UFO Projects Getting Done!

I think I've found a theme for the July Quiltvillians retreat.

Find it and Finish it!

It's wonderful to see quilt projects that have been in time out in a bin, some that needed unstitching to take place so things could be fixed, some projects that were adopted by friends who were no longer able to quilt, and fixed and completed on the sly with the intent to gift them back when done.

It's been a wonderful week of "Let's see what we can do to get this in the done column." And so inspirational!

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The Rain That Never Came -

Oh, there was thunder.

And there was the crack of lightning.  Enough so that the power blipped on, and the generator ran for perhaps three minutes -

Just enough that if you are sewing on a computerized machine, it reset your needle position back to home base and you had to readjust it again.

But it never rained.  Not a drop.

It didn't matter!  The quilters were inside quilting and making wonderful things.

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While The Cat's Away...

I made a quick getaway with a couple of friends over to Marion, Virginia for the annual Art & Crafts festival held at Hungry Mother State Park.

It's a beautiful park with loads of walking trails, even some that circle around the lake.

I love these kids of little festivals and was eager to see what we would find there.  I wasn't searching for anything in particular, and even if I ended up not buying anything it was a gorgeous day to wander in the shade beneath the trees.

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Deanna & the UPS Guy!

Sometimes I get to witness some pretty amazing acts of long-lasting-through-it-all kinds of love.

Yesterday was just such a day.

I had received a VERY strange email in the morning telling me to be "In front of the main house at exactly 11am."

No details were given. There was no name left - just a very vague email address.

My reply? "Main house? Which main house?" Hoping to get more information or perhaps simply discern if this was a scam or not.

It wasn't a scam!

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Hello, Gretchen! Gift-Away!

Are you ready for some fun and exciting paper piecing?

Are your saved scraps overflowing and out of control?

If so - Hello, Gretchen! just might be the pattern you've been waiting for, the quilt you've been eager to dive in and make.

I was completely obsessed with making this quilt.  It uses EVERYTHING, even those cut-off corners you've saved from doing things like stitch n flip where you put a square on the corner of a base unit, stitch the diagonal to become a corner triangle, and trim the excess.

There is a lot of fabric waste in that excess!  Actually...I consider those to be BONUS triangles because there is so much you can do with them.

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This, That & The Other -

I don't know about your camera roll, but mine is full of things I took photos of with the intention to share what I've found, but somehow in the vast array of photos from quilters and projects on retreat they just fell back into never never land.

When I went to see the neuromuscular guy on Friday, I had just enough time to wander an antique mall I hadn't been in for months and months and months -

I found a COUPLE of things. I noticed this quilt right away...

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Between The Rain Showers!

We must have all been doing quite the rain dance - because once Saturday rolled through and we stopped to take a photo of the dam that no longer had water flowing over it on Wilson Creek - 

It rained for nearly two days straight - yesterday being the heaviest of all, so I'm glad we had opted to take our over-the-porch-rail photos on Saturday afternoon between cloud bursts!

Take a look at all of these Lupine & Laughter beauties!

The sky may be grey, but these quilts are sunshine.

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Quilting Weekends and Happy Birthdays!

What's it like to spend your birthday on retreat?

Fantastic of course!  All of your best quilty mates around you to help celebrate, and eat your cake.

And yes, there was ice cream as well.

I love to spend my own birthday doing something I love (In somewhere far away from here) and it tickles me that folks will plan their retreats around their birthday month so they can continue to celebrate all month long.

And you just have to know that any gifts are also quilty, right?

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Days of Distraction!

Some days we just have to put it all out on the table, decide which is the most important and let other things slide off onto the next day's to-do list because...moment's like this only come around so often!

Rain in the forecast - but ladies wanted to sew before going to the quilt shops after lunch.

Could I get anyone to break away for a 45 minute nature hike? Just a quick 2 miler?

Yes!

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Pieceful Hearts and Dirt Road Hikes!

Mid-summer.  That means getting out as early in the day as we can, even though early is purely relative to everything that has to be done before I actually get to the retreat around 10am.

"I'd love to go on a walk" someone says as I walk through the door of the quilting quarters after feeding Hazel and Flash.

I'd already put in about 2 hours of computer work before leaving home...if we wanted to make the most of the morning my reply was "Meet me at the van in 10 minutes!"

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Bikers & Quilters!

Quiltville Inn sits at the crossroads of highway 16 coming up from North Carolina and highway 58,. Route 58 runs for approximately 508 miles stretching horizontally across the entire southern border of the state. It begins near the Cumberland Gap at the western tip and ends at Route 60 in Virginia Beach on the Atlantic coast.

It might look like a lazy 2-lane highway in front of the inn, but this route is a favorite of motorcyclists and other travelers alike in the summer months.

This means that I am often a destination rest stop for quilters as well!

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No Scrap Neglected!

I was anxious to get to the studio yesterday so I could throw myself into getting this little sewing machine stitchery together.

As I look through the scraps I gathered from my pre-cut squares box to sew into this border...how many decades of scraps are represented here?

I spot a print I know is from the 1980s as I used that print (in a different color) when Jason was a baby.  He's going to be 43 in November.

There are recycled fabrics, civil war repros mixed with Kaffe, novelties, more contemporary/modern prints...what quilts and previous projects were these scraps left from?

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You'll Never Guess Where!

It was all by accident.

I had literally given up.

I had gone through every drawer, every file folder, every shelf - even rearranging some things in the process.

(And yes, I admit I even decluttered and threw some stuff out in the process...because...might as well?)

And then while doing something totally unrelated -

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Beating The Heat!

Those of us on the Easty Coasty have been experiencing incredible heat indexes over the past week.

I even gave up on my morning driveway walks because by 10am it could be 80+ and I just wasn't feeling it.

This is so uncommon for us in the mountains....usually our HIGHS don't go above 85 mid afternoon, but this was definitely over the top.

And the thunderstorms my weather app kept promising?

Fizzled.

Barely made the pavement wet if there was anything, and it was dry 5 minutes later.

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Hot As A Firecracker!

Happy Fourth of July, everyone!

We've got a projected high of 90 on the mountain today...and we usually push the "projected" forecast by a degree or two so buckle up for a hot one, baby!

It was even hotter yesterday - the thermometer in my car read 96 though I'm not sure how accurate that read is from a parked car.

At any rate - it's a good weekend to only celebrate when temps come down in the evening.

During the daytime you'll find me in the cool of the studio sewing up Romanian flag colors looking remarkably like fireworks!

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Tulip Swirl: 2026 Leader & Ender Challenge!

It's July!
And you know what that means - Not only are we more than half-way through our year, but it's time to make good use of some scraps between the lines of our chain piecing and make something pretty in the process!
We've been doing these Leader & Ender challenges for many years now, and I absolutely love seeing where your creativity takes you as we sew little pieces together to keep our chain piecing not only continuous, but fun.

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Last Stitches In!

It's done!

I put the last stitches into my Goose Feathers quilt and it is done done done!

To be honest, I'm a bit over the aqua for a while.

Between this quilt, and the aqua in my hexie quilt and both quilts pushing for a finish - it's been an aqua overload.

I still love this color, and I'll come back to it, but let's take a break, shall we?

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And They're Off!

I waved goodbye to the Mississippi Stitchers yesterday -

Actually I was waving from where I was seated at my desk writing yesterday's post because they left before I even got the blog out and could get there.

They had an extra long drive ahead of them, and just as required, I got a text about bed time that everyone had reached home safely.  I'm so glad!

It was hot yesterday for the mountains, today is going to be hotter still.

I am always relieved when everyone makes it to their front door.

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