Retreat projects

In spite of the BLIZZARD last week, the roads were clear enough that I could go on the Quilt Retreat Weekend, at DicksonValley Farm. The "farm" is south between Sandwich and Plano. It is a wonderful place. It is in the country surrounded by fields and forest. It is a youth camp. We get to stay in the main lodge. We can stay up as late, and in our pajamas if we want. All our meals are included in the price. It is a great place. Cell service is very limited, so no bothers.

I decided that this time I was going to bring projects that did not need a lot to be finished. This first one is probaby from the 90's . In it's plastic bag, it had the pattern and fabric. I had one strip of flying geese done out of 4. I finished paper piecing the the next 2 and decided that it would look just fine with only 3 strips. It finished at 7 1/2 x 10 inches. Done!! The "United We Stand" has been around since 2001. Only 3 of the star blocks were done.It still needs another small border and binding, but the major part of paper piecing is now all done!

These are dresden places made into table toppers. A couple needed backs. All needed to be quilted, now they just need the circle in the middle to be finished. These had been around at least 2 years unfinished. My orginal idea was to have one for each month, with a theme to represent the month. Maybe, it will still happen. Just not now!!

This one is called "Cabin Friends", by Primitive Gatherings. I did start this a couple of weeks ago and had about half of the log cabin blocks done. Now to stitch all the wool pieces (the center) down. They are fused and ready to finish! Oh, I ended up paper piecing the log cabin blocks. The instructions are not written to do that. I just can't sew straight enough lines to create the correct size blocks. Paper piecing allows me to get the correct size.

The watermelon is part of a calender quilt that still has 5 blocks to be completed. Something happened that spring and summer, and I did not get them done. This is for August, and just need to sew the binding down!! That was from 4 years ago. The snowman and trees is a patterm from 1997. I needed to add a tree and put it together. It now needs the hand stitching,and buttons to be finished!!

This was a "Mystery". More blocks could be made to create a quilt. I decided a table runner would be nice. There were 4 blocks, that would make a very long tablerunner. I made the 4 blocks, and now have a table topper. The left over pieces from the project made another small table topper. All needed to be quilted and bound. I only have to sew the binding now!!

That's it for the retreat projects that I worked on. Now there is a bunch of handwork, that is always good for evening TV watching. Much more incentive to get them done now!! Needless to say that did not put a lot of dent into the unfinished projects, but it is a start!

These 2 mug rugs are part of a swap from the Quilting Gallery, and are on their way to Australia. I hope she likes them!!! They are paper pieced. (Can you tell I like to paper piece?)