More Fall Retreat

On the second full day of the retreat, Sue spent the morning finishing up small projects.  The zipper bag pattern makes a set of 3.  The 2nd and 3rd went together more easily than the first.

Then another fabric box was in the works. The first 2 were made with 11 inch squares; one had corner triangles sewn at 2", the other at 2.5".  This 3rd one is a 12" square with corners at 2".  Each variation will give you a different finished size.  The tutorial can be found on Seaside Stitches blog.

Then it was time to tackle some preparation for the "repair project".  If you recall, Sue posted about this a few weeks ago.  The first step was to make some replacement "footballs" that will be appliqued over the ones that are worn.  She also worked on adding some blocks to a border strip that will be added to the top of the quilt.  The "footballs" were made with Quilt Smart templates; they just needed some size adjustment to account for the different construction method she used.

When no more could be done on that project, she switched to a UFO; this plaid quilt has all the pieces for the 20 blocks cut - they just need to be sewn.  It was determined that this was a guild "Ways and Means" project from 2002 or 2003, so that makes it a 13-year project (so far)!  She got one block sewn Saturday and 2 more Sunday morning, so now has 7 of the 20 blocks sewn.  As with the zipper bags and fabric boxes, they get faster the more you make, so Sue had better make some more blocks before she forgets how they go together!

All things considered, it was a productive retreat and a fun weekend of sewing with like-minded quilters!