a day with me, helping me get a few things done, chatting and laughing was a great stress reliever as well!
This is Jane Richens, a talent extraudinaire- here she is showing me how to use a print Gocco- amazing device- you can do small scale screen prints with no mess. In general I stay right away from things like that as I
I get ink all over the place!

Jane is working on an idea with me for a Creative Journalling Tour in India, she has lots of exercises already planned to weave into the travel itinerary- I can't wait to try it all out myself! My duty as the head of the company to try out the workshops, try out restaurants, hotels and etc first...can you hear the violins play as I roll out that sob story?
I KNOW I am lucky.

Part of the flap for me was getting out the door to Fiji- a Workshop in Paradise at Daku Resort http://www.dakuresort.com/.
This is my second visit and I was so looking forward to it. The place is lovely, we have a week to be creative and play, but best of all the staff and the ambience that they create make the place feel like home from the moment you arrive!

I was so looking forward to seeing how everyone is going.
I am happy to report everyone is well, Irlene the wonderful cook is having a baby next month, Merioni and Kenny's brood are growing up fast, Raj is as helpful as ever and all the rest of the crew are still smiling.
The flight across was spectacular 3 distinct layers of scattered clouds and the sun playing hide ansd seek above, through and under it all giving spectacular reflections off the water....

Flying along the top of the big island with her lush plantations...

The lovely Merioni, showing us about Masi cloth [ you might have heard the name Tapa which is used in some of the other islands of the South Pacific]
We are planning to use some of the masi cloth as an element in some of our stitch projects this week.
It is kind of like velum but more condusibe to stitch, a richj creamy white colour with a slight texture...I love it as a cloth