Down the rabbit hole..............

 

Another excellent day! It's so warm that I didn't even wear a jacket when I walked the girls in the morning. Summer is around the corner! But first -let's enjoy spring. And yes - I was out in the gazebo yesterday. I think I might need to install a hammock in there! A little bar fridge and well - I could live in that darn gazebo! It's my favorite place, to say the least. 

I had some computer work to do, so I wasn't totally slacking off while enjoying the sun. I had some research to do and found exactly what I was looking for. Now I have a wee bit of homework ahead of me, and I'm good to go! All in the name of learning and keeping ahead of the students! 

You cannot help but be entertained by the girls. They are hilarious, and well, one of them is definitely an attention seeker. Do you know which one? I don't think we even need to say her name - we all know who I'm talking about. I swear she's so intelligent and yet...................

We don't have much for plants in the backyard, yet Murphy thinks this little flower bed is for her! 

Mom, Can I lay here?

NO Murphy - plants are growing there. 

How about here? Can I lay here? 

NO -- plants are growing there as well. 

Mom, can we play hide and seek? Can you find me?

Yes, Murphy, I can see you - barely, but I know you're there because you made so much noise getting there. 

You can't see me!!!

And even Murphy needs some major downtime! And her stress bear is never far away. 

Mom -- look, no plants! 

It's along this side of the house that she can look into the studio windows and see me. And she knows to do that! 

What a big goof! Actually, she likes to sit beside the house in the trees because she thinks she's going to catch a rabbit that lives under the deck! Oh, Murphy!

When we were in the forest yesterday, I noticed that the rocks are still there, but the bookcase was gone. And there was a city truck driving through the forest. Not sure if they were checking for gatherings - they did when we had our initial lock-down or just checking for maintenance things. Anyway, the bookcase was gone. 

The bookcase is gone

But look at the forest - isn't it glorious?? 

The forest

 I realize there are no leaves on the trees, but the buds are there! We are just so fortunate to have this space so close to the house. Well, it's right behind our backyard fence! And that green space, more than the house, was the selling feature for me! 

Now the rabbit hole? Nope - that's not for the rabbit that lives in the backyard. It's for The Quilt Show website. I signed up for the 7-day free trial, which will kick into a year-long subscription in a week. Oh boy --- I watched two shows from the 400 series. So much to learn from all these quilters! It's well worth the $50 US for the year. I just need to REMEMBER to watch!! Then I found the current block of the month, sew along (which I won't be doing), more classes from a ton of teachers, and well - that will keep me entertained for a LONG, LONG time. 

And I have some of our own material from SVP that provides HOURS of entertainment and learning. Yes - it's time to get glued to the computer screen and put the audiobooks away. At least for a little bit. No podcasts yesterday, although I subscribed to a new one - thanks to a reader!!!

I managed to get the quilt top together. OK - it's almost together. I'm working on the borders. Half of the inner border is done, and the rest is ready to go right after our walk. I'll finish it easily today. I see it's raining outside, so I might have to stay inside all day. I've got videos lined up - I'm good!!!!

I got half of one of the Snail's Trail blocks done. These are my mini design boards!

Pieces for the Snail's Trail blocks

And can you tell me where this red thread came from? Seriously - I'm not working on anything red!

The red thread from nowhere

I got more paperwork out of the way, and I'm good! Not exactly as much fun or as productive as the sewing retreat, but that's OK. Things are getting done, and that's all I care about. 

Look what got delivered to my door yesterday. A gorgeous embroidered mask!! I've already tested it out as I had to go to the post office - AGAIN this week. Thanks, Diane!!!!

Embroidered mask

Yep - I'm almost on a first-name basis with the lady at the post office. Amazingly, there is almost always someone in the line either before or after me. People are sending tons of stuff!!! 

On that note, I'm out of here! I need to finish up this quilt top, make the binding, and get the backing done so it can go on the long arm. This one doesn't have to be totally finished for a month, but it would be nice to get it done. Then I need to get to work on that other one that is due on Monday. And I'll try to limit my time in the backyard! HA!! OK -- I can take the computer out there and watch videos! 

 Have a super day!!!!

Ciao!!!!

Seek and you shall find

 

Well, I had a moment of excitement yesterday. We had our machine embroidery class on the weekend, and we're talking about stabilizers because stabilizers are very important to machine embroidery. I suggested that we make samples, so I had dug out some rolls of stabilizers and made some samples for me!

Then I remembered in my drawer of stabilizers where I have many samples - perhaps some of those could be used rather than cutting into the rolls. Oh boy - be careful what you ask for! Look what I found. 

This stack is made up of SAMPLE packs that I have from three different companies. Well, I don't need the duplicates, so those will be given to someone else in our club. But seriously?? Why did I NEED so many samples? But at least, with all the cleaning and sorting, they were all in the sample place, and well - that just warmed my heart!

Sample packs of stabilizer

I store my rolls of stabilizer in a tub on top of that set of drawers, but here are the packs I've purchased over the years. Lots of different types!!!

A drawer filled with stabilizers

But then it got worse (better?). Look what I found. A stabilizer workbook that I paid $50 for! I sure hope that was Canadian rather than in US dollars. There are all kinds of exercises to do in the book, and all the fabrics and stabilizers are already included. AHA - I see I have something to keep me busy for a while. 

A stabilizer workbook

Then I found a Stabilizer Guide Wheel by Inspira. How neat is that? The type of fabric you want to embroider is on the outside, and you spin the wheel to see what stabilizer you need to use. I don't even remember buying this - it was years ago. They don't sell this any longer, and I'm not sure that it's totally up-to-date with all the stabilizers, but I'm sure most of what I would want is on the wheel. 

Stabilizer guide

I'm not done - I found a book on Inspira Stabilizers. All of the stabilizers and how to use them are in the book. Who knew that I had that? 

A book on stabilizers

So here's the thing - before we go off on a wild race to acquire something, perhaps we should look in our own studios?? In the old filing method (which was non-existent), I would never have found all this. But in mere seconds, I found a whole pile of handy information. More lunchtime reading!

Yesterday was Monday sewing, and I LOVE Monday sewing. We all get along, we have a lot of fun, Zoom allows other people to join who could never come to our physical sessions, and well - it's just the best. I managed to get some quilts trimmed, and the batting scraps dealt with. 

Then it was time to choose something to sew. I really should have been working on something with a priority, but no, I did not. Well, that's not true - M had asked me to make her a couple of masks, and I want to get her quilt in the mail, so I worked on the masks. They were, in fact, a priority, and they were on the current projects table.  

Two beautiful ones with red roses on them. Thanks to Mary, they have nose clips in them, and I bought the adjustable pieces of elastic from Oh Look Fabric. I love that I didn't have to buy a HUGE pack of them, I bought four sets, and I have one leftover at the moment. 

Two masks for M

Then a bit of a search to find the fabric to make a mask for DH. I knew it was on my current project table, but I couldn't find it on the first pass. I almost gave up and then thought I'd try again. Oh yes - there is was, stuck to a piece of batting. Obviously, I can't cut well, I needed to fussy cut the fabric, and I goofed on the first piece. So I decided to get creative and make half the mask with the fancy fabric (the wrongly cut part is on the inside), and the other half is black. I think it looks great and makes the novelty print stand out. 

Star Trek mask

So that's it for mask making for a while. Like I said, I have the fancy elastic pieces for one more mask and a few extra nose pieces. 

After we finished with Monday, it was off for the afternoon walk. And then back to the house for a snack. I decided to have a healthy snack and made myself a smoothie in the Vitamix. 

Making a smoothie in the Vitamix

Well, it turned out that I had to eat it with a  spoon. When I was putting the frozen raspberries in, a few too many fell in, and it was definitely too thick to drink with a  straw. That's OK - it was yummy -- almond milk, almond butter, protein powder, and frozen raspberries. 

My thick smoothie

Look who has a new job!! Yes - that is Mr. Bear, and he even has his tie on!!! The little monkey - he is so darn cute!!! 

Mr. Bear - ready for work

M starts a new job today from home, and here's her view from her desk. OK - so I'm super jealous. That looks gorgeous, and she can see the mountains from another direction. She's been on a cleaning kick just like me!! Yep - the apple didn't fall far from the tree at our houses! Good luck, M, on your first day!!!! 

M's desk ready for work

I'm in Toronto! Well, you all knew that! But on my walk across Canada, I'm now in Toronto and currently on the 400, which is a stupidly huge highway. The Google car must have gone down the road on a holiday as the road is practically empty. Usually, the highway, all 16 lanes (in some points), is jammed with cars and trucks. 

The 400 in Toronto

I see it snowed overnight, and it's a snow day! Seriously?? It doesn't look like that much snow, but I guess in light of many people not knowing how to drive in the snow, they canceled schools. 

I need to take a picture of the living room and all the quilts. M asked me yesterday if they were still sitting on the floor. Ah no. They are all over the house. I needed to take some pictures for one of my upcoming guild presentations, and well, it's like a hurricane went through that room. Piles and piles of quilts are everywhere!!

Let's just say that I was no longer cold after an hour of moving quilts around and taking pictures. I actually had to take my sweatshirt off, which is unheard of at my house!!

OK -- the more that I use the Google calendar and the task list, I love it. I can add items from my phone. I used to send myself an e-mail and then ignore it, but now the task comes up, and I see it on a list. Oh my -- I'm in love with that!!!!

So it's going to be a busy rest of the week. I have six store presentations, one guild presentation, and two classes, plus one presentation to sit in on. Oh yes - busy!!!  I'm partially prepped for them all, but some last-minute touches, which take forever! to add. 

I'll try to squeeze some time to go through more receipts, but now I'm hooked on reading a physical book about the justice (or lack thereof) system in the US. Wow -- it's unbelievable what has happened to people and how biased the judicial system is with less than model citizens.  

So what do you want to clean today? How about your stabilizers if you are into machine embroidery? Even if you do not do machine embroidery, you should have a stabilizer around the house, especially if you do machine applique. Gather the bits and pieces. Store them in bags or however you want, but take stock of what you have. You might even have some of those sample packs that I have. 

On that note, I'm off to trudge through the snow. The girls are currently outside, happily playing in the snow. I do not understand why they need to shuffle around the HUGE block on a leash, but if they don't go for a walk, they are depressed. 

Have a super day!!!!

Ciao!!!

Parting is such sweet sorrow

 Yep - today, Bear and M will be leaving. They have a mid-morning flight to catch. I'm sad to see them go - it's been great fun to have them here, even though Bear has totally thrown my routine off! He gets one more walk this morning before he has to be bundled up into his carrier - he's NOT going to be happy about that. 

M and Little Bear

Yum!!! Slurp!  Yum!!

He is so darn slow. No - that's not true exactly. He's unpredictable. One day, he runs the entire time we're out, and the next, he dawdles. 

At least my girls are predictable! And they like routine - they are NOT going to be happy that Bear gets to go first this morning. 

And then it'll be time to get back to reality and back to routines and back to work!

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree with my kid. I tend to spread out everywhere I go, except when I travel. For whatever reason, I keep my things in my suitcase when I travel. It's harder to lose stuff that way. M? Oh no - her things got scattered all over the upstairs. I think she was up all night trying to get everything back into the suitcase. 

And we had some things to do together, but that got left until yesterday. But it did get done.  

I shouldn't say much since I had to make a couple of masks for her to take back, and YES - I finished them yesterday afternoon!. But making two masks is a lot easier than the tasks that she had to do. These are the 3-D masks. I watched the tutorial on the Thimbles and Things website. But instead of elastic, I used a strip of T-shirt material to make a tie. 

Two masks 

I have a couple more to make for her, but I'm looking for the adjustable elastics and the wire nose strips. I found small quantities of both at local shops, so hopefully, they'll just put them into an envelope for me. I do NOT want to do a porch pick up for either. 

I made excellent progress on my Cherrywood Challenge quilt. There's a lot of precise work in the piece, and my Husqvarna Viking Designer EPIC 2 did NOT disappoint. And it went through layers and layers of fabric without a glitch. I should be able to finish the quilt top today and get myself organized for quilting it tomorrow. 

Or if I'm really ambitious, it would be great to get it quilted today and put the binding on during Monday sewing. I'll see how it goes. It's pretty tedious, but the end result looks amazing. 

But I plugged in another audiobook, and I listened away. I finished the book yesterday and ready to start a new one today. I have three waiting to be read and nine on hold. The trick is to not have all nine come in at once. They are scheduled a week or so apart, but if someone returns a book early, then it ends up coming to be me early! 

Oh well, lots of sewing ahead, I guess. And let's not forget the jigsaw puzzle. Here's where I am. 

The status of my jigsaw puzzle

I managed to get the easiest part together. This is NOT an easy puzzle as the pieces fit in multiple places. I can't wait to pass this one along! I'm trying to get that steering wheel done, but it's so narrow that it's quite the challenge. I may change to the sky section - that might be easier!

I have two favorite puzzle companies - Ravensburger and Heyes. My all-time favorite is the Heyes puzzles. They have a huge variety of puzzles, and some are so detailed with crazy cartoon scenes. It's hilarious to work on them. They are also NOT easy to do. I have about 5 or 6 of them waiting to be done. I just checked out the catalog for 2021. OH - so many that I would want, but I'm NOT buying them. Not when I have a huge stack of puzzles waiting to be done. 

You could go crazy doing these puzzles and searching for them online. STOP!! I don't need anymore! But it appears that there are a couple of puzzle-loving quilters near me, and guess what? When I'm done with my puzzles, they are being passed along!

Looks like I'm going to have to step up the pace at which I do these puzzles so I can justify buying a new one! 

I need to do some embroidery designs that will take a LONG time to do, so I best get started on them today. At least that can work on its own (well, that's a lie), but I'll be downstairs working on my Cherrywood Challenge. 

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!!!

On pins and needles

 

Another GREAT day! I don't care what the rules are - having people to talk to is important! Whether that talking is via Zoom, on the phone, or in person. If you're NOT getting out or connecting with people, you NEED to do that. It's important for your mental health. And it's going to be even more important as winter arrives and people tend to cocoon inside their homes. 

I've found a good way to multi-task. I plug my headphones in, and I make calls while I'm on my afternoon walk. I have to laugh as this has TWICE resulted in a much longer walk for me! I went to the grocery store earlier this week and yesterday. I took the long way to get there, but when I arrived, the conversation wasn't over, so I went around the block, and by the time I arrived at the store, the conversation was finished! That's hilarious! But guess what? I accomplished two things - talked to a customer and got in my walk, and both are important to me. When time is at a premium, why not? 

So go for a walk, take your phone and a set of earbuds and get on the phone and yak to someone. It works!! Call someone you've wanted to call for a while but haven't got around to it. Call someone you haven't talked to in a while. Trust me - there are people out there that need this connection! 

I'm making great progress on all of my Virtual Walking challenges, and I'll share that in a few days! But the excitement is building for the grand finale!

Yesterday was another GOOD news day. I had one presentation last night and ZERO issues with the internet. As a matter of fact, when I did my slideshow, there was ZERO lag on the slides. The second that I changed the slide, it changed for the participants. Are we out of the woods? No idea, but things are looking up! And all it took was a new wire! I almost felt "let-down" after the presentation because things went so smoothly! And I got some feedback that I'm much more comfortable with all the camera switching. Oh yes -- I even did a LIVE demo of ruler work last night. I'm good, and I LOVE IT!

I did get some serious sewing done yesterday, but I don't have much to share with you as I was working on homework, and it's only fair that the class sees the work FIRST. Can you believe that I'm working on the LAST blocks of ALL the new projects that I undertook this year? The last ones!! I'm so impressed that I was able to keep up. 

I was putting the last border on Aviatrix Medallion this morning. I had JUST enough fabric for the border. Yeah!   Two of the borders are on the quilt. The other two are pinned in place. I had sewn the second to last border on, but I didn't pin it very well, so I'm in the process of ripping it out. It won't take long to get those two side borders sewn on, then onto the backing and the binding, and this one will get put to bed BEFORE the end of the class, which is next month! 

The piece on the right is all that was left after the border was cut

I did finish this block from Summer Moon. This is from the homework for last month, and yes, there is a LOT of little pieces in this block. The half-square triangle section is 5" unfinished. So that's teeny. The rest of the blocks are now cut and ready to sew, and some of them are done! 

Summer Moon block

I also got my barn block sewn for this month. I think I might have to dig out a slightly darker grey. That one is a bit wimpy, but I'm not changing it! And now to buy the ingredients to make the cookies! I know - me baking cookies?? 

Barn quilt block

I still have a couple of blocks cut out and ready to go, and I hope to get the blocks on the bottom tray done later today. I've got three events today, so I'll have to work around that, and I MUST not forget my UFO homework, which is due on Sunday. 

Blocks ready to sew

I was the recipient of a Halloween mask! I love the BEWARE across the front. I need to wear that when I'm in a bad mood! Oh - it doesn't show in the picture very well, but they put the elastic on the side with the little toggle, so it's easy to adjust! Thanks so much!!!!

My Halloween mask

You know how we tend to let things slide. Something isn't working just right, and instead of fixing it, we just live with it. Well, I've been living with these horrible pins for months. I'm talking about the red, white, and blue star pins. They are huge and would make horrible holes in my work. They must go. So I'm going to remove them today. I'm not sure what I'll do with them since I do NOT want to use them for any fabric - they are HUGE. But I'm sure I'll find some use for them. If anyone wants them or has a suggestion about what to do with them - let me know. 

My pincushion

Those pins are a good example of FREE stuff. I received those pins when I had reached a certain level of buying at Missouri Star a couple of years ago. So yes, the pins were "free," although I'm sure I bought them several times over with the amount I purchased. But the pins are cheap and horrible. So was this free gift really a free gift? NO - it's useless!!! And that's the story with many free things - they are cheap, they are stuff that we'll never use. So they become clutter in our house! We need to STOP wanting to get free stuff because, in most cases - it becomes clutter!!

M sent me this next picture that she found on Facebook or somewhere. Everyone, at some point in their life, has had one of these. I no longer have one. But I loved them; however, I love my magnetic pincushion much better. 

The Tomato pincushion!

I've been sewing up a storm with enders and leaders. I take the little cut off pieces from bindings or narrow borders and sew them together. Now I have TWO big stacks that are sewn, but I need a serious trimming session. 

Ender and leaders that need to be pressed and trimmed

I have two ironing boards set up, and each one has a pile waiting to be pressed and trimmed. I should add that to the trimming of those double wedding rings arcs, which is going very slowly!!!

More pressing and trimming

So it's official!!! You can now purchase the pattern for the quilt that I designed for Quilts of Valour. Check out their website for all the patterns that you can purchase. My pattern is flexible. You can make the blue/red/cream version on the cover, OR you can save time and put a panel in the center. Very clever!! It's a straightforward pattern to make, and all the proceeds are donated to Quilts of Valour. I did not and will not receive any compensation for the pattern. I'm excited that that project is done! 

I'm still not out of the woods with paperwork - I have some e-mails that need to be sent out this morning and more due soon. I have a busy weekend, but I'll try to fit some of it, so it doesn't become URGENT. That's when it's no longer fun!

Don't forget the CQA Auction of the Trend-Tex challenge pieces. I see many of the pieces have at least an opening bid on them. Will there be fast and furious last minute bidding?? That's the problem with silent auctions. I hate the flurry of activity at the end! And I've been known to threaten people if they want to outbid me! Just kidding - it was a friendly threat!!

That's it for me this morning!! Lots to do, and I'd better get started! 

Have a super day!!!!

Ciao!!

Even a little bit is better than none!

What do you do when you decide the morning of your workshop that you NEED new samples? 

You get your butt in gear! That's what!!!

I'm teaching a workshop on basic quilt building blocks this morning at 9:30 AM. I dug out my old samples and thought I could just use those. Then I thought I could kill two birds with one stone. Make new samples that I can use as a step out plan live. But hey - why not take pictures, and then they can be used in a PowerPoint presentation, and if I write them up in a handout, they can be used over and over again. 

Yep - so that's what I did this morning! I'm not quite finished, and I haven't tested the location of my cameras, so the girls will have to have an abbreviated walk this morning. I'm good with that, and I know they'll be fine as well. Thank goodness, they don't have any sense of time! They're just happy to get out!

I suppose I could make a video, but I don't think this will translate well to video. You want to see STEP by STEP and who wants to keep starting and stopping a video. OK -- it would work just fine. I just don't need a video as well. 

I edited a ton of pictures, and they just need to be loaded in some PowerPoint presentations. I need to learn to load those files in the cloud instead of putting them on a USB to move files between computers. ACK!!! I know I have a ton of storage space in the cloud, and where is it?? I'd better find it and quick!! I might resort to the USB this morning in the essence of time. 

Thankfully, my computer files are more or less sorted in an orderly way. There's a lot that could be deleted, and I do need to take some time to make that happen. It's all clutter, but at least you can't see that clutter!

I didn't get the entire container of paperwork sorted through yesterday, but I did manage to eliminate some stuff, and a little bit is BETTER than none. A lot of it seems to be stuff I collected at Quilt Market. Well, I guess I don't really need to keep any of that anymore. But I found three patterns in the and a few other things. More sorting later today. 

We had our mini Sit and Sew yesterday and it's always fun to chat in person. Claudette made herself another mask. I love this one. 

Claudette's new mask

You probably can't see very well, but she put crystals on the eyes! It looks amazing! And now the new fashion statement is say "I like your mask!". Nice job Claudette!

Crystals in the eyes on the mask

Lynn was working on her mystery quilt blocks from Border Creek, as well as Christmas Fig. But Little Bear had other ideas for her. He just loved to sit on her lap and next thing, Lynn was sewing away and Little Bear was quite happy to just lie on her lap. He's so spoiled!!  So is he looking at me, saying HAHA, or is he looking at the bag of treats??? 

Little Bear as a lap dog

I got a lot of work done in the morning, but once noon hit, the phone didn't stop ringing and I was running around like an idiot. I still accomplished stuff. I finished ALL the B arcs for the Double Wedding Ring that had been started. That was a nice accomplishment. Then I decided to forge ahead and finish all the ones that were not started. I'll need them for the second quilt and might as well do all the same bits at the same time. There were three sheets that had to be cut apart. 

The sheets of paper pieced sections

I did that after the others left. I opened up a new audiobook. Oh my - this one is going to be good as well. I know what I'll be doing this afternoon. Listening to an audiobook! It's called The Wives by Tarryn Fisher. So far, I'm intrigued. 

Now here's a mystery. On those papers, you can see there are six arcs - three of A and three of B. There was a second side to that sheet as well. So technically, there should be six of A and six of 6 on each sheet. Three sheets times six equals 18? Well, I seem to have only 16 of each. I don't know. I must have been having a moment yesterday!!

Well, doesn't matter, I'm going to get them sewn. . 

Here are the arcs that I cut from the sheets

I started to sew the first pieces on - well, that's a lie. I did some cutting and I sewed fabrics to ONE arc to get the concept of how the first two pieces of fabric get sewn on. I trimmed one of the quilts that I quilted last week and that was it for me for the day!!!

I'm also trying to keep up with the walking goal of 10 - 12 KM a day. We usually go out for dinner on Friday night, so I decided to walk home from the restaurant last night. It's only about 1.5 away. That worked just fine. I should have been doing that all summer when it was hot!! I actually resorted to long pants last night! NOOOOOOO

That's it for today. After my workshop, I get to play with more sample making. Yeah!!

Have a super day!!!

Ciao!!

The Virtual Retreat - DayTwo

I know that some of you are missing in-person visits with family and friends - the sit and sew days, the laughter, the camaraderie, the sharing of stories. Well, I can't say that I'm missing that at all. While the Virtual Retreat isn't the same as seeing people in person, it comes pretty darn close.

To be honest, I kind of like the whole virtual thing. Why? Loads of reasons - where else would we be able to visit with people all the way from Germany to Vancouver Island and loads of places in between? Nowhere else. Where else would we be able to share our sewing spaces? Nowhere else. And where else would we be able to sew with friends and not have to bring our sewing machines and supplies? Nowhere else. No packing, no forgetting your cord to the sewing machine or some other important tool or supply, you get to have a nap or go shopping or make dinner for your family, and when you're done, you can come back to the group.

What about those that don't drive or would never come out for a day, but would pop in to say HI. Oh, yes - I love the Zoom thing. I think the others are as well because I got asked if I was hosting the Virtual Retreat in August? I hadn't even thought that far ahead. However, it's now booked - the weekend of August 22 and 23. Mark it in your calendar and come and join us - even if it's just to say hi. It's so much fun.

I don't know how many people in total stopped by - some stayed the entire day, and some just popped in to say HI. That's perfectly OK - whatever works with your schedule.

OH - and where else can you track the weather? Sure - you've got an app, but there's nothing like getting a visual from locations around our province, letting you know when the rain, wind, tornado warnings have hit. Yep- yesterday was a pretty stormy day. It was hot in Berlin and Vancouver Island as well - 30 degrees. So this crazy weather is everywhere.

This is a picture of the trees in my backyard. I didn't even know I took that picture. It's hard to see, but the wind was blowing like mad, the rain was driving down in torrents and well - it was dark and very stormy. Unfortunately, from our house, we can't really see the skyline, but some of the cloud pictures I saw afterward were pretty spectacular.

The wind and the rain

Besides all the crazy stories and laughter, loads of work got completed. Heather hand-stitched the binding on a QUEEN sized quilt. I wonder if she got that hand massage or just the ice packs? Jane was binding some quilts by machine, Shelly was making rope bowls.

Shelly's rope bowls

Morgan and Kathy were working on their Christmas Fig homework. And there was so much else being done!!!!

Katheleen made more masks. She is now up into the hundreds (600++) of masks that she's made for her local senior organizations. She now has strict instructions to take a break for a while. That's a lot of mask making. It can be draining and take the fun completely out of sewing. Great job, Katheleen!!! You've done a great job and deserve a break!

Katheleen's last set of 35 masks

There were three long arm quilters on the call, and we hung around after the others left at 8 PM. We had a great chat about the differences and similarities of our machines - yep - we each have a different machine (from three different companies). Sharing of good practices - it was awesome. Thanks, Carol and Karen!!!

We also got to chatting about jelly roll rugs. I promised that I'd post the pictures of the ones that I've made. This is the one that made headlines in the industry. I think everyone (OK - so I'm exaggerating) made one of these. It's the oval rug designed by RJ Designs. There is so much "noise" on the internet about these rugs that I can't find her original site.

The oval jelly roll rug

Then there was the rectangular rug. Made the same way with the batting filled tubes. But sewn in rows, not in an oval. Same pattern designer.

Rectangular rug

And then years ago, I made this rug which is made with the batting filled tubes, but you make blocks and then stitch the blocks together. This pattern is by Auntie's Two Patterns.

A block style rug made with batting tubes

Here's the pattern number from the Auntie's Two website.

All these rugs, of course, are reminiscent of the rag rugs that were made years ago. NOTHING is new. I have two more balls of batting stuffed tubes, all ready to sew into two oval rugs. But no time for that.

I also made a few promises for the next Virtual Retreat. OH NO - how did that happen?? Well, I plan to take most of August off. But seriously - what does that mean? OH - I have no blog posts for QUILTsocial to write, no magazine quilt due until September 8, a few customer quilts that can be delayed until September if they don't get done before the end of this month. NO - I'll still be sewing the entire month of August! Just different things. I'm such a dreamer.

Anyway - I did promise that I'd learn or figure out how to work my hand-cranked sock knitter. I really want to get this thing running. I will leave the book out so I can start to figure out if I even have all the pieces.

The sock knitter book

As for me at the Virtual Retreat - what did I get done? I finished the second quilt for Quilts of Valour. I finished the piecing and threw the top on the long arm, and while we Zoomed, I managed to get that quilt quilted as well. It came off the long arm, and I trimmed it this morning. The binding is ALMOST on. I should have it done in less than 10 minutes.

Putting the binding on the Quilts of Valour quilt

I love having the clock on my sewing machine. I glanced at it while sewing that binding on and realized that I was going to run out of time.

The clock on the Designer EPIC 2

The quilt is still in the machine, and once my morning chores are over, I'll get it finished. I need to put a sleeve on it, but that'll have to wait. I'll hang it up with my hook system and take a picture. That's all that's required for the moment. The second quilt made with a different fabric collection is draped over the long arm, and I hope to get that custom quilted this week.

Because we hung out so long on the Zoom call, I didn't get in a very long walk. But I did manage to hit the Manitoba border on my virtual walk across Canada. That's exciting - one more province gone.

Just crossed the border into Manitoba 

I need to start booking some Virtual Classes for the fall. I'll be doing that shortly and let you know all about them. I have actually booked events on my calendar starting in September. That's awesome and relatively easy to schedule because I don't have to allow travel time. I need to purchase a couple more pieces of equipment before I'm up and running to my standard.

And a HUGE thank you to everyone who stopped by the Virtual Retreat - I had a blast and hope you did as well. See you in August!!!   Welcome to Anita who got her video and audio working. It was great to see you this time!!!  I can't wait to see your tumbling block quilt FINISHED or at least progress made on it in August.

If you couldn't get the videos to work yesterday, you have to click the small arrow in the bottom left corner of each screen. Actually, I think you have to hit the big PLAY arrow in the middle and that brings up the small PLAY arrow in the bottom left corner. Have a look - Carol did a great job with those banners.

On that note, I'm out of here. I have a "few" things that need to be done this week. After this week, my schedule is almost completely empty. How does that happen that everything hits at the same time? Well, I'm lying - you all know that because the moment that something gets done, something else pops up!


Have a super day!!!!


Ciao!!!!