Retreat 2019

We had a wonderful time at retreat this year.  There were twenty-four of us there, which made a very nice group.  A friend of mine, Lori, had given me a printed fabric panel which says, "What happens at  quilt retreat stays at retreat."  I added some borders to it, and it stood on a little easel on our welcome table.  It helped (as if we needed any help!) to remind us that retreat is all about having fun.

This year's Quilt of Valor block was a simple foundation pieced scrappy block sewn on a sheet of phone book paper!  They will go together to make a very nice quilt.  Eight inches was the biggest square that I could get out of the phone book, so that's our size.  I'll need to add a border or two.  Here are some of them sewn together.  The little blue dots are actually tape telling me the row and column number so I could keep them all straight.

And I made progress on the 2018 Quilt of Valor that we made at last year's retreat.  I got a backing pieced for it, and with the help of a couple friends, it is now sandwiched and all I have to do is quilt it.

Retreat is always a very cozy time for me.  The weather outside may be challenging, and this year it was colder than usual.  I don't think any of us used the hot tubs this year, as it was just too cold to think about getting out of the hot tub!  But inside it was warm and cozy, as usual.  The hum of machines and the smell of hot fabric being ironed really appeals to me!

In light of my recent broken bones (last December), Kalynn encouraged everyone to wrap me up in pieces of batting to protect me from further mishap.  I looked like a mummy!

Making Quilt Squares out of More Scraps

This is not a new project, but a continuation of one started about two years ago.  If I were to finish everything I have started, the world would probably be covered by quilts!  I just love starting new projects.

This is from a class taught to our guild by Claire Witherspoon.  The class was called "Scrap Strategies."  It was a fun day of learning different ways to use our scraps.  We all shared our scraps, piling them onto one big table, then helping ourselves.  

In this square I sew several pieces of either red or blue fabric scraps together (because it's going to be a Quilt of Valor), then use a template to cut out the center shape.

Yes, this one has both red and blue fabrics in it!  I know!  I'll explain later.

This is the paper template (very high-tech, right!!) used to cut out the red or blue "pieced pieces."  It has rolled-up painters tape on it to help keep it from wiggling when cutting out the pieces.  Obviously, a ruler gets placed on top of the paper template when making the cut.

And these are the templates which are used to cut out the white pieces.  (Actually, only one is needed.)

Here are some of the scraps I used for these squares.  These particular pieces are leftovers from another quilting project (not sure which one), a pattern where I was trimming off corners.

And you can see at the bottom of the photo a red/light blue triangle.  That's where the red and blue pieces came from!  These pieces are about 4" to 7" at the longest.  I don't usually have pieced triangles left over, but I just happened to have some that day.

The photo below shows how I pieced together lots of these little leftover triangles.

The next photo shows some very, very tiny pieces which are the result of piecing together lots of small  pieces and trimming.  Looks like I did some very intricate piecing, doesn't it!!

  You can see that for two of these finished blocks, I had some quite large scraps to start with.  As far as scraps go, I rarely keep anything really tiny.  If I can't fold it up into a smaller square, I usually throw it away, I mean, put it in a bag for making pet beds.

This is how the blocks will get arranged, so that white-ish squares are formed at the intersections of the blocks.

Quilt Retreat 2017

 Our annual quilt retreat started on Monday.  This year we are 21 women who all love fabric and quilting and eating.  Here's a photo of a portion of our workroom.

We have seasonally appropriate centerpieces on our eating tables.

Also, appropriate cocktail napkins.

Part of our snack table, before happy hour begins!

I placed this sign on our outside door.

The coffee bar.

Now for a little bit of our work.  (You'll see more in a later post.)

What do you see in this quilt?  Dark cats?  White cats?  No cats?

Here's a close-up to help you see.  I think this quilt is amazing.

This year we are again making squares for a Quilt of Valor.  (See post from last year's retreat.)  Each person used two 10" squares of contrasting fabric to make two half-square triangles.  I love that there are so many ways to arrange HSTs.  

I used light green flannel for my design wall, so please disregard that odd color!

Another arrangement.

I've been working on quilting last year's Quilt of Valor.  (I know--how can it have possibly taken me a whole year to get it put together??!!??  I have no good answer.)  I'll show more later, but I'm doing some straight line quilting, using a decorative stitch, and those curves inside the square parts.

Quilt of Valor

Last summer/fall I sewed this quilt top for a Quilt of Valor.  It was inspired by a picture I saw in a quilt magazine.  Someone's new fabric line, I think.  I started with 10" squares, laid one on top of another and free-hand rotary cut a gentle curve through the middle.

Then I switched around the two halves and sewed them back together.  It was a fun method for making blocks.

Here it is with two borders.

When I was ready to sandwich it, KittyStitches was right there to help me!

Now it's all sandwiched and KittyStitches is very happy with her work!

PPQG Retreat 2016

Our annual guild retreat was held during the second week of February.  We had a truly wonderful time.  There were 25 of us.  A good number. 

I wish I had taken more photos of our work room (aka sweat shop!).  We stay at the Dry Creek Inn Best Western in Healdsburg.  It is a very nice hotel with great amenities and employees.  This is the 5th or 6th year we have been here and we love it.  Our workroom is a large conference room (above).  Each person has a long table to work on.  They provide irons and ironing boards, and there is always coffee, tea, and water available.

A lot of great work gets done here, like this beautiful quilt above with purples and blues.  Lots of Harmony Art fabrics!

Here's a great triangle quilt top.

We even had live entertainment!  One of our quilters brought her guitar and played/sang wonderful music for us during our nightly happy hour.  Another quilter brought her ukulele and she provided us with lovely music, too.

I like this deceptively simple quilt with square patches, offset by uneven rail fence blocks.

Here's a real stunner.  Three-dimensional flours cascading down this beautiful quilt.

Here is some of what I worked on.  These are patches made with my father's shirts.  I was playing around with placing them on point on my design wall, just to see how it would work.

And I think this is the best idea I have ever had!  I asked every participant to bring two four-patch blocks with them, made with red, white, and/or blue fabric.  Each of the four squares measured 6" square to start with.  After we got to the retreat I gave them directions of make a disappearing four-patch.  Now they will all be put together to make a Quilt of Valor.  The above photo shows just some of the blocks made, but we have 49 altogether.  That will make a quilt top 6 blocks by 8 blocks, plus one on the back for the label. 

Guild Quilt Show 2014 "Quilt The Music"

Our guild's annual challenge show (PPQG) was on exhibit last month.  The challenge this year was to take a piece of music and make a quilt to somehow illustrate it.  I entered three quilts.

This first one is small, about 11" square.  I belong to a small group and we all decided to make small wonky houses and use the "Little Boxes" song as our theme.  We had ten quilts to enter, and the lower right hand piece in the photo above has the words to the song printed on it.

I was assigned the color pink, so thats my little house right in the center.  It was fun to make--totally free form, no pattern.  It's not very visible, but I embroidered a little flower at the lower left, and that's a button green watering can near it. 

We all agreed to price our little quilt-lets at the same price ($25.00).  Several of them sold, including mine.  We'll be rolling in the money now!

The next quilt I entered was a baby quilt.  I blogged about this quilt here.  It is one of my favorite designs:  half-square triangles made from Bear Patch Bits fabric squares.

For the challenge I chose the song "Hush Little Baby Don't You Cry," and titled the quilt 

"Go To Sleep."

And my third quilt was a Quilt of Valor that I recently completed.  Since I had it available, I decided to enter it into the challenge using the song "Stars and Stripes Forever."  I named the quilt "Brave and True."

I'm afraid I don't have a "whole quilt" photo to show you right now, but here are some process photos.  Trust me, it really is finished!  I blogged about it previously here, while I was working on the quilting.  The top was made by the mother of a friend of my SisterStitches.  The mother passed away before she had the chance to finish this quilt.  I ended up with the quilt top and feel honored to finish it for her.

Quilt Retreat 2014

Our guild's annual quilt retreat was held in February.  This is truly one of the high points of the year for me!  We go away for three nights to a hotel.  We set up all our sewing machines and irons in one of the conference rooms.  Then we sew away!  All day and sometimes all night.  We do, however, take breaks for food, happy hour, and hot tubbing.

Here are a couple shots of our little sweat shop, with people busy, busy, busy.  It's really a treat for us to be away for 3+ days with no cooking and no bed making.

One of the projects I worked on this year was quilting a Quilt of Valor.  These are quilts that are given away to wounded veterans to help comfort them in their recovery.  I was actually given this quilt top already pieced, so I can't take credit for its beauty.

I'm happy I was able to get this quilt sandwiched at home before I went to retreat.  I like to use a quilt like this as a way to practice my free motion quilting.  I used a variety of quilting patterns on different areas of the quilt.  I did simple loopy lines down these red stripes (below).

Here I have marked a removable line down the center of a border strip and am quilting a different design.

Unfortunately it doesn't show up real well, but I found a cute design to use in the square star centers. It is called "circuit board" and is made by making random square-cornered meanderings.

* * * * *

After I had all that quilting done, I started on a baby quilt.  This one is made from 5" charm squares that I received from Bear Patch Quilt Company.  I belong to their Bear Patch Bits club, where I receive 20 charm squares every month.

I chose 72 of my blue squares for this quilt.  Then I sewed them into half-square-triangles.  This is a photo of all the half-square triangles placed on my design wall, before I sewed them together into rows.

Then, of course, there is always a tremendous amount of inspiration to be found at our retreats.  Everywhere I looked I saw beautiful quilts in different stages of completion.  And I always want to 

make each one for myself!

My friend Gail's beautiful color combinations coming together.

This is Dee's quilt, pieced from very small bright scraps that she stores up.
 I just love the brightness of it!

I just adore the beautiful colors--and the color combinations--in this
quilt started on a design wall.

These small squares were appliquéd on, rather than pieced in, in order to preserve
the beautiful prints in the background fabrics.

Isn't this amazing!?!  Circles appliquéd to small white squares.