A weekend of fabric, fun, frivolity and food, food, food!

As it is Wednesday already, perhaps I better get this report written before I stand at Max. The week's sure whizz by quickly when the Monday is a public holiday. While most of the retreaters departed on Monday afternoon, our Melbourne guest left Tuesday morning.

Thanks to Maxine for the blog title, as I have borrowed her comment from the guest book. It is always interesting to read the comments written by the girls. Gayle wrote that she looks forward to her "Bordertown fix", and calls it her "home away from home". I am humbled and also appreciative of the fact that she drives 8 hours to come here, at least 2 or 3 times a year. And yet another comment from another lady....."how can making 56 flying geese feel so restful?"

So without further ado, I will move onto the report, and first up is Kathy, who was the overachiever in the group. Everyone works at a different pace, and some are on a mission to make the most of their sewing time, and others break up the sewing time with some social time, or rest time. I am happy that they all feel free to work out the balance that works for them.

We had the usual allocation process, and choices were made about the quilts they would do. Sorry I did not even think about taking photos until later. 

Kathy chose Broken Tiles........which was a very simple quilt to make...............

...........and the blocks went together quickly.....................

................and it was not long until the centre was made..............

.................and it was time for borders....................

............and Ta Daa..................... it was finished on Saturday.

Kathy had her eye on another quilt, so decided that she would move onto that one. Northern Lights was a bit more complicated, with half square triangles...................

....................and lots of four patch units......................

.....but she made good progress and had 2/3's of the centre done by the time she left after lunch on Monday.

Chris also chose a fairly simple quilt, called Zebra Crossing.

..............and of course a little lubrication makes the strip piecing go quicker!!??

Now you can see why the quilt is called zebra crossing, as the striped sashings are sewn on.

The centre is now ready for borders, and a finish looks close.............

.................................and by late Saturday evening it was done!!

So now, what to do for the rest of the weekend?? Well, Chris had an idea, and wanted to make a quilt called Mirror, Mirror. This called for 6 fabrics and 12 strips of each colour. She searched through my shelves and found some fabrics, and after lots of "help" from the others to select the right mix of colours, the strips needed to be cut. Out came the "Go Cutter" and in half an hour all the strips were cut.

.......................time for some strip piecing...............

and some cutting, and here are the first couple of rows laid out.................

.............and by Monday afternoon, she had 2 sections done!

Maxine chose a quilt called Catalina, in pretty Tropical colours.

                   Her block centres are done, and now it's time for some flying geese ...............

.....and a few (72!!) half square triangles, and one block is made! Only 8 more to go!

One row is done, and by the time of departure there were 3 rows made, but sorry I don't seem to have a photo of these. I look forward to a finished photo soon (?) with the borders on!

(This is a picture of the EQ layout for this quilt.)

Dot's quilt was called Freshly Picked, after the name of the range of fabrics.

There were quite a few flying geese, and half square triangles....................

and here is a Ta Daa moment when the first block was made...............

.....and now part of the centre is made........... (you might notice that some of the quilts were pinned to the fabric shelves on the right of the photo, and no I did not take a photo of them like this)

(And this is the EQ picture of the finished quilt).

Gayle chose a quilt called Lenton Rose, and is a repeat, (although with different border and background fabric), of one that was made in a retreat last year.

Gayle was storing her finished units on the seat near the sewing room, where the teddy's are sitting. 

                      They were minding them, as the piles increased, all weekend................

                       ..........until the blocks started to appear.

  Time at the ironing station was usually a social occasion! And if you had lots of units to press,

 a seat was a good idea.

Gayle had a few extra hours to sew as departure was not until Tuesday morning, and here is her progress late on Monday evening.

This is the EQ picture of the quilt.

Pat is my checking lady and gets to attend each weekend, and decided that she had a lot of UFO's that needed finishing. Here is her Cleopatra's Fan quilt that was started at a retreat last year.

It was time to choose borders, and of course there were lots of opinions.........

...........and Ta Daa, we have a finished top!

.......................A simple little girls quilt was next on the agenda...................

                            .........and here is another little quilt, now ready for borders.

This time there were no "day" girls at retreat, so there was a space at the sewing tables. I had been "hanging out" for some piecing time, and thought about setting up my machine. I was torn in 2 directions, as I have been working on this quilt for a friend, since last July. It has been "patiently" waiting in the queue for my quilter to find make time for it. So I decided to load it and start quilting it, and made a few decisions about what I was going to do. I could not decide what colour thread to use if I did an allover design. Finally I made up my mind to do a simple custom job on it, and that way I didn't need to decide between black or coloured, as I could use both!! I did some quilting with Max, on Saturday and then spent the rest of the weekend at the sewing machine.

I decided to choose the quilt, Summer Sun, in scrappy blues and yellows.

I love that the half square triangle units that are cut on the Go Cutter turn out to be a perfect 4 1/2" square without any need for trimming. Certainly saved me a lot of time.

One block made and pressed, and someone with a camera while I thought she was just snapping the block on the ironing board!! .............

.......and after this photo, I realised that I had 2 gold fabrics sitting together!! And I have left them together............

.....................then it was one row together.....................

.........and that camera was still snapping me!....................

..........................and with some more stitching time after most had left on Monday afternoon, I had the centre done. In my mind I was hopeful of getting the borders on that evening, but the body decided otherwise, and I came to a stop, so they are still waiting to be sewn! My quilter probably won't get to it for ages, as usual, so there is no hurry is there?

A lot of pictures were taken of the group and as usual it was tricky finding one 

where everyone is smiling.

I guess all good things come to an end, and all too soon, it was time to repack the cars and travel home. Those 3 days went so fast and who knows what happened in the world in that time? Thankyou girls for coming to Number eight. There was, as the title said, lots of fabric, fun, frivolity and food. Perhaps we will also add to that, friendships formed and renewed.

Of course, there is a lot happening in this world of ours at the moment, but that is a whole other subject and I am not dwelling on it now.

That's all the newsfromjude for this post, and it's time to stand with Max and get that quilt finished, so that I can get back to customer quilts.

Blessings, From Jude