Virtual Retreat July 2015 - Join Anytime

[wendy w.]

Hurrah Margarita a step in the right direction. Amazed you can layer the quilt so early in rehab. I love that your goals are quilting related.

Are the peas purple?

I bet if the giradelli were in front of you Lotti you'd nibble the chocolate off

[Lotti D.]

yes you are absolutely right, wendy, if those choccies were in front of me i would nibble off some of the most uncontaminated choccolate - but as i'm the fussiest chocolate-person there is - not toooooooo much - my passion are the LIndt & Spruengli "Cru Sauvage" Truffles - but due to their price, i indulge in a box once a year and make them last... http://www.spruengli.ch/collection/truffel.php and then they are the absolute treat of all treats :P

sooooooo disappointed to see the purple hulled peas - as the name says - it's the hulls only that are purple - and the peas look rather beany to me. but they have a very interesting history and there's even a festival: http://www.purplehull.com/index.htm

have a great day ladies :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

[Marianne G.]

I love how you give your machines names. Don't know how you do it - I found it difficult enough to find names for my children so I can't imagine coming up with names for machines :lol:
Sorry to hear about your hands, Rita! So annoying when you are on a roll doing something.
Rosemary, wish I could go to your EG exhibition - haven't seen any embroidery for a long time. How did you alter the neckline to make a cowl neck on the tee?
Cathy looking forward to seeing your portrait quilt - I haven't got the patience to do one but I admire people who can get all those tiny pieces together to get a likeness. DD2 brought some Ghiardelli chocolate back when she went to a conference in the US - it was so yummy!
Artmomma, there are several examples of the Farmer's Wife quilt to be seen on Pinterest.
Good news on mobility, Margarita - agree with Lotti, don't over do the exercise
Lotti, that peony is so beautiful! Sadly mine flowered while away at a family re-union this year but now I can enjoy yours
I managed to make 2 t-shirts at the week-end - still rather confused about stitches for knit fabric, need to investigate more but cut #3 yesterday so can practise some more. Quilted some of the "bigger" lines on the machine cover so now need to make a decision on inside the blocks. Itching to get back to some FMQ but time is so elusive. Keeping up with my "quil-ket" though so trying to be a good girl :lol: You lot are hard to keep up with though when on a restricted-internet-time-diet :P
Marianne

[Lois B.]

I join Geneva with that "light" thing. Hush! Hush!

Been so so busy with summer stuff. Happy that I wasn't so distracted that the "light thing" project didn't get lost in a black hole in my brain. Whew! I am loving keeping up with all of you. Lotti, what a great peony.

[Lotti D.]

so good, lois
my light-thing is also coming along... hopefully getting finished over the weekend and in the post on monday (if my confetti-idea comes together and can actually be made stable with a bit of lightweight mesh).
:silly: :blink: :silly:

not sure if you had seen this one before - made this for my cousin's baby daughter last november...

[Susan S.]

Lottie, free form creativity is actually harder than it sounds! Love the baby quilt. When I did a confetti addition to an art quilt I laid the fine mesh over the very tiny fabric pieces and free motion quilted all over that area. Confetti adds a whole new meaning to using every piece of fabric scraps! Your nature pictures make me drool!!

The hulls are the only purple part of a Purple Hull pea. This is a very popular vegetable in the southern states here in America. I never heard of it before moving here. Your fingers get purple stains when you shell them by hand. My husband has a pea sheller which saves all that work of shelling by hand. I am amazed at the number of older women that want to buy the peas in the hull to shell by hand. The pea festivals are fun. People race garden tillers and endless other very odd forms of entertainment!

I do not plan to make a sampler quilt but enjoy looking at the variety of patterns. I love Pinterest and will see what has been pinned.

[Susan S.]

I made a twin size farmers wife quilt...at least I got the blocks done and some of the sashing on :dry: in a block of the month class. learned a lot making the blocks, but think I prefer paper piecing to templates :P Might be why I haven't finished it ops:

[Susan S.]

Lotti--wonderful picture of the red peony.

Having said that--the pictures I took for "show and tell" are not as spectacular. Had to take them twice and sometimes three times. I thought by using a tripod, I would not have a problem but they we all blurred so here they are with a lot of adjusting and editing:

The first quilt is for my great-niece and her baby (this is the one that was done in time for the baby shower, whew!):



The next several are the critters that were put on the twins quilts:
















Check out the next post for more critters!

[Lois B.]

Ritzy, WoW! Love them all and we can all tell they were made by Ritzy! Your signature colors. And the critters are wonderful. Are they original? They are so, so cute. Thanks for posting.

[Nancy R.]

Love the quilt and the critters, Ritzy! And I'm sure the grandkids love them even more!!

[Nancy R.]

More critters:




This one caused a lot of problems! I will tell you about that in a bit.







Here is the picture of the quilt, yes it is hung the correct way--the lizard fooled me. I thought the lizard was oriented correctly, and it was but when I went to do the next animal it wasn't. Now, I had a choice of ripping out or leaving it. Since it took more than two hours to put the second animal on--the choice seemed easy. The problem is that now the alligators are on their heads and tails.



Now I have to finish the binding on Zeke's quilt. The animals are not put on the same color blocks as Ezra's. The quilts are backed with minky. I have used this before and not had problems. This time--the minky had little nubs on it and THAT caused lots of problems.

This last picture is one of a boy that loves his gram:



OK--back to work on that binding so I can was the markings off the quilts and get them dried and ready to go.

[Lotti D.]

Fabulous quilts, Ritzy, and I love all ghose critters. The twins are going to be soooooo happy with these. Very handsome grandson there. Great picture of the two of you.

Yes, covering my confetti with a mesh and then quilting everything down is what I plan to do. Just hope the picture will still be recognizable after all that quilting...
The proof,'s in the puddin'
But first I have to clear off the dining table and set up the machines - hopefully on Saturday - unless the weather's too gorgeous in which case I'll grab the camera and new monopod and go shooting
Sunday's early Morning Animal park visit has been cancelled, so we're now going for an early morning hike followed by breakfast in the hills... Then back home in time for our annual Jazz'n Summer lunch concert (11 am 'till 3 pm), looking forward to a good day :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

[wendy w.]

Breakfast in the hills sounds good. Love yours and Ritzys bright quilts they have so much energy. Those babies are going to be over stimulated.

[wendy w.]

Nice to know you missed me :kiss: :kiss: . I was too tired to get on on Tuesday, and last night we went to visit some friends we haven't been able to meet up with for yonks. They are house sitting nearish by this week. We had a wonderful evening and didn't get home until after midnight :blink: :blink:
Everyone has been very busy this week.
I know I will miss something but hear goes
Margarita, good to hear things are on the mend with you and you have got the leg brace off now.
Geneva I got your message & have sent you my address (although someone else has probably beaten me to it.
Beautiful pictures as always Lotti. Your hike in the hills sounds good too.
Marianne I will get back to you about how I altered the neckline to a cowl neck, but it needs some drawing up doing first - although you could try googling cowl neck pattern drafting (if you haven't run out of computer time :whistle: )
Ritzy, great fun quilts, and as others have said we can spot your colour schemes a mile off.
Art Momma I love to eat freshly shucked peas, so I can understand other ladies buying them in the pod, although getting purple fingers in the process could be a bit of a problem if you were going anywhere smart afterwards....
Wendy, here fishy, fishy, fishy...

[wendy w.]

Posy P,
I have some hand dyed fabric with your name on it!!
Thanks for your comments on my blog
Www.letscreatetoday.blogspot.com
Please send your proper name and mailing address
[email protected]
And, if you view the posts that followed the first giveaway post, you can let me know if you have a fabric preference. I'll see if I still have some of it available.

Looking forward to sending you a package
Luann