I had a wonderful time at my retreat. I originally planned to write a post on Sunday but decided not to. Writing posts when suffering from sleep deprivation is not a good idea! But now I’m wide awake, most of the laundry is caught up, so here it my report.
We had very nice weather for the first 3 days of the retreat. One of the benefits of having the retreat at the Farmstead Inn is it is close enough to Yoder Department Store and Lolly’s Fabrics that I can easily walk to the stores in “downtown” Shipshe.
The Jane Stickle Quilt retreat is named to honor the
quilt Jane Stickle pieced during the civil war. Elaine Frey’s Jane was on display for the week-end. This quilt was made and gifted to her several years ago by retreat participants. The quilt was a gift of friendship in appreciation for her time spent organizing the retreat for so many, many years. The retreat wouldn’t exist if not for her leadership.
The first Jane block I ever pieced is in this quilt. (G5-Poof)
Someone commented on my last post that I should make some shopping time, and I did! Most of my shopping came from the resale table at the retreat where I bought these treasures, Ayers House Dancing Dollies Quilt by Irene Carrig and Auntie Green’s Garden by Irene Blanck of Focus on Quilts fame!
I scored the patterns on Wednesday evening and then on Thursday, Irene actually stopped by at the retreat to see her friend Patty Harant. She autographed the pattern for 
me and then we took a photo together. The whole retreat was a wonderful experience, but getting to meet Irene Blanck was the highlight of the entire week-end. Here we are, Patty, Irene and me!
A friend and I took some time on Friday to shop at Yoder’s and Lolly’s. Well, she shopped and I did reconnaissance in anticipation of Wana Night Out on December 1st. I’m getting my list ready!
On Saturday, I drove us through the first major winter snow storm of the year to Caroline’s Cotton Cottage in Rome City. (Hey, it’s northern Indiana. Unless I want to stay home all winter, you just have got to drive in snow!)
I bought designated fabrics for projects there. The bottom 4 fabrics are for Lucy Boston’s Patchwork of the Crosses I want to EPP someday. Doesn’t that border edge look lovely! The top left fabrics are 30’s fabrics to be used in Sweet Surrender and the blues on the top right are for the Salinda Rupp quilt, Nearly Insane. Some of the blues for Lucy Boston might make it into Nearly Insane too!
The final purchase I made was also from the retreat. I purchased a used Grace hand quilting frame that has never been used and is still in the box. (Does that make sense?) Son 2 is my handyman and he will get to put the frame together when he and his family are here after Christmas. I won’t be ready to use it until I complete quilting Jane on the old sticks and stand quilting frame. A new quilt frame gives me even more incentive to get the quilting completed. We’ll see if I can have her finished by the start of the new year.
Thursday evening was a pink pajama party with the famous pj’s from Target. There were 115 women at the retreat and 70 of them had the pajamas.
Many of the retreaters participated in a service project Friday morning and made dresses for Africa. 47 dresses and 8 britches were completed.
Late Friday afternoon Anita Shackelford was our guest speaker and gave a presentation about rescuing quilts. This was a very fascinating program with pictures from before and the finished rescued quilt. I would have thrown most of the before quilts in the trash but she took what I considered trash and turned them into treasures. She posts about her rescues on her blog. She really has given these quilts a new life.
Friday evening was Show & Tell. Only retreat participants can show & tell but the public is welcome to join us in the oohing and aahing. I didn’t get pictures of all the quilts but will just show you a few of the highlights. I also don’t remember who exhibited what except in the pictures that contain the maker. To see all of Show & Tell, visit Rosemary Youngs blog and see her smile box slide show. The first photos on Rosemary’s smile box are from the show & tell at the November 20th Moda club held at Lolly’s. Get a cup of coffee or tea, set back and enjoy all the beautiful quilts!
Lori displayed her Jane made with Kaffe Fassett fabrics.
Someone showed the start of their lovely Jane in blues. She changed up the cornerstones with itsy-bitsy 9-patches.
Val showed her 9th (!) Jane. Instead of using the normal corners, she substituted applique and embroidery.
Edith Shanholt showed this lovely quilt from both the Affairs of the Heart and My Mother Taught Me to Sew patterns. This picture isn’t from show & tell but was taken afterwards. Rosemary shows the actual quilt from show & tell and looks much nicer than this one displayed on the floor. Edith hand quilted her and used 950 yards of thread.
I can’t forget to show Lynn’s Phoebe designed by Diane Ford. This was a very long-term project and looks just beautiful.
These are just a few of the quilts from show & tell. To see them all, check out Rosemary’s slide show.
What did I work on over the long week-end? The main project was a kit I had purchased several years ago at Lolly’s for a queen sized, purple and green Summer Lake Log Cabin quilt designed by Judy Martin. The pattern is found in her Log Cabin Quilt Book.
This is 60 V blocks, 30 W blocks, 26 X blocks and 4 Z corner blocks. The borders are pieced piano keys. I had the strips along to sew, but just couldn’t sew another stitch on this project. All of the center blocks are pieced and I’ll lay them out and get the center sewn together sometime in January. That’s the plan anyway.
I also finished appliquing another album block for the Pastor’s Attic quilt.
When I started prepping for this applique quilt, I cut all the background squares. I like to overlock stitch the edges so they don’t ravel. I finished 5 edges, then decided this was extremely boring. I bagged up the remaining 20 backgrounds and took them along to the retreat. They have all been edged and are ready to be appliqued.
This retreat always kicks off my start of the winter season, a time for slowing down and doing the needlework projects I so enjoy. I also spend time in the barn feeding calves and other chores but there is no field work in the winter for me.
There are 142 days left until the April 2016 retreat which will signal the end of winter and start of the busy summertime here on the farm.
I’m linking to the following blogs –
Kathy’s Slow Stitching Sunday
Quilting is More Fun than Housework!
Love, Laugh, Quilt
Cooking Up Quilts
Esther’s Wednesday Wow
Someone had done some preliminary outline quilting on this little quilt, but it needed more stitches. I added the clam shells in the sky and quilted my version of echo quilting in the grass and pond. I’ve never done echo quilting before, and my echo lines aren’t as close as they should be, but for a first time, I think it is pretty good. They hadn’t quilted at all in the border so a cable was quilted there then I finished her with brown binding.
Gretchen's Little Corner 