Poppy Nametags

 

I'm making the name tags for our upcoming BAMQ retreat in April, so I dug out two prior name tags to get some ideas on construction. This one is 5"wide,  3.75" high. I liked the yellow ruler printed cotton ribbon, it's very soft and looks cute too. It's a fairly simply sewn frame around the printed name section and it feels like it has some lightweight batting inside. Looks like it was likely sewn around 3 and a half sides, leaving an opening to turn it right-side out, with the neck ribbon sewn into the seam.

This name tag was from another of the BAMQ retreats, you can see our logo was used around the name section. It looks like it was fused to a very stiff interfacing along with a piece of fabric on the back.This is the no-sew version. It held up well and looked nice, it was very lightweight.

I think I like the position of two spots for the ribbon to be attached as opposed to the one point with a clippy lanyard. I remember it catches on my shirt and getting tangled with my necklace. So I will plan on doing the two spot attachment.

I think I will do a similar frame sort of look like the first example, and use the poppy fabric on the back of the name tag. Definitely going to keep it simple as I'm making a maximum of 14 of these name tags.

Still unsure on which of the two ribbons to use, I think I'll poll the other folks working on the retreat to see if anyone cares one way or the other.

Edited to add: This is now a moot post as the retreat has unfortunately been canceled. 😞

Retreat Shopping & Prizes

 

At the retreat, I went shopping with everyone at the Family Threads quilt shop. They generously gave our group a retreat discount. I got some blue thread for sewing on the facings of Running Out of Raincloud. A pack of chrome sewing machine needles because I wasn't sure I had some with me. And a pack of John James chenille needles, always good to have for hand stitching. There was a good selection of sale fabrics, those two on the left, the weird green plaid and the orange/yellow/pink text block fabric were a great deal. 

I then couldn't resist the good range of Marcia Derse fabrics.

Here's the Marcia Derse fat quarter pack un-packed.

After I laid the fat quarters out, I realized that a couple of them were not Marcia Derse, but Carrie Bloomston instead, that's okay they play well with each other.

We played some fun retreat games, and I scored a great ruler that I haven't tried out yet. Several people there said it was good and I do love the non-slip-i-ness of Creative Grids rulers. 

The ruler came all wrapped up in the cute holiday print FQ which exactly coordinates with the jelly roll strip that I got in another game. A nice coincidence.

The retreat had a little gift shop, so I checked it out and bought a stretchy Our Lady of Guadalupe bracelet, some Monastery Creamed Honey (yummy!), a nice bottle of goat milk body lotion from a local farm, Bell Hill Farm. I'd also bought some of the same company's goat milk soap at the quilt shop. 

The final shopping opportunity didn't work out as the store was closed on Monday's. Friend Jaye had spotted a Featherweight for a very good price and I was toying with the idea of getting it. Am I now a person who really really wants a Featherweight? Maybe so, several people use them at Sew Days and really like them. If they're in good shape they have a very good stitch. Some research is necessary, so I think I was lucky the shop was closed.

Final Day of the Retreat

Home again, home again, jiggityy-jig. I had to get all the way back home from SF to be able to post about what I did on the final day of the retreat. I hadn't unpacked and taken any pictures of what I sewed in those final hours. I guess I was working too hard at it to stop and take in-process pictures. 

Soooo....I worked on making the last possible four-patch blocks for the Old Town mystery quilt that I could assemble with the fabric strips that I had with me. These are assembled in groups of 10 so that it's easier for me to count them up. They're all made in such a way as to be fairly scrappy although there are many that match. 

There are only "some more" left to make, instead of "lots and lots". So it feels like overall, I made great progress on getting nearly all of the units done to start making blocks for this quilt...emphasis on almost. 

I was very inspired by watching friend Jaye’s progress on block assembly for the Old Town mystery quilt over the course of the retreat. She gave me lots of tips to keep in mind once I get to that stage which will no doubt be very helpful. 

Then for the last little bit of time I had left, I worked on the Y.E.S. Coat, cutting various widths of strips of the grey fabrics to then sew into strip sets. These will all be cut up and re-sewn again or used as is, to fill in the coat assembly between all the other Seminole piecing and paper pieced blocks.

Here's a great group picture of almost all of the attendees of the retreat. It sure was a great time, that extra day was almost too much for my stamina but I made it through and feel great about what I got done. Most of all I’m very pleased at the time I got to spend getting to know more of the guild members who were attending. I worked on 6 of the 7 projects that I brought along with me, so I feel like I packed just the right amount of stuff so that I had lots of choices and types of work to do. I did make a list for myself again of things to remember to bring to retreat next time (like a table lamp of some kind) so I'm already looking forward to that next time.

Retreat-Third Day

 

On the third day of the retreat I pieced together the rest of the backing for the Bohemian Wife quilt. I’m happy with how it looks and that I got to use up so many of the extra blocks and scraps left over from making the quilt top. Thanks to friend Jaye for taking the picture.

It’s just as loud and wild as the front of the quilt, which is what I wanted.

I also made a lot more of the hourglass blocks for the Old Town mystery quilt.

I got a start on my entry for this year’s challenge quilt for BAMQ.

As you can see it’s made with a lot of the fabrics from the Bohemian Wife quilt.

Here’s what it looks like all at once, hanging up on the post in the workroom of the workshop.

I started out at this end, specifically with that big flower. The challenge is to make a quilt without any 90 degree angles on the corners. We will see where I end up with this…

Retreat Report-Day 2

 

Back to work on day two of the retreat. Hourglass blocks for the Old Town Mystery quilt.

I thought I was finally done with all the hourglass blocks, but I was missing one.

Ahh, that’s better.

So many HSTs for another mystery Quilt clue. But I stuck with it and got them ✅ 

Stacks and stacks of HSTs.

There is a nice big design wall for us to use but it’s not solid, so stuff falls off without pins.

That’s why no official final group picture of all the HST goodness.

Happy view out the window next to me.

View of the design wall and part of the workroom.

 And some of the retreat goodies

First Retreat Day Report

 It was a beautiful drive down to the BAMGG retreat in San Juan Bautista. 

Shopping as a group at Family Threads quilt shop was very fun.

I helped set up and our fabulous organizer, Bonnie handed out detailed very clear lists of steps for each thing we needed to do before everyone arrived. A great innovation that really worked out well!

My first project was trimming the edges of Running Out of Raincloud, and then sewing on the facings. I also made a hanging sleeve, so all done except for the hand sewing.0"”1

Retreat to The Retreat

 I'm off to the BAMQ retreat, with a whole bunch of projects to work on. And some cans of mixed mojitos to share.

Don't worry, LeeLoo, I'll be back pretty soon, you hold down the scrap basket for me.

4 I's Quilting

 

One of the other projects I spent time on during the retreat was free-motion quilting the 4 I's quilt for the BAMQ fair challenge exhibit. I spent most of Saturday working this and still didn't finish. It was very very hard to "stay in the zone" during a retreat, and memo to self, don't try it next time. Is it award winning quilting? Well, no, but it's done by my own hands, as in non-stitch-regulated non-ruler using free motion quilting that shows my character and my style. 

I still have the green sections on the lower right as well as the gray borders and triangles left to do. All those thread color changes were worth it as the quilting isn't too prominent. I've got to get this done before the deadline which coincides with my knee surgery date, a double deadline!

Retreat Treats

 

Pre-retreat shopping at Family Threads Quilt Shop, I didn't go too crazy. I found a selection of the ombre confetti fabric 1/2 yards. I've always wanted to work with this fabric, it's just so pretty and I love the idea of trying out using ombré in a quilt design. I also had just seen this Ombre Triangles pattern from V and Co, and had it in my mind. I also got some Magic Pins fork style as I enjoy using their straight pins. They are marked as "fine" but I found them to be way too thick to use in cotton, maybe they'd work on upholstery or canvas?

The goodie bags were filled with fun stuff like Quilty stickers, one special sticker made just for the retreat, a sparkly scissor guard, really nice thread, candy & gum, a keychain. Best of all, one of the retreat committee people made everyone (wow!) a table pouch. The part that sits on the table is a fabric covered heavy piece of tile, so the bag that hangs down won't fall off. Really fun.

And lastly, I won something at the retreat! One of the larger prize bags got divvied up into smaller things which let more of us get the thrill of the win. This lovely bundle of fat 1/8ths. Norma Rose by Natalie Barnes for Windham Fabrics. Such great colors and the fabric designs are super interesting, all of them will play very well with many other fabrics that I already have.

More YES

On the last day of retreat I worked on making more Y.E.S. Paper pieced blocks for my YES coat. These are printed out from EQ8 on newsprint. I couldn’t do the fold and flip paper piecing method because my glue stick was no longer glue-y.

Give a Y, give me an E!

 Just what I wanted, easy to not really see the YES in the blocks but it still is distinct enough if you really look.👀 

What an awesome retreat, really enjoyed it and getting a chance to know more of the bamq people. I tried my best, but I overdid  it and my knee is very unhappy with me. A good reminder of why I’m having surgery.

63 Out of 100 Days

 

Here are seven more days worth of the 100 Days Project. I'm away at the BAMQ retreat and have scheduled this post and sewn ahead of myself a couple days.  Hopefully I remembered to post all 7 pictures of the new 9" segments.

My plan is to bring this giant roll of sewn Scrap Tape along with me to keep up on the days while I'm there. I'm planning to use the scraps that I generate as I'm working on the projects that I bring to the retreat, so there will be a distinct look to those segments.

That white on white checkerboard fabric is so odd, but so cool. I thought it looked good around some fabrics that had bits of white.

A checkerboard of mis-cut cornerstones for the 4 I's quilt makes an appearance. 

More bits from the making of Bohemian Wife blocks appear.

This combination on the left is a great palette for a quilt, the grey orange, purple, yellow on purple/pink, then a chartreuse, woohoo!

One last segment for the week. Can't believe I'm up to 63!