Quilting progress

My friends are asking "what did you do at the quilt retreat?" Ummmm - not much. I took the blocks for this crazy 9-patch Christmas quilt to the retreat and never got the chance to sew them together. I did purchase the green border fabric at a quilt shop on the way home though. After I got home I sewed all the blocks together (the blocks were partially made by the youth at my church) and put the borders on. The red striped border is from my stash and I love the holly leaf fabric green border.
The backing is this holly leaf and berries flannel. It will make a nice cuddly quilt. The young people are going to raffle off two Christmas quilts to raise money for their mission projects.
The one big thing I worked on at the retreat was the blocks for the Come-On-A-My-House quilt. These are some of the blocks placed on my design wall. I have a lot more to do. Unfortunately some of the cutting directions were not entirely accurate which caused me some delays and problems, but it is all figured out now. The cuts were too big instead of the other way around which made the fix easier than I expected.
The picture is not very clear, but the house on the bottom row with the blue siding has a little girl in the window over the door. She says "Hi".

Sam (Carol) and Gus

Please allow me to introduce you to our hostess for the retreat - Carol. Since there are two Carols in our group, I will refer to her as Sam which is the name her family and non-quilting friends call her. Sam has this beautiful house and the house next door for us to enjoy on our retreat. She borrows tables from the local high school so that each one of us has a long table on which to work. She provides supper the first night (turkey on the grill - yum yum) and we bring lunches for the rest of the week. For supper we try different local restaurants and quite often opt for the fresh Walleye.Sam is an expert quilter and has won awards for her fabulous quilts. She worked on this beautiful border-print quilt that had to be cut with extreme precision.
This is the completed top without the final border as sadly she did not have enough fabric. Thankfully she was able to locate the fabric on the Internet and will be able to complete the quilt.
A close-up of the star blocks that take advantage of the border print. Clever pattern!
Sam's loving companion is Gus. Poor Gus is getting old and didn't have much spunk this year. He was content to guard the quilts and lie beside each one of us in turn.

He decided to place himself right where my chair goes and I didn't have the heart to make him move.
He particularly liked Gail's design board, lying as close as possible so that the blocks started to fall off. As soon as you put something on the floor, he is right there testing the softness and making sure it doesn't float away.
Lindsay and Gus cuddling.
It was a great retreat - our 5th! Now some of you may be wondering what I did at the retreat since I have not yet shown anything. I'm the only one who did not finish one thing. I got lots of components done, but no quilt top finished. However, I will start showing the bits and pieces that were sewn at my machine. Perhaps tomorrow.

Introducting Lindsay - Retreat Attendee

Lindsay is my "sister". Years and years ago when Lindsay was just a young girl, I became close to her large family. Her mother lead the church choir and I played the organ. Every Wednesday night I had dinner at their home before going to choir practice. Conversation around the table was always lively and fun. Lindsay is the one who got me started quilting inspiring me with her abilities. She taught me how to use the rotary cutter and how to make connecting corners, and I was off and running. Lindsay hand quilts and is currently hand quilting a special quilt made by a 91 year old woman in our church. She is a school teacher and is married with two children and a rescued greyhound dog. She and I worked on a quilt project with the youth of our church. We had them help sew together two crazy 9-patch Christmas quilts. Lindsay got one of them put together.

Then she finished up another crazy 9-patch for her sister. Most of her time was spent working on a special wedding quilt - from cutting to making the blocks to assembling - a big job!
Here is the finished quilt top - ready for some fancy quilting in the big center blocks.
With only a few hours left, Lindsay quickly put this sweet little quilt together and will finish it with a beautiful scalloped border.
Every Christmas we take turns giving each other a quilting challenge. This year the challenge was to work with the youth at church and the two resulting Christmas quilts will be used by the youth as fund raisers. In addition, we are also making banners for each other.

Lindsay is a true blessing in my life.

Carol

Carol, today's featured retreat attendee, is our piecing queen. Piece by piece, quilt after quilt, she gets an inordinate amount of work done and each quilt is a delight to see - just like her winning smile.This is her "Chocolate Covered Cherries" quilt.
Next she worked on the wonderful border of this little quilt.
Every once in a while she would take a break to make a block from some BOM's she is doing. In no time at all she produced this table runner.
Lastly, she had a big container of hundreds of strips for a log cabin quilt. Quietly and steadily she sewed and ironed.
Carol usually hosts our Christmas and Spring potluck dinners. Her home is large and comfortable with a huge screened-in porch for the Spring dinner and a large dining table for our Christmas dinner. There are quilts everywhere in her home - red and green for Christmas and wonderful pastel flower quilts for Spring.

Carol is a retired school librarian. Her children lead very interesting lives and we love to hear the stories she brings to our group.

Tomorrow you will meet Lindsay............

Meet Aline

The second retreat attendee to be featured is Aline. She is a retired graphic artist. Her quilts are precise and well thought out. She finished this Bullseye quilt top in no time and everyone agreed that her borders add greatly to this exchange-block quilt. (Please notice Gus, the dog, who you will meet later.) Here is Aline at work on a Thanksgiving quilt done from a panel which she is very accurately cutting apart.
The finished Thanksgiving quilt. The words - Give Thanks - will be added later.
Aline working on a crazy 6-patch batik quilt. Once again she is very, very carefully measuring.
The finished colorful quilt.
Aline also does redwork and beautiful embroidery. Her handwork is as precise as her quilting. Quilt labels done by Aline are as wonderful as her quilts. Lately she has been doing a lot of machine quilting and her artistry shines through in that also.

Come back tomorrow for the next featured person. There is talent galore in my little Bee group.

Gail

Please allow me to introduce you to Gail. Gail is our teacher/coach/encourager and fixer-of-problems in our Bee group. We just got back from our annual retreat and I decided to feature our retreat attendees one by one. Gail is first. She is retired (from being a high school teacher) but continues to teach at the local quilt shop where she makes shop samples too. She also tends to her horses and dogs and her husband. This Big House quilt was in her binding stack. This is Gail, on the floor, laying out a pink and brown quilt.
And here is the quilt all put together.
Gail is very proficient and we finally decided that she must have a twin hidden away who makes half the blocks. No one can get that much done by themselves!
This is Gail on the first day, only a short time after we got started she had the basket quilt finished and up on the wall.

Close-up of the basket quilt.This is a little Christmas quilt she whipped up next.Here is dear Gus guarding another of Gail's quilts.
Here is the quilt finished. The star centers were exchange blocks.
One of Gail's many secrets to success include her daily nap. There she is going past the window on the way to her cottage for her afternoon nap.
Gail is always cheerful, helpful, and ready to share her techniques and ideas.

More coming tomorrow........