Sewing Retreat - Day Two

Day two is finished and done!!  Oh my goodness - I heard somewhere that children laugh about 400 times a day. Adults about 15. Well - I guess that means we've all reverted to our childhood while we're here. The laughter is hilarious!!!  And what we talk about at retreat - well that stays at the retreat, but this is such a great way to connect, to relax and to just have plain old fun which, to me, is what life should be all about.

If I could have my way, I'd be at sewing retreat for the rest of my life. We often talk about what we would do if we won the lottery - we'd make a permanent retreat house! Yep - that would be awesome. The only problem would be - how big to make it? I know that we could fill it. And the best part is that for almost all the retreats I've organized, we've never had any major issues with a participant. There were one or two people that were not asked back, but seriously - out of almost 40 retreats I've organized? I think that's a pretty good rate.

I popped out in the early morning for a bike ride. I managed to ride 30K which is a perfect distance to ride just for fun. The roads around here are not bad traffic wise, unless you decide to drive past the quarry. The truck traffic from the quarry is unbelievable and of course, there's a massive hill to climb, no shoulder and you've got trucks passing you. Not my favorite part of that road. However, there are lots of other roads which I shall explore this morning.

I popped out for a couple of errands as well - I was back to Fabricland to get some different colors of threads. OK - so I'm not sure what the heck happened to me when I was packing, but I packed all sorts of projects, but guess what? Barely any tools and I think I left the box of sewing machine feet on the ironing board. That means I have my 1/4" piecing foot and that's it!!!  Fortunately, Sacha has the same brand of machine and had a zipper foot so I was able to get a couple of zippered pouches made.

But not before, I spent a good part of the day fiddling with a tote bag. The tote bag has been sitting for about 1 1/2 years. It was partially cut out. So now it has pockets with velcro fasteners, and it's even quilted. It looks awesome.

Alice in Wonderland tote bag

I stole this photo from Facebook, but since it's my photo - I guess that's OK.

If you want to make this tote bag - the instructions are on QUILTsocial. Search for "quilted tote bag by Elaine Theriault". I'd share the link, but it takes a while to connect to various sites on the internet from this location so I'm not going to bother. You can do that search. But that tutorial is very detailed - you'll have no problems making it. OH - you could come to a class at Oh Look Fabric in Milton where you'll have a lot more fun than doing it by yourself at home.

Did you notice the Alices' on the tote bag? I did NOT pay attention to how I cut the two sides and they are pretty much identical and centered. A total fluke - I mean - I meant it like that!!!

Once that tote bag was finally finished, I moved onto something fast and easy. A zippered pouch.

Monster zippered pouch

I don't remember when I did the embroidery for this. It's a free design that comes with the Husqvarna Viking sewing machines. I thought it would be cute to make a zippered pouch. So the pieces were cut and the fusible fleece and Decor Bond were attached. I even had a zipper and the matching thread in the bag. This project had gotten put away and resurfaced when I had the water leak in the basement.

We happened to have Stacy (aka Shelly) with us who is the queen of bags and zippers. So after a wee tutorial and I hear there's going to be a BIG zipper tutorial today, I got the zipper in the bag. Not 100% to my satisfaction, but I was happy.

There was still time before bed so I got out another zippered pouch from my project bag. This was made with leftover fabric from the tote bag that I made when I was writing that tutorial. These pieces were also cut and the fusible fleece and Decor Bond was attached. I had a zipper and I had matching thread.

Second zippered pouch

I was much happier with the zipper this time. If you want to learn tips and tricks for inserting zippers - I think we have a zippered pouch class at Oh Look Fabric.


I've got more pouches on the agenda for today, but I don't have Decor Bond and fusible fleece with me. I'm NOT buying more because I have loads at home. I also need some lining for these pouches so if I can get the outer part done, I'll be happy. Then what I need to do if I'm not going to work on it right away which is very unlikely, then I should prep it so that when it goes in the retreat bag next time - it's going to be ready to sew together.

Honestly, getting anything done is all about prep work. While I did some prep work - it seems that I didn't do enough!!!  I don't normally work on NONpiecing things at the retreat. I've got a few things to learn!


Ronda and Lynn were madly sewing blocks for our Quilts of Valour quilt. I think we now have 24 out of 48 made. We should be able to get that quilt top done! 

Look what pictures I found today. This is the fabric that was in the kit that I completed the first day of the retreat. This busy prints on the left were the focus fabrics in the kit. The dark one on the right was supposed to be the accent, but it would have blended in like crazy. Thank goodness I did NOT use it. I substituted a solid black. And the striped fabric in the background was to be the background of the focus blocks - again - the entire quilt would have been a hot mess. Thank goodness, my design sense kicked in!!!

Fabrics included in the kit

This is an OLD line from Northcott designed by Mark Lipinski. It never ceases to amaze me how the designers do NOT think like quilters. I know Mark was a quilter, but this collection is so busy that without solids, it would be nothing.

Selvage for the fabric from the kit

Oh - look what else I finished when I was at home. This had got pulled out a while back but never finished. So now it's together as a table runner. I have the backing made and I pulled some fabric for the binding which I don't think I had a chance to make before I left. But that will be done when I get back and moved into the "to be quilted" pile.

Table runner - just needs to be quilted

As Ronda and I were digging through those backings in the stash room, you could see that some of them had not been touched in a long time. Look at the dust that had accumulated on this one. Yikes - let's hope that that never happens again!!!!

Dust on the quilt backings

That's it for today. We're having a blast and for those of you who are interested in coming to a future retreat, I'll be in touch with dates. Seriously - this is good therapy and we don't see why we can't write off the cost of the retreat on our income tax as a medical expense. I must say as well, that for what we get, we don't pay much.  Sorry - I can't post the link - but it's Fireside Retreat in Orillia.

On that note, I"m out of here.

Have a super day!!!!


Ciao!!!!!