Quilters are Crazy 2013 Retreat

This weekend was simply amazing! I went with six of the best friends a girl could ever ask for to Outlaw Ranch for quilt retreat. I knew it would be challenging to be away from my family, but I also knew how much I needed the friendship and support of my friends.
In preparing for quilt retreat, I made a bunch of kits up with blocks prepped and prepared to create tops. I find I don't like to make tops at home, so it was fun to get them ready to put together. I felt so productive actually having finished tops to take home.
I started Friday afternoon with these Dilly Dally 5" blocks and made this Easy as 4 pattern by Me & My Sister. I also have backing all prepped and a piece ready for binding. The backing is to the right. This one was for a friend, but she had a different theme, so I changed gears and now it is ready for the next baby girl I need a gift for. I finished this before supper on Friday.

This chevron is from a Max and Whiskers layer cake. I had other plans, but I ended up making this for a sample for a class I plan to teach next quarter. I love how it turned out and can't wait to quilt it. I need to get a backing for this one. I finished this late evening Friday.

This is the Unity quilt top I had mostly completed. I added the borders and got the backing ready. This was finished Sat. night.

Emilee worked on these plus blocks.

Nicole finished her 2nd quilt top, a plus quilt she designed herself.

Nicole, Cindy, Jenn, Emilee, Tammy, Gaila, and I Saturday night

Gaila made this table topper from Atkinson designs.

She also made this little wall hanging from a Moda candy pack. She sent it with me on Sat. and I found the border so she could finish it.

Friday night I laid out this Thangles BOM and started sewing it together while I pumped. Around 2AM I found my way to bed, but I was awake at 6 AM, so I sat and sewed it all together while I pumped. I had it into this top by breakfast at 8 AM. I have a border to put on, but had left it at home.

Saturday was spent on Scrappy Swoon. I spent all day on it and I'm just not loving it. I went to bed at 2 AM with the top done and left it on the design wall. When I got up at 7AM, I just kept looking at it and really not liking it. Well I have a couple squares out of place and I need to do some ripping. I just didn't want to spend any more time on it.

Here's a more true color picture of it. I used purple/green/black batiks. The colors were all the same value, so it just didn't set the star off enough. I'll still finish it and I think put a big bright purple border on it to make it big enough for our bed.

Gaila made these wall hangings for her mother and mother in law from a panel she got from me last summer.

We had a small forest of Aurifil trees which we finished. Mine was the pine beetle infested one!

Throughout the weekend I worked on this one. It's a scrappy chevron using 5" squares. I marked while I pumped, sewed while I pumped, cut while I pumped, and pressed while I pumped. As Nicol said, Keep calm and pump on. This will be another sample for my chevron class.


The weekend was truly amazing and I can't believe how much fun we had. I was so thankful to have such understanding friends and be away from home. Paul and his mom had a great weekend with the kids as well. I can't wait for the next one.