Recipe for a fun retreat!

Thanks to everyone for your well wishes on having a great retreat! I'd read your comments while at retreat and just smile at the wonderful virtual quilting guild we have here among us. So here's the recipe to a great four days away...sewing!

Ingredients:

One very nice hotel located in a small mountain community.

Rainy, windy weather outside.

A large room filled with quilters.

Your own little spot. 

Now mix in a little fun and laughter!

Yep! EVERY time you used your seam ripper you had to pay a nickel. I think I put $1.50 worth of nickels into that there little jar. But, darn didn't win the jackpot. Boy that would have totally bumped up my Piggy Bank Challenge contents huh! Bummer!

Using trader's dice, we played using fat quarters. I walked away with these six.

Lucky me, three that I can contribute to the I-Spy swap! This was a fun game.

Oh man, and what is quilter's retreat without a jelly roll race!

I would have never been able to do this without the help of my friend Lori.

Seriously this was kinda hard. I mean I was sweating and my machine was shacking!

But I finished this wonderful little masterpiece in 39 minutes and 36 seconds!

(I was trying to cross my eyes in this picture, but I obviously didn't accomplish that.)

I won a charm pack for coming in second place. YEAH!!

And soon after I received the nickname: "half inch" as my seams fluttered like ruffles as they were soooooo big!! LOL!! One participant even asked: "Don't you have a quarter inch foot." I responded: "Yep. and even an automated 1/4 inch setting." The room rolled in laughter and thus my nickname was created! (Go ahead look closer...so funny!)

It may have turned out smaller than everyone elses, but those seams aren't coming apart!  I'm going to add a black border, back it with some minky and it will make the perfect classroom reading quilt don't ya think. The kids will love it. Oh! Everyone's cracking up in this picture below because my neighbor in the white announced I should turn mine around so we could see all my pretty ruffles!

Fabrics used from left to right: Chipper by Tula Pink, Eden by Tula Pink, Polka Dot by Moda, Hello Darling by Bonnie and Camille.

We both worked on our raw edged flowers/nine patch quilts. Lori layered her flowers in threes and used all pinks and browns.  Pretty huh!

My flowers have four layers and I used a lot of Kim Diehl fabrics and some wovens.

Both of these will be queen size quilts and I think we are both about half way done. Pre-cutting all our flowers and nine patch squares saved the day for sure!

We all went home very happy campers and now need to get unpacked and set up at home.

Thanks again for your well wishes and as you can see, my retreat experience was fun and productive! (Though I don't think we'll get a lot of empathy from our husbands as we now complain about be so tired. Seriously, we never went to bed before midnight!) Speaking of fun. Please do share your favorite retreat memory or/and if you have ever participated in a crazy jelly roll race. 

Tomorrow we'll be rejuvenating  Farmer's Wife posts.