Happy green day, or something like that

Here's a couple more quilts with a lot of green in them for your St. Patrick's Day edification:



Quilt above, "Rhubarb", made by by Karen Hampton of Indiana; entered in the category Art-Abstract, Small at the 2005 International Quilt Festival.



Quilt above, "Nebraska's Rising Sun", made by Sandi McMillan and Laura Franchini of Albion, Nebraska; winner of 1st prize in the category Two Person at IQF 2006.

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I went to the one-day version of the quilt retreat a couple of weeks ago - that is, other people stayed longer, but I just went for the one day. I was really glad I went at least for that long, because instead of taking those same blocks I've been stalled on, I took the not-quite-finished quilt of my mother's that I've been meaning to put the binding on for ages. I got that all cut and pressed and sewn on, and now I'm doing the hand-sewing on it, and it should be finished soon. (I'm usually quite good about doing the hand-sewing once I get to that point.) And then I got finished with that around lunchtime, and I spent the rest of the day cutting pink fabric. Remember that pink quilt I've been saying I'm going to make? Well, it's no longer a pile of uncut fabric; now I have a pile of squares instead, which should eventually become a pile of triangles. We'll see how long it takes me to get to that point.

I wish I'd stayed longer at the retreat, really, because a lot of people were there that I hadn't seen in ages and I didn't feel like I got to talk to all of them for very long. (Oh, and also? You ought to see what Cynthia England is working on. It's a long way from being finished, but what she has finished is absolutely gorgeous.)

Retreat pictures start here

(See below for explanation)


exchange blocks in fall fabrics 

pickle dish cats (note the tails on some of them!) 

ocean waves variation in Christmas colors 

these are Kaffe Fassett fabrics 

I believe the quilter said that the 2 figures were her granddaughter and her father. 

For anybody else who uses Blogspot: I highly recommend the free "Hello" software that Blogger offers for managing pictures. I had to download a patch to get it to work correctly, but boy is it a breeze adding pictures now!

I don't have any idea what this pattern is, but this is another one with colors that I love! 

I love the colors in this pinwheel quilt. 

This is sort of a round robin - the person who started it made a block and chose a theme, and everybody else made blocks to go with it. 

this is blurry, but hopefully not too horridly so - I think this one is called Winding Ways 

flip-flops! 

(You do understand that these are not my quilts, right? I just thought I'd point that out, if I hadn't already. These are things people had at the retreat. Somehow I didn't even get a picture of mine!)

Part of this is a log cabin, of course, but what are the curves? Are they fan blocks? 

unfinished applique block (I love the bees) 

I can't remember the name of this pattern with the curves, but I really love it. (That's the top of my mother's head in the foreground, if you're wondering.) 

(I think the name of the pattern may be Radiant Suns.)

cute table runner 

Morning Glories 

Is this flannel? I think it's going to be a raggedy quilt. Anyway, I love the colors. 

There are more pictures under the long text entry, incidentally.

Retreat report

(I guess I should explain that I always go to the retreat with my mom, and my aunt has been going for the last several years, too. Lots of family togetherness!)


Thursday

We got got here about 3:30. The other day I said in my journal that the dragonflies were swarming - well, up here it's the love bugs that are swarming. They're EVERYWHERE. (To the point of being gross.) (I've gotten curious, so here's the skinny on the damn things. They're actually a species of fly. Who knew.)

We got all set up and it was after 5 by the time I finally started sewing, but I still got 12 leaf blocks made - not bad.

I wrangled a room by myself - it's called "Siptak" for unknown reasons. It has a bed that is literally the same height as my belly button. I don't know how much higher that is than a normal bed, but it appears to be extremely high. I almost feel like I'm floating in the middle of the room. I just hope I don't fall off.


Friday - after midnight

We got up and had breakfast and took off for Austin early. My mom had fussed a little bit about driving ALL the way to Austin, but she stopped once we got there because she really liked the quilt shop (which is actually called The Quilt Store) a lot. She ended up spending a ton of money. I only spent a little bit, but since I'm very broke it was probably more than I should have! I bought 2 batiks (1/2 yards), a sale fabric that was sort of reproduction-looking, and a fat quarter. SHE bought 6 yards of batik, a couple of yards of 108"-wide toile, and... a couple more things that I forget. All of that batik - hers, not mine, that is - is for a fabric exchange that we're both doing, but she bought all the fabric she will need for every month through December. I'm waiting until later to buy October's fabric, even. She is also doing 2 sets of fabric (5" blocks, but you need 44 of them, which means you do need close to a yard) to my 1 set, though, so she had more to worry about.

Anyway, we just ate lunch and came on back to Round Top. We got back about 2:30. I got 18 blocks made after we got back, so that's pretty good.

One woman sitting near me spent a good bit of time this afternoon teaching another one to knit. (Darn knitters are everywhere.) The first woman claims to be a beginning quilter but she also pulled out a couple of quilt tops that are damn gorgeous, so if she's really a beginner, she's one of those incredibly overachieving beginners.


Saturday - after midnight

I was just thinking it over, and I think I have made around 50 blocks total, which is not as many as I hoped I'd get done, but it's still not bad.

Mom won a door prize at dinner yesterday, which was a gift certificate to the quilt shop in Brenham. So after lunch today we drove back over there so she could spend it. (Brenham is only about a 20-minute drive from Round Top.) Of course, I spent another $10 or so that I REALLY couldn't afford, now, because no matter how broke I am I can't resist the lure of fabric. This shop (Stitch Haven is the name of it) is not nearly as big as the quilt shop in Austin, of course, but I always like going there. They have cute stuff.

The big event of the retreat on Saturdays is the show and tell segment of the program. (As a matter of fact it is the ONLY program - there are no other planned events at this retreat other than meals.) Everybody comes over to the main house and brings whatever they've been working on so we can see. It's everything from finished quilts to partial blocks to, well, knitting. There's always some fabulous stuff. (The pictures going up are mostly from that.)

Oh, also, I got talked into doing an exchange. It's not a really terrible one, though. It's a particular block (Indian Puzzle) in fall batiks, and I have to do 12 12" blocks by the retreat next year. Not bad at all. (An example of a terrible exchange? - meaning terrible in terms of the amount of work required - here's how I got my triple 4-patch quilt: we did sets of 20, at least 1 set per month and every other month we did 2 sets. So you had to make either 20 or 40 blocks EVERY month. I think it went on for 8 months or so - I know we ended up with something like 260 blocks. So 12 blocks in a year is a piece of cake.)


Monday

Nothing much ever happens at the retreat on Sunday. There's a brunch and everybody does their little bit of cleaning and packs up and goes home. You don't actually have to leave right after brunch but most people seem to. I barely even said goodbye to anybody except my aunt. (I'll see most of them next Monday at quilt guild, anyway.)

The lighting isn't very good, but this is a beautiful pineapple quilt. 

Bullseye quilt

I really like the quilting on this. 

(You should be able to click on the picture and get the big version, if I'm understanding this correctly.)