Well, congratulations to everyone, especially Mayme.
Vicki, thanks. I have been wanting to praise your quilt because it so well captures a cat's fluid lines. Bozogardener: I was one of those who voted for your quilt. It is not only beautiful and striking, but the design is unique, and I imagine that doing the applique took a lot of work.

Shannon has already told us that her charming ladybug is destined for the wall in her bathroom. My Mystery of Cats is on the bedroom wall. I have long planned to do something in that room with yellow and purple, so it happens to fit in!

I was limited in choosing the color for the cat's cushion, because at the time I started my quilt, I was under the impression that we could only use one color (though different shades of it were allowed) besides the black and white. Well, cats do not have red or pink or lavender eyes, so that left me with green, yellow, or blue for the eyes and the cushion! :0)

Come on, everybody, tell us if you are going to keep your quilts and if so, what you plan for them!

Red: Thanks for the kind words.

Yes............congratulations on a lovely quilt!

I loved them all, and the creativity just was awesome. I had a really hard time choosing from about five of them because each one grabbed my heart in a different way. It was really fun to try and match each work with whom I thought may have made it.
BTW, Biwako, I did match your cat to you and I can say it now, it was the one I ended up voting for. Some of the other ones I was just SURE I could guess the seamstress.......I was totally wrong! LOL

Both of the convergent blocks quilts caught my eye, because I'd never seen that done before and liked the 'movement' it created.

So did the drama of the Midnight Trellis. The softness of the florals peeking out of the dramatic design was very original. I also loved the way Caroline brought the flowers out of the main pattern in her Moonlight trellis.

And Oh My Gosh, would I love to have that tote bag.

The Northwest fish quilt also appealed to me, a lot. It came in a close second for my vote.

I hated it that PetalPatsy decided not to enter her piece, because I was not satisfied with mine, either as a contest entry. But, Vickie wanted this to be a challenge, and that it was. It was the first time I'd ever machine quilted, the first time I'd ever used such a modern fabric, the first time I'd ever did a quilt as you go. And the funny thing was, before Red Penney posted about a fun and done technique, I had worked it out for myself and it was the process she described. I really felt like just completing so many new experiences justified doing it. After the fact, and it was nearly completed, I decided I would have done something different with one of the borders to make it more symmetrical, but by then time was too short. I was just telling somebody yesterday that the thing about any skill is that at the end of the day, there will always be folks who do something better or less well than yourself and one should be really happy if they have met their own goals and then strive to set them a notch higher.

My quilt got sent to my step g'daughter. I'm doing one for each of the g'kids and when I started seeing this one as a finished product, it seemed to fit her style.

What fun this was, and thanks to both Solstice and Vicky for all their work and inspiration.

Thank you everyone that entered and everyone that voted. You all this years challenge the BEST!

I have ideas running around in my head for next years challenge and I'm open for other ideas. So if you have something let me know via e-mail.

To my daughter, Shannon, I have to say dear that I LOVE those little teeny 1/4 inch squares and that wall hanging is just right for your bathroom and for JENY! You did a great job! It's been a joy to work with you to see you come so far with quilting to be able to turn out such beautiful work by yourself. Keep quilting! I looking forward to that Sunflower quilt...... someday :-)

To everyone else you all did a great job. The quilts are wonderful and they all say a little about each of us. We are a very diverse bunch and it's great that we can come together via the internet to join in a common love.

A special thank you to Kate!!! Let's give her a round of applause here!!!! Thank you for ALL the help you gave me. The challenge wouldn't have been what it was without you!

Vicky

Congratulations Mayme!!

Everyone did such a great job---you all deserved to win.
Thanks again to Vicky and Kate. You both did a great job organizing and presenting this.

I wasn't in this challenge but enjoyed looking at all the wonderful creations--I had a difficult time deciding but finally voted for Shannon's charming 'Bug in the Bathroom'.

I also enjoyed trying to match projects with the creator. I did know who owned three of them but totally guessed wrong on the others, including Shannon's.

~Geraldine

What a wonderful challenge!!! Congratulations to all. All did a winning job!!! Great fun!

Biwako, thank you for your kind words about the fish quilt. It was fun to design and make. I am not sure what I will do with it-right now it is on the family room wall.

Solstice (Kate), I really enjoyed your wall hanging. The gold/yellow was so vivid against the black and white, and the inside border was perfect!

Mayme-congratulations on your lovely winning quilt, it is a beautiful combination.

Everyone did a lovely job, and my favorite part was that they were all so different!

As the photos were being sent to me, each time I saw a new one I thought "Oh my! That's it! That's the one I'll vote for!" LOL I loved them all and was so excited to see new emails show up with photos.

Midnight Garden Trellis and African Gold ended up being my two favorites, although I liked all of them. African Gold got my vote after long consideration. It was so hard to pick just one!

I was surprised to see so few quilts include blue. I ended up using golds, but my first ideas all included sky blue! I have enough black and white strips left and may still make the one I was originally planning to make.

Thanks to everyone who liked my Sunshine wallhanging. I have it hanging in the covered entryway to my home and I love the way it looks against the bricks. I won't leave it there too long because the sun will fade it but it's nice for now. It makes me feel optimistic whenever I look at it.

Mayme, your quilt is beautiful! I love the way you arranged the colors and the small multi-colored border is perfection.

Kate

Congratulations Mayme ~ love your quilt!! Did you use a pattern?

I love looking at all the quilts....much inspiration and so much talent. It is so informative to read the descriptive comments. It was nice to see the "challenge" was taken literally & all the new techniques, fabrics & designs everyone accomplished. Congratulations to all who participated & finished on time - you all are winners!

I got overwhelmed with job responsibilities, so had to back out of the challenge, but I did get most of the top completed ~ and it was a new challenge for me ~ It too was a Ricky Tims Convergence quilt - the twin to "Circle Meets the Square" by Polardream. The colors & fabrics are eerily alike ~ when I opened the pics, I thought I somehow had mistakenly sent a picture! Yours is finished and I love it!
All the other quilts were so different from one another, this coincidence must mean that Polardream & I must have been separated at birth!~LOL~

A big thank you to Vicky and Kate! And a question for Kate-is it possible to post these pictures with the names of the quilters in the Gallery section at a later date? Those pages seem to move much slower, and they are definitely inspirational.

I have to admit I hadn't thought about keeping them. I guess I could post them on the gallery, but if I delete them in photobucket the connection will be broken. How long do you want them to be available? The photos take up a huge amount of room but I'll leave them for a couple months if you want me to.

You could try clipping the post with the slides to save in your clippings. Or 'right click' on each one you want to keep and save it as a picture on your computer. Or even printing them all out.

Kate, I hadn't thought about how much room they take up ~ just recently figured out to post pics thanks to your wonderful directions.
I'll try to copy them onto my computer. I do have another question - if I save them to my clippings in GW and you delete or move them in Photbucket, do they still disappear? Just want the correct answer, either way, I'll copy them if I can when I get a chance. You were so generous with your skills to post the pics, please do whatever you were planning. Again - thanks ~ and I figured out you were the "Sunshine in my Eyes" as soon as I saw it!

I don't know about GW clippings, but from experience I can say that if you right click on a picture and choose "Save Image as" then you can put it in "My pictures" or elsewhere on your own computer and it will stay there until you delete it or your hard drive kicks the bucket.

Oh, groan, somehow I managed to merge Kate and Vicky in my mind, so I only thanked Vicky! Thanks to you, too, Kate! I thought your quilt was very elegant with its shades of gold. It belongs in a place of pride in someone's front hall. Its shape reminds me of a Japanese wall hanging.

Kate & Vicky
Thank you for organizing and putting the slides/voting together. What a lot of work! This challenge was fun - I, too, voted for bright blocks for brooke - LOVE IT! It was a tough decision because I loved them all! My DH looked at them all and he was amazed how different they all are and said he was glad he didn't have to vote! BIG CONGRATS TO MAYME! Great job.
Magothyrivergirl - that is too funny about your top being a twin to mine! It was my first time free-motion quilting. It is really fun, however, I'm not sure I could handle a really large quilt on my machine. There must be a trick to it ... maybe will try on one when I retire and have the time & patience for that!
Now that I'm back to school teaching I won't be able to do as much quilting ... boohoo! This was just too much fun!
Sue/polardream

Congratulations Mayme on you outstanding win. Nice job.
Congratulations also go to Vicky and Kate for hosting such a fun challenge and doing such a wonderful job with it.

I had a great time and found it difficult to choose among so many fabulous efforts. I didn't even try and match them with names but now I can see a relationship with various interest and talent.
Kate, yours was my final choice but there were several others that made it very difficult to decide. African Gold
was a close second. I guess I was on a gold kick.
Perhaps next time we could have some runners up and I do hope there is a next time.
I think everyone was a winner, your entrys and talent were first class!
Thank you again Vicky and Kate. Your the greatest.
Jayne

Congratulations Mayme on your beautiful quilt. I really like the color variation you used with the black and white and your GD will love it.

Thanks Kate and Vicky for your work in putting this challenge together, it was so much fun! To everyone who entered, congratulations on your fine projects and was creative talent we have here.
Jeane

I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who helped to organize this challenge - from the hosting, to the posting and organizing of entries! Thank you. It was the first challenge I have participated in, I have wanted to for a long time and never seemed to have the time. Mine was far from perfect, but I think that's the point of the challenge, and I'm just happy that I finished it and the general idea came across :) I'm looking forward to the next one, and thank you again for everyone's hard work in making it possible!