It was all Go, Go, Cut, Cut..........

Time for some newsfromjude after a very busy and productive retreat. It has been "Go, Go", over the last few days and we have much to show for our time. The weather has been very cold, windy and wet here at Bordertown, but it has been nice and warm inside. We did look out the window when we heard the hail come down, and any visitors to call in told us how cold it was outside. Except for 2 quick walks out to the wood shed for a refill, I did not venture outside for 5 days.

Because I knew that sorting and cutting requires quite a lot of space, along with sewing machines, and the bags of scraps that came in the door, limited spaces were available for this retreat. Raylene had arrived mid morning on Thursday, Joy by mid afternoon, and Pat and Dione on Friday.

Joy had managed take up most of the space in one room, and Raylene and I in the other room on Thursday, and on Friday we all had to reduce our spaces. 

Joy and Dione are both bloggers and have "known" each other for a few years, and met for the first time here at Number 8 in June 2018. (Click on the names to go to their blogs.) Although they are in regular contact with each other, this was only their second meeting and they had lots of conversations about their blogs, and pattern designing and marketing. In my recent post about the Festival of Quilts, I showed photos of Dione's prize winning quilts in Adelaide, and we were fortunate to have a show and tell of some of these.

This is my collection of Go cutting dies, that I posted a few days ago............................

...............and this is Joy's rather substantial assortment.

Sorry I did not get a photo of Dione's collection of Dies, but she did have Cleopatra's fan, and a frog, which was very popular. There was quite a bit of swapping of dies to try each other's out.

This was how Joy's corner looked and was only some of the bags of scraps she had brought to sort.

Her first little pile of 2 1/2" strips cut.

                       Gradually the scraps were tamed into submission and the heaps got bigger.

These were waiting for the pressing fairy.

Joy decided that she had cut enough scraps at this stage,..............

.............so she decided to try out my 2" finished HST die and made these blocks.

Dione arrived on Friday afternoon, and unloaded a few projects. Her first priority was a Mystery quilt that she had started at a retreat "some time" ago and not touched since. This is what the case looked like 13 months later and progress was made over the next few days.

All her blocks were finally sewn, and laid out on the bed, with the border fabrics placed to see how they looked....................

..............and then "someone" came along and suggested another layout possibility.................( I look forward to see how Dione will decide to sew them together).

Dione has a purpose for this quilt, and it needs to be made larger, so a plan was made to add a top and bottom border to the quilt and fill it with applique flowers and critters. Good use was made of several dies to cut these out. And it is great that they already have the vliesofix attached, so they are ready to iron to the background and sew. This quilt was then packed up and will be sewn at home.

Dione then tried out her Cleopatra's Fan die and made a block like this.

You can see there was lots happening on this table.

Pat's first job was to sew a final border onto a quilt that needs to be finished for our local exhibition. Then it was onto EQ8 to work out the measurements for her next UFO...............

...............but when she saw Dione's fan block there was a detour to start another project!! Now we all know how that happens, don't we?

Not long before Pat had a show and tell of her bed runner with 4 fan blocks!! And then it was back to working on that other quilt, but sorry, forgot to take a photo of that.

Pat's daughter and granddaughter called in on Friday to catch up with her, and it was not long before Yasmin was put to work pressing Joy's scraps before they were cut. 

Yasmin (who lives in the city, but was staying with her grandma,) seemed to enjoy her day spent with us, and came back on Friday with some flannel fabric, that she had found in Pat's stash. She was keen to make a baby blanket for a new family arrival.

She loved the frog die, and is hoping to use these in a project........... I think she has the bug that is thinking of the next thing before you have finished what you are working on!! This frog die was in great demand by many, including a few local visitors. I look forward to seeing the results of all these frogs. And it is great to see some younger entrants to the quilting world.

This was Yasmin's next project, using lots of the stings that turned up after cutting the strips. Not a lot was thrown out.

The next few photos are of my scraps and the progress that Raylene has made for me. We had set up in the work room, next door to the other girls sewing room. Some of these scraps had come out of the drawers that had been cut awhile ago, but more were added over the last few days.

These are blue and yellow scraps that are going into a Mystery case for the next retreat.

We cut lots of gold stars, using Joy's die, for use in future quilts.

Edited - added Tuesday.............. another die I have is the 12" log cabin one and I wanted to try this out, so picked a few fabrics in a hurry and stitched one block, which is not photographed. But you can see the logs all lined up ready to sew. This is a very fast way of cutting a log cabin quilt with all the lengths cut of pieces that will finish at 1" wide.

We had 4 rubbish bins full of scraps, but this was reduced back to 2, after taking out the bigger bits, which went into the string bins. There is probably a fair amount of waste with the die cutting system, but this needs to be balanced with the shorter time to cut the same amount of pieces. I am not short of fabric, and consider it is probably a waste to have scraps not cut to size. I hope that I can reduce the time I spend on cutting kits for the Mystery retreats, by making better use of the Go cutters.

There was lots more that I could have taken photos of, but was too busy working with Raylene on projects on my list, as well as feeding the troops. A few locals called in and had frogs, critters, flowers and butterflies cut.

I found this in the freezer, and decided to use it for lunch one day. I noticed the label claimed that it was ICM! Apparently this means Integrated crop management farming!??? What exactly does this mean I wonder? There are so many labels on food products these days, Gluten free, Free Range, Organic, Vegan, Hallal, RSPCA Approved, Heart Tick, Go Green and many others. It makes shopping so complicated and you almost need a degree to go shopping.

Pat lives near an Olive Farm, and regularly gets bulk olive oil and bottles it into smaller quantities. I needed another bottle of Olive oil for cooking, and she offered to bring in a bottle for me. I did wonder who had bought a bottle of Chardonnay for the weekend when I saw it on the cupboard in the kitchen. Then I found out it was really olive oil in a dark bottle, and still with the original label. Does this look like the cook has an occasional sip of wine while she is cooking?????

It was such a busy, productive weekend, and all Go, Go, and more Go. Lots and lots of laughter, and stories, and many local visitors coming and going. I forgot to get the visitors book out to be signed before the first ladies left, and even forgot to get a group photo taken. This is the best I can do for a group, although should have taken one with Yasmin in as well.

The girls (except for Raylene) have returned to their homes and the beds stripped and washing done. The sewing room floor is still a mess, with scraps of fabric abounding. Raylene is staying for some time and will continue helping get some organisation into this place and attend out local group patchwork days. Max needs to get some attention tomorrow and my time "off" is over!!

That's all the newsfromjude for now, it is almost time for bed. Raylene tells me there are Owls and Fowls, meaning the owls are those who stay up late, and the Fowls are those who got to bed early. I am usually a Fowl, but this weekend have turned into an Owl. So there is a bit of catchup sleep needed I think.

Blessings, From Jude