Retreat and Debbie Caffery Workshop

July has been a good month.  We have had unseasonably mild weather here in E. Central Illinois.  Not to say that we haven't had some hot and humid days.  But as I am writing this wearing sweatpants and thinking about a sweater, well, I think you get the point!

One of the fun things for this month is getting started on a new project with Chocolate Chicks, one of my small groups.  We are doing a Churn Dash Stash Buster.  This is how we are doing it.  This month our hostess Cyndee entertained us (about 12 quilters) with appetizers and soft drinks.  She passed out a pattern for the Churn Dash that she wants, along with a fat quarter of a cream fabric to each quilter that she wants used as her background.  We are to use from our stash fabric for the churn dash.  She requested a print that reads "Red Solo Cup"! I think this nailed it!  I used three different prints from my stash.  She will receive three 7.5" finished blocks from each member, so she will have enough to make a quilt!  Each member takes a turn hosting! Simple appetizers, nothing fancy.  We have found out that there are so many different variations of the churn dash pattern.

I went to retreat with the Materials Girls (another small group I belong to) for a long weekend of sewing and girl fun!  We stayed at The Old Brick Inn in Chrisman!  Joy, the innkeeper, is a delightful hostess.  We ate wonderful meals in a cozy atmosphere.  I worked on several projects while there.  This was a miniature I had purchased the kit for at the Indiana Heritage Quilt Show this winter.  It is now on the to be quilted pile!

Last week my local guild hosted Debbie Caffrey for a lecture and two workshops!  I was unable to attend her PowerCutting workshop on Friday, but I was able to take her workshop Open a Can of Worms. There we learned some power cutting techniques, how to use the half square triangle ruler to make half square triangles and trapezoids.  These blocks I got done in the morning.

These I got done in the afternoon, sort of like extra credit!  These fabrics are the same fabrics I used in the Kaye England workshop a few months ago.  They are Christmas prints, so I will be able to make a sampler of workshop blocks at some point in time!  The diamond shape I am going to make a small medallion quilt with it!

Guest Blogger

I was the guest blogger today on Teri Lucas' blog that is devoted to faith and quilting!  I am very excited to be included in this venture!

A stained glass window in Notre Dame.
 

There's an app for that!

I would have to say that I am middle of the road when it comes to being tech savvy.  I do not shun all the new technology, nor am I first in line to get the latest and greatest.  I was very late in getting an iPod, and only got one when I saw a patient with an iTouch (pre iPad) and thought of all the wonderful things I could do with it besides listen to music.  I also resisted getting a smartphone.  Of course, that is all ancient history, as I am the proud owner of a Samsung Galaxy S4!
I am sure that I am not using it to its greatest capabilities.  I do depend on it for my calendar.  And I do use the camera.  And today I learned how to take screenshots...on purpose!  I have taken them accidently, but was never too sure how I did it.  The reason I wanted to know this new skill was to tell you about an app that I absolutely love!
At a quilting retreat I was thinking that I needed a way to inventory or category my quilting books, on my phone, so I would stop buying duplicate books.  God bless Amazon, which doesn't let me buy the same book twice from them.  But I don't always buy my books from Amazon, so I needed something more dependable.  That's when I thought, surely there is an app for that!  I asked our techy guru quilter if she knew if that was available.  She didn't know off hand, but a quick search found that there were several options available!

As I have an Android, I opted for Book Catalogue.  It is free (yea!) and got good reviews on several sites.  There are many similar options available to Apple products.

You can easily locate your books that you have added by author, or by books.  You can collapse or expand as needed. 

By touching a title, you can see a picture of the cover and all the pertinent details about the book.  There is even a place for you to make notes about the book.  And you can note if you have loaned a book to someone!

Adding a book is as easy as scanning the ISBN barcode that is located on the back cover of the book.  Older books will not have a barcode, but you can manually enter the ISBN.  The app will search Amazon, Google, and other internet areas for the book and bring up the information.  It also will tell you if you already have this catalogued.

I give this app a definite thumbs up!  Enjoy your day!