I had a great retreat! Great fellowship and lots of accomplishments.
It was my turn to bring the door prize for the retreat. I struggled for months with different ideas and about three weeks before the retreat I was reading the blog, Cathy Tomm Quilts and she had made a mini iron case that was a free pattern from lillyella.
It was challenging but totally worth it!
I had raspberry zippers by the yard from By Annie which meant I had to adjust the back piece to be about a half-inch taller.
I'm definitely going to make another case for my mini iron.
We had fun project at retreat...we made a stand for our cell phones. Very easy! I love mine. I no longer lose my phone underneath fabric because it isn't laying flat anymore.
All it took was one piece of fabric, 8x10-inches, Stiff Stuff or Trim-tex for the flat spot which is the base the phone rests on and rice or crushed walnut shells to stuff..
I might have to make one for every room in the house...especially the kitchen.
But I came for the quilting...
After dragging this quilt to four retreats...and I did work on it for at least a day at every one of those retreats...I finished the Skyfull of Stars - King Blue Version. The center blocks of this pattern are a free pattern from Moda Bake Shop, Skyfull of Stars
I added an extra row of stars and three borders to make it king size...I couldn't help myself. As I was working on it I just knew it had to actually be a quilt on my bed for those long...dark...winter months.
I opened up my EQ8 program and worked out the borders.
Such a help to work out the details with a preview. I was trying to hard to keep the borders simple but scrappy.
The next quilt I worked on was super fast to put together because I once again turned to EQ8 to figure out how to combine two panels.
I learned how use the custom format and load photos and use them as fabric.
I have a lot of embellishment plans for this top. I want name tags for all the dogs and some fun quilting to enhance the design.
And my last project actually had to be finished at home. When I start working on borders it really frustrates me to have to stop and come back later so I came home determined to finish this quilt asap.
This is the original pattern, Royal Gardens, a BOM from Cozy Quilt Designs.
I finished the center of the quilt but just didn't love those strips for a border. It need more bling. I decided on a braid-like border.
It really helps to work out the math and get a little preview by using EQ8.
I love this quilt so much...it will look great in my home.
And my favorite part of retreat is Show and Tell.
I finished the hand stitching on the binding for this quilt at retreat.
I am gifting this to my son who is in the Air Force, is a bigfoot enthusiast and does a lot of hiking.
I predict very little sewing time in the future months...gardening season is upon me and I have more landscape projects planned for this summer...big ones.
