Happy Faces from Cape Cod

A few more photos from our Cape Retreat at the beginning of December. Seems hard to believe that it is the middle of December and Christmas and New Year's are almost upon us!

 If you missed the other posts, you can read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 at the named links.

Sue won the Right, Left, Center game and walked off with at least three dozen new Christmas prints.

Sally

Sue and Marion

Terri and Paula

Joannie, me and Marion.

Joannie

Joanne S. with her new safety pin sculpture. Jo Ann E. is in the background.

Marion!

Nancy D. mugging for the blog.

Joanne S.

Terri

We played a spirited game of Quilt-O. Nancy D. was the big winner, taking home nine (!) prizes. If you don't win, you can always eat your markers (mine were M&Ms). I won three prizes and took home some lovely fat quarters.

The end of the Retreat.

A good time was had by all!

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

WIPs, the Cape Cod Edition

Sorry to have kept you waiting, at long last, here are some of the beautiful Works in Progress (WIPs) from our recent Cape Cod retreat. You can read Part 1 and Part 2, if you missed them.

When life hands you scraps...

Lynne put her Accuquilt cutter to work BEFORE the quilt retreat.

Make some quilt blocks...

 Put them on the Design Wall...

 ... and watch all of your other quilting friends drool. These blocks belong to Lynne. I've never seen her make anything that wasn't fabulous. Me? I would have put those triangles right into the next pet pillow!

I had to do a Hexagon Intervention with Marion. Marion has been working on this quilt for a while. She makes a few rows at every quilt retreat and them puts them back in a box. She kept insisting that she needed to make more, so I finally told her to lay them out on the table and see how many she still had left to make.

Here are two rows...

The quilt kept on growing! We discovered that Marion had more than enough to make a bed size quilt. There will even be some hexagon rows on the back! Good thing I intervened or she'd have to make an RV cover instead!

The colors are bright and fun!

I spent my retreat time working on a quilt for my oldest nephew, Sam.

Sam's quilt on the design wall.

 We all made some blocks to give to Debbie for a Quilts of Valor quilt top.

Hooray for the red, white and blue!

 

 

 

Linda's Mario blocks in progress. She has twin grandsons, so she has to make two Super Mario quilts. She couldn't find the fabric she wanted, so she cut these squares out of sheets.

Nancy D.'s batik star quilt in progress.

Wendy's Christmas quilt. She got it assemble and layered and was quilting it. It looked like it was almost finished by the time we left. She backed in Grinch fabric.

Jo Ann E. cranked out another set of pretty quilt blocks!

I have a few more photos, so I'll do one more Cape Cod post.

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

Quilt-Themed Gifts

Need to buy yourself a little something or is your significant other just clueless when it comes to buying you a gift? Just in time for the holidays, my brother Gary has created some special quilting theme items that you can find in his Redbubble shop.  

Warning: there is one item with mature content on it. (Bet you didn't think quilting items could have mature content, did you... now you have to go and see for yourself.)

Start here.

Search under "available products" to see all the different products that can be created. For example, this t-shirt was my first request.

If you don't like to wear your quilting identity on your chest, you can purchase this design as a tote bag. Gary has added this design in several different colors. There are notebooks, greeting cards, mugs, pillows, laptop sleeves, stickers and a whole lot more!

Here are a couple more designs. Meet Sew-pergirl! My brother Gary combined his love of comic books with my love of quilting to come up with this one.

I like the design below a lot too. I will probably order the printed version and hang it in my cubicle at work, in an extremely visible spot so my co-workers can see it. Especially George who keeps asking me to mend his sailboat cover. Sorry, no can do!

Hanukkah officially started this evening, but it lasts for eight days, so you still have time to get me a gift! I accept Christmas gifts as well. Or gifts for no reason at all. I don't discriminate.

Disclaimer: I don't get anything if you buy something from Gary except a warm, happy feeling that I've helped my brother. Gary, however, does make a commission (albeit a really, really tiny one) on anything that you buy from him.

Gary is happy to do a special custom design for you. You can send him a "bubble mail" through the website. If you can't figure out how to do this, just let me know.

You can also see the special Pug Hanukkah t-shirt that he designed for me. That's what started this whole thing. He's happy to do the dog breed of your choice in the Hanukkah shirt also.

Happy shopping and Happy Hanukkah to all my Jewish blogging and quilting friends!

Linking up on Friday to Confessions of a Fabric Addict and to Crazy Mom Quilts. Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

P.S. If you're on my gift list, don't be surprised if one of these fabulous items ends up in your stocking or under your menorah!

Give a Cheer for Finished Quilt Tops!

In my last post, you saw all of the beautiful things that were finished at our Cape retreat. Here are some quilt tops that were completed. Now on to layering and quilting!

This quilt below nearly made it to the other post. It is completely quilted, but it just needs a binding.

Paula's daughter made this skeleton quilt for her daughter (Paula's granddaughter). She doesn't like to do the bindings, so she asked Paula to do it. Of course, Paula agreed.

Here's a close-up. Her daughter must have had a lot of fun collecting all these different skeleton prints.

This is the fabric they chose for the quilt binding. It is called "Quiltmare (as in nightmare)." Apparently there is also a "Knitmare" version.

Here are some lovely quilt tops that were finished at the weekend.

This is a mystery quilt class that Joannie took at Homestead Quilting and Fabrics. Terri taught the class.  It took Joannie nearly a year to complete this. This quilt has a lot of pieces!!! Terri is going to quilt it for her and they are going to display it at the shop.

Here are Marion's birthday blocks from 2012.

New quilter Wendy finished another top and it is being layered in this photo.

Here is Wendy with her personal quilting teacher, Nancy D.

Here is Jo Ann E. with her birthday blocks from 2014. I love the soft pastels that she chose.

Here's a close-up of some of the fabrics. Aren't they pretty?

Nancy D. finished this beautiful Christmas wall hanging. This lovely pattern is Holiday Lights by my good friend Kate Mitchell. You can purchase this on Etsy as a pre-cut, pre-fused kit here or just purchase the pattern here.

This is a new friend, Paula (Paula #2). She finished this lovely batik top.

More importantly, Paula brought the best chocolate cake to our retreat! It has a skinny layer of raspberry filling in the middle. I could go for a piece right now! Perhaps I'll just lick my monitor screen...

This was also made by a new quilting friend at the retreat. Sorry, I can't remember her name. I think she may have been the third Paula. Marion was enchanted by the reproduction pinks and browns in this zig zag pattern.

Linking up on Friday to Richard and Tanya Quilts and to Confessions of a Fabric Addict. Thanks for visiting! In my next post you will see some of the lovely Works in Progress (WIPs).

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

I'm Back! (no pun intended...)

November was such a nasty month for me that I decided to not blog again until December and see if bad Karma was done with me. I'm not sure who I may have offended, but I hope that my bad luck has moved on.

Finally my aching back was well enough to join my Brown Bagger buddies and some new quilting friends at the Cape for a week time quilt retreat. I'm so confused that today is Friday, since normally our quilt retreats take place over a weekend. Today is supposed to be errand day, but I haven't accomplished anything yet this morning besides walking the pug boys and eating breakfast, so I thought I might as well write a blog post!

Let's start off with some finished projects!

Joannie finished this quilt for her sister. She even stopped at her sister's house on the way home and gave it to her! She quilted it herself on her Pfaff sewing machine.

Here's a close-up. Her sister wanted mauve and grey, but Joannie amped up the colors a little bit. It is even prettier in person.

Sally, Paula and Terri finished some bags!

Sally is making Schlep bags for Christmas gifts.

The small one on the left is for Sally's granddaughter, the larger one on the right is for Sally's daughter. They have handles which don't show up in this photo. Sally has several more in progress.

Paula finished this pretty batik shoulder bag. Despite Paula's smile here, there were some choice swear words involved in the bag's construction.

Terri made this gi-normous quilted bag, big enough to hold all three of the pug boys or a queen size quilt.

Paula also finished this skeleton print zippered bag for her granddaughter for Christmas. Paula's granddaughter loves skeletons! Look for Paula's skeleton quilt in a future post soon. This bag is not the infamous Boxy Pouch, this pattern is A Little Duffle Do It.

Joanne and Nancy D. finished some table runners!

Joanne is making these table runners for Christmas gifts.

One is completely finished and the other seven (!) just need binding! Joanne spent her time working exclusively on these!

This is Nancy D.'s sunflower table runner. It is bright and cheerful!

No scrap of fabric or batting went into the trash. We stuffed three more pet pillows and sent a half finished one home with Terri to take to the quilt shop in Lakeville. My friend Michelle, who owns Homestead Quilting and Fabrics in Lakeville, MA also saves scraps for me.

Pat donated these leftover decorator fabrics which made some very elegant pet beds. Thanks Pat.

More soon!

Thanks for visiting and for your well wishes! Linking up on Friday to Crazy Mom Quilts, Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Richard and Tanya Quilts.

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy