October Sewing Retreat

Good grief, it's almost September!!!
I had better to get cracking with retreat organizing, it's only 5 weeks until we go.
I've made so much mess in Quilty Quarters while faffing with other sewing. I'll have to sort that out before I get a project (just one?) all of my projects ready to play with on my retreat.
Are you coming with us? Here's the basic information, let me know if you are interested.

Sewing Retreat October 2024
Hillscourt Hotel, Lickey Hills B45 8RS

Arrive Monday 7^th October from 11am.
Set up your sewing space, there is a lot of space.
Buffet Lunch @ 12.30pm
Afternoon tea, coffee, biscuits.
3 course dinner served @ at 6pm

Tuesday 8th
Full Breakfast menu, 7.30am - 9.30am
Mid-Morning tea, coffee, biscuits.
Buffet Lunch @ 12.30pm
Afternoon tea, coffee, biscuits.
3 course dinner served @ at 6pm

Wednesday 9th
Full Breakfast menu, 7.30am - 9.30am
Mid-Morning tea, coffee, biscuits.
Buffet Lunch @ 12.30pm
Afternoon tea, coffee, biscuits.
3 course dinner served @ at 6pm

Thursday 10th
Full Breakfast menu, 7.30am - 9.30am. 
Mid-Morning tea, coffee, biscuits.
Buffet Lunch @ 12.30pm

You can sew all afternoon, leave for home any time before 5pm 

For this retreat we will be sewing in the wonderful & extra-large conference room with plentiful tables. The room is available for you to sew with no time restriction.
Irons, ironing boards and electric cables are provided.
The hotel has a bar, obviously, you pay for those drinks.

The total cost for 5 wonderful days of sewing is £485.00 A £50.00, non-refundable deposit when you book. Payment in full by Monday 23rd September.

Please feel free to tell your sewing chums, so long as they are independent workers.
This is a 'Sew your own thing' relaxed retreat.

My Shop is now closed. 

It will be open on 

Saturday 31st August, as normal.

Stitching News

I've had lots of new people visit my shop this week. Apparently, quilters go on holiday and search for quilt shops to visit during their travels, who knew! We all know really, I think we all do it.
I've met customers from New Zealand. Australia the USA. From France and Ireland. Peterborough, Nantwich, Meir Hay and Uttoxeter. They all tell be how wonderful my shop is, so they are very smart people, ha! It's quite sad to hear from some that so many quilt shops have closed. Hey Ho. I'm still here. 

Princess Jackie spied opportunity to make her circus quilt sandwich. Such a fun quilt with lots of colourful detail. I think Jackie's plan was to get lots of the quilting done during her sewing retreat.

 Di made more of her Garden Retreat flower blocks. She's using lots of Tilda fabrics from a recent Fat Quarter Bundle purchase and she's very happy with the look so far. Those taller blocks measure about 23" and a fat quarter measures only 21", so Di has been purchasing long quarters too.

Deb purchased this Mug Bag pattern quite a while ago then forgot all about it. There are lots of us going to Checkley Sunday Fun-days with mugs in these cute bags, they are a perfect addition to your sewing paraphernalia. Deb was very happy with her making day and she'll be showing off at cuppa tea time at Checkley on 29th September. Toot toot toot for Deb's fabulous finish.

Eye Spy play mats are perfect gifts for kiddos. They are a great size for babies too. I sell "Eye Spy 6 Packs" in my little shop. 30 x 6" squares, every one different. For a smaller baby quilt you can make up your quilt without sashing then, obviously, add sashing and borders to make larger quilts. This is Deb's Eye Spy Quilt top, she's chuffed with her corner stones and says it makes it a bit more boy-ish.

Can you guess who this belongs to? Princess Jackie sent the picture from her retreat with the Tuesday ladies. What a mess it looks (to me) but Jackie loves tying off all those ends. Usually it's a rainbow of mess and I think it will be more tricky all in black. Doesn't matter what I think though. I'll report back on this soon as they are all home from a wonderful relaxing quilting retreat and, hopefully, ready for next Tuesday's class.

While I'm talking about retreats. Our next available one is in October. We are going to Hillscourt Hotel again.

Arriving on Monday morning 7th, Tuesday 8th, Wednesday 9th and going home on the afternoon of Thursday 10th. Total cost is £485, single rooms, unless you want to share? you can book a twin room.  The retreat includes refreshments, (tea and coffee) A full breakfast menu, buffet lunches and a 3 course dinner. I think you can class that as very full board! 

You'll need to pay a £50 non-refundable deposit then the full payment by 23rd September. You can pay in smaller installments if you want to.
If you are thinking about joining us on this next sewing retreat please let me know as soon as you are able. Any Questions? just ask.

Stitching News

 My shop is back open as normal after my little trip, which was a lot of fun, even without sewing!  Next week though, I am treating my very own self to another few days without work! How very dare I? It's quite easy really. I just tell you I'm not in my shop and off I go, ha! The dates to note...
My shop will be closed on Friday 23rd August. It will be open again on Saturday 31st August.

Norma finished sewing her binding to the back by hand, her favourite method, and very kindly brought her quilt back to my shop so we could see it one last time. We should raise our trumpets to give her a toot toot toot fanfare for another fabulous finish. 

Norma is already well on her way with another quilt. This pattern is Grow Free, Wild Flowers and is an excellent one for using up odd shaped pieces of fabric and larger scraps. This time Norma is going to quilt each 4-Patch all by her very own self and then join them together, apartment-ly.

Sue is very much enjoying her newly acquired Juki f600. What a wonderful birthday gift it was. She'd made a 9" finished Log Cabin block to begin with and found it so much easier to be accurate with her quarter inch seams, speed control is such a help. So much so, that Sue decided to continue adding more logs taking the block up to 18 inches, an excellent cushion size, perfect for gifting.

Julie was able to make her lovely Garden Retreat quilt sandwich. We had to hang it over the table edges just a little bit as Julie had added extra 4-patch units, accidentally of course! Such bright and cheerful colours, you know I love oranges! It's a big quilt to work on in our current heatwave!

Stitching News

Many of my customers work on more than one project at a time, especially those who come to class each week. Inspiration never stops catching the eye. Almost all declare that they won't start anything new until they have finished what they are doing. But they all do it! Starting a new project is fun! Just one more won't hurt, ha ha ha. That's how we end up with a list of things we want and need to sew, there are not enough hours in a day. We need more Bank Holidays don't we?

I've kind of lost count of how many sewing projects Christabelle has on the go at the moment. This one is the beginning of a Stack-n-Whack quilt. The fabric was purchased years ago. Now Chis wanted to get it all prepped for an upcoming Quilting Retreat. So she Stacked, Pinned & Whacked the main fabric, cut out all the background units and kitted up each block.Then of course she wanted to sew a block together to check all was tick-etty-boo. Isn't it going to be stunning? Chris had to be very strict with her very own self NOT to continue stitching blocks until retreat time. 

Another almost finished quilt for Our Norma. She has really enjoyed the piecing process of the 9-patches. She especially loved doing the applique in the borders. The quilt had just returned form the Long Arm Lady, Amanda In Stone. So Norma was able to prepare and machine sew on the binding ready to be hand stitched to the back at home. A job she really enjoys.

Julie hadn't even finished her pink-ish version of the Garden Retreat quilt when she sent me this picture of the border applique blocks for another Garden Retreat quilt. This one with a very different colour scheme. Very much improved Blanket stitching skills, which is no surprise with all her hours of practice!

Princess Jackie made another of her Circus themed blocks. How blooming cute are those Penguins!! You know, they do look a bit tipsy to me. This quilt will be gifted to a very lucky baby when it comes.

A new thing for Our Pam. Can you believe that she started another project? 

I certainly can't. It's all the fault of the internet. Pam was happily enjoying looking at the work of others when she spotted a green and cream Log Cabin quilt. That was on a Monday evening. Tuesday during class, she was on a roll! All the fabrics were cut for the upcoming retreat. I suspect she'll be taking approximately 22 projects!!!

Stitching News

 There are many lovely patterns available online these days. Instantly download-a-bubble, PDF patterns. It's dangerous! Our Pam loves cats. She loves dogs too but lately has been enjoying cat themed things. Her birthday was approaching when I came across this website sewfreshquilts.com There are so many patterns to choose from. I decided to purchase a pattern for Pam's Birthday gift. I chose this one.

Pam loves a cuppa and adores cats, so an excellent pattern!

But, a printed PDF pattern doesn't look good as a gift, in my opinion. 

When you purchase a paper pattern it looks like a proper gift, don't you think?

I decided to make up a Kitten In Cup block to wrap the pattern in, instead of paper. Genius? It took me a whole day to choose the right fabrics from my home stash, cut up all the bits, lots of little bits that all needed labeling, and sew them together. It was so cute, I decided to make it into a nifty little bag for Pam to use for her Juki DX7 Foot pedal and cable. I was very happy with this gifting idea, it looked much better than a printed PDF pattern.

Pam was very happy with her new Kittens In Cups, printed PDF pattern and the nifty bag. But she refuses to keep her Juki foot and cable in it. She's going to use it as a bag. If I had thought that, I could have made it a bit larger, and probably more useful, hey ho. It's displayed in Pam's entrance hall, for all visitors to admire. 

The pattern has two different sized blocks, this was the smaller one @ 10" finished. 

It was an easy enough make with easy to follow instructions. 

Remember though, I did say there were lots of patterns to choose from on the website.

I will not be held responsible for your new pile of patterns, convenient, printed PDF patterns!

I'll be happy to help you choose fabrics from my very own shop though, ha ha ha.