Every two years the Virginia Consortium of Quilters organizes a retreat with classes and lots of wonderful activities called Celebration. This year was the fortieth anniversary of VCQ and in honor of this there was the Ruby Quilt Challenge.

Knowing I had not completed my projects from the last Celebration classes (and I will – really), I thought it might be nice to have something to show so I can say I actually do finish some projects.

One of my favorite quilt books is Rainbow Quilts for Scrap Lovers by Judy Gauthier. I saw Judy on Sewing With Nancy, and was inspired by the eye appeal and simplicty of the 12 projects in the book.

The title of this post should be “Read ALL the Instructions”. Seriously though, had I read all of the instructions (more than once) I would have saved myself hours of time and frustration.

Error number one began with cutting. There was a certain way to stack the pieces so they would go together perfectly. I just stacked without paying attention to whether the pieces were face up or down and cut. So I had to go back through my bin of “rubies” to pair up the pieces that I cut wrong in the first place.

The second error I made was to iron all of my seams rather willy nilly. Well, they were all supposed to be ironed open. This was an easier fix and I am glad I fixed it as there was less bulk where all the seams come together.

All of the blocks needed a center. Initially I considered yo-yo’s, but that would have been a real bother for my long arm quilter to work around so I decided on something I saw demonstrated by my friend Gerry, origami hexies.

To create the hexies you start with a circle and press the edges to the middle. Although not perfect its really is a nice finish for the center of these blocks.

I got all of my full and partial blocks together and on the design wall and it was time to sew them all together. Oh Y! By the last row I felt I was close to mastering the Y seam.

Once the top was finished I got it to my friend Robin of Robins Nest. She did a fabulous job of quilting the piece. I put my binding on and my hanging sleeve and off to Celebration we went!

It was so much fun to see all those red quilts hanging. I had several favorites and was amazed at how many people participated and the quality of the pieces.

Everyone did a wonderful job. The big surprise came on the last evening of the retreat when the announcement was made of the top three peoples choice awards.

I got a ribbon for second place!.

Honestly, I was surprised and so incredibly happy.