I find it impossible to put into words what three days at this retreat last weekend meant to me, and did for me.  But, I’ll try with photos, and just a few meaningful words.

Ten woman from eight different states… a mix of backgrounds, personalities, likes and dislikes…but with one common thread–we all love to quilt!  The perfect recipe for a perfect weekend.  Three of us are celebrating July birthdays, so Amanda brought the “cake”…  They were very tasty!

From California, Cindy…who came this year never having met any of us in person.  She fit in like the perfect peg!  She travels with Bonnie, her trusty green Singer Featherweight, and she had us all drooling over her Sherbet Pips Flowering Snowballs!

Mary just drives down the road to meet us in St. Cloud, and she might just be my favorite grandma!  She brought several beautiful show-and-tell projects, the Birdie Stitches WIP, her Schnibbles zig-zag runner, and the schnibbles shown below.  She spent her weekend making major progress on a beautiful Single Girl Quilt:

I, too, have a Featherweight that often heads to retreat with me, but she stayed home this time and my trusty Bernina made the trip instead.  I finished a baby quilt top (started in October t another retreat, and then “lost” for awhile–now it is found, assembled and ready to be quilted!), and spent the majority of the weekend cutting pieces for my Candied Hexagons Quilt.

 

Rene also brought along her sister this year, Michelle, a brand-new blogger, who joined us all the way from Georgia.  She is so sweet and so humble and probably quilts better than most of us after just one year.  But she has a great teacher in her big sister.

Shelly shared part of her long drive from Missouri this year with Toni and I, and we were so glad to have her in the truck!  She’s the sweetest cowgal you’ll ever meet… and one heck of a quilter.  She brought along a patriotic log cabin that was what she sewed on last year, and worked on two more WIPs this year… We are very happy that she thinks we are worth her nine hour (one way!) trip!

Stephanie joined us for the first time this year…  Michigan Mama Pea of “peas in a pod” blog fame– 😉 brought along her daughter’s bed quilt, a gorgeous purple, green and pink medallion star quilt.  As one of her roomies, I couldn’t resist taking a picture of her sleeping under it Sunday morning!  I failed to take a picture of the beautiful batik quilt top she finished, or her other WIPs, but she was a busy girl!

Last year, I invited Terri to join the fun, she and I have been blog buddies since we first started blogging three years ago.  I’m so glad she came again this year!  She’s a busy full-time art student these days, so sewing time is even more precious to her.  She basted a quilt or two, made some mini quilts, started a beautiful maverick star medallion that apparently I never snapped a photo of, and probably more I am forgetting to mention!

Busy mom, Toni (who gave up on her blog to focus on her family) kept us all in stitches as usual, and made some great progress on a sunshine quilt she is making for her SIL.  She also kept Shelly and I laughing on our road trip to and from Grubers!

Amanda worked tirelessly to finish a quilt top for a wedding gift…  made of sumptious autumn colored solids.  She also brought her hand applique quilt that she started here last year to show us the completed top (so pretty!)

Despite all of our talking and laughing, trips across the parking lot to shop at Grubers (just one more time!), and eating, we really did get a lot of work done.  The lights burned into the early morning hours… and no one really slept in.  Of course, the time to say good-bye came all too soon, and none of us wanted to waste a second more of our precious time together by sleeping!  A girl can always sleep after she gets back home, right?