Montana Quilt Retreat

My best friend (and fellow quilter) and I headed to Red Lodge Montana last week for a quilt retreat. She and I have been sewing together since we were about 6th grade.  She still lives in Idaho, so I flew into Boise and we took a road trip to Montana!  Sorta like "Thelma and Louise."

Her sister lives in Billings, MT.  She and her quilty friends had arranged this fabulous retreat--

There were 6 of us and we stayed in this "cabin" in Red Lodge Montana.  It was rough, but we managed.

We spread projects upstairs and downstairs! 

The local ladies brought delicious things for our meals and everyone helped out in the kitchen. 

Here is the view out the kitchen door. My friend and I threw on our sweatshirts and had coffee out on the deck every morning, and happy hour in the evening!

We took 2 days to make the 8 hour drive up from southern Idaho, but hey, there are a lot of sweet and unique quilt stores along the way...and we stopped at them all.

There were also fuel stops. I have never taken photos in a restroom, but by golly, there's always a first. I don't know how many of you have ever even seen a thing like this, but I have not seen one since I was a kid.  Ewwww!  Needless to say, we semi dried our hands on our jeans at this stop.

Big Sky country in Montana.  Dry-farm wheat fields on the left.  The snow just melted a week ago here.

Along the Madison River in Montana. 

Island Park, Idaho. 

Island Park, Idaho.

Morning ice under the irrigation sprinklers where my BFF lives in Southern Idaho.

Snow on farm over Monida Pass as we dropped  back down into Idaho.

Typical dust storm as we drove through Idaho Falls, ID. 

Here are a couple of fun wall hangings the ladies made while we were there.  The Kimono quilt is for a daughter who spent time teaching in Japan.

This western wall hanging is going to receive a lot of TLC with hand embroidery and fun embellishments. 

My friend  brought a couple of machines and of course everyone else brought their machine.  On the way up, we shopped for flannels for everyone and I taught them how to make these self-binding receiving blankets. Link with a tutorial for them here: Self binding receiving blankets

I also made up kits for the "sausage roll" pillowcases.

These are some I made a year ago.

I don't know why I didn't take photos of the pillowcases at the retreat.  It might have been "Happy Hour" and I was off duty on the deck about that time, but here is a link that leads to a tutorial: Pillowcases 

First time I every flew for a weeks vacation and only took a carry on.  I did a little load of laundry one evening and still had one clean shirt when I got home.  Why did I always think I needed to pack everything I owned??

Oh, one more thing- did I mention we bunked with John Wayne?