Small Quilt Retreat

Some of you know that we had a small quilt sewing retreat last month. I meant to post pictures but I've been really busy since I got back. I forgot to charge my camera battery before I went so had to use my phone to take pictures and then had trouble loading them up to the blog for awhile. But they're here now, so enjoy - 

There were 13 of us who met for a few days at a hotel north of Chicago, near me. 

Jane and Robin

Karen

Jen

Kathy and Deborah 

Karen's craft table

Susan and her gorgeous antique quilt

Mona and her pretty retreat quilt -  Fall Flowers

Robin and Jennifer

Karen and her orange peels. Tada - finally finished!! 

Jen made us some sweet little hexie pincushions.

Candee made us pretty wool button pincushions. 

Some of us took a break from the intense sewing (hah!) and drove over to the Chicago Botanic Garden on Saturday afternoon

Jane, Robin, me and Liz 

Dinner at PF Changs

Jen, Heather, Liz, Candee, Susan, Jane

 Karen, Janet, Kathy T (not me, I'm the photographer), Deborah, Mona, Robin

Jane and Candee liked  LOVED Marian's quilt I brought for Show & Tell

Karen finished her Mystery Quilt

Kathy's pretty scrappy quilt with that purple border.

Robin finished her retreat quilt too!

Janet

Kathy T's cute project

BFFs

Robin's Mystery Quilt

Everyone got along really well and a great time was had by all.   (Well, there was that ONE troublemaker . . . . and there was that time we lost Mona . . . .) We re-connected with old friends and made some new ones. Couldn't have asked for nicer quilting friends or a better time. We're planning on doing it again next spring and in between will plan some additional sewing days to get together in the northern Illinois/Chicago area. You're welcome to join us if you happen to be in the neighborhood  : )  and if you promise to bring chocolate to share.

Have a great week!  

Civil War Quilts E-Book Winner

Thanks so much to all of you who posted a comment to enter the e-book giveaway of a copy of The Big book of Civil War Quilts. And a great big thanks to Martingale for their generosity.

The winner is Ellie Lively from Indianapolis, IN.  

Ellie -  please contact me to let me know you've received my e-mail. I will pass on your info to Martingale and they will send you the free download.

I wish I could have given every one of you a free book. It's that good. 

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Have a great Labor Day weekend, everyone. It's hard to have fun when our hearts are breaking for all those in southeast Texas. Words escape me. 

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For those of you who are in my Facebook and Yahoo small quilt groups and think you'll feel like sewing this weekend, lucky you - I've got just the project for you. It's September 1 and the challenge quilt for this month is the little strippy quilt from my book Small & Scrappy. Isn't this the cutest? Our friend Marian Edwards made this tiny version of one of the larger quilts in my book using 1 1/2" blocks!  If playing around with such tiny pieces is not your cup of tea, you can substitute the 3" blocks from the larger quilt to make your challenge quilt. 

Have fun with this one and post a picture of your finished quilt in one of the groups. The pattern is on page 73. If you don't have the Small & Scrappy book yet (and why not??) there's an e-book version available here, at Martingale's site.  You don't even need to leave your home -  it's an instant download. How easy is that?? You could be sewing as soon as you finish reading this . . . . 

Civil War Quilts Book Giveaway

Love using your reproduction fabrics to make Civil War-style quilts?  Well, there's a great book that just came out and Martingale (That Patchwork Place) is generously allowing me to give away a free e-book. 

The Big Book of Civil War Quilts. Just released!

Books like this provide us with wonderful inspiration to create legacy-worthy quilts. It's a nice collection of patterns for large and small quilts. The book contains six of my previously published patterns from two of my books plus 52 other wonderful quilts by some of our favorite designers. 

Here are a few of mine -  

There are 58  fantastic quilts by Country Threads, Carol Hopkins, Jo Morton and Julie Hendrickson as well as many other Martingale designers.

If you like working with reproduction fabric and scraps, you will love this book!

** To win a free e-book, leave me a comment to enter your name. (You can instantly download this e-book to your computer or other device.) Remember to leave your name and e-mail so I can contact you if you win. Good luck! Winner will be announced on Friday.

  You can purchase a hard copy of the book here. 

Winner was announced. COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED.

Clarissa's Garden and School

As I mentioned in a recent post, I live in a town in northern Illinois that was established in the mid-1800s. 

Sometime in the 1840s, Lyman Wilmot and his wife Clarissa came here from the east coast to settle on 240 acres of land. (At the time, land in this area cost as little as $1.25 an acre).  Part of this land was donated by the Wilmot family in 1848 to build a one-room schoolhouse. Education was important for these early settlers and building schools for their children was often high on the list of priorities when a community was built. Clarissa Wilmot became the first school teacher at the new school. That school no longer exists but a replica of an old schoolhouse was later built for the town's small historical village. An elementary school now stands in place of Clarissa's original school.

My antique Schoolhouse quilt.

For the town's 150th settlement celebration, a local teacher had her class plant a prairie garden with an abundance of native plants common during the 1800s in memory of Clarissa Wilmot. When my daughter was in middle school, we drove past this garden every day. One day it hit me that I really should  make a small quilt to honor Clarissa and her garden and the contribution she made to our town's educational system. It turned into this little quilt with a simple floral motif - 

My Clarissa's Garden pattern is available here.

Have a great Weekend!  Stop by next Wednesday, August 30, for another exciting giveaway! 

Done

The other day, I sewed the LAST stitches on the LAST binding of the LAST quilt for my next book and then sent all of them to my publisher. Yay!

You have no idea how good it feels, to have worked hard and stayed so focused for months to accomplish yet another goal. Writing a quilting book with 17 quilts in just a few months can be totally exhausting as well as exhilarating, whether the quilts are small or large. You still have to stay focused and not veer off track or it just will not get done. I've been living nothing but quilts and even dreaming quilts in my sleep for months. Waking up in the middle of the night, in a cold sweat, thinking:  OMG - I need to change this or that or even - Oh no! Do I have time to start over? Will anyone really want to buy this? It's been a journey and I thank all of you for following along with me for so many years. I know I say this every time, but I think this book is going to be the best one yet.

The publishing process is often a long one and I know it's hard to be patient before you see the final product. There's still a little work to do - some necessary editing, rewriting, more editing, research and documentation, etc., in the coming months before the Martingale team turns it into another beautiful finished product next year. I'll be sure to give you updates when I get them but for now . . . . I'm done with the big part. I need to take a little break.  Maybe read a good book and then take a nap . . . . or a much-needed vacation.

Have a good weekend. Easier if you stay away from the news but I'm not one who can ignore what's going on in the world or bury my head in the sand and pretend to not be affected by it all. We live in difficult times. We can wish we lived in more tranquil times but the fact is that we don't. I don't have any answers for what is happening but all of us need to somehow come together on some level and realize that we are all more alike than we are different. We need to face the trouble in the world with courage and try to find solutions by focusing on spreading love and compassion toward our fellow human beings instead of hatred. And make the best attempt to elect leaders who couple that compassion with strength of character and wisdom.

Stencil Winners

Congratulations to the winners of the free Stencil Company stencils -

• Lauren H.
• Pauline Simpson
• Nancy Kennedy
• Donna Lockwood
• Joyce Carter
• Debbie (from  fetchr at aol dot com) 

Winners, please e-mail me your mailing addresses so I can know where to send your free stencils.

Thanks to everyone who entered the giveaway. I wish all of you could have won some stencils. Those of you who did not win, remember that you can always order a few if you go to the Stencil Company's website. They sell stencils in all shapes and sizes but if you're mostly interested in marking small quilts, go to their Sentimental Quilter page to see some stencils I've used. When you place your order, remember to use the coupon code  SQBAUG17  to get a 20% discount. The code will be available until August 17, 2017.

Thanks for all of your sweet comments! It was so nice to read that so many of you are already hand quilting or inspired to try it. I wrote a blog post last year about needles and thread if you are interested in reading more about what I use. But, remember the bottom line -  it's all very individual. Sometimes trial and error when it comes to what needles, thread, etc. to use. What works for one may not work for you so try several different things to find your own hand quilting "groove." Quilting is a journey and when you're learning something new there can be both pleasure and frustration in the process. But, don't be afraid to try something new - it may just bring you some unexpected delight. 

     Have a great weekend!