Well I have read this entire chat and boy has it brought back memories for me. My darling daughter loved to fiddle and play with fabric from an early age. We used to live in an isolated part of the Northern Territory in Australia and one year a patchwork tutor came to our little town to run classes. I told my daughter she was too young to come with me (she was 8 at the time) and when the tutor learned that she wanted to come she made me go home and get her. My DD spent all Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday being taught how to cut fabric and sew it back together to make a cushion. It didn't take long for our house to be overrun with cushions. I even had to buy her her very own sewing machine so we would stop fighting over whose turn it was to sew.
For the next 5 years this tutor arrived and all us patchwork and quilting mad ladies and one very small girl would sew until we were ready to drop. A deep friendship has been formed with this tutor who calls my DD her protege. My DD has made endless quilts, her first when she was 10, quilted jackets, dolls, charity quilts, machine embroidered items.
She is now 27 and says she has been quilting for nearly 20 years, I'm getting old Mum. She has been subjected to the odd raised eyebrow and snicker over the years and her way of handling it was to name drop all the tutors she has met over the years and what workshops and quilt retreats she has attended. Shuts them up everytime.
So Momski I hope you never have to deal with rude and ignorant people again