Off on another adventure

It's amazing what one can pack in a car if one has the desire!

I'm off on retreat this week - and I have high expectations.

The blue fabric bowl is full of scraps from recent quilts that are waiting to be "tamed" with my Go Cutter - that's what all the green things are - dies for my cutter.

See, I dearly love scrap quilts. And I hope to put together a really wild and wonderful one this week.

I've also brought several project boxes (far left) with UFO's to choose from. You can never have too many projects when you go out of town on retreat...cuz ya'never know what mood you'll wake up in and which project will catch your fancy that particular day.

Notice the drawer system in the middle? Well, that top draw is all my 2.5 strips and it just seemed easier to bring my drawer system (there are four drawers) with some of my fabric stash and work out of the back of my car instead of trying to pack things in a suitcase and lug it all in...

And behind all this is two suitcases with fabric bolts so I'd have some yardage to choose from as I work through my scraps.

Today's project was a UFO - I had already completed all the blocks from Debbie Maddy's Simple Stars Beautiful Quilts book - the pattern Broken Star - I adapted it to be cut with the Go Cutter and actually pieced the blocks using Bonnie Hunter's Leader and Ender technique - in other words, the blocks were pieced as I worked through other quilts (customer t-shirt quilts over the past few months). My goal this afternoon was to use the design walls at the retreat center for the proper layout. A task that took much longer than I anticipated, but happily accomplished while chatting with my fellow retreaters.

The beauty of a retreat is not only having uninterrupted time to work on personal projects, but to share the journey with my fellow quilters. Everyone works on something of their own...some are finishing up a project previously started while others have chosen a new project just for the week.

We love to celebrate the "ta-da" moments when someone has all their blocks together. It's a shame she forgot the border fabric. Oh well, on to the next project!

I can almost guarantee by the end of the retreat this t-shirt quilt will come together very nicely.

Mission accomplished for day one - by 10:30 PM the interior of this quilt is now complete. I too forgot the border fabric, so it's still a UFO, regardless, I'm a happy camper!

Stay tuned....there's more to come!