Finish line

 I made it to the finish line!  How many of you will finish by the end of the month?  I have to say everything else took a back seat this month so I could wrap this up.....pun intended. Machine pieced and for me that's saying something. Big stitch quilted which is supposed to be quicker than regular quilting but it still takes time to hand quilt anything.  I kept it simple and not on point for sanity and in the end I like it a lot. 

Now I can work on the Liberty circles,

The going is slow but I had no idea I had this many finished till I just put them out for the photo.  This is a project with Friend Barb and she has many more done than I do but now that the churn dash is done the evening hand work will be the circles.  There is no rhyme or reason to these colors.  The fabrics are from what I purchased in London and here and online.  Totally random.  And there are over 300 to do so more variety will show up as I go along. 

So that's it, folks.  We are moving into Halloween weekend and as the kids grow the plans change. Then it's serious Christmas shopping plans.  Ugh. 

Mug Shots

 Barb told us to bring a yard of fabric that "says you " to retreat. It was a mystery but she said we would take the fabric back home uncut.  I asked if we were going to be expected to wrap our naked bodies in a yard of fabric, you know, like the Calendar Girls, but she assured me it would be painless.

So, here we are:

  Joyce is all batik and a certain color scheme.  If it's teal, turquoise, wine/burgundy, green or navy, it's in her stash.

Barb is in a blue mode right now as you saw in her show and tell  quilts

I don't remember why Lisa chose this sand color. I must have been distracted and not listening when she said.

Here's me with strawberries, of course.  This is a piece I just don't want to cut. 

Sally likes Christmas quilts so she chose this red wonky stripe

I wasn't in the room when Jan had her s taken and explained her choice but it's identical to Lisa's.

Marissa just moved back to Michigan from 14 years in Colorado. Her fabric had feel good messages printed on it. 

We should have had a mug shot number pinned to our shirts!  This was a fun thing to do if you want to  take photos of your retreat people.  For lots of years I have taken much larger frame with me to gatherings. It's a great ice breaker and the pictures are a nice souvenir of the event.  

Retreat

 Lots of pictures in this one, ladies.  We had our retreat this past weekend.  There were seven of us, the weather just could not have been nicer so there was lots of hand stitching on the porch. There was no way I was going to sit inside any building when we know the clock is ticking on this perfect weather.

This is our Inn and after over 10 years of going twice a year it feels like coming home . The porch is uninhabited at the moment, but only for the moment!

I like to take a walk or two or three and there are so many choices with over 130 acres of woods, meadows, ponds, lake.  I walked around the lake but then discovered it was opening weekend for bow hunting so didn't go out again. 

The porch is perfect for hand stitching with our drinks at hand.

My porch sitting hand work.  Barb and I are each doing a liberty circle quilt.  She is way further than I am because she works faster than I do and spends more time at it.  I keep waiting for the shoemaker's elves to come in the night and work on some of my stuff.  

We did show and tell on the porch because no one wanted to go in and the photos turn out better with the lighting.

The long armer used lime green thread on Barb's blue quilt and you can't tell from the front, only the back. 

Marissa worked this bargello to look like Colorado's mountain country. The skies, the trees, the rivers. You can see she added trunks to her tree wave.  She lived there for 12 years and only just came home to Michigan.

And Sally.  I've said before many times our Sally loves to do itsy bitsy teeny weeny piecing and no one can top per perfection.  

This one?  You know those corners you cut off flying geese or other blocks?  She saves them and this is what she used this group for.  I'm telling you, they are teeny!

She made this one for her grand daughter but didn't want to give it to her when it was finished! So she didn't!  

Every year we take a group photo to document the weekend.  You can see I spent the weekend working on my churn dash.