Sunday evening.......

I have been sitting here for about 2 hours, and sorted, and exported all the photos I wanted to use, loaded them to the blog, and written half of what I wanted to say, and then................. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!@##$T%U........... don't know what happened, but it went off into cyberspace somewhere! 

I shall try again, and make sure that I hit save more often, (although I had done that) but not sure you will get all the same story this time, will be more brief. (EDIT - was not brief after all!)

Time to set up the machines, and get your self organised ........

......and Val was off and running, ruled up all her squares ready to make hourglass blocks.......and made one block before calling it a day.......

By Sunday lunch time her quilt called "Modern Roses" was done!!!

Di got off to a good start. I stress the importance of the 1/4" seam as I have cut a lot of the units, and they need to fit together well. She checked the measurement on the "ruler" printed on the side of her machine and was very happy.........but when it came to crosscutting, she found that the ruler only measure a bit under 6 1/4"!! So it was a "bit" of unpicking to correct the strip sets.......

.......and now all the 9 patch blocks are done and accurate.......

.................Now onto the half square triangle units.....

...................and the first 9 blocks put together....................

.........And by Saturday evening we have a finish, called "Spinning Around"!! Di then decided to buy another case and start another one..............

This was progress by Sunday morning, and I am sorry to say I did not get a photo of the rest, before she left this afternoon.

Sadie was a first time "mystery retreater", and was happy with her progress for the weekend.

Lots of 4 patch units, and flying geese to stitch.........

....one star coming together.........

...............and lots of units ready to be sewn together by the time she left this afternoon. This was called "Dancing Daisies".

Cathie is another first time "retreater", and chose a scrappy quilt, called "Twosies and Foursies", that had lots and lots of 2 1/2" squares to sew together................no strip piecing in this scrap quilt....

Some blocks coming together, and there will be a further photo later, as she is still sewing and planning on leaving in the morning. Maybe she will achieve lots tonight as we are the only 2 left, and as I am RETYPING this blog post, it is quiet and she has no one to talk too. (She did tell me that she can talk to herself!!)

Sherrel is usually rather quick to get her quilts made, but this time she had lots of strips in Bag number 1 to sew into 16 patch blocks.........

 ......until there was a loud exclamation about 3pm on Saturday afternoon when she finally got to open Bag number 2!!!!!!

This is the centre of the quilt, partly sewn together, and then there is a black border. The colours in this photo look a bit washed out, and are actually much brighter.

The background fabric is a newsprint, in French, so I can't tell you what it says. For want of a better name, I called this quilt "French Puzzle".

Robyn was full steam ahead, and making good work of lots of half square triangles, in varying colours..............

..............and then she had all the units ready to sew the block together..................

.........but when she got to this stage, I believe there was quite a bit of unpicking when she kept sewing the points in the wrong direction, more than once, or even twice!!??

 ..........which did slow her down quite a bit, and when it was time for home, there were some blocks finished, and some ready to sew together...the blocks will be sashed, and then bordered. Maybe there will be a photo on the blog one day. Her quilt is called "Whirlygigs".

Margaret was probably rather apprehensive about making her quilt, because I stuffed up the cutting of the sashings on her last retreat quilt. All was well this time though, and I breathed a sign of relief when she reached the end. She did have a bit of a laugh, and confessed that she thought the other quilt ended up much nicer with the substituted fabrics. 

This time she was working with grey and pinks, with a quilt called "In Full Bloom".

 And this is the finish about lunch time on Sunday.

At some retreats, there is occasionally a queue at the cutting table, but this time it seemed to space out a bit...................

..............but there was often a wait at the 2 ironing stations, and even a "protest", when someone jumped the queue once.

Sue's quilt was called "Amethyst Trails", in those jewel colours, and the background was a pearlessence fabric with a shine, and looked great when she had finished. (Did you hear that Sue, I loved the background fabric!!??)

......nearly there, only one more border to go!...........

Sue was a "day girl", and lives in town, and this was her mode of transport each day. Gives a whole new meaning to the term "on yer bike!"

 Last, but not least is Paulines's quilt, called "Folk Festival" using the Rosalie Quinlan designed fabric of that name. Pauline was not doing the retreat, but had 2 of the ladies staying at her house. She called in Friday afternoon for a coffee and to meet up with them. And "somehow" got conned into playing bingo, and choosing a case, and spending the weekend here!!!????

The reveal late this afternoon, with 2 borders remaining to be done. I think she was very happy with her quilt, which a grand daughter will get, and is pleased she was "conned" into joining us.

We had some local girls drop in, including Jean, who wanted some crochet help from an expert........

.......and Marie who came to visit and had a coffee and met some new girls........and Helen called in late this afternoon after most had left, so sorry no photo of her.

.....one afternoon there may have been a little tipple or two, of a nice drop......and had the girls writing down the name of it, with a view to finding a supplier!!

Sunday morning we were blessed to have Pat cook us pancakes, and bacon and poached eggs, which were delicious. THANKYOU PAT.

This is our group photo. Sometimes there are more quilts finished, but that's usually in a 3 day retreat, and this was only 2 days. But I stress, it is not a race, and is meant to be a stress free weekend.

And then it was time to pack and head for home. The house is quiet tonight, with only 2 of us, and Cathie will leave in the morning. 

So there endeth another great retreat, with quilts sewn, new and renewed friendships, lots of laughter, stories, sharing, and food. I hope they all go home refreshed and revived to the reality and demands of their lives.

Tomorrow it is back to the quilt loaded on Max, and the usual week's activities. Maybe there will be news soon of a baby??? Still taking guess' in the competition, and thanks to those who have.

Blessings, From Jude, who feels like she has done a marathon, by doing this blog post 1 1/2 times!!!