Retreat: Sew. Eat. Sleep. Repeat.

Last weekend, my quilt guild held its annual retreat in Stroudsburg, PA, at the Shawnee Inn.  This was my first retreat, and I had a wonderful time and am ready to go again!  It was bliss to be able to sew and talk quilting and share quilting tips and get to know other members without having to worry about meals, laundry, cleaning and all the other daily responsibilities that impinge on sewing time.
The Shawnee is an old, venerable, classic hotel; when you walk down the halls, you see photographs of visitors like President Eisenhower, Mickey Mantle, Dizzy Gillespie and even the Lone Ranger!  (I don't know whether Tonto was there or not; I didn't see a picture.)  The Inn sits right on the Delaware River north of the Delaware River Gap; we were lucky to have unseasonably warm weather on Friday and Saturday, so two friends and I had a lovely walk on Saturday morning before we began our sewing marathon.

We also took some time out to visit Pocono Sew and Vac in Stroudsburg, too.  What a wonderful store!  It is family owned, and they sell just about every make of sewing machine as well as fabric and thread and notions.  I scored a Bendable Bright Light, and pair of Machingers Quilting Gloves and a few yards of fabric on sale.  (I did not even go to the part of the store where they sell vacuum cleaners!  This was a quilting retreat, after all.  If I ever go on a housecleaning retreat, I'll look at vacuums.)

The Inn provided us with a big meeting room where we could set up our machines and irons.  The room was available to us from Friday morning until Sunday afternoon.  Throughout the weekend, there was the hum of sewing machines punctuated with the voices of quilters complimenting, questioning, advising, reassuring, exclaiming about each others' projects.

I spent a lot of time before the retreat prepping for the projects I took with me.  Like some travelers, I over-packed projects because I wanted to be sure that I could choose what to work on depending on my mood.  One of the projects I worked on was my interpretation of a house block inspired by Jeanneke"s Building Houses from Scraps.

If you have seen the Building Houses from Scraps blog, you know that Jeanneke started a project to make 366 3" house blocks in 2012, one for each day of the year.  I decided that 3" blocks were way too small for me, and although I enjoy hand-piecing, finding the time and motivation to make one block a day for a year is not a commitment I could fulfill, so I drafted my own 6" house block and cut up lots of scraps to take on the retreat.
 
Here's the first house block that I used as a guide:

I cut up some charm squares and lots of scraps and a few jelly roll strips.  Except for choosing appropriate fabrics for the sky pieces, matching the pieces on either side of the door and window, I cut all the other fabrics into pieces without regard to color or scale.  After making a few blocks, I also decided to fussy cut some of the windows.

Here's a tip for organizing pieces for blocks that require lots of little pieces: use a cutlery tray!
Here's what my tray looked like before I started piecing:

And here are the blocks I made during the retreat.

Now that I am home and doing some other sewing, I'm using the house project as leaders and enders, much less pressure than making a house every day! (Oops!  I just realized that two of the blocks are not pieced correctly....too many distractions, I guess.)

Next up, another project that was in my retreat baggage, one of my favorite patterns and one of my bucket list quilts.

March FMQ: Doodling with Ann Fahl

Ann Fahl is the featured teacher for  this month's Free Motion Quilting Challenge organized by Sew Cal Gal.  I really enjoyed the "assignment!"  Ms. Fahl contributed a very comprehensive lesson with lots of information and advice about threads, needles, blocking and basting.  When I was at the AQS show in Lancaster I treated myself to some colorful threads at the Superior and Aurifil booths, and this month I had fun trying some of them out. 
So here's my final product for March.  I tried some of Ms. Fahl's suggested designs and added some doodles of my own.  The threads I used for this sample were Superior's Rainbows and The Bottom Line in the bobbin.  I was a little skeptical when I saw how fine these threads are, but I am really happy with the results!  I started in the upper right doing loops, moved down the right side adding stars and hearts.  Then in the lower right I tried some spirals and morphed them into daisies on the left, a few flower doodles, two heart-in-hands that look like clown hands, and finally loops again at the top left.

I took this photo with my iPhone using a camera app that I read about in the NY Times on Thursday.  It's called Camera Awesome and it has lots of cool features that help you take better pictures and edit them on the spot!  You can read about it here.
In my next post, I'll tell you about my guild's recent retreat and show you my secret to staying organized when piecing quilt blocks.

February Free Motion Quilting

With only two hours to go in the month, I have to post less than stellar attempts at Diane Gaudynski's echoed plumes.  February has whizzed by, even though there is an extra day this year.  So here are my feeble plumes.  I made a promise to myself that I'll do a lot more practicing on the March lesson. (And of course, there are two more days in March, so that will help.)

 

But that's not the only sewing I did in February.  I made this whirligig quilt for a friend's new grandson, using the tutorial from Turtle Hill Quilter.  I had to take the photos in less than optimum conditions, so you'll have to excuse the shadows.  The fabrics are all children's and novelty fabrics, so the wee one can play a little I Spy.

Here's the front:

and the back:

 

 

And finally, I made this quilt top to for my daughter.  I used a charm pack of Kaffe Fassett fabrics for the background and some hand-dyed fabrics for the hearts and hands.  I traced my husband's and my hands and we each drew our own hearts;  I appliqued them by machine using decorative stitches on my Bernina.  The feature that allows you to make one stitch at a time came in handy on all those tight corners and curves.  I'm planning to hand quilt this and have it ready when DD finishes redecorating her room.  

 

We did a little shopping recently at the mall, and stopped for lunch where I snapped DD and her dad.

 

Free Motion Quilting Challenge #1

I signed up for the Free Motion Quilting Challenge lead by SewCalGal.
Because we spent the middle two weeks of January in Florida, and I traveled sans sewing machine, So I watched the video by Fances Moore, and did as much practicing as I could before we left.
I'm pretty pleased with my final attempt. I have a few tension issues and I need to make my spacing more consistent, but otherwise, with only half the month work on this, I'm pretty happy.




I'm looking forward to February's challenge by Diane Gaudynski!

Quilty techies....this one's for you!

While watching the Giants-Packers game, my sister and I have been on our computers creating our own QR codes.  If you search for "create QR code,"  you'll find lots of sites that you can use to create a QR code for your blog or other site, and some allow you to customize the code.  So here's my very own QR code that links right here to S is for Stitch!  Try it, you'll like it!

2012: Am I Nearly Insane? Maybe....

All around the blogosphere, there are 2012 resolutions and To-Do lists and project plans.  One of my very best talents is starting something and not finishing it (someday I'll write about The Chase sampler I have been working on intermittently since, well, since a long time ago.)  So I am reluctant to write about my quilting plans for this year and then spend much of the year procrastinating and then feeling guilty that I am not posting lots of pictures of projects in the making.   But I am putting on my big girl pants and taking the plunge.  So, herewith, are some of my quilty plans for 2012:

First, I am participating in the Free Motion Quilting Challenge organized by SewCalGal (notice the button to your right) in which there will be a FMQ lesson/video posted each month by one of twelve FMQ experts.  The idea is for participants to practice the lesson and post a picture of their best effort, which enters them into the drawing for a prize for that month.  So I am practicing the January lesson by Frances Moore of Fantastic Stitchwitchery, and as soon as I am satisfied with my results, I'll be posting my picture!

Second, I am taking an online course on Free Motion Quilting (do you sense a pattern here?) with Wendy Butler Burns through the Craftsy website.  I took advantage of a half-price sale to sign up for this course, and so far, I have watched the first four lessons.  Craftsy has things nicely organized; students have the ability to pause and bookmark the lessons, take notes, and ask questions of teh instructor and fellow students.  After all this FMQ instruction and practice, I should be an expert by the end of the year!  (Right!)

Third, I am going to complete all the star blocks for Natalie Bonner's star Quilt-along (see link on right) post pictures, and get that quilt finished!

The last quilty project I am going to publicly commit to is to make significant progress on my Nearly Insane quilt.  The Nearly Insane quilt is based on a quilt made by Salinda Rupp in Lancaster County, PA in 1870.  It has 85 six inch blocks with thirteen additional pieced blocks that are halved and surround the center of the quilt.  I bought the book by Liz Lois a few years ago with the intention of stretching my piecing skills and because I love the idea of this kind of project, but I hate the Dear Jane quilt.

Here are the blocks I have made so far: (The block numbers are from the pattern.)

Block #2

Block #13

Block #31

Block #1

Block #6 (with a mistake: the flying geese are facing the wrong way, but that's the way they'll stay!)

Block #11

I had a good time collecting fabrics for this project, and I'm sure there will be lots left over so I can use them in another quilt.  Did anyone say Barbara Brackmans' Civil War Quilt?

So here's to 2012; to starting new projects; to finishing projects; to learning new skills;  to forgiving ourselves when we don't accomplish everything we hope to; and to remaining on the safe side of Nearly Insane!

Catching Up: Sing-Off Stars and a Whole Lotta Bakin' Goin' On

Every year, in December, the Dartmouth Aires, a men's a cappella group from Dartmouth College gives a concert hosted by the local Dartmouth Alumni Club here in New Jersey. The group tours the East Coast after fall term exams and before they go home for the holidays.  This year, the Aires were on the TV show "The Sing-Off," a competition for a cappella groups, and after competing against 15 other groups from all over the country, the Aires placed 2nd!
All of the publicity from the TV show meant that our concert audience was 3 times what it usually is, and there were lots of Sing-Off fans asking for pictures and autographs of these college "rock stars."
The Aires sang songs from the TV show, along with some audience favorites and ended with the Dartmouth Alma Mater.  It was a wonderful concert.
As you can see, they are as energetic in person as they were on the "The Sing-Off," just not as well dressed! ;-)

 
























 The arrival of the Aires is always a reminder that Christmas is coming, and there's baking to be done.

I usually make a dozen kinds of cookies and give them as gifts to friends and family.  I keep a list of what I make each year and try to make a few different kinds along with traditional family favorites.  This year, when I started baking, I had good intentions of posting each batch on Facebook, but after the first few, getting out the camera and uploading the pictures became just another chore after cleanup.  So here are some of the early batches:

 

In the foreground, pistachio coins, a recipe from an old Gourmet magazine that I tried for the first time this year.  It got good reviews from my tasters, but I wasn't bowled over. 

These are cinnamon stars from Nick Malgieri's How to Bake, one of my favorite baking books.  They are made with ground almonds, cinnamon, lemon zest and meringue.  Part of the meringue is painted on the cookies, then they sit out to dry for an hour or two before they are baked.   Labor intensive, but worth it!

 Also from Nick Malgieri (and also labor intensive) are these checkerboard cookies.  I have actually had people ask me if I put all the little squares of dough together for each cookie!

These Chocolate Kissed Gingerbread cookies are from the blog Becky Bakes.   I think they are gorgeous, but the next time I make them, I'm adding more ginger so the bite of the ginger contrasts with the sweetness of the chocolate.

This is the first plate of cookies I made to take to a friend's house.

When all the cookies are baked and stored in the freezer, it's time to pack them into boxes for gifts.

                 Each box looks like this when all the cookies are packed and ready to be delivered.

And so the Christmas baking is done!
 

While all this baking was going on, I took time out this year to help my cousin make a t-shirt quilt for her granddaughter who just started college.  

                   Sifa, my cousin's bluepoint Siamese was quite intested in the whole process!

 Our trusty quilt display models are holding up the almost-completed quilt!
The quilt has been tied and the binding sewn on.  I left my cousin with the tasks of clipping the threads and hand sewing the binding to the back of the quilt.
I hope it was a hit on Christmas morning!

Happy New Year to all!  May 2012 be a year of peace, health and prosperity, and may all your dreams, quilty, bakey and otherwise, come true.