In the 19 days since my last post I am sure I have sat in front of my computer at least a dozen times to post and ...nothing; nadda, zero, zilch. I just could not come up with any inspiration to write. There was lots of news, a few pictures, but NO words. Today is really not much different but I just decided that I would force myself. The funny thing is this; when I blog daily it makes me want to keep at it, but when I get away from blogging, it is just so hard to get back at it. Much the same as my eating and exercise regime. Boy have I bombed at that lately! Up until the retreat weekend I had 14 pounds lost. Needless to say I fell off the wagon big time. But hey it is Monday and we all know Mondays are a great day for starting over. So,(I know I shouldn't start a sentence with So, but...) let's start over. New day, new week, new goals!
What have I been doing? Let's back up a bit...
Retreat was absolutely fantastic! We have the best bunch of quilting ladies ever! We (Sue and I) had mentioned a few times that this would be our last year coordinating a "full fledged" retreat. We have 2 retreats a year and one is chocked full of activities and goodie bags and fun stuff and the other is what we call a "no frills" retreat. As you can imagine the first one takes a lot of work and planning and the other is much much less work in preparing; set up a menu with the centre, a seating plan, a room plan and collect the moneys. Done! While at retreat we get to work on our projects instead of keeping busy with retreat activities so it is more productive for us as well. The ladies are happy with having 2 "no frills" retreats a year so that is what we will do.
Because it was our last year coordinating a full retreat the girls wanted to surprise us with tokens of appreciation, and surprise us they did!
It seems every time I left my work station there was a gift there upon my return. I jokingly said to the girls that when I returned home I would be expecting Mr. O to be leaving me little gifts on my chair every time I vacated it.
These ladies were so creative and thoughtful in their gift giving; home made fudge, chocolates, cookies and jellies; soaps and creams, hand made gifts such as selvedge potholders, crocheted donut pin cushions, sewing and travel kits, gift certificates, note cards, books, ornaments and fabric, homemade laundry soap and many other things! I can safely speak for Sue as well as myself to say we felt truly humbled to be the recipients of such wonderful attention.
auditioning borders
Some of the ladies call this their "winter vacation" and decorated their work stations accordingly. If you enlarge this picture, you might get a smile from their sign...
Great participation in the mystery project and we have a wall of fame to prove it!
Next up are random shots of the weekend.
Alice won a years subscription to Quilter's Connection magazine! (my project on the design wall in the background is all done but the final border..YAY!)
See all these chemo caps?
These three ladies devoted a large part of their retreat weekend to making them. Bravo ladies! My hat's off to you. (no pun intended.)
Home Sunday. Tuesday I drove to Halifax; Thursday to Moncton; home on Friday. Drove back to Moncton on Tuesday. Home Wednesday evening. Thursday and Friday and Sunday I had company...I may not have been blogging but I have not been sitting around gathering dust!
Looks and sounds like a good time was had by all. I see a few familiar faces there....lots of great lookin' projects too.. Quilt on, ladies!!
ReplyDeleteAnd a great time was had by all.
ReplyDelete