What happens at Monday sewing

Ah - Monday - my favorite day of the week. It's our Monday sewing day and well, getting together with friends and enjoying a laugh (or two, or three, or - well you know what I mean) and getting a bit of stitching done at the same time. It doesn't get better than that.

I'm making progress on the current piece that I'm hand appliqueing. It's one of the big quilts that we did in our $25 class at The Hobby Horse in 2009!!!!  Yep - if I could clear up those quilts, I'd be laughing. So every stitch moves me that much closer. Once I'm back from my trip to Needle Works in Cochrane, (November 13 and 14) I'll be more or less done with commitments for the year and I'm going to be focusing on getting some of those UFOs done this year. Yep - that's me - ever optimistic that it'll happen.

I'm that much further along than I was at the beginning of the year. I'm happy with my progress.

So what did the others work on yesterday? Loads of stuff - it was a full house and we had quite a few guests. I love the guests!!! We're all becoming one big happy family and that's so exciting!

Lynn is working on her Celtic Solstice blocks that she acquired this past summer. Between four of the Monday group, they collected quite a few blocks.

One of Lynn's Celtic Solstice blocks

Helen Anne is working on some hand applique. Darn it - I think she's way faster than I am - she even does the prep at Monday sewing. Mind you, she probably doesn't "waste" as much time as I do. I think this block is complete or might be missing some embroidery. Now she's working on the U block. U is for underwear. I don't remember the name of the pattern - I have it, but I'm not running downstairs to find it.

Helen Anne's appliqued block

Nancy was hand stitching the binding to a quilt. You got to love those binding clips! I use them for all kinds of things, but NOT binding.

Binding a quilt by Nancy

Sheila was also working on a hand applique project. This was a small quilt by Laundry Basket Quilts. Those butterflies are super cute and she's done an amazing job at turning those edges under.

Sheila's butterfly blocks

Joyce was working on her homework for the landscape class this Wednesday. The pattern is called Rough Water Canyon by Quilts and Quirks (Joni Newman). Can't wait to see it finished.

The pieces for Joyce's landscape quilt

Mary is becoming the border queen. And the queen of this colorway. She's been working on this quilt for a fair bit. I do LOVE the colors. The quilt has FOUR borders and I think she got at least three on yesterday. Yeah!!!! Not sure what the pattern was.

Working on the borders for Mary's quilt

Susan was working on a quilt that incorporated several panels. As I'm staring at this, I realize that I WANT this panel. Hmm - before I run off and do something silly, I'd best look in my panel section to see if I haven't already purchased the darn thing.

Susan's wintertime quilt

 Heather was working on her batik block of the month. Nice colors!!!!

Heather's blocks for her Block of the Month

Diane was in a binding mood. She got the binding on this small wall hanging and also on the huge quilt that I quilted for her. These embroidered blocks are from the Christmas Cats pattern by LunchBox Quilts. 

Diane was working on binding 

She also started the borders on another quilt. I took this picture in case she asks me next week what order they are supposed to go in!!!

The order of Diane's borders

Linda was working on some homework so I didn't take a picture of it. You'll see it soon enough. But she made this adorable little basket. I LOVE IT!!!!  I gave her the pattern as I had received a bundle of them. Guess what I threw in my retreat bag? Yep - my copy of the pattern and some foam. The pattern is called Petit Four Baskets by byAnnie.com.  It's a FREE pattern. Oh, shoot - I just downloaded a couple more free patterns.

Linda's little basket

 Jan (crazy Jan) finished up the last border on her 99 bottles quilt. Those nine-patches are teeny tiny. Only Jan could work on a quilt like this. Well, I have my eye on this pattern - actually have had my eye on it for a long time, but there's been no time to make it! It's in a book and I don't remember the name of the book at the moment.

Jan's Ninety-nine bottle quilt

 Kathi was making an advent calendar from Grinch fabric. And instead of putting candy in it, there's a little Grinch that you move as the days progress.

Kathi's Grinch advent calendar

Shoot - I didn't get a picture of what Marg and Judith were working on. I think Marg was working on her homework for our upcoming class so you'll see that in a couple of weeks and Judith was knitting.

When I got home, I realized that I should be quilting. There was already a quilt loaded, so I fired up the machine and tried to come up with something different. So I got this wavy pattern going which is what I wanted. I might not have done it the most efficient way, but it doesn't matter - it's done. And I came up with a whole lot of other ideas as I played with this wavy line.

Quilting a wavy pattern on the long arm

Originally I was going to custom quilt this so I didn't take note of the length of the quilt. However, I decided to use the computer to quilt it and guessed at the length. Not bad for guessing.

Only a teeny bit ran off the edge

Here it is finished. I'm tempted to reload it in the opposite direction and do the same wavy lines. Not sure yet. I don't have time to worry about it at the moment so I've got time to decide. This is the Lilla quilt that we are working on this year at Oh Look Fabric. Our final show n tell is at the end of this month. I'll actually have an almost completed quilt to show and tell. Hell is going to freeze over for sure!

My quilt - DONE

The next quilt is on the long arm and I'll be firing that up pretty soon.

OH  - one of the things that we also did on Monday which was super exciting. We came up with a list of classes for next year!!! Oh my - some pretty exciting stuff and I'll be sharing the schedule with you all in a bit.

I managed to get one side of the binding sewn on this giant quilt for a customer. Since it has to be delivered tomorrow, I'd better get the rest of it done today. Nothing like waiting until the last day to work on things.

Attaching a binding

I still have two quilt blocks to make that I sort of forgot about. They need to be done before I leave tomorrow or I'll tuck myself in the dining room at the retreat and finish them then. Always a little window of opportunity to help with a deadline. In addition to my two classes today, I have a few things that need to be dropped off and picked up. Oh yes - nothing like waiting for the last day.

However, I've managed to amass huge piles of stuff to take to the retreat. Now, how the heck did that happen??  A bag for this project, a bag for that project and before I knew it - there was loads of stuff at the door waiting to be loaded tomorrow morning. I'm OK with that. Better to have too much, than not enough. So little bit by little bit, it'll get done.

I'm going to share this with you as I think it's beautiful. It's a poppy project in Perth, Ontario. Make sure you pop through the six photos at the beginning. I'd love to create a large artwork project. Something that people all over the world could contribute a small piece to. How fun would that be? And we could blog about the progress and the final display. Hmm - any suggestions and what about a location?

Anyway, wear your poppy with pride and remember all those that died to give us the freedom that we experience each and every day. We need to be grateful for that each and every day, not just on November 11.

On that note, I'm out of here. I've got loads to do and the day waits for no one.

Have a super day!!!!

Ciao!!!