Just a little challenge among friends....

 I've been meeting with a group of sewing friends for many years. We met last week for our bi-monthly meeting and I challenged them to a new project. I cut up an old calendar and laid out the pictures upside down. Then each of us picked one without looking at it. We had the chance to re-pick if we really didn't like the picture we got. The challenge is to make something using the picture as inspiration. We can use the colors, something in the picture, or recreate the picture if we want. The quilt can be any size.  (I like to keep the guidelines loose so that individual creativity can blossom.) We then talked about ideas that came to mind as we looked at our pictures and each others.  Here they are with their pictures! Mine is the bird below.

mine

 Our friend, Jo, moved to Florida last year, but she was game to play too, so I skyped her over the weekend and blindly chose this one for her. She liked her bird, so we are ready to go. We set a date in July to meet again and have to have at least a start or a plan or something to share by then, with the finished projects to be shown in Sept.  I'm excited about this challenge and think it will be fun to explore some possibilities. What would you do if you got my picture?

Jo

More eye candy!

Cindy finished her quilt from our small group challenge recently. I love how it turned out!  The story of mine, plus Cindy's is here.

Pat is finished with her last Sampler quilt and brought it last night for Cindy to quilt. It's gorgeous and definitely out of her color box....she usually used more muted colors.

Cindy

We had a few people missing last night at Sampler Club, but several put their blocks on the wall for a photo op (or maybe I just took it as one!). Cindy made all of her center blocks a different set of colors for an interesting look. They worked on a paper pieced block last night. It always takes them a bit to get back in the groove of pp when I throw one in the mix, but I like to incorporate them in the samplers for the practice...plus there are some awesome blocks you just can't make any other way!

Dianne

Dianne chose some pinks for her block last night. She has her setting triangles cut too.

Pat

Pat's all caught up on her blocks, with her block from last night almost finished. I forgot to snap a pic, though.

Rose was busy catching up on her multiple blocks last night, and I didn't get a picture of what she does have finished.

I haven't had time to do much sewing lately. I spent Saturday in the garden and cleaning, and then went to my hometown on Sunday and spent Sunday and Monday visiting there. School will be out next Wednesday, so I will catch up then!

Friday randomness

I've taught quite a few classes this past week so I thought I'd share some of the pictures of blocks from these sampler classes. I have one group that chose which sampler they wanted to make and are each making a different quilt. The others are making the same quilt. Sometimes they put their finished blocks up on the design walls to see how the new one fits in. So it's always fun and colorful. 

Some are beginners and some are seasoned quilters. I didn't get pics of everyone in the classes as some didn't finish their blocks so didn't want them taken until next time. One group has to make 10 of these friendship stars, so they definitely have homework.

                                        

 Several brought show and tell also, so I'll share those tomorrow. 

                                  

                                

                                    

I got together with my small but mighty quilt group last night. We had fun chatting and sewing...I attached the binding on my challenge quilt for that group, so it is finished! One of the gals had an accident with her challenge quilt...her dog chewed a hole in it, so she has a new challenge to face before next time! We are all bringing them when we meet in May so that we can take a picture of our challenge quilts together. They are all so different but incorporated fabrics from all of our stashes.

The CB quilt show committee met for the first time Thursday night. We felt we had a productive meeting and have chosen a theme and laid the groundwork for next time. We are going to focus on modern quilts this time, including art quilts. If you live in our area and want to help plan this event please let me know!

A quilty Sunday...

My quilting group decided to do a little challenge project awhile back. We swapped a bunch of odd size pieces and were to make something with them. We could add to them if we wanted, but needed to use most of them if possible. I had a hard time getting started on it to begin with...lots going on and I just wasn't inspired about what I wanted to do. After much thought, I decided to make braids, so took them with me on my Feb. quilting retreat.

 I cut all the odds and ends of fabrics from the swap into strips, then used my HexNMore ruler to cut them into half hexies. It is so easy to make braids this way that I quickly got them sewn together, and surrounded them with white sashings. I hadn't taken anything along for a border,  so dug through my fabrics when I got home to see what I had that would work.

This red paisley seemed just perfect for some reason so I went with it. I used one of my older pantos, Tumble and quilted it Sunday with white thread. It's a smaller quilt, about 47 x 58.

I had enough  of this floral fabric left over from another quilt for the backing and will use the red border fabric for the binding. It's made, just needs to be attached. My group meets Thursday night, so I will probably work on the binding then and have some show and tell for them!

The inspectors are always around to give their opinion and pose for a picture.

Talk about challenges....

I took my challenge bag from the fabric swap I did with friends a few months ago along on my retreat. You might remember that we all brought fabrics of different sizes with the guidelines and we had to make something out of it. I had some trouble deciding what to make plus have been busy with other things. So I decided it was time to get busy on it.

I cut it all into 2 1/2" strips and then cut those into half hexies. I sewed them into 2 long braids, then cut each in half. I had about 36" of braid in each row after trimming.

I had taken white along to put in between the rows. I think it adds some clarity to the busyness of all those scraps.

I like it! I hadn't taken along anything to border it with, but when I got home last night I tried out several fabrics I had here.

So far this is the winner. It's a reddish paisley. I don't think I want anything multicolored, though not sure.

Here is a close up of the design, though the color isn't right in this picture. It's not this goldish.

Cindy is in the same challenge group and I posted pix of her blocks in progress awhile back. She finished her blocks and put them together on retreat. We all loved it!

Now for our RETREAT challenge.....

We like to play games while on retreat. We play the L-C-R dice game with fat quarters. It's fun and someone ends up with 6 fat quarters at the end of each game. We also play Trader's Dice, which is fun because there are no losers....everyone ends up with whatever you are trading. Last year we each took 10 width of fabric 2 1/2" strips, cut them in half and played with them every time we played Trader's Dice. The challenge came after we got home...using them to make a project that we would show at the next retreat. I procrastinated until about a month ago, but made this cute snap bag with mine. It's got the strips in the lining too. I used them all and didn't use any other fabric except for the point in front.

Diana made each of us a soothing eye patch that can be heated or frozen .  They are filled with good smelling scent and flax seed.

Rose made this cute quilt sign for her quilt room.

Here is Dianne's bag....she had it started so it was her first finish on the retreat.

Cindy finished hers on the retreat too. We all loved it...and thought she did such a good job that she could make each of us one too.

I will share more of my retreat pictures through the week. 

Ahhhh.....retreat....

 Our retreat is in full swing and we're having a great time. I worked on finishing the mystery quilt, so I worked in another room most of yesterday to keep the mystery a secret. I was glad to have the blocks put together late in the afternoon so I could join the others. I could hear all of the conversation, but wanted to join in. It was a great motivator!

They were busy all day! Diana is working on a sampler quilt...she really wants to finish it this morning.

Dianne made a microwave bowl....and finished her challenge project.

We swapped 2 1/2" half strips last time, so challenged ourselves to make something...I forgot to take pictures of all of them, so I will do that later, but here are Cindy and Dianne's projects!

Cindy finished her challenge project....

nice!

Rose is working on her ZigZag quilt. She got the blocks put together already this morning, but I don't have a picture of it yet.

I made two microwave bowl potholders....I love them! You can get the pattern here.

I also started cutting the fabrics from my OTHER  challenge...so will be working on it soon. Breakfast is ready...gotta go!