I'm Back From QuiltCon!

I am home from QuiltCon!  My friend, Christine, and I had a wonderful time meeting quilters from all over the world, attending lectures, looking at all of the quilts and shopping!  I have participated in the #makeaminimakeafriend swap at QuiltCon twice in the past and signed up again this year.  This past fall, I was told my swap partner was Katie in Oregon.  I asked her to make something that told me about where she lived and she told me she likes fall colours. I did not pick out fabrics or do any sewing until January but I was spending time before that mulling over a design.  I found some fabric for the background at a quilt store in January and that led me to picking the colours below for the quilt...four greens, four yellow/gold and four orange/red solids from my stash. 

Then, I got busy making a 6.5" churn dash in each colour. 

For the centre, I made a 12.5" churn dash in a churn dash block in two shades of gray. 

I quilted this project with my walking foot, using the background fabric from the front as the backing for the quilt. I did a poll with some Quilty friends regarding the colour of the binding and there were equal votes for gold, orange and green so I had to cast the winning vote for gold. 

All of the swappers met up on Friday night and exchanged their quilts with their partners. Katie and I hit it off right away and both of us were thrilled with the quilts we received from each other.  The quilt that Katie made for me features narrow strips sewn together into the shape of the state of Oregon and a Riley Blake Designs Oregon print on the back. Perfect!

Friendship bracelets were a popular giveaway/trading item at QuiltCon this year.  Katie made me the one on the left and I received the other one from Corinne Sovey. (Corinne is speaking via Zoom at the Oxford Quilter's Guild in March!)

It was a two day drive to Raleigh and lots of stitching was done in the car as we travelled.  I am working on the last motif on my winter/Christmas cross stitch project. Maybe I will get this done by next weekend...

Many modern quilt guilds from around the world participated in the annual Community Outreach quilt project and these quilts were on display at QuiltCon. Each year, there is a palate of colours and a theme to be used in these quilts. You can see the colours below and the theme was Symmetry. As a member of the Toronto MQG, I made four identical checkerboard blocks. Several other members were also given two fabrics to make four identical blocks.  There were no repeats in the blocks and once they were gathered up, a group put them up on a design wall to decide on a layout.  We just happened to be at the quilt when another member of the TMQG was there--Meg.  Christine took this picture of us pointing to our blocks. 

One of the advantages of going to QuiltCon is the weather--it's warmer and we get a taste of spring!  The camellias were in bloom. 

Downtown Raleigh has an oak tree and acorn theme.  

While in line for a lecture the first day, we met these modern quilters from Scotland.  They belong to the Glasgow and Edinburgh Modern Quilt Guilds.  It was fun to chat with them and we saw them several times throughout the show. Their fun sweatshirts and bags caught our eye! When I was in Glasgow several years ago, I saw the actual Duke of Wellington statue with the traffic cone on his head.

We saw our friend, Karen Brown of Just Get it Done Quilts, at the show too.  The three of us sat together at a quilting retreat several years ago and we saw her every month on zoom during the pandemic as members of the Toronto Modern Guild.  

Finn sent us this picture while we were away so we would not forget him!

We had a great time in Raleigh at QuiltCon and now we are inspired to sew!  Christine and I are off to a Guild retreat this weekend.  My bags are packed and I have lots of projects to work on. 

One more quilt--this was made by our friend, Barb.  She hosted several swaps that we participated in a few years ago and she spoke at our guild and led a workshop on pineapple log cabin quilts.  Barb's quilt was at QuiltCon but she wasn't.  Maybe we will get a chance to meet her in person some day!

We drove along part of the Blue Ridge Parkway on the way home.  Beautiful views!

I will link up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers on Sunday morning. 

Local Tourists and Back to the Sewing Machine

I did not have a lot of sewing time in the last 10 days...you see, my cousin and her husband came to visit us for a week.  They live in Scotland and we had not seen each other since 2019.  Since it was their first visit to Canada, they wanted to see all the famous tourist sites including the CN tower in Toronto and Niagara Falls.  So, my husband and I planned an itinerary full of fun and interesting things to see and do...our days were full of chatting and laughing and doing activities together.  Before I share some pictures of the places we went, here is a picture of the very small amount of stitching that I got done while they were here. I hope to make more progress this coming week. 

My daughter is almost finished her Ottawa cityscape.  Just a few more spots to fill in. 

Our company left on Thursday evening so today, I reacquainted myself with my sewing machine by making some blocks for the Toronto Modern Quilt Guild Charity quilt for Quilt Con 2024--four identical 6.5" blocks in assigned colours.  I will put these in the mail tomorrow so they can be added to the quilt. 

I am two months behind on my Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks so I made a red pineapple block for July.  I will make the June block this coming week. 

In Toronto, we went up the CN Tower where the views were fabulous!  I had only to the CN tower twice before--once on a field trip in public school and once with my daughter about 20 years ago.  The Toronto skyline has changed a lot in those intervening years. 

In the evening, we took a one hour boat tour of the harbour and had great views of the city. 

There was a photo op at the TORONTO sign in front of city hall.  They were amazed at how busy it was and the size of the buildings. 

We spent several hours at "Little Canada" a scale model of various cities and sites in Canada. There were trains running on the tracks and cars driving on the roads and lots of tiny people in all sorts of interesting situations. 

It was interesting to see the buildings in the model and then see them in real life as well. These curvy buildings are in Mississauga, just west of Toronto. 

If you are ever in Toronto, I highly recommend a visit to Little Canada. 

We spent the next day at Black Creek Pioneer Village, a living history museum with costumed interpreters in most of the buildings.  I spotted an old cross stitch sampler and a sewing machine in one of the buildings.  

We spent the next day at Point Pelee National Park near Leamington where we rode bikes and went on a boardwalk hike in the marsh where we saw several turtles, lots of birds and dragonflies and two beavers. 

Next, we went to Niagara Falls where we climbed the Brock Monument... 

Had butterflies land on us at the Butterfly Conservatory...

Went on the Voyage to the Falls Boat tour...  (this used to be called the Maid of the Mist--I had never been on this boat tour before!). This picture was taken from the Journey Behind the Falls. 

We also strolled along the Main Street in Niagara on the Lake and admired the beautiful flowers.

On the way home, we stopped at the Welland Canal viewing area in St. Catharines and watched a large ship go thought the locks. 

Our final full day together was a tour of our home town and included visits to the Elevated Park, local murals, Port Stanley and, of course, Shaws Ice Cream Parlour.   

We all thoroughly enjoyed seeing all the sites together and look forward to when we can see each other in person again. They didn't get to see Finn and our daughter in person, but we did talk on FaceTime several times while they were here. 

I will link up with the Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning as well as the Rainbow Scrap Challenge folks. 

October UFO's and PomPoms!

I finally made my September block for the Elgin Piecemakers Guild Comfort quilt project this past week! We were each to make a bird block with a gray background.  We had plans to meet outside in September in someone's backyard but it poured rain the night of our meeting and it got cancelled so now, the bird blocks will be handed in with the October blocks this month.  I had already made all of my blocks for the rest of the year in the spring so this was the last one to make for 2021.  I used a Riley Blake pattern I found online. 

My October UFO project is finished!  The hand stitching on the binding was completed last weekend. I even labelled it!

For the back, I had one yard of the dark print fabric and just used some solid yellow fabric to made the backing big enough. I am using what I have rather than purchasing fabric at the moment. 

Since our group's UFO challenge is for one year, and I have well over 20 items on my UFO list, I decided to try to finish a second UFO this month.  This is another charm pack quilt--an effort to use up the charm packs in my stash.  This little quilt will make a great baby gift some day.  I like to have a few baby quilts made ahead of time to be ready with a gift, should the need arise. I am currently about 3/4 done on the machine quilting. 

I am using a pale turquoise thread and the backing fabric is also turquoise. I should be able to finish this quilt by the end of the month. 

Over the past few months, I have been participating in the Toronto Modern Guild Round Robin project.  There are 6 quilters in my group and I have now made something to add to everyone's quilt tops.  This week, I added a border to Tania's quilt. The pink line was on the block--I removed it and then added the borders and then pieced the pink line (with my own pink fabric) back in, extending it into the border.  I happened to have the black and white border print fabric in my stash and it fit right in with Tania's block.  This block is in the mail. 

I added pompoms to my three hats today.  I used a Clover pompom maker. 

Finn loves to rearrange this blanket to make a comfortable nest!

Love Birds was delivered to the newlyweds on Thanksgiving weekend and is now hanging on their wall.  They were thrilled with the picture and frame.  This makes me happy! I managed to finish it and get it to them before their first anniversary in November!

I will be linking up with Kathy and the Slow Sunday Stitchers in the morning.