Retreat Projects

Since I showed you all my purchases and additions Sunday, I thought I would take some time today to show you what I worked on during my retreat.  As usual, I took far too many projects! I started with my blocks for the Crossroads quilt that 4 of us planned to make. Unfortunately, as I cut my fabric, I realized part of the way through that I'd cut it incorrectly. I decided to assemble the blocks anyway and then figure out what to do. 

On Thursday, our first day, I got all the blocks put together. Once I had them together, I was getting tired, so decided to pull out a table runner kit that I brought with me.  I got all the fabric fused and cut and then called it a night - for sewing at least! We hung out together for a while and went to bed way too late! 
Show and Tell - Karen and Muffet both finished their Crossroads tops!
My goal for Friday was to get a couple quilts bound.  The first is the Stack-and-Whack quilt from Lois' UFOs.  Jill quilted it for me and did a great job on it.  I had the binding made already, so it only took me about 45 minutes to get it sewn on. I decided to bind both sides by machine. Next up was my Christmas disappearing nine patch. For this one, I decided it would benefit from the two-color binding technique. I will do a full review of that later, but (spoiler alert) it took forever and was much more time consuming than I had planned. 


Needless to say, by the time I got it done, it was late in the day and I was a little fried. My mom and I went back to our room for a nap and I really could have stayed there and just gone to sleep at 7pm, but we had show and tell and door prizes to return for. After I got going again, I went back to the table runner and got it finished.  It will be the next project to quilt for me and I hope to have it done in time for Thanksgiving. 

I knew we'd call it a night soon, so I decided on a quick project - quilting a mini-quilt.  It went quickly and I was pleased with the result. 


Saturday morning, I woke up refreshed and ready to go back to my Crossroads blocks to see what I could do with them.  It took me a few tries to get the right size connector square in the middle of the blocks so that they would wind up square. 


I had to fiddle with a partial seam, which took a little time, but it was worth it in the end. Here's the final result of my top, which I will call "Change of Plans." I really like the fall colors and they will go well with our new couch. 
Last up for this retreat was a couple wonder wallets.  I made purses that match these a few months ago and had the pattern and fabric hanging around. I got them both put together in about an hour and was able to gift the blue/green one to my neighbor for her birthday last week. I used mine over the weekend and it is great! I think these will become a staple in my gift giving. 
Wonder wallets


Me, Muffet, Pam, and Hannah
On Sunday morning, we packed the cars and headed west. Our group has started a little tradition of having breakfast together before we go to Erica's in South Bend. We tried a new place this year and had a great time recapping the weekend around our table. 

We'll be back together in March for our spring retreat and I look forward to that one!  
Mom, Kathy, Loralei, and Karen

Comments

Karen said…
Great recap. Sounds like we had a lot of fun. I've got my pictures taken but haven't written my blog posts yet.