What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

The last day of any retreat is bittersweet. While we are excited to go home, it's time to leave, and no one wants to go home. This retreat house is several hours away, so I had plans to leave at 1 PM, and it was exactly 1 PM when I drove out of the driveway. 

However, I managed to get a lot accomplished before I left. All in all, this was probably one of the most productive retreats EVER! I've no idea how that happened. 

This was my last day to take a walk to the lake, so ...

 I'm so sorry to be an enabler, but it's not often that a pattern comes along that I NEED to make, so I'll see how we can work those Elizabeth Hartman patterns into the schedule. Remember -- if you are pressed for time, make the SMALL version of the quilt. It's all about choices and making priorities. And if you can't do the sew along with me, there'll be another super cute pattern next year!

I'm so excited -- I was showing the short Amazon tour video to the retreat group, and then I decided ...

I have to laugh as I've been checking Instagram and Facebook in the last couple of days; there have been tons of pictures with fall colors! The leaves are spectacular and OK -- so I have two more for you today. 

OK -- I had my schedule planned out for next year - I was reasonable in what I was going to sew, and then BAM -- I spotted this adorable quilt by Elizabeth Hartman, and all reason left me. I WANT to make this quilt. 

Check out this link for Fab Farm and The Produce Section. Both are super cute, but my ...

I'm amazed at how focused I am here and how much I have accomplished! I even managed a long walk. Anything can be accomplished when there are no distractions and you are motivated. Now, if I had brought all that missing fabric, I wouldn't be quite as far ahead, but I would have some more finished projects, but that's OK. 

I managed to finish one of my UFO projects (due on Sunday), so I've saved myself a $10 penalty. I won't show you the homework yet, but suffice it to say that it's made ...

 Well this is the last retreat of 2022. I will say that there were a few of them this year, and I've enjoyed every one of them. Yes -- I am spoiled and I truly appreciate all my friends who have made the retreats possible. I would NOT be renting a house just for me! 

There are retreats booked for next year and I believe all of the spots are full! That's how much we love our retreats! We are at Seams Appropriate near Huntsville in case you are wondering! 

In the past, we have always gone to the ...

 I seem to be taking my sweet time to unpack everything from the retreat. It's SUMMER, and I'm in summer mode -- slow, and I'm OK with that. 

They are making progress in leaps and bounds in the front yard, and the girls and I christened the patio last night. 

The new front patio

They still have some stuff to plant, but the three "big" trees are in. Let's not forget my little patch of grass has to go in. I don't want it; the landscaper does. I'll let him win, but then, I might ...

What a difference a night makes. I had a perfect sleep the night before and last night? I couldn't sleep. Now, why is that? Not to worry -- I'll be having a nap later today. 

The last morning at the retreat is always weird. The norm is to eat all the leftovers for lunch, and then everyone leaves. This time, everyone but Dede and I (who carpooled) left before lunch. Cleaning all the food out of the fridge has always been a big issue. In the past, there would be a ton of food left by others, and I ...

 HA -- I love the comments - I LOVE them all referring to the Jen Kingwell quilts. Yes, indeed - I LOVE them all, and very hard to pick the one I like the least. They are all so worthy in their own right, and I'm just so darn proud of everyone who finished, and there will be more finished quilts. Those will get posted and added to the appropriate slot to keep them all in the same place. You'll know when that happens. 

It's that bittersweet day at any retreat, as we're going home today. But as usual ...

This retreat definitely has a different vibe than many I've been on. Perhaps it's the location? I'm not sure, but it's very relaxing. I headed out in the morning for my walk, and I decided to go for a long walk. A bit longer than usual, but I was still back in two hours. 

It was brisk in the morning, and I wore my vest the entire walk. The sun was out yet again, and I was comfortable. The environment was stunning. Since it was Saturday morning, there was very little traffic, the sky was blue ...

Is anyone having trouble getting my blog notification? Susan has been using the e-mail link on the blog, and it seems to be coming later in the day than usual. I'm not sure what is happening there, but hopefully, you are all getting the links OK. 

Day Two of the retreat has come and gone. OH MY --- what a great group of people. We have someone new on this retreat, and it's her first retreat with a small group. You always worry if the new person will fit into the mix, and I'm happy to report that ...

 Guess what?? Yep -- we're back at a quilting retreat. YES --- I know that I'm fortunate to be able to go as often as I do. When we first started going to quilt retreats, we used to rent the same house for every retreat, and it was the same group of people, and things were easy! 

When that first house closed down, we moved to another one that was a bit closer, and that was fun. Then that one closed down, but we found another one even closer. This time, we're at a different one -- we first came ...

Thank goodness for buffer miles! I walked 3.2 KM yesterday. That's the least I've walked in a VERY LONG TIME. I was so tired when I got home that I unpacked the car, had dinner, and basically went to bed for a long, long sleep. I must confess that I didn't sleep well at the retreat. That was no fault of the retreat house, but I suspect the fact that it was pitch black and, for the most part, totally silent had a lot to do with it. Just a different environment than I'm used ...

 A bit of an eventful day yesterday, but I did NOT panic! Ronda has a book with 160 Unusual things to See in Ontario, and a couple of them were close to the retreat house. We decided to visit the steam train, located at Muskoka Heritage Place, which was very close to the retreat house. We had a great laugh when we drove to the place as we had driven past it on numerous occasions on the way into and out of town. We had seen the sign but had NOT paid attention to what the rest of the sign ...

 Wow --- time is flying past at the speed of light! However, I'm so pleased with what I've accomplished here. 

I did bring the bell which you are supposed to ring whenever you finish something. I haven't rung the bell often, but I'm OK with that. I did cut a few things at the last minute and put them in the bag, and those are the ones that I worked on. Only to find that I forgot to cut one section, or I was missing one piece. However, I made HUGE progress on that one project, and ...

Wow -- day two is already gone! Nooooooooooooo -- the time is going too quickly! But that's OK - I'm getting lots done. I'm actually puttering on some small projects. I don't have access to e-mail on my laptop yet - that isn't going to happen until I get home and get my passwords. 

So I'll pull some pictures from Facebook again! And we had a major power outage last night, but thankfully there's a generator here, so we were fine. I was in bed anyway. But the router needs to be rebooted, and we don't ...

 Hmmm -- It seems that I don't have access to my e-mail account, so even though I ran around yesterday taking pictures, I can't share them with you. 

Why don't I have access to e-mail? Well, remember I had to set my laptop back to factory settings. And while the software got reinstalled, I had not set up all my accounts in the various programs; one of them was e-mail. I could reset the password and try and set it up. But I'm going to wait until I get back. I thought of throwing my little password ...