Bryce Retreat Day 4

The party's over....we finished our last day up at Bryce for the quilt retreat. What a wonderful time we have had the last few days.
This morning I taught a class called "Grandmother's Flower Garden". This quilt is all hand sewn using the English Paper Piecing method.

I think Bonnie was inspired to have me teach this class this morning because it's such an easy technique to learn. I asked my class if their brains were on overload after 3 days of quilt classes, and they all nodded "yes". Our group sat and stitched and talked and we even had a few hours just to wind down. The quilt is time consuming, but very easy to do and very therapudic. By the end of the class all were in agreement.


Nanette of Freda's Hive was in my class this morning. When she first arrived she handed me this packet of fabric as a gift! That Nanette is so generous. I had purchased her "In the Leafy Treetops" pattern and she gave me these vintage blue fabrics to get me started. Wow! And included was the white fabric as background, greens for the leaves, and even some brown ric rac for the tree branches. Oh my word!!!! Last night she gave me a pot holder, and now this! I feel so privileged to be her friend. Thank you so much again Nanette!

I experienced another fun occurrence this week. I met Sharleen who had just won the $50 Gift Certificate from Superior Threads Give Away! What a small world! She was enrolled in my class this morning, too. From of all the comments and votes from all over the country, Sharleen was randomly picked by a computer program. And here we met at the same retreat, and she happened to be in my class. (Which she signed up for months ago).

I love this quilting world.

The first flowers of Grandmother's Garden from the students in my class.

To add to all the "small world" experiences, Barbara,of Nevada (on the right) had also signed up for my class. Our daughter's had been good friends several years ago when they both worked in California. They knew each other, but Barbara and I did not. Just last weekend our daughter's had reconnected at a friend's wedding in Las Vegas.

One of the class mates brought vintage "Grandmother's Flower Garden" blocks hand made by her grandmother. She brought them to class to ask our opinion on how to finish the quilt that her grandmother had started. We loved the wonderful fabrics in this group.

We were really drooling over the fabrics in the box. Especially Nanette who purchases Vintage fabrics on line for most of her projects.

After lunch we met back in the conference room for "Show and Tell". As an end to our retreat, everyone was asked to bring their projects from the classes they had taken the last few days.

Ricci made this wall hanging. That Ricci! She can pull the funniest faces! She sure kept us laughing!

Judi had taken Ricci's class, and this was her finished quilt.

Verny also took Ricci's class. She made her quilt out of Halloween fabrics.

Rather than have all 250+ of us hold up our finished projects one by one, Bonnie had a great idea. She called each class by name and asked for a show and tell.

These are the ladies from my "Fun and Done" class.

Bonnie Miles really did a wonderful job providing a great retreat for all of us. There were 45 classes lasting 4 days. She organizes our rooms, meals, lectures, trunk shows, humanitarian projects, and vendor's mall all by herself. She was guessing she has brought groups together at Ruby's Inn for 16 or 17 years now.

Yes, we gave her a standing ovation at the end of today's program.

Thank you Bonnie! We are already looking forward to next year.