Happy Campers

Eleven lucky women made the most of summer quilt camp at the Point Bonita YMCA in the Marin Headlands last week. If you only saw the bunks and showers, you'd say "masochistic" instead of "lucky," but once inside our workroom, it was a whole other story! We arrived Sunday afternoon and by Tuesday night I'd finished a quilt that I sent off to Art in the Redwoods (opening Friday in Gualala, CA). Called "Evolution of a Sea Ranch Studio," the piece depicts the journey my husband and I've been on since 2008--designing an addition, going through the homeowners' association's design review process, and then getting it built (still not done).

After that, I made pants for my grandson and completed a wildly colorful top out of Sylvia Einstein Circles of Hope blocks--letting go of perfectionism and just playing with the kind of wonky blocks and bold border.

Good food, good laughs, good camaraderie, new techniques shared . . . and inspiration abounded. I am so grateful for the time to create, to finish projects, to enjoy a break from the quotidian, and to connect with my sister quilters.

As we slid into the second half of the week, I decided to piece a Day of the Dead/Dia de los Muertos quilt, inspired by my new friend Leigh. After a trip to New Pieces for fabric, I pieced that queen-sized quilt in no time when a couple of other quilters took a break from their own projects one evening to act as my sous-seamstresses. In a day and a half, it was ready to sandwich and quilt--a project that would have taken a month and a half if I hadn't been away and singleminded! (Multi-tasking isn't all it's cracked up to be.)

Next, I took some blocks left over from my "Sea Ranch Through the Redwoods" quilt, made a couple more, and put them together as a top to donate to East Bay Heritage Quilters' outreach program, which donated over 1400 quilts last year to babies, children, and others in need. During that one week of camp, I think Deanna, EBHQ's lead philanthropist, must have finished 15 tops to donate!

I practiced "precision piecing" on a couple of blocks for a Christmas quilt, but had no patience for the process, especially while tuned into all the conversations in the workroom; so I moved on.

I took some of my recent handpainted fabric and made a small composition for a wallhanging, fusing and quilting it, so all I have left to do is to bury the thread tails and add the binding.

 

I can't wait for our next quilt camp in January, and then again next August! Look at the setting . . . by the lighthouse, with an evening view of a full moon over the Golden Gate Bridge.

And we had dark chocolate caramels.  Wow!