Jaye – Page 149 – Artquiltmaker Blog

BAMQG Exchange Blocks

A few weeks ago I talked about the blocks I was planning on making for the BAMQG challenge. Here are the first two. I had an idea for these blocks, but I also had a couple of obstacles to the finished pieces.

First, I had to find the rotary cutting directions. I tried to draw the blocks on EQ7 and wasn’t, initially successful. Through a series of weird coincidences, I found a block in the big Jinny Beyer block book and had a pad of graph paper near handy, which allowed me to visualize the grid. Once I had that, I was able to draw the block in EQ7 (I was surprised not to find it there already there) and EQ7 generated the rotary cutting directions for this Courthouse Square block. Update 10/9/2011: I found that this block is Brackman Number: 2815A. You can see an antique example of this block in a quilt at the Quilt Index.

I used the fabrics I showed in the last post and am pleased with how they came out. I was a little nervous about using the Michael Miller fabric, because I have it slated for another project. I slapped myself and used the fabric since I hadn’t used it in that other project yet and it isn’t as though I have a shortage of fabric. I think the block looks great.

Two blocks wasn’t enough and I still had some fabric, so I looked at the gallery (I apologize if you can’t open the link) that Adrianne made.I found this one in Jinny Beyer’s book also. It is called Multiple Square Quilt and is from a 1953 issue of the Kansas City Star. That book is a useful resource if you love blocks at all.

I am thinking I will make one or two more, but I made a list of all I have to sew this weekend, so we will see how much I get done.

It is kind of fun thinking about blocks in a different way and trying to make them modern. I still have more fabric, so I may make a few more blocks.

Book Review: The Mindfulness Solution

This isn’t a quilt book, per se, but it did have an effect on at least one project. I hope you will find the review interesting and useful.

The Mindfulness Solution by Ronald Siegel

I first heard about this book on an episode of Creative Mojo with Mark Lipinski (). I was in the middle of reading The Distant Hours by Kate Morton when this book came in from the Library. I didn’t want to rush through The Distant Hours so The Mindfulness Solution languished a bit while I enjoyed The Distant Hours. As luck would have it, before I got very far, the book was recalled to the Library! So many books, so little time!

Still, I found a few tidbits that I can think about, which I think will expand my horizons a little bit.

The first thing I noticed, in the preface, was the author’s ability to say something directly that did not make me think “who does he think he is telling me THAT?” In the preface Ronald Siegel writes “How can one practice possibly help with so many different problems? The answer is that they’re all made worse by the same natural tendency: in our effort to feel good, we try to avoid or escape discomfort, only to discover that this in fact multiplies our misery (pg.vii).” He goes on to promise that examples in the book will prove his point. In the recesses of my brain, I realized that I was avoiding finishing the back of the Zig Zaggy quilt, because I had done too much piecing on the back and it was a pain to finish the piecing. I got the piece out, finished piecing the back and now the quilt is ready to be quilted. I feel much better. This must seem like a lame example when there are so many people suffering in the world and I am sure a psychologist could find a zillion things wrong with me. Still, I like to start slowly on new things and not get too much embroiled in something unproven.

Siegel is also a good storyteller. He, obviously, knows that people will get something he is trying to tell them much better if he tells it in a story form. In the chapter called Life is Difficult (no beating around the bush for this guy!), in a section called Happiness is Possible-but optional, Mr. Siegel talks about brain evolution. In that section he suggests that enjoying life, according to nature’s priorities is optional and not a priority (pg.4). This hit me in the head. While I have always known that I am in charge of my own happiness, lately I have felt on the verge of chronically unhappy. When I read “Evolutionary forces don’t particularly care if whether we enjoy our life…” (pg.4)

Further in the Life is Difficult chapter, Ronald Siegel explains mindfulness in a way that makes sense to me. He says (pg.5) ‘Mindfulness is a particular attitude toward experience, or way of relating to life, that holds the promise of both alleviating our suffering and making our lives rich and meaningful.” This is a little bit of overpromising, if you ask me, but at this point I am willing to keep an open mind. For practices such as mindfulness, we do brush the edge of ‘woo-woo.

The section headings are amusing in this book. I found a gem that really made me think in the section entitled Our prognosis is terrible. The author recounts a conversation with a great Zen master who was asked (pg.6) ‘ “What is the most remarkable thing you’ve learned in all of your years of meditation and study?” He answered, “The most remarkable thing is that we’re all going to die but we live each day as though it weren’t so.” ‘ I hear and do listen to people who say to live each day as if it were you last. I try to do that, but don’t always remember. The Zen master’s comment is a little different way of saying the same thing, which will, perhaps stick in my head better.

Change is always a favorite of mine. I don’t like change, but who does? I chose a profession that has been in a constant state of flux since I joined it. I have to deal with change every day and I still don’t like it. Ronald Siegel writes about a book which states “…that most of what makes us unhappy involves difficulty dealing with the inevitability of change. (pg.8)” This bit is followed by a “Resistance to Change Inventory.” It asks you to categorize the most difficult changes, unwelcome changes and your emotional reaction to each change. I don’t know that I am self reflective enough to fill this out, but I am going to make note of the sections and try.

I am not going to get much farther in this book, right now, but as I implied, the above is a lot to think about.

View all my reviews, including non-quilt book reviews

Manteca Quilt Show

I keep referring to not having enough time to sew recently. I could go into a whole dissertation about what is enough, but the short answer is: I haven’t found what enough is.

I have been doing quilt stuff, just not sewing. I talked about the BAMQG meeting, the Primal Green viewing and the SFQG show. My last other quilt event from earlier this month was the Manteca Quilt Show. Manteca is a small town about 1.5 or 2 hours from where I live. My mom lives out there and I want to encourage her to join up with other quiltmakers in her area. It is a small show, but they had great quilts and a nice vendor mall. You can see all the quilts in my Flickr set.

All over the hall were different little displays of embroidery. We would never see this in a larger quilt show. It made the show seem very homey. I especially liked this pattern. I am a sucker for baskets.

There were probably about 100 quilts. Many of them were Sampler quilts. I have a soft spot in my heart for Sampler quilts. I think that Sampler quilts are a great way to learn to make quilts in a class setting. I know that method is not in favor at this time. This guild makes Sampler quilts. There were a number of star samplers and Christmas Samplers. I think they had different block exchanges, but I don’t know for sure.

Above is one of the best sampler quilts I have ever seen. I love the use of the Provence fabrics. This style really shows off the fabrics well. The maker has really shown the power of blocks by her use of fabric.

The block above is similar to the block I used in the Frosted Star quilt. I really like the corners, too.

I also like this star, which looks complex because of the angles and also because of the use of fabric, but upon further examination is really doable.

One of my favorite quilts was the quilt above because of the great secondary pattern created by the combination of two blocks. I also like the colors. using yellow as the neutral is awesome!

You can see that one block is a 16 patch and the one next to it is an hour glass pattern. It is a great use of these two blocks together. Also, the joyful use of color is wonderful.

I was really impressed with the piecing of this group. There were some simple quilts and beginner quilts, but a lot of the piecing in a large majority of the quilts had some element of creativity or complexity. The picture above shows a quilt that had one large piece of fabric in the middle and then this lovely star border. If you look closely, the star border can be dissected to show that it is easily recreatable.

Fabric of the Year 2010 Top & Back

As I mentioned in the Zig Zaggy post, I am working on finishing tasks for a number of quilts. One of the tasks I finished was the back of the FOTY 2010.

The Zig Zaggy quilt back was miserable to make because I used too many small pieces. I put it aside 4 or 6 months ago and I hadn’t finished it when I started the FOTY 2010 back.

I decided that I would try and use similar colors instead of using all variety of colors. Is this a new way of making backs? I don’t know, but found it a lot easier to use big pieces instead of a bunch of fat quarters. The process went faster and wasn’t so frustrating. It also didn’t take up an entire weekend to make one back. I think that using a similar color will be better for the quilting. I think it will help the quilting stitches blend in.

I built the back on the design wall, which I found to be a lot easier than trying to lay it out on the floor. I really like having a second design wall, as I think I said.

I had the Metro Coffee fabric I had saved to use. The Metro Coffee fabric was printed in such a way that made it too much of a pain to use for another bag. I found another large of piece of fabric in a similar color.

In addition, I used number of the fabrics from this year, but I also used a fabric or two from one of my fabric bins.

Somehow, I found using similar colors was a lot easier to make than using many different colors. I think it took out one decision from the process of making the back.

I don’t know what has gotten into me with this finishing jag. I think some factors were: not having enough time to sew for a week or so which made just want to sew as quickly as possible. Bringing a quilt to the quilter and knowing she could do a just a little more for me made me get on with the bindings so I would be farther ahead when I got the quilts back. I also think that talking with Colleen about three quilts ma and then made me see the possibilities if I did just a bit more work to get more quilts to her. I am behind on FOTY 2010 and finishing the FOTY 2010 top made me want to try and catch up on it.

I knew I would have a good chunk of time on the weekend to sew, so I got a bug in my ear to move through some of the finishing tasks. I also knew that I didn’t want to spend all of my weekend sewing finishing tasks, which doesn’t seem like creative sewing to me. Since I had a bit of time during the week, and small amounts of time are great for making bindings, I decided to make the bindings for the 3 quilts (Frosted Stars, Frosted Stars Leftovers and the Purple Quilt) which are currently being quilted. I also made the binding for FOTY 2010 and will make one for the Zig Zaggy quilt.

It is great that my longarm quilter will machine sew the bindings to the front of the quilt for me. I normally do it myself, but, this week, I decided that having her do it would move the process along a bit quicker.

On my list for this year is finishing one of my UFOs. I need to move through some of these other projects before I can get to that UFO. I have been trying to move projects past the piecing process before I start something new. I am trying to move some of these projects past that point.

Primal Green Viewing

Last Saturday I went with all of my CQFA colleagues to view the Primal Green Show. I forgot my camera, so the photos are from others or from the day I went to check on how the hanging was going. That day was a gorgeous day in The City, which meant a lot of glare inside the fabulous Main Library!

I really enjoy this group and the picture above shows what a great group we are. The photo also includes the librarian with whom we worked to get this show mounted. Maureen’s husband was kind enough to take the photo for us.

The photo above shows the 5th floor Government Information Center. The left case has Virginia’s quilt. Behind the lighted kiosk are three quilts, Terri’s, Maureen’s and Soyoung’s. I found out at lunch last week that Soyoung does most of her work by hand and that small quilt took about 100 hours!

The curators at the library are wonderful. They came up with this great signage. The quilts are spread out all over the 5th floor, so the sign on the bottom very nicely shows where all the quilts are hanging.

My quilt, Change of Seasons, is the tree in the middle of this case.

The librarian was able to secure the use of this case as well, even though it wasn’t in the original plan. This extra case allowed the quilts above to be included in the show as well.

My Red Journal and Bron’s Bird Nest, both 3 dimensional, were placed in this table case along with two smaller quilts. This case is slightly to the right off the elevator.

This is the quilt with the arrangement of the signage.

The standing case shows a number of quilts and indicates the entrance to the Stegner Center. Again, the glare was a problem with the photography.

The Wallace Stegner Environmental Librarian is the sponsor of this show. The Stegner Center is a gorgeous space with a view overlooking City Hall. The two quilts in this case looked gorgeous with City Hall behind them. Unfortunately the glare did not make them easy to photograph.

The roses (left) quilt is the first quilt and the sun quilt is all made from recycled tie fabric acquired from a tie factory. The use of color is excellent as well.

The Library is a very public space so all of the quilts are in locked cases. This is a different kind of look for a show. The arrangement really gives the show the feeling of the art show that it is.

The quilts are in the window alcove on the right and straight ahead and to the left.

Over a hundred ATCs were made for the show. We thought they could be used to decorate the bottom of cases, but the curators chose to frame them in groups. I have never seen ATCs framed before and I like the effect very much.

In the same hallway, the educational material was also on the wall.

Since the Library is an educational institution, we asked a group of members to create some educational materials showing some part of the art quilt making process.

The educational materials were designed to go in a table display. The curators decided to put them on the wall, presumably to include the 3D objects in the exhibit as well.

The above educational frame shows the making of applique pieces using freezer paper.

After viewing of the quilts, many of the members went to lunch across the way. We were treated very well and were allowed to sit for a long time. We were given place cards and I was pleased to participate in a wonderful conversation with my colleagues.

The Gang of Three (Nancy, Maureen, me) also decided to award a grand prize to one of the people who contributed to our collection of ATCs for the show. For that drawing, C&T Publishing, via CQFA member and C&T Education/Communications Manager Lisa Fulmer, donated the majority of the prize: Inktense pencils, a book and a few other things. I added in some embellishments and beads. I also made a journal cover to include. Caroline was the winner. I hope she enjoys her prize. We really appreciate everyone’s participation in making this show a success.

Zig Zaggy

I have been on a finishing jag since my post about projects on my mind. I want things out of the half finished stage. I want to feel ok about starting new projects, not that that is really a problem.

I am not finished with anything completely yet, but I am in the process. Three quilts are at the quilter and in the past few days I have finished two more, which will be dropped off at the quilter on the 25th.

I took the FOTY 2011 off of my portable design wall after finishing the back and, instead of taking the portable design wall down as planned, I put the Zig Zaggy quilt up. I have to say that I really, really like having 2 design walls. I only had two sides of the back to finish to make the back big enough to quilt the quilt. Since I was in finishing mode, I just sewed some extra pieces on to the back. Now I will make the binding and be done with it.

I like the front, and the back started out as a good idea, but I stopped working on it because sewing all of those leftover strips was a big pain. I am not doing that again. I am sure I can find a use for strips. I had a much better time finishing the FOTY 2010 back. I used large pieces and it was a lot easier. That is my new mantra for backs: big pieces of fabric.

Here is a the detail of the top. The top came out smaller than I thought. When I was working on it, it seemed huge. Now it seems tiny. Compared to the FOTY 2010, it is small. I guess it is all about perspective.

Various & Sundry 2011 #4

As you have probably noticed, this hasn’t been a good week for posting. I have a couple of posts in the works, but they aren’t finished. Life is a little crazy and I just haven’t had a chance. I hope you enjoy this post!

Other Artists
In case you didn’t hear, Jean Ray Laury died on March 2, 2011. What a huge loss for the quilt community! There are obituaries all over the web, including on the C&T blog and in the Fresno Bee. I took a class from her via EBHQ and it was the first time I was happy with surface design results. It may have been the only time. I don’t remember when that was. I think it was before I started this blog. She had a Thermofax machine and showed us how to print designs on to fabric. I really wanted to get a Thermofax machine at that time and think that if the class had been over the course of several weeks or had been an ongoing class, I may have taken up more surface design. She made it fun and seem doable.

She also had some cool, if a little scary looking, fish fabric that she had just designed. I bought some and I still have a little piece. One of the fish made it into the Eye Spy quilt. I’ll never forget the teeth on those fish. Her website is still up, if slightly out of date. Take a look at it before it is taken down.

I took a class from Libby Lehman sometime ago and it was one of the best classes I ever took. I learned a lot. Libby was not a prima donna. She knew lots about other machines besides her own brand. It was a great class. Recently, I watched a TQS episode where Alex and Ricky interviewed Libby, showed her house, one of her techniques and her workroom. It was a great episode.

I also watched an episode with Verna Mosquera. She has a soft vintage look that I really admire, but don’t have the wherewithall to pull off in my own life. Her company, The Vintage Spool, sells patterns. Verna is also a fabric designer, but I don’t remember seeing any of her fabric. I enjoyed the interview, partly because it was so complete. I like hearing about the quiltmaker’s background and her inspiration, both of which were covered in the interview.

They have really good guests on TQS. I also like the tutorials they give. Alex showed, in another episode, how to draft a feathered wreath quilting pattern and she made it seem like anyone could do it. She also taught viewers how to piece a split LeMoyne, which she made very accessible as well. I have a few issues with the show. The pricing model and what is available to me is hard to understand from looking at their site. The site is really busy, too. I seem to lose connection to their server in the middle of episodes. Also, the images can be pixellated. I think it is sometimes my own connection, but also partly their problem. They don’t have a very good way of marking your place in the show and coming back later, though I think many online shows suffer from that problem. It may be that the technology isn’t as well developed as it will be in the future.

Primal Green, the art quilt exhibition at the San Francisco Public Library, has some information on the Green Stacks portion of the SFPL website. Hope you can see the show.

Websites and Blogs
Have you tried My Sewing Circle? Anyone can join. It is place to connect with other fabric makers, catalog your projects, patterns, fabrics and notions. I wanted to compare it to SeamedUp since I am site tester over there. Jewel, the My Sewing Circle site mom, is very fast at adding patterns and steering members in the right direction.

I will be speaking at the Primal Green panel and have been thinking about what drives me. One of the aspects of design that drives me is repetition. You can see it in FOTY 2008 with all of those rectangles. You can see it in FOTY 2010 with all of those diamonds. My friend, Kathy, pointed me to a quilt blog call Elisa in Real Life. She has a post showing some gorgeous photos of a quilt show with awesome quilts. You can see the repetition employed by some of the artists front and center when you look at the 3/15/2011 post. More inspiration!

Mom is doing a mini color tutorial on her blog using the Munsell color system. go read the second of the series here.

Blocks and Patterns
I always wondered how the wonky pinwheel block was made and recently Marcus Brothers posted some visuals on how to do it. They have a little ruler you can use to keep all angles the same. I might make my own or see about using one of the lines on a ruler I already have. I have a plaid quilt in mind, though brighter and cheerier than the one pictured, and this might be the perfect pattern for it. Mom did a blog post about her adventures with this block and it was very interesting to see what would work and what wouldn’t.

Other
Check out the Fabric Worm blog post about their giveaway.

And the Winner is….

Mary from Mary’s Art Musings!!!

For what you ask? On the most recent book review I wrote, I offered a giveaway of the book.

Yes, she is my mom. No, this wasn’t rigged. I only received two comments on that post, so both Deirdre and Mary had very good odds.

Zen Quiltmaking

I had an appointment with Colleen yesterday to talk about the quilting for the Frosted Stars, the Frosted Stars Leftovers and the Purple Quilt. I wanted to bring the Fabric of the Year 2010 top over as well, but I wasn’t able to even start the back. My life felt like it was spiraling into complete craziness this past week as things just continued to get heaped on to me. To add to the general life craziness, my work computer is acting up. It has been for awhile, but it reached new heights of not working on Wednesday afternoon and I lost patience. Nothing would load (web pages, local programs, nothing) and I could hear the hard drive churning away, which I knew was a very bad sign. Finally, on Wednesday afternoon, completely and totally fed up, I went to my boss, told him him the problem and asked him if I could just read my email from home on Thursday if my computer was working the same way. He said if my iPad was faster, I should just go home and use that on Thurs. WOOHOO!

Sadly, his IT staff came in early and did a stopgap fix on my computer. It was much better on Thursday, so I had to stay at work instead of hang out at home with my iPad next to my sewing machine. 😉 Oh well.

The computer problems just added to my stress and in light of the craziness, I decided I had to be okay with not getting the back of the FOTY 2010 finished. I talked to Colleen and will bring it in two weeks when she is back in town and ready to quilt again. That means I have two weeks to finish the back.

This past week wasn’t a complete quiltmaking desert. I did get a break on Monday when I didn’t have to take the Young Man to his regular Monday appointment and I took the opportunity to finish the FOTY 2010 top! Yay! I feel so good about that.

All the diamonds were sewn together and the border strips were cut, so I just had to sew them on to the top. It took me a long time – about 3.5 hours. I never think that borders and backs are going to take long, but they always seem to take longer than I expect. Oh well.

I learned a couple of things making this top. First, my deadline was to piece the whole top at the CQFA Retreat. It turned out that I wasn’t ready to piece this whole top. Diamonds require finding my sweet spot of piecing. I had to develop a rhythm and a method and I hadn’t done it by the time I reached the retreat. Second, this was a top that needed me to take my time. I ripped out much of the piecing I sewed at the retreat. A lot of people don’t care about points being cut off and I am not going to beat myself up about every single point, but I absolutely don’t want my bad technique to distract viewers from the overall look of the quilt. Finally, this quilt needed to be pieced slowly and carefully.

I have been lamenting my pictures (my whole blog, really) lately and these two show great detail, but they are not great photography. I am pretty pleased with the color layout on the pink and white section.

The diamonds are not in perfect positions colorwise, but I have improved since FOTY 2009.

In the photo of the pinks and whites, I am really pleased that I clustered the whites in the corner. In FOTY 2009 I put them along the left side one on top of the other and I decided that wasn’t as effective in terms of the colorwash idea. It is very difficult to get a really smooth colorwash effect when using prints. As I said, I think I improved over last year.

My mom kept telling me to move diamonds AFTER I had already sewn them and finally I had to tell her to make her own colorwash quilt!

As I mentioned in a post earlier this week, I will be making a block or two from Joel Dewberry fabric. I have the fat quarter laid out on my ironing board (see previous comments about horizontal space in my workroom!), because my design wall is full, and there is no horizontal space.

As I was finishing the FOTY, I kept pressing bits and pieces. When I was pressing the corner of the inner border on top of the JD fabric, I noticed how interesting this particularly corner looked with the JD fabric as the border. I didn’t want that active a print on the outside of this quilt, but I thought it was interesting.

On My Mind

My mind has been swimming with all the sewing I am not getting done. I had a lot of quilt fun last weekend, but I did miss my sewing.

Since the projects were really jockeying for position in my mind, I decided to lay them all out and give them space on a page:

Sugar Pop Chubby Charmer – squares sewn; need to make straps, lining and line with batting
2 Martha Negley totes – already cut out; ready to sew
Grand Revival Flea Market bag in light violet with green dots – need to pick and cut out lining
Grab Bag- push out corners, press and top stitch
Finish testing hexagons
Corner Store – thinking about making the blocks 4″ instead of 5″, which means unsewing a lot of blocks, trimming and resewing.
Grand Revival Flea Market bag in violet Innocent Crush – unsew, fix straps and resew
Back for FOTY 2010
Bubble pillowcase
Zig Zaggy back – make it a bit longer
Stars for San Bruno – still need blocks, will put together starting in April
Block for Modern Quilt Guild

These aren’t the only projects I am working on, but these are the ones in the forefront of my mind.

Oh! Did I mention that my mind is swimming with new ideas as well? Sigh.

BAMQG Meeting Report

BAMQG Logo

This past weekend, I spent all weekend doing fun quilt stuff,. None of it, really was sewing, but all of it was inspirational.

The Bay Area Modern Guild met on Saturday for a meeting and sew day. Don’t you love the new logo? I do!

The Manteca Quilt Show was all weekend, but I went with Mom on Sunday. Look for a post about the show soon. My camera acted up, so I need to get some of the photos from mom. I’ll also put a Flickr stream.

I really like the Bay Area Modern Quilt Guild people. I really didn’t know what to expect or what I was expecting, but everyone is great: cheerful, fun, easy to talk to and doing fun projects. Even though I missed sewing on my own projects at home, it was worth the effort to go. Although I feel like I have a lot of deadlines (self imposed, of course) and I am not going to meet them, I need some sewing companionship and I am not going to get it at home alone.

The meeting was really fun. We had a bit of a business meeting and then show and tell. Show and tell was great: my favorite part. I love seeing what everyone is doing. I feel like I am getting some fresh ideas. I have been sewing, but I really had nothing to show. I haven’t finished much and need to get to work.

Amanda got some fabric from Urban Burp and combine the vintage fabric with some modern fabric to create some placemats. Everyone was very enthusiastic.

Kathleen brought this square in a square piece. She used a pattern. Someone said that there is also a Kaffe Fassett pattern in one of his early books that looks similar. If I have time, I’ll look for it and let you know. I like the color and the different sized blocks used in one quilt. I also enjoy Kathleen’s work, because she uses similar colors to the colors I use.

I brought the Black Jane Market Tote and everyone admired it, but I was busy doing something else while Kathleen was taking photos, so no photo. You have seen it anyway!

Adrianne’s hexagons are quite large. She used a special cutting technique by Kay Wood, which is described on her (Adrianne’s) blog. I tried this and had some problems. Adrianne and I worked together at the meeting to figure out the problem. What we surmise is that you must have a 60 degree triangle with the tip. I was using my new favorite ruler, the Fons and Porter Pyramid ruler. I love that ruler, but the top is blunted and, while, it works great for the Twirling Triangles, but creates oblongs instead of hexagons when using Adrianne’s/Kay’s technique.

Adrianne used Innocent Crush in her piece and machine pieced the hexagons in rows. I am not sure if the Innocent Crush is in a particular colorway. I saw a number of different colors of the various designs.

Julie‘s show and tell was her cool beginner sampler. It is so fresh and fun! I haven’t counted up my requirements for techniques to learn when doing a beginning class, but Julie’s piece hits most of the high points. Her really good news was that she is opening an LQS!!! I was so excited until I heard it will be in San Jose. 🙁 She will have an online store as well, though, so I can buy from there. She is planning to open after Spring Market.

I am really hoping that an LQS will open in my neighborhood. I am in an LQS wasteland! I’ll keep you posted on Julie’s store developments.

Kathleen has been busy. She is making string blocks as well as well as the Square in a Square and the Mod Mosaics. They remind me, a bit, of Pineapples. I believe this is also a swap on Flickr. Again, I love her colors. I am so glad someone else is working in brights and dots. Kathleen said that she is working on so many swaps that she hasn’t had a chance to work on her own projects!

It is interesting to see these swaps going on. I remember back in the quiltmaking dark ages when people did swaps and they went awry or people received blocks that were less than stellar in workmanship. I am glad there are people who aren’t as jaded as I am.

Everyone brought their blocks from the 2.5″ strip swap. I was amazed at the variety of blocks. I think they will go nicely together. Adrianne and Kathleen put names into a bag to draw for all of the blocks. Chris of Quilt Bits won! I can’t wait to see what she makes.

For this month’s challenge, Adrianne and Kathleen brought Joel Dewberry’s Modern Meadow fat quarters. The idea is that people took the FQs and will bring back blocks to the next meeting. The theme is to make blocks with squares: log cabin, 9patch, 4patch, etc. Like last month, we will either make a quilt and someone who worked on it will win or we will draw for the blocks. Almost everyone wanted to participate, which I thought was great! I guess this is me sticking my toe back into the swap waters.

The photo to the left shows the fabric I chose. The colorway is Pond. It is called Acorn Chain in a Lake, which I find very entertaining. I have been trying to think of what block to make and, especially, how far I can stretch the definition of ‘square.’ 😉 At the moment the top contender is Block # 9 from the Layer Cake Quilt Challenge. I am pretty in love with 4 patches right now, though and am trying to think of something interesting to do with a 4patch (e.g. 9patch with 4patch corners??) . Adrianne posted some fun options from Flickr. I am reserving judgment as I have not yet looked through any of my block dictionaries. I am sure I can make more than one block from the fabric I have. I just hope I find some time to sew!

I chose this fabric because it looks like dots. Also, that lighter blue looks like aqua and I think I might use some of the aqua dandelion fabric I got from FabricWorm/Birch Fabrics. It is called Dandelion by Michael Miller.

It looks like they would go together. We are also supposed to use Kona white if we plan to use a white in the block. I have Kona Snow, but not Kona White, so I will have to get some or not use white. I keep thinking that a bit of orange would be nice, but I’ll have to see when I lay out the block.

What is your favorite square block?

I only brought projects to cut out: Jane Market Totes from Martha Negley fabric, Multi-tasker Tote from Michael Miller’s Ironwork fabric, another quilt like Michaela’s quilt, but using fabrics from one of the Birch Bundles I got last summer. I thought I would get a lot of cutting done. It turns out that I was Miss Social Butterfly, As I mentioned, I really enjoy the women there and took advantage of the opportunity to talk quilts, guild activities and life. Who knew I wouldn’t just stand in the corner by myself?

The left photo shows all I got done; cut out 2 Jane Market totes. That’s it. C’est tout. I am happy I got these pieces cut as the table was nice and big, but I really wish I had gotten more done. I blame Adrianne and Kathleen for doing such a great job organizing the meeting and being such nice people. 😉

Kathleen prepared the demo. The demo was the Mod Mosaic technique by Elizabeth Hartman of Oh Fransson fame. She has a pattern for a floor pillow using the technique. She talks about the blocks here and shows different ideas for settings.

Kathleen is in a swap group and they are swapping these types of blocks so a tutorial/demo on how to make the blocks seemed a good idea. It was a huge success!

Kathleen’s blocks are gorgeous! I watched and listened as I did my own stuff. I looked at the pattern later and I get it. I think this would make good use of scraps. Just what I need: another project in process!

Peggy got on board right away. She came with fabrics for a bargello quilt and, instead, used them to make Mod Mosaic blocks!

Lisa’s blocks (right) looked like circus blocks. I loved their bright cheerfulness. Kathleen also showed some of her blocks in detail.

Looking at the black and red blocks makes me think of my new scrap organization system and how that system would lend itself to be picking scraps out of the drawer and sewing them into these types of blocks.

On my way home from the meeting, I wondered about my interest in the Modern Quilt Movement and it occurred to me that I have been, at least mentally or intellectually, struggling with categorizing my own style of quiltmaking.

What style of quilts do I make?

They aren’t really traditional, though have classic elements and are often block based. I don’t really dye or paint or engage much in surface design, so they aren’t art quilts, really, either. Perhaps I am exploring modern quilts to determine whether these types of designs are that fine line between the art and classic quilts?

I really enjoyed the meeting and can’t wait to go again….even if I don’t get anything done. 😉

Want to come to a meeting or join? Take a look at the:

Bay Area Modern Quilt Guild blog
Bay Area Modern Quilt Guild Flickr Group
Super Cool Facebook Page

Thanks to Kathleen for allowing me to use her photos!

____________________________________

3/10/2011 Update: Kathleen said that Square in a Square pattern to which I referred above is called Outside the Box by Rose Mason of Wilsonville, Oregon.

Book Review: The Quilter’s Catalog

This review is LONG overdue! I have to apologize to Meg Cox for how long it took me to post it. She kindly sent me the book and I couldn’t let it go. I read and took notes and read again and enjoyed. Well, the time has come. Read through the review for something special! 😉

The Quilter’s Catalog: A Comprehensive Resource Guide by Meg Cox

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Meg Cox was kind enough to send me a free copy of this book to review and giveaway. She did this shortly after I received the books from Lark Books and I had mixed feelings about that experience: happiness that my work on the blog was recognized and stung that they never responded to any of my emails for more information.

As an indirect result of that experience, it took me awhile to get to starting this book. Once I did get to it, I had a hard time putting it down. This is a dense, packed-full-of-information book. It a book to which you can refer over and over, and a book you want to read with pencil and notepad in hand.

The two things I really like about this book are the layout and Cox’s writing style. The book is divided into sensible sections including “my quilt history,” which tells us her personal quiltmaking story and sets up her credentials, “who quilts today and why,” “sewing now..,” “more revolutionary tools,” etc. There are also sidebars which have mini-articles and additional information.

She was on staff at various newspapers for over 20 years including 17 at the Wall Street Journal. I found her writing style to be witty, intelligent, and businesslike in an accessible way.

Ms. Cox talks about the quilt world as I see it, and not the fantasy quilt world of sharing and love that is associated with the world of quilts in many quilt books. (Not that there isn’t sharing and love in the quilt world, but it is a business world also and there isn’t enough acknowledgment of that, IMO). She starts the books with her own brief quilt history. I like knowing where an author is coming from. I like to have some context about why the author is writing the book. Often, introductions don’t satisfy my curiosity, but this one does. That leads into a section of who quilts and why. She talks about figuring this section out by doing her own survey to gather information.

One of my favorite parts is called ‘6 Quilt Myths Debunked’. The myths include quiltmaking as an American invention, cutting up clothes to make quilts, quilting by hand, old quilts value, etc. I am really glad that she tackled these issues head on, because I have a problem with “information sources” that perpetuate myths without performing any research or providing back up sources or citations. This part of the book is not a historical tome meant for academicians. Cox writes about the issues using a style that makes sense, has been researched and is an easy read for the general public.

Throughout the book are lots and lots of pictures. Pictures of quilts, pictures of department store fabric sections, pictures of rock star quiltmakers, pictures of software, sewing machines, antique textiles, books and more quilts. Most of the photos are black and white, but there is a middle section of color photos, which is also filled with the obligatory projects.

Because this is a book, it is now getting to be a bit out of date. 98% of the information is NOT out of date and the book is still very much worth the money. New products have come on to the market that are not reviewed, some webTV shows have developed further and there are new tools. This is not a criticism, but it made me think a lot about how this book could be kept up to date. Companion website? Make it a loose-leaf like legal materials and send updates out? New editions each year? I couldn’t really think of a satisfactory answer, but perhaps an iPad app with new information followed by new editions when enough changes had taken place is a possibility?

One of the good things about this book having older info in some sections is that I can see the development of certain things in the quilt world. For example, in a section called “Seeing Quilts Online” Meg talks about how museums do not always show their vast collections of quilts, but they are making inroads on scanning them. She goes on to talk about the different large collections of quilts including IQSC, the Art Institute of Chicago and the Alliance for American Quilts, among others. This section, I think, shows a clear path to the Year of the Quilt in NYC! Someone at museums must have read this book or heard about it and thought up the concept of the Year of the Quilt in NYC. Okay, perhaps I am fantasizing, but a connection between the popularity of quilts, how many are in museums, the recognition of the artistry of quilts must have led to the Year of the Quilt in NYC. I hope to see more of those types of exhibits.

I think there is something in this book for all types of quiltmakers. I don’t think every quiltmaker will be interested in every section, but I think there is enough to entertain beginning, intermediate and advanced quiltmakers. Meg Cox has included some projects for those who cannot find enough of them in projects books and on the web, she has included history, biographies, lots of information about teachers, a section for beginners on basic how-tos, etc. Some of the how-to section would be interesting for more experienced quiltmakers who didn’t have experience with said techniques. I have to admit that I like the fruit tart pincushion.

There is also a practical side to this book. Meg talks about quilt shows and gives practical advice on how to attend including what to wear, how to shop (yes, more than just bring a credit card!), what not to miss, pros and cons of lectures and demonstrations, booking rooms, etc.

I was pleased to see some of the history of the longarm section of the quilt world. I was also interested in the section on computers and quiltmaking. It included quilt software (EQ and PCQuilt, listserves (QuiltArt etc) and what the Internet offers. I grew in my quiltmaking career seeing some of these resources develop and was pleased to see mention of a now (mostly) defunct listserve on which I used to be very active.

Throughout this book, Cox subtly points out what a vital, fluid and continuously changing art form quiltmaking is. You really should go out and buy this book. I think it is one that every quiltmaker should read, if not have on their shelf. Nice work, Meg!

View all my reviews

Meg does not, yet, have a blog, but she does have a website and free monthly e-newsletter, Quilt Journalist Tells All. To see a copy of the newsletter and subscribe, click here. You can also connect with Meg by reading her two columns: Megabites gossip and news column in Quilter’s Home, and Look Who’s Quilting Now in the Ricky and Alex publication, The Quilt Life.

To enter the giveaway, you must leave a substantive comment on this post. I will do the drawing with names of all of those who comply on March 13 or 14.

If you are an author or publisher and would like would like me to review a book, please read the policies page. Thanks!