It's beginning...

to feel a little like Christmas! I wasn't planning to put up my tree this year but this basket of ornaments got me in the mood this morning. These are the ornaments I brought home from the shop and I think I have to put up the tree so I can look at them all month long! This is one of my favorites - it's very simple but I just love it. It's a Homespun Elegance pattern.

I can't believe it's December already. November was a whirlwind month and it went by way too fast. I spent the first two weeks mailing out orders and figuring out how to work only from home. This will be an ongoing issue for me as I am still working on getting my space at home organized for my new way of working without the shop.

I went to a Dear Jane quilt retreat with my mom the week before Thanksgiving. This is an annual event for us and we go to Shipshewana, Indiana. It's in the northern part of the state and primarily an Amish town. We hit Lolly's, the local quilt shop, as soon as we drove into town, before we even checked into the hotel. We met our friend Mary who drove in from VA and before too long, we had destroyed a new display of Moda flannels - mom and Mary bought all of them while I looked on. They may not look like much in this photo but they are scrumptious and the softest flannel I've ever felt (and I have felt a LOT as it was the first type of fabric I collected when I started quilting). I can't wait to see the quilts they make from them.

I don't have any other photos of the retreat to share - my camera never made it out of my purse again but I did take these photos when I got home of the quilts I finished there. First is an Auburn quilt I made for my niece for Christmas. It's a great quilt for a teenager who loves Auburn but it was very constricting to only use three colors in a quilt, especially with one of them being orange...

Here's the back...I used all the leftover fabric as I didn't want to add it to my stash!

And, here's a closeup of the quilting - the longarmer (I do not do my own quilting) put footballs on it...we did this on my nephew's FL Gators quilt last year and they loved it.

Here's the 2nd quilt I finished there...it's mostly Kaffe Fasset fabrics with a few batiks thrown in. I made this to order for someone who wanted "RED". It's very red but the turquoise inner border really set the whole thing off.

Here's a closeup of the border - I fussy cut it so the half circles would go all around the quilt. I was fortunate it worked out around the corners without them running into each other.

I had to cut down the red so put a teal fabric on the back - it's one of my favorites and I have it in every colorway I've ever seen. Wait...I could say the same about a lot of Kaffe patterns!

Here's a quilt top I put together at the retreat. I had the blocks all made and just had to do the sashing and put it together. I used Cherrywood fabrics I bought in Houston (at the Festival) many years ago and Kaffe Fassett fabrics. I bought nothing new except the sashing & cornerstone fabric. I've been trying to use fabric I've had on hand for a long time.