Various & Sundry – Page 15 – Artquiltmaker Blog

Various & Sundry #18

I can’t believe that September is over – well, nearly, anyway – already! I hope you are doing your Christmas sewing, because it will be upon us before you know it. And those of you who don’t celebrate can just stop laughing! I may get you into my sewing room as a sewing slave. 😉

Tools
Did you hear that Anna Maria Horner is the new spokesperson for Janome? They made an announcement on the new AMH/Janome collaboration site. I wonder what happened to Marie Osmond?

I thought I had mentioned True Grips to you, but I don’t see a reference on any of my previous posts. I heard about True Grips in a recent issue of Quilts & More. They often have a little page of tools and supplies, with interesting blurbs. These caught my eye, because of my experience as well as Sandy and Frances’ recent comments about slipping rulers. Sandy is slowly changing out all of her rulers to Creative Grids rulers. I also like Creative Grids rulers, because the dots on the back provide some traction. TFQ and I have talked about Creative Grids rulers. She likes them, too, except for the big branding circle in the middle of the ruler that seems to always be right where you need to line up lines. Still, I would like to replace all of my rulers with Creative Grids rulers, but it is just isn’t practical. I’d rather buy fabric.

Enter True Grips.

Supposedly they keep your ruler from slipping (after you have applied them). I have tried Invisigrip and haven’t found it to do the job. Also, it is a pain to apply. You know those times where you are trying to get 2 feet of plastic wrap out of the box, cut and applied to the giant amount of leftovers that will take over your fridge? That is how I feel when I work with Invisigrip.

True Grips are little dots that you put on the back of your ruler that supposedly give it some traction. I don’t know if they are thin or thick. I hope they are not thick, because I don’t want to have to deal with a wobbly ruler. I have a lot of square and rectangular Omnigrid rulers that I would be happy to not have to replace. I checked out the Grace Company website, prepared to buy a couple of packages. $5.95 for the True Grips and $11.95 for shipping! Now Grace Company sells quilting frames and they probably have standard shipping rates. For a large thing, $11.95 is probably a good price, but for a little thing like the True Grips, $11.95 is not so good. Even shopping crazy person that I can be, I didn’t buy them.

I asked Julie to buy them. And she did. She will post them in her store soon and you can buy them for your non-Creative Grids rulers!

BTW, Intrepid Thread Julie is being (or was) interviewed on Quilter in the Gap podcast.

Adrianne pointed me to a blog post about pricing handmade goods at the Ink & Spindle (great name, huh?). Definitely food for thought.

Out & About
Another new quilt museum joins the growing list: the Wisconsin Museum of Quilts and Fiberarts. There was an article pointed out to me by Morna McEver Golletz, Founder, President & CEO of the International Association of Professional Quilters. If I were planning a quilt trip, I guess I would hit the IQSC first and then drive to WI to see this museum and then down towards Kentucky for the AQS museum. Of course, this trip is not only just in my head, but straight out of my head as well. I would definitely do research before I left so I would hit all the quilt museums that are popping up and coming of age.

Karey Bresenhan and her cousin, Nancy Puentes, are also starting a quilt museum in Texas.

This is the badge that was waiting for me when I went to the reception for my quilt at the quilt museum. I wrote about how weird (in a good way) I felt seeing my quilt on a gallery wall. This badge which clearly says ARTIST contributed to the feeling. Ever since I co-hosted Creative Mojo with Mark Lipinski back in June, I have been thinking about art quilting, what it means to me and what I do. This badge was another piece in that puzzle. I keep meaning to write a blog post about my thoughts on the subject, but haven’t done it yet. What I have done is gotten back to working on a couple of art quilts. One is Kissy Fish and I am embellishing like a demon. I would really like to finish that quilt. The more I work on it, though, the more it asks for!

The Web and Social Media
I hate to be a crank, but I keep getting friend requests from people on various social media sites. This isn’t a bad thing, but I don’t know who they are or why they want to be friends. I am not a friend collector so I only want to be friends with people that I know. I always try to write a little note to the person with whom I want to be friends, even if I know them pretty well. At least they will know I am not a bot and it is really me. Am I too buttoned up?

Barbara Brackman has a wonderful Wedding Ring quilt on her blog post about the Quilt Complex. It is a wedding ring with a twist. I can see it being the type of idea that the Modern Quilters would run with. In a way, it reminds me of the more complex version of the Single Girl quilt.

Moda is having a Country Fair blog hop. I have dipped in and out, but haven’t made it a habit. Today I happened upon Barbara Brackman’s blog. It must be BB week for me! She had a chicken potholder project included in her Moda County Fair Blog post. She said that she “made several in different fabrics.” BB is very much into repros, which is not really my style. When I saw the chickens, I immediately thought of pink polka dots. I wonder how friends would like pink polka dotted chicken potholders for the entertainment value not for the decorating value! 😉

Media & Quilt World News
The Alliance for American Quilts needs volunteers at Houston to interview quiltmakers for a forthcoming book. Contact them if you can help out.

Dear Podcasters,
Please interview Ruthann from Mirkwood Designs, Toni from Silly Chick Designs and Jennifer from Patchwork and Pacifiers so we can find out how they are doing. Thank you, J.

I have been listening to some new podcasts just to expand my repertoire. I don’t really need anymore, because I am, once again, filling my iPod with audiobooks. I have found that there are things I like about podcasts and things that I don’t like:

I don’t mind rambling and hearing a bit about the podcaster’s life
I dislike self deprecation
I dislike needless apologies about the length of the episode; just make it however long it is, that is why I have a stop button
I don’t need a music intro, but it is nice when people have them
I like it when the podcaster introduces him/herself and says the name of the podcast. The date is nice, too, but not a requirement
I don’t like podfading. It worries me and makes me wish the podcasters would just say they don’t want to take the time for recording anymore
I like hearing opinions, though not so much about politics or religion
I like hearing about what you like, the products you use and the fabrics that make your heart sing
Thank you for introducing me to new designers and websites

And podcasters….I really appreciate the time and energy you put into your episodes. Keep up the good work!

I am interested in the new Kindle Fire. I really liked the post on the Stash Blog about books as objects, especially her quote from Anna Quindlen about building enough bookshelves.

Various & Sundry 2011 #17

I was so thrilled at the response I received to my last Various & Sundry post that I am excited to start this one. I really appreciate the comments you leave and I do read all of them. One person didn’t agree with me on some points and I appreciated hearing her viewpoints, especially since she disagreed nicely and didn’t imply that I am an idiot! 😉

Projects

Attack of the Hexies is still going strong, though I think people are silently sewing them together. Sew Excited posted some tips on her blog that I thought were useful, especially for people who don’t sew in blobs, but like to sew in rows.

Pam over at Hip to be a Square podcast also posted about working on her hexagons. I thought about working on my hexagon piece over the weekend, but was derailed by the Food Quilt. She said she will win the race. I didn’t know there was a race, but I am already ahead.

Tools
Janome came out with a new machine over the weekend, The Horizon Memory Craft 12000. I would love to get one of those in the mail, kind of like the review books I sometimes receive, so that I could review it. I don’t think the machine actually hit the stores until October 1 and I didn’t pay attention to the launch party on Saturday, so I don’t know all the features and details. It looks like a hybrid between the Memory Craft 11K and the Horizon. I always thought I would buy another Janome for a lot of reasons, but after my recent servicing drama, I am not so sure. I have to be fair, though. I don’t know how much of the issues were the age of the machine vs. technician error. Buying a new machine isn’t in my future for at least the next 8 years, so the point is moot. It will be interesting to see what machines are available in the next 8-9 years!

Adrianne, over at Little Bluebell has posted a great post on color palette tools. While some of the tools are quite sophisticated and require special software, most are readily available to you on the web. Check out her post and expand your color horizons!

Media
Jennifer Ackerman-Haywood, Craftsanity interview maven gets interviewed n Petit Purls blog. Check out the post. I love the weaving loom photo. The paper envelope/book project Jennifer has on the CraftSanity site has, as Anne Shirley would say, lots of scope for imagination.

As if SeamedUp, Creating the Hive (slightly different) and My Sewing Circle weren’t enough, now we have Tomspoolery! They have a pink and green brand and launched in beta on 9/6. I read over the welcome message, which I thought was well done. How is this crazy competition going to shake out?

Other Artists
Camille Roskelley is part of the Moda County Fair blog hop. Her post was on 9/9. Her family has the most gorgeous skin! I love the colors of her blog. If she posted 5 times a day, I wouldn’t get tired of looking at the polka dot chair and the aqua she uses. Anyway, the post shows all the blocks she has made for the Farmer’s Wife Quilt-a-Long and I love them. I want them. I don’t want to make them, but I want hers! I know I went back and forth about making them. Blocks are always tempting for me, but I just can’t devote the time right now.

Various & Sundry 2011 #16

CPP Responses
Danny Gregory doesn’t truly respond to the Creative Prompt, but his drawings can provide inspiration. He took his son, Jack, Paris and has posted wonderful drawings of their time there. Do not be intimidated. Be inspired. Strive to draw every day so you can achieve something like his drawings in the future. Everyone is creative and it just takes practice. Danny has been drawing for a long time and you can get there, too, if you put in the time to practice (like, say, responding to the Creative Prompt every week!).

Quilting (in the sense of stitching layers)
I got some bad news this week. My quilter has a pretty major family emergency and won’t be returning for the foreseeable future. She lives part time near me and part time in Alaska. She had planned to quilt Stars for San Bruno #2 and Pavers when she returned from this quick trip. She sent me and email and apologized and I feel so terrible for her. The new grandson is great and she is great. Other things, which are not mine to disclose. For the moment, I am leaving the quilts at her shop until I decide what to do. What that means for me is that I have to find someone who can quilt Pavers and the SfSB quilts. I am pretty particular about who quilts my quilts and what they quilt on it. My quilter doesn’t charge extra for ‘custom’ quilting. That is what she does, so I think I am a bit spoiled. I don’t want Pantographs and I want someone with experience who can work with me to complete my vision. It is possible that I will go back and longarm the SfSB quilt myself, though not ideal. What a mess. She makes my quilt life so easy and now it is so much harder. Sigh.

Other Artists
Lil Sissy has a lot of new work up on her site, A Paper Addict. Most of it is not paper, but she is doing some nice work. She has a variety up there.

Pretty By Hand has a gorgeous messenger bag posted on her blog. It looks very similar to Candy Glendenning’s messenger bag pattern, but I don’t think Pretty By Hand used Candy’s pattern. The zipper looks particularly good.

Speaking of Candy’s messenger bag pattern, I have been working on reading through the directions and it is really a great pattern. I love the way she has outlined the cutting and distinguished the pieces. Why am I not sewing this pattern? It calls for home dec fabric. I have to see what I have in the closet and then decide whether I am going to buy more or make another trip to FabMo.

Fabric
I loving the Pure Elements solids by Pat Bravo! As mentioned, I am using them for the A-B-C Challenge with BAMQG. I cut up the Cozumel colorway and it goes sooooo well with the Festival Fuschia colorway (I think; it is hard to tell with solids). You can take a look at the colorways on Pat’s site.

I just finished The Gentle Art of Quiltmaking by Jane Brocket (look for a review soon). I was already in love with Philip Jacobs work, but now I am in a Philip Jacobs frenzy. I have been looking at all of his designs and fabrics. I’d like to go to his house in Dorset and meet him, see his fabric barn and get to know him. He would probably call the police, but fantasies are free and not scary. I especially like the Delphiniums, which QuiltHome.com has in 3 colorways.

I am trying hard not to buy more fabric. I don’t want to say I am on a fabric diet, because that will send me on a binge, but I want to sew through some fabric before replacing it (cut and sewed a half yard yesterday, which is a good thing). I think this weekend will be the weekend I finally make the sewing machine cover and I just may use some Philip Jacobs fabric! Still, I love those Delphiniums and wish I had a large space where I could hang lengths of them. Perhaps I could Modge Podge lengths of fabric to one of my walls? My workroom needs a serious makeover and this idea might kill two birds with one stone.

SeamedUp Logo

Media
Are you on SeamedUp? SeamedUp is a site that allows you to track your fabric, patterns, and books. Once you have your sewing room populated, you can share your works in progress, UFOs and finished projects with other members. The site is very much in beta, but Allison and Brye are working all the time on improving it. One of the things I like is that they are working with the quilt industry companies to get fabrics, books, patterns, etc into their database. Sanctioned information – not right-click-and-save-image-as information. They are constantly recruiting for volunteers to help populate the fabric database. Currently, they would like people to add information about patterns (not a scan of the pattern!) from current magazines to their pattern database. That is a great idea! How many times have you thought to yourself: “now where did I see that pattern recently” as the current stack of magazines next to your bed falls over? I received a notice that they had just added books to their offerings. The other thing I like is that they respond to member suggestions. There is a companion podcast (available for subscription on iTunes) where they interview a member and talk about tech updates, their own projects, member projects etc. It is a nice addition to the whole SeamedUp world.

I have added many of my projects, though not all. I started adding them randomly and now have to be careful not to add something twice! DUH! I should have been more organized, but I wasn’t. It is fun to get a wider audience to my projects and I add links to my blog in order to drive traffic here. Not sure if it works, but one can hope. I have to figure out how to add fabrics to an existing project. That is confounding me at the moment. The SeamedUp girls have a fundraising campaign going on right now at IndieGoGo. This is an opportunity for you to be a venture capitalist. Forget the guys in suits in Silicon Valley; you, in your sewing room in your pajamas, can be a venture capitalist. They have prizes, too. If everyone of the over 2K members gave $5, the system would be faster, SeamedUp would have much, much more money than they need right now to upgrade the servers and the free site for quiltmakers would get a huge shot in the arm. Go over and give your $5.

Where SeamedUp is one of the good guys (girls!), I was disappointed to see the evil side of the Internet come out last week on a review of the FabricWorm/Birch Fabrics (Go to maps.google.com and search for Birch Fabrics in Paso Robles). Last year I visited Birch TWICE on my way to and from Long Beach and they couldn’t have been nicer to TFQ and me. I wrote a glowing review, because I really thought they did a great job even when we showed up in the middle of their work day and they were cutting like madwomen. I am not going to rehash my review here, but you can go and read it. Someone, whose web name is Sunnydays, wrote a decidedly un-sunny review of FabricWorm/Birch fabrics. I have never had a problem with Birch, but I am there are customer service glitches occasionally. I am also sure that Cynthia will rectify anything that is a problem. The review as vile and I suspect someone jealous of Cynthia’s success wrote it. If you have good customer service experience with FabricWorm/Birch fabrics, do go and write a review (Go to maps.google.com and search for Birch Fabrics in Paso Robles) telling people about it. If you have had a bad experience, please call Cynthia and give her a chance to rectify before you trash her woman-owned, small business.

I saw a notice posted on Big tent that Katie of Katie’s Quilting Corner podcast had made a video of her sewing room. I am always interested in where other people sew, so I took a look. It is a long video (12+ min), but I still thought it was interesting to see her set up.

Take a look at the Hasty Quilter. Very nice photography and great description of her projects.

Someone sent me an article from the Alameda Patch about a woman who sold her fabric stash recently to raise $10,000 for the Alameda Food Bank. I am pretty sure I recognize her name from EBHQ. I just found out that one of my relatives can only afford one meal a day on her income (she just gets Social Security) and I know that she hasn’t always made the best decisions (who does?), but she doesn’t deserve to not have food. I am going to send her a care package. The article made me think of all the people who will be “fed from fabric!”

I have been thinking of asking other publishers to put me on their review list. I was talking to a person who works at one such company and she said that they send out the ebook version to reviewers. I am not sure I want to sit at my computer and read a book. I do a lot of reading online for work and really cherish the time I get to lay on the couch and read a real book. I suppose I could read such a book on one of my mobile devices, but it doesn’t seem as appealing. I am going back to the drawing board and thinking before I send out any letters.

You can get a nice view of some of the artwork in Masters Art Quilts v.2 over on the Lark Crafts site. I really enjoy working with Amanda on the reviews and giveaways. She is really nice and makes me wish there was such an organization in San Francisco that would hire me to work for them. A girl can dream.

Various & Sundry 2011 #15

I do like these various and sundry posts. I feel a sense of freedom when I write them. I don’t have be terribly organized, magnificently coherent or make all the words relate to each other. I can’t point you in various directions and send you off on journeys, hoping you will return and tell me what you think.

The weekend of the 6th saw a huge event in NYC to support the Alliance for American Quilts. they are having an event called Quilters Take Manhattan. I think all of the unexpected hoopla surrounding Infinite Variety gave new life to quilts as art. All of the quilting glitterati were there and I followed the action as best I could from 3k miles away. Some blog posts I saw about this were:

Bumble Beans Inc QSoS interview
Cocktails and Thread
Fashion Show
Jackie’s Quilting Chronicles
Red Headed Mermaid (very short mention)

In the course of following the events, I was pointed to Marianne Fons blog. I like her writing style and hearing about her family. She is a sensitive writer who records her observations in a delightful way. In a way, she reminds me of Rosamunde Pilcher, my personal gold standard for descriptive writing. She writes about her personal life and family, but doesn’t give too much away, but she does write about her daughter, Mary’s, illness a bit, which I had only heard about in passing. I was curious, of course, but such a thing is none of my business, so I wouldn’t ask, even if I had someone to ask.

Marianne, in turn, pointed me to Mary Fons blog, which I will look at and, perhaps, add to my blog reader.

Media
I saw that a show called Why Quilts Matter will be coming to PBS in the Fall. I am looking forward to watching it. The website has a video trailer. It is 9 part documentary in which Shelly Zegart is heavily involved. A lot of the people in the trailer are from Chapel Hill, North Carolina. I wonder if Frances will be able to take advantage of any lectures or anything? 😉 There are a lot of other contributors as well. I checked my Tivo and the show isn’t yet listed, but I have a ‘quilts’ keyword search, so, hopefully, it will come up in that search.

Stitched, the movie, came out a few months ago and I still haven’t seen that. My libraries don’t have it yet and I am not a Netflix member.

I think there is something to be said for quilt companies to be small businesses, well any companies really. I am not enamored with large companies right at the moment. Small businesses seem to care more about their customers, though that is a generalization and a stereotype and I know it is not always true. The ones that have been taken over by larger companies, such as Fons & Porter, have become impersonal and don’t really seem to care about their customers. Fons & Porter is now owned by New Track Media LLC, which is further owned by a person and a private equity firm. They also own Quilter’s Club of America, Keepsake Quilting, QNM and others. What is their interest in quiltmaking? Money, I am guessing.

I watched one of the Fons & Porter episodes #1201 on the Spin Wheel quilt project (definitely a repeat), which said that the updated directions for using the hexagon ruler and their pyramid ruler to make the Spin Wheel with these tools would be available on their website. I bought the DVD with the pattern from the magazines, both rulers and went looking for the adjunct instructions. They weren’t on the website. I searched over and over to no avail, so I contacted customer service. The customer service people (called Answer54) were diligent, but supremely unhelpful. They had canned responses and I became more frustrated as it became clear that my question did not fit into their list of responses. Somehow I was transferred to Keepsake Quilting and the person contacted me and responded to me several times, but ultimately didn’t have the instructions. I also posted on their FB fan page. No response. I can make the block without that adjunct sheet of instructions, but it just seems so lame of them not to be able to find a sheet of instructions. I guess New Track thinks of their quilting properties as cash cows. This seemed like a simple request: M&L said the adjunct instructions were on the website, they are not on the website, please send them to me. I guess New Track Media thinks their brands are so awesome that they don’t have to provide customer service. Customer Service is everything, New Track. Get with the program.

SeamedUp is having a fundraiser (you, too, can be a venture capitalist!) to get more server space and a bunch of other stuff. They are a small, women owned company. Only one person has contributed, as of this writing, which is kind of sad. If all of the almost 2000 people who are members contributed $5 that would be $10,000, which is much more than their goal. Go for it and if you are not a member, join up! You can read more about their plans, the campaign and everything SeamedUp on their blog

Tools, Books and Supplies
I bought a new iron when I was out shopping for the Young Man’s school uniform parts. It is the most expensive iron I have ever bought – $29.99. I figured I should splurge since I have two in the closet downstairs that were cheap and, clearly, not up to my pressing needs once I got them out of the box and heated up. It is really nice to have steam again. I also like this iron, because it doesn’t beep at me all the time. I need many fewer irritating beeps in my life.

Did you enter the book giveaway I announced earlier this week? Check it out!

Are you interested in how thread is made? Coats & Clark made a video which I saw on AllPeopleQuilt.com.

BryeLynn of SeamedUp and Sew~Stitch~Create did a review of the Frixion pen. It is really nice when someone else does the heavy lifting for you!

Learning
As I have mentioned a few times, I have helped to organize a class at Always Quilting on August 27, 2011, 10-4. It will be taught by Lynn Koolish of C&T fame. It is open to everyone though the BAMQG and CQFA folks have had a headstart on sign ups. The class is now on the shop’s website. You can register via the website or by calling their shop at (650) 458-8580. Hope to see you there!

ArtQuilt Tahoe is coming around again. There are still some great teachers available. If you are able to attend and haven’t taken a class from Libby Lehman, sign up immediately. She is a wonderful teacher – giving, not stuck up, a great presenter, personable. I’d like to go sometime, but this isn’t the year. I’d love to hear about it, if you attend.

Projects
Hooded towels are very popular in our house. The Young Man thinks about things in the show and likes to tell me about them when he emerges from bathing. They are great to wrap up in on cold bath/shower nights when bathrobes are too fussy. The hooded towels have the added bonus of drying the hair with very little effort. They are harder to find as children get taller. I saw a tutorial for a hooded towel. For larger children, I would use two towels. Use a very sharp needle when sewing the two towels together, so you don’t break a needled or jam up your machine. Since you may be having the same issue, I thought I would share.

Yesterday, I posted about the gift I made for Grama. I took it to show a friend visiting from New Zealand and realized I hadn’t done the topstitching from the top hem to the bottom corners. DUH!. It would really help if I read the directions once in a while!

Last week (?) I posted the finished Kona Challenge quilt. Yesterday I saw a blog post about the responses to the challenge from the Las Vegas Modern Quilt Guild. Some of them remind me of Angela’s Kona Challenge quilt (which she was binding at the last meeting!!!)

Due to my ongoing machine issues, I am working on easy projects, or projects that don’t require complicated piecing. The Jem just can’t handle it. I bought some more of the Tufted Tweets chair fabric when I went to New Pieces the other week and cut out a pillowcase to go with the purple quilt. I sewed the whopping 3 seams it took to put the thing together and will send it off this week, hopefully.

Other Artists
I had heard about Claudia’s blog, Machen und Tun from Frances, but had never gone to look at it until I saw one of her quilts in the Quilting….for the Rest of us Flickr group. She is a working on the Attack of the Hexies project and is doing a wonderful red and white color scheme. Why didn’t I think of that? I went to her most recent post (8/4/2011) and was thrilled to see a, mostly, aqua and red sampler quilt. If you scroll down she shows some more blocks and the whole effect is quite wonderful. She talks about looking at the Fresh Lemons Summer Sampler Series blocks inspiring her, but also encouraging her to go off in her own direction. She might select different blocks that weren’t as difficult or required no paper piecing. She also talks about making the blocks a little differently to make them her own. What a great idea for inspiration! I noticed a circle tutorial, which looks very similar to the Dale Fleming method. The other thing about her blog is that she writes in English and German. This is great practice for me. Thanks, Claudia! Her blog is definitely worth looking at.

Angela has posted over 240 photos of quilts from the UK Festival of Quilts. She posted the photos in a Smilebox format on Creating the Hive, so you can scroll through them fairly easily.

Life

Really good reminder of how the inner ambivalence can affect outer life.

Amplify’d from stillmansays.com

Art therapy? How do you connect your anti-passions to your passions? And when you are talking about passion you must talk about Jesus at some point anyway. Look, Jesus didn’t know what magazines were so lets cut him some slack here. Lots of people’s coffee tables are cluttered, so maybe that was a lucky guess. But her violent reaction to it mirrored her real frustration with her job situation. Her inner and outer, as far as she understood them were the same – even though it was hidden to her. What I offered her gave her a chance to actually take the advice from Jesus above and expand her vision of herself and experience entry into a new kingdom.

Read more at stillmansays.com

See this Amp at http://amplify.com/u/a1b5k7

Various & Sundry 2011 #14

Save 20% this week from Cafe Press using the code TA0802. You can buy from any shop, but especially the Artquiltmaker Store. 😉

Learning
Everyone on the web seems to be way better at Photoshop Elements than I am. My friend, La, tries to give me little tips, but I forget by the time I get home. As result, I have helped to organize a class at Always Quilting on August 27, 2011, 10-4 and is taught by Lynn Koolish of C&T fame. It is open to everyone though the BAMQG and CQFA folks have had a two week headstart on sign ups. The class is now on the shop’s website. You can register via the website or by calling their shop at (650) 458-8580. Hope to see you there!

I was listening to an episode of Creative Mojo the other day (via podcast) and Mark was interviewing Patrick Doughty, an artist whose medium is sticks. I wasn’t terribly interested in the work, but find that I can always learn something. He said something really profound in response to a question about getting stuck. He said (paraphrasing) that it takes time to get into the groove of creating. He creates every day or only takes short breaks. this helps him not to have to get back into the groove, because he is already in the groove. This is a really important part of how I work. I think, write or read about quiltmaking every day I cannot be at the sewing machine. I cut, press, fold and organize fabric when I can’t sew (like last week when my machine was getting services). Every other time, I sew. I am always in the groove, because my work is in the forefront of my mind. I do get stuck on projects, but then I move to another project or cut, press, fold and organize my fabric.

Quilt-a-Longs
I think I talked about the Farmer’s Wife Quilt-a-Long. There are a lot of blog posts, discussions and projects blooming out of it. I saw on the ModaLissa site that the United Notions people are having a Hen Party (go read the post) that also has to do with FWQAL. Perhaps I do need to jump in…meaning ‘need’ in the broadest and most non-committal sense of the word.

Camille Roskelley of the gorgeous red dotted chair blog, ok the Simplify blog, has posted another group of her Farmer’s Wife blocks. I love them! Perhaps I do like grey after all. I think I have get out my Ultimate 3-in-1 color tool and see what I can learn from her color scheme.

How about my Block-a-Long? Have you made any blocks? Let’s see them? Are they boring?

Color
I am reading a book (review soon-ish) and I realized the author was not doing complicated piecing, but was creating complex color stories to tell in the form of a quilt. I am intrigued by this concept, especially after working on FOTY 2011. I ran across the Michael Miller site, which is doing color stories every week also. During the week of July 20 they had an aqua and red color way, which you know I love.

Media
I am feeling like Miss (Ms?) Popularity lately. I never was one of the cool kids at school so I am not quite sure how to handle it. I was recently interviewed on episode 2 of the SeamedUp podcast. It was fun to talk to the SeamedUp ‘girls’ and get to talk about design a little bit, my blog and life a little bit. They produce their podcast in a very professional way, I think, but laugh a lot along the way.

I was listening to a recent Annie Smith episode and heard about Cori Blunt. I took a look at her website and blog. Her drawings are really sweet, I especially like her bike pillow. Of course, I probably wouldn’t do any of those quilts, but I can admire them. I do like the way she did the sashing around the star blocks in the Cherry Tweets quilt. Very clever.

In conjunction with her episode #166, Amy of Creative Mom Podcast post GORGEOUS pictures of stairs with mosaics on the risers. Even if you don’t listen to her podcast (which you should!), go take a look at these photos. They are wonderful and make me want to do some mosaic work on my stairs.

I think I heard about GenerationQ magazine from Adrianne at some point in the not so distant past. I was reintroduced to it last week via an article they did on smartphone quilting apps. There are two that are interesting to me. One is block pattern app similar in concept to Around the Block, one of the most useful books in my library. The other, which constantly made me think of TFQ is the Fabric Stash by Blueshift Software app. She needs this app. This one does not get high marks, but the writers say that the portion where you can document your fabric stash works really well. It seems easy to photograph your fabric and keep it handy on your phone when I go shopping, especially for projects like the Food Quilt where I am trying to get one piece of many different fabrics. it is on the pricey side for apps, but it may be worth trying out. Now to get Blueshift together with SeamedUp so I can zap my fabric from my phone straight into SeamedUp. That would be awesome (at least in my head).

Other Artists

Lil Sissy passed on a good blog post from Kelly Rae Roberts. I think it worth reading and keeping in mind. Short version: there is a time to dream and a time to savor.

Vicki posted an Art Saves story on Crescendoh. I didn’t know about those stories until I saw a link on Vicki’s site and happened to click on it. Very interesting. I like the stories.

Fabric

Last week, Julie of The Intrepid Thread post some photos of new fabrics in her shop. She posted:

Sweet Treats http://fb.me/16eeAMWIt
Licorice Cloud http://fb.me/SdMcvn79
Cotton Candy http://fb.me/wwGp0deq
Sapphire http://fb.me/Ez55AJPA
Ruby http://fb.me/TwMwQ24o
Citrine http://fb.me/160LGuNQ8

They were some fabrics I saw when I was on my quilt journey a few weeks ago. When I saw them at New Pieces I thought that I couldn’t possibly use such fabrics, but when I saw the pictures Julie posted, I thought they might be fine if I cut them up. Is there a meeting point between fussy cutting and strip piecing that would allow the beauty of some of the larger motifs to come through? What do you think?

Various & Sundry 2011 #13

Quilt World News
Ardis James died on July 7, 2011. She was a pioneer in the quilt collecting realm, at least in my opinion. She, and her husband, Robert, were pioneers in antique and contemporary quilt preservation as well as quiltmaking traditions. Ardis and her husband helped establish the International Quilt Study Center in Nebraska. Thank you, Ardis, for your generosity. Rest in Peace.

Quilter’s Home will also die. It is being killed, actually. I am a subscriber and received an email on Friday saying subscriptions will be replaced with Quilters’ Newsletter. Sigh. I wonder if the change from Mark was just too much for people?

Out and About
A librarian friend sent me a link to an online lace museum called the Virtual Museum of Textile Arts. I am not that interested in lace, but I am interested in the history of the work of women’s hands. This is an Italian museum or related to an Italian entity, so there are some unique spellings on the site. There are multiple ways to search – by date, period, technique. I found some records and each of the records seems to have a photograph associated with it. There are videos and tutorials, which I didn’t look at.

Projects
I have a lot of projects going on, but I also have ideas swirling around in my head and supplies that suggest projects. I bought a couple of fun and cheerful charm packs recently and am mulling over making another 1-2 Chubby Charmers. My hesitation has a couple of stems:

how many Chubby Charmers does one person need?
are there quilts or other projects that would interest me enough to use for the charm packs? If so, what are they?

I posted FOTY 2010 to the “Linda M. Poole I made a quilt for me page on FB” and got a lot of nice comments about it, including one from Michele Foster of Quilt Gallery fame. She pointed me to a page on her site showing the designs for the upcoming 2014 Winter Olympics to be held in Sochi, Russia that look similar to my just finished FOTY. Trendsetting, again?

C&T Publishing had an interesting bag project posted on their site (I actually saw it on Creating the Hive). I like the shape of the bag.

I have started to listen to Katie’s Quilting Corner Podcast. I like her confidence and it is fun to hear what other people are doing. Katie has a good way of organizing her show notes with her podcasts. This comment could be down int he Media section, but one project that I really liked was Katie’s Mondo Bag. It is a postage stamp sort of design and I really liked the shape.

And, if the Farmer’s Wife Sampler Quilt-a-Long and the various other quilt-a-longs going on in the summer weren’t enough, Fresh lemons and two friends are doing a Summer Sampler Series.

Media
Frances has been suggesting the Crafty Garden Mom podcast for months and I have been resisting. Before I left, I thought I would need some extra listening so I downloaded an episode and listened to it. As I said in a previous post: Love it! I just listened to a few more episodes and they are equally as good. Tanesha is a good storyteller.

Did you sign up for the Giveaway from Lark Crafts? It is still going on, but you do have to follow the rules.

I was desperate for some podcasts, so I downloaded a few from the Pioneer Quilter. One was an interview with Leah Day. I really learned a nice amount about her work and her site as well as the products she offers. I was interested to hear about how she works. There was a lot of background noise and a pretty big disparity in the loudness of Kelley’s voice and Leah’s voice, which meant I had to have the sound very loud to hear Leah and then I would get my ears blasted when Kelley asked a question. There was also some repetitive thumping int he background and occasionally some jangling that distracted me. I know next to nothing about podcasting. I greatly admire podcasters who take time away from their quilting to podcast. I love hearing about people’s projects. I do find that the sound is important, though and hope that Kelley will go back and see if she can edit this podcast a bit. I the information is excellent and the sound problems distract from that.

Fabric

I didn’t realize (well, I probably did, somewhere in the back of my mind, know it was a possibility and just didn’t think about it) that I could get myself into trouble with fabric just by attending a BAMQG meeting. Well, now I know. 😉 Angela bought a healthy stack of fabrics from the Intrepid Thread. Since Julie attends the meetings, she brought the stack to the meeting. You know how I am attracted to bright colors and shiny objects (magpie principle), so I had to take a look. I really prefer to see the fabrics than to buy them sight unseen online. Above are the fabrics that I bought. The conversationals were little treats that Julie included with my package. Have you seen how Julie wraps up her sales? It is like receiving a gift. I don’t need to receive my fabric that way, but it does make me feel special. 😉

Business
I really did update my Cafe’ Press store. I enlarged the selection of products and changed the image on the Jacket, cards, and tote bags to the FOTY 2010 image. Yes, a jacket! Don’t you want to wear a quilt around? I think I am going to buy one to see how it fits. If you missed the Seeing Red products, sorry, but I did warn you. I need to pay for high school so I hope you will take a look at what I have to offer. Thanks!

When I received a Kindle as a gift, I bought a cover from Elizabeth David Designs and really like it. She recently sent out a free shipping notification, so you might want to check out her Etsy Shop. She is using some lovely fabrics for her covers.

Hexagons
And for your hexagon inspiration: This little mini quilt is from Malka Dubrowsky.

Now go forth and be inspired to do great work!

Various & Sundry 2011 #12

Hexagons
I saw a hexagon cushion pattern by Lori Holt after listening to one of Annie Smith’s podcasts. The fabric choices are appealing – lots of dots – but I also like the red plaid (gingham?). I am not sure about pompoms, though.

I also saw a lot of great hexagon quilts and tile designs on Flickr. BariJ is making one from the Lecien group I am using for my hexagon.

Be*mused has a lovely hexagon with a striking black path between the Grandmother’s Flower Garden arrangement of hexagons.

Making Blocks
There has been a lot of talk in my quilt circles recently about making blocks – challenge via BAMQG, Farmer’s Wife Sampler, Lovey blocks, etc. Last month at BAMQG we talked about our obsessions and I mentioned that blocks are my obsession. Frankly, I couldn’t think of what quilt obsession I had and that seemed to be a good one. That resulted in a number of people asking me about block dictionaries and other books about blocks. I am really surprised that more people don’t know about books like Around the Block or have EQ software. I guess I shouldn’t be, but Around the Block is my go to block book when I need to make some quilt blocks. It has a number of blocks and tells me, in clear instructions how to make each block in a number of different sizes. The publisher has compiled this book and its two sequels into one large book called 501 Rotary Cut Quilt Blocks. I would highly recommend this book (or the three that preceded it) for those of you who make blocks frequently.

Alternatively the Electric Quilt software is great. Yes, you will have to shell out some dollars, but the capabilities for this consumer software are great. You can take any of the included blocks, modify them and print out rotary or template directions. The capabilities are so vast. Plus, the technical support is really great. They are nice and friendly and will sometimes even draw blocks for you. 😉

I talked about the Farmer’s Wife Sampler that some at the BAMQG are doing. Pam, from Hip to Be a Square podcast, turned me on to the Farmer’s Wife Sampler Yahoogroup. I was giving her a bit of a hard time about paper piecing all those blocks and she said she couldn’t do it without that group. I am not a member of that group, but perhaps it is a group that will help you with your questions about the Farmer’s Wife Quilt-a-Long.

And just so you are reminded that I am obsessed with blocks and Camille Roskelly’s life in my imagination, I have to say that I love LOVE love her color choices for the Farmer’s Wife Quilt-a-long.

In addition to Jinny Beyer’s new-ish book, The Quilter’s Album of Patchwork Patterns, Piecemeal Quilts has a new post in their Skillbuilder series on block grids and drafting. they also include some info on copyright. I am suspicious of anyone posting copyright information who is not a lawyer, but I will reserve judgement as the explanation seems fairly basic and practical. Consult a lawyer (e.g. Lawyers for the Arts) if you get into trouble or have questions. Seriously. You can find the whole list of posts in the Skillbuilder Series on a separate tab. There are many ways to talk about learning quiltmaking and these women have a done a good job in explaining different skills.

The Skillbuilder ladies also have a button you can put in your sidebar. I thought I would spice things up on this text heavy post for you!

More on Market
Apparently Riley Blake designers did a paper doll quilt that was available for people visiting Market to win. There is a blog with block patterns at All Dolled Up. I have always loved paper dolls. I had a friend in grammar school who drew manga-like dolls before manga was even a word, which we made into paper dolls. I love the designs these designers have provided, but it is probably too much applique for me.

Doing Good
I guess I don’t get around the quilt world as much as I thought, because I didn’t see anything about this project over at Moda, Just One Star. They have just posted some process photos about receiving quilt blocks, squaring them up and sending the blocks back out to be made into quilts. The project is related to Quilts of Valor. They made their goal of 100 quilts in 100 days.

Fabric and Supplies
I saw this ‘color story‘ on a blog yesterday and thought I would share it. What do you think influences people’s color choices?

I was looking for the Fons & Porter Quilt Shop in Winterset, Iowa and found this cool quilt shop graphic of quilt shops in Iowa.

Lecien has an update to its Flower Sugar group, which I saw on the Hawthorne Threads site. I am not as fond of the colors as I was of the first group. They got rid of the bright blue I really liked.

I am really disappointed in the hardware available to use in making bags. Hardware on bags available to purchase is much nicer. I am particularly enamored of the hardware Sherpani uses. It is gorgeous. I want to be able to buy lovely hardware for my bags. Do you have a source?

Business
I have made a half-hearted attempt to make some money off of quiltmaking without selling my quilts or quitting my day job. Part of that was linking Amazon books and such that I liked. As you may have noticed, I removed that widget, because Amazon has kicked all Californians out of their Amazon Associates program. It has to do with collecting sales tax and reporting it to the state. You can read about it in the LA Times. I just don’t want to give them space on my blog, if they aren’t going to pay me for referrals. I may make a list of books I really like, but you can also click on the Book Reviews tag in the idea cloud and read all about exactly what I think of books I read.

Nota bene: I know I added a lot of links. Hope you have time to take a look. JL

Various & Sundry 2011 #11

Inspiration
A friends shared the link to this hotel with their wonderful inspirational rooms. If you want to be in a fairy tale, check out these photos.

Pattern Drafting
As you may remember, I really struggled with trying to figure out how to layout the FOTY 2010 diamond quilt. Unlike rectangular shapes, the diamonds weren’t quite as straightforward. DH helped me figure it out, so it all worked out in the end.

This topic came up again when I was back East with my SIL who now has an Accuquilt Go Baby. We were looking at the book that came with the device and the quilts were not inspiring. She wanted a chart or list of blocks she could make with each of the templates. I was thinking that this would work for those of us who cut our scraps into regular squares or triangles to have them ready for ….. something. For example, she and I (from our different points of view) would like to be able to say “I have triangles that make 2″ finished half square triangles, what can I make?” What blocks? What overall design, if applicable? What are my choice for the parts I have?”

This is related to the FOTY problem, to which I linked above, because in that case, I wanted to say “I have 340 diamonds, how big can I make a rectangular quilt?”

I searched for a chart or a list specifically related to the Accuquilt device, but couldn’t find anybody thinking that way. When I step back, I think that nobody else must think this way. Does everyone say I want to make an Ohio Star or a Lone Star or a hexagon quilt and then go from there? It seems to me that this would make scrap quiltmakers happy.

Do you know of such a chart? Have you started one?

Media
SIL bought the Jinny Beyer Perfect Piecer that I discussed a couple of weeks ago, because she is going to start on her Eye Spy quilt. It didn’t come with very comprehensive directions about the possibilities for what we could do with it. Granted, the ruler is pretty self explanatory, but we wanted to know more (do you sense a theme here? She and I feed off of each other in terms of quilt information). We went on to YouTube and saw an interesting video from Wish Upon a Quilt (bought some stuff from them recently and found their customer service to be excellent). The video was not specifically about how to use the Perfect Piecer, though the presenter did go into it a little, but we found that what information she gave was helpful in terms of looking at the Perfect Piecer. I wasn’t able to find any other videos, more comprehensive or not on using this tool, but hope that someone will make one. I have Jinny Beyer’s Handpiecing book, Quiltmaking by Hand and will look in there to see if she goes into it at all. It may also be in her puzzle balls book, Patchwork Puzzle Balls. I don’t think this ruler will help me with the Flowering Snowball, but one can dream.

My computer is declining to recognize any device plugged into a USB port. What a pain on a lot of levels, let me tell you. As a result, I wasn’t able to update my iPod before my workout on Wednesday. That meant no Sandy, Pam or Frances to whom I could listen. Fortunately, I had downloaded an episode of Crafty Garden Mom. I was reluctant to start listening even though everyone was saying what a great podcast it was as I was just reluctant to add another addiction to the list, but I was short of podcasts. Boy, am I glad I did. I love Tanesha’s voice and content!

Other Artists
Joanna Figueroa of Fig Tree Quilts had a blog post up recently about Sit Upons. Sit Upons are a Girl Scout staple project, but they are great for other uses as well. I wasn’t even thinking about these types of projects, but I am thinking about decorating. I saw these and was so taken with how professional they look, how taut they are and how nice the buttons look. I love the colors, but have to be careful, because I get them home and find that I have nothing to go with them.

Blocks and Piecing
Adrianne and other in the BAMQG are participating in the Farmer’s Wife Sampler Quilt-a-Long. These quilt-a-longs are so interesting to me. Back in the first days of general access to the Internet, we did swaps. I keep trying to compare that to this new phenomenon. Anyway, I was reading the blog post on this QAL written by one of the organizers. She mentioned holding her templates in place with glue stick while rotary cutting around them! I would have never thought of that. I think of drawing around templates with a pencil, Sewline or SCUF, but not actually rotary cutting around them. Very interesting.

The BAMQG is also doing a block-a-long or quilt-a-long. I am not sure which. People are making blocks that start with a letter of the alphabet-going in order- and then they will make a sampler. Some are using the Farmer’s Wife book and other are just using block books and Quilter’s Cache. Camille Roskelly is doing the Farmer’s Wife QAL and I love her blocks. I wish they were mine. I haven’t decided if I am going to make the blocks, but if I do they will be in the same colors as CR’s.

Various & Sundry 2011 #10

Mentions and Accolades

My post about the Maker Faire was a featured post on Creating the Hive. It is easy to deal with, because the posts I write here are automatically shared there. Yes, people may see some duplication, but I get a whole different audience there. Are you a member of Creating the Hive? I’ll send you an invite if you want one.

My Sketchbook from the Sketchbook Project has been digitized. You can see it at: http://www.arthousecoop.com/library/637. I was able to page through it, but let me know if you are able to do so. Regular readers will recognize the drawings. 😉

Sandy wrote a great review of the Quilter’s Academy v.1 book that I reviewed some weeks ago. She, kindly, built on the review I wrote, which I really appreciate.

Fabric Requirements?

I saw this tool for calculating fabric requirements. I have no idea if it works even though I tried it for hexagons. I just have no frame of reference for using the tool. What do you think?

Robert Kaufman also has a fabric calculator for the Android Market. I don’t have an Android, so I haven’t tried it. Perhaps Sandy will do a review?

Other Artists

Danny Gregory is a writer and journal artist. He did some podcast with artists who were featured in one of his books. I really liked those podcasts, because they talked about creative process, tools and journals. He put a recent blog post that really spoke to me. In it he says “We don’t just want a pat on the head; we want connection, reaction, insight, something that makes us see what we made in a newer light or on a deeper plain.” I try not to want this, but I have to admit that even if I don’t want approval, I do want that connection and a conversation to start. He also says “The true value of acknowledgment isn’t registered in the ego; it’s the opposite, a breaking down of the barriers between creator and audience so that we can unite in a shared appreciation of something that lends beauty and meaning to the grinding metronome of the day. We see a glimpse of the heavens together, a view that appeared to one of us first but is now a canopy over us all.
It’s even true of a joke, a shared laugh, the quick bark of recognition that our minds thought alike, we saw the other’s insight….” It seems to be all about connection.

I took a look at Leah Day site again when mom and I were talking about free motion quilting. She just bought a Flynn Frame so I showed her the site. What I didn’t realize is that Leah has great videos on her site. They are professional, but not slick. They come across as a friend genuinely wanting to share information with another friend. I was inspired.

Nina Johansson is a Swedish artist who does really great drawings. See. Be. Draw had an interview with her recently. Nina is the artist whose coffee cup drawing I adore.

Dan Rouse is a quiltmaker whose blog I found through the East Bay Modern Quilt Guild. He has a great post on pieced circles (just say yes!) on his WIP Wednesday post.

Exhibits and Such

Lisa Call has put up a Squidoo site about Quilt National 2011, which opened last week at the Dairy Barn.

The ‘and such’ part is SeamedUp. Quiltin’ Jenny posted a great interview with the Queen of Everything, Allison Rosen. Quiltin’ Jenny had a great series of posts earlier this year/ late last year (??) about cleaning out various rooms of her house. It was very inspiring and made it seem doable.

Here is a gallery of quilts from Quilts Inc. Who will Pinterest them?

Oops

I have been looking at spelling lately, especially the apostrophe problem, and shaking my head. I found a doosie in a Quilt Market Report today. Not just in the text, but as part of printed signage. I see this as a sign that the apostrophe will be gone before 10 years are over. Sigh.

I am not immune. A kind reader pointed out a date error on one of my recent posts. Thank you! Please feel free to kindly point out spelling errors and such. I want my blog to be the best it can be and am only human.

Various & Sundry 2011 #9

Cafe Press Store

I am getting ready to change out all of the designs on the items in the store. If you want any of the Seeing Red items, now is the time to get them. You know you need that iPad cover. 😉

Supplies & Patterns

I never think to look at Nancy’s Notions for quilting supplies. Not sure why. I saw an update from her on FB and checked a new product she rolled out at Quilt Market. I also looked around at her rulers and such. She has a nice selection of what looks like innovative tools and rulers.

I am sort of interested in needle felting – not actually doing it, but knowing about it and seeing other people do it. I thought this project for a felted iPad cover was a good idea. Useful as well appropriate pattern for the materials.

Fabric

Michael Miller has posted all of their new lines of fabric. They also have an Aqua Red line that includes the Little Plain Jane flower print that I am using on my latest sampler. I may also buy more of the aqua with the red dots. I love the cheerfulness of that fabric design.

Rouge et Noir looks like it also has some nice prints. I see some of them becoming bags.

In both of the lines I have mentioned, I see Michael Miller reusing designs, which I think it is a good idea. I still would like Windham to reissue Botanical Pop in the turquoise colorway. They might have missed their chance, because I am really liking the aqua/turquoise with white dot print in the Queen Street line (above or bottom row, 3rd from left in this photo). I also like the red, which is from the Moda Bliss line.

Michael Miller has spread dots all over their new lines. They have included some of the ‘dumb dots’ (dumb name, IMO) and the Ta Dots in their various new lines. I consider those dots to be staples and am glad to see them reappearing. I will have to search hard in the new lines to ‘replenish’ my supply. 😉

I keep hearing that grey is in for the new season of fabric. I don’t think I am buying into it. I live in the fog. Weeks can go by when I don’t see the sun and the last thing I need is more fog in my workroom.

Did anyone see anything new from Martha Negley at Quilt Market?

Quilt World News

Quilt Market has come and gone. Again I did not attend. I followed along via Twitter, which was ok. The Fat Quarter Shop posted tons of candid shots and that was fun. Stop Staring and Start Sewing has a great blog post recap about it-one of the best I have seen. Camille Roskelly also posted a nutshell recap. There is a great picture of her booth and I just love the colors. I can’t get enough of them. Front and center is a tray of Ruby charm packs. I think I have to get one. Lots of fabulous aqua and red photos in Camille’s post. Kathy at Pink Chalk Studio has a wonderful recap. She posts pictures, but also talks about the trends. Her post feeds my intellectual curiosity about the quilt industry.

C&T publishing, and their Stash imprint, was featured in an article about their phenomenal growth in a difficult industry. YAY C&T/Stash!

I have to admit that I was disappointed in the recent blog list in Quilter’s Home magazine. I like the idea of the 50 best blogs or whatever, but was disappointed (a) because mine wasn’t in there and (b) because most of the blogs were the same old, same old. I have to be honest. I work hard on my blog and it would be nice to see it show up in one of these lists sometime. Still, that isn’t the reason I write this blog, so fine, I am moving on. The other thing, though, is that the blogs they featured are great blogs: good info, gorgeous photos. There isn’t anything wrong with the blogs, but they are the popular blogs. The writers/editors didn’t have to work to make a new and innovative list.

Getting the Word Out

I am excited that another one of my posts, Hooked on Hexagons, was featured on Creating the Hive. This is my fourth post to be featured on Creating the Hive. Creating the Hive is another space for people to talk about their art. Lisa of LisaLizaLou invited me to join. If you want an invitation, let me know.

The other great news is that FOTY 2010 will be hung at the San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles. How did I do it? I just sent in a picture for one of their shows. I am pretty excited. I finished putting the binding on, but have to get the sleeve on that baby and then I can consider it done and will show it here.

Various & Sundry 2011 #8

Patterns and Projects

Julie, over at the Intrepid Thread, has created a tutorial for an iPad bag in conjunction with Cutting Corners. Aside from the bag being cheerful, I like the directions. There are a ton of photos and the words are pretty clear. This is a long tutorial, so put a new ink cartridge in if you plan on printing it.

I bought a gift of fabric from Julie and she was kind enough to offer to include a card. She sent the fabric out in a timely manner as well. Great service.

Quilts & Shows

The 2011 AQS Show winners are posted.

I love this quilt. It was part of the Red and White show in NYC. Don’t you love the different borders? I might make one.

Media

I was listening to Creative Talk Radio with Pat Sloan recently. She had an interview with Joanna Figueroa, which was about a half an hour long. I really enjoyed hearing about her and about her new project with Quilts & More magazine. It starts with the April issue. I will have to seek out that magazine and see what it is about. Pat also had an interview with Eleanor Burns on that same episode as well as the news that she is moving her podcast to the AllPeopleQuilt.com website.

As a result of the podcast, I decided to try out the Fig Tree Quilts Fresh Vintage subscription for awhile. They called me to get some payment information and Joanna Figueroa picked up the phone. What a thrill! Who cares about Brangelina!

I have purchased this publication before. TFQ and I were together when I bought issue 10 that has the fabulous Tea Basket quilt in it. I haven’t made that quilt, but still admire it. I am looking for something a little different and hope that this magazine will provide it.

Sandy of Quilting for the Rest of Us podcast has started to write some book reviews. I flatter myself that I inspired her, but I know that she wrote book reviews on some other subjects for previous jobs. Go check out one of her first books reviews.

Penguin has come out with some new editions of classics such as Black Beauty, The Secret Garden and Emma. The creative part of this everyday publishing phenomenon is that they are being released under a new imprint called Penguin Threads and the covers are hand sewn. I saw a brief article in the Atlantic that featured wonderful pictures. In the images the stitching can be seen. The colors are cheerful without being glary. There is a lot the article doesn’t say, such as how many are being made? Are they all hand stitched or only the first one? Cool, in any case.

The Quilt Index had a great Double Wedding Ring quilt up last week. The background was Nile Green – kind of a combination aqua and green – which provided a real WOW factor to this quilt. The maker really had some guts.

Linda Kemshall has a new blog. She is a UK artist who works on DMTV and Thr3fold Journal. I wrote about her, and her daughter Laura, in a blog post some time ago.

Stars for San Bruno

As you know, I finished the first quilt top and am gearing up for the second. Someone offered me some fabric and replied to my query about her being sure she wouldn’t mind sending it along to be used with a very entertaining quip: “It’s been on my shelves for a couple of years now. I figure if I haven’t even pulled it off to audition it in that time it’s better off going to a home which will make it feel much more needed and useful. I’m all about helping my fabric self-actualize.”

Trying to Do Good

I like to do charity projects that fit with my life and my interests and help people locally. You have seen me make pillowcases. I have made about a dozen so far. I finally got my act together and called the hospital to arrange a time to donate them. I left a message. A few days later, a chipper, cheerful and young woman called me back and left a message telling me they have a ready supply of pillowcases and don’t need any. She told me to take them to a town about 20 miles away. She was very nice, but I am still annoyed. I guess some hospitals are getting too much of a good thing.

Fabric

I have to admit that I didn’t remember buying this fabric. Also, I didn’t have a receipt for it, except what came with the fabric when it was shipped. I don’t usually purchase fabric from Fabric.com, so I was really confused.

It is very strange and has really put me off buying fabric lately. If you bought this for me, will you, please, confess so I can write you a thank you note? I also want to get over this feeling of losing my mind. Thank you!

UPDATE: I have a secret fabric fairy. Thanks, Mrs. K.!

Various & Sundry 2011 #7

Inspiration

I saw this photo on Camille Roskelly’s blog and couldn’t get the sentiment out of my mind. I like her blog. I like the colors and the feel. I like the look of it and the hopeful tone of the way she writes. As an added bonus, Bonnie and Camille (of the Camille referenced above) are coming out with a new fabric line called Ruby. It looks very similar to Bliss in the coloration and in a few of the motifs. I can’t see the motifs very well, but what I can see I love. I want a full half yard set of all of the prints. I have to resist.

If you haven’t looked at Nina Johansson’s blog recently, it is worth a look. Her drawings are lovely, especially some food drawings she did in Barcelona.

Exhibits

From the American Museum of Folk Art newsletter: See http://www.folkartmuseum.org/infinitevariety for more information. Thanks to TFQ for passing this along.

More than 24,000 people came to see “Infinite Variety: Three Centuries of Red and White Quilts,” presented by the museum at the Park Avenue Armory last month. It was the largest exhibition of quilts ever held in New York City. Visitors from around the world filled guest books with thank-you notes expressing their gratitude to Joanna S. Rose for sharing her singular collection, and many have posted images to the museum’s Flickr group. We will upload footage of lectures and interviews to our YouTube channel soon.

This magical but ephemeral moment will ultimately be captured in the pages of a fully illustrated catalog copublished by the American Folk Art Museum and written by Elizabeth V. Warren, guest curator of this spectacular presentation. Stay tuned for information about the publication date.

A digital guide to the exhibition, including images of all 650 quilts that were on display, is available as a free app for your iPhone, iPod touch, iPad, or Android smart phone. Go to the Apple iTunes App Store or Android Market for the free download.

I downloaded the iPad app and found it to be quite inspirational. It took awhile to download, but it is great to have a quilt exhibit at my fingertips.

Fabric

Do you need an explanation of what exactly those dessert bundles Moda is selling contain? As your info resource, I found one for you at the Moda Bakeshop. Take a look.

Other Artists

Freshly Pieced is having a SuperNova challenge/exchange. The blog author posted some examples of participants’ work. The post is a great example of how, using one block, everyone’s work will be different.

The Molly Flanders blog author has started a Flowering Snowball quilt. It is flattering to think that I started something, but I doubt it. Remember mine? I haven’t done anything lately on it and need to make the border.

Workspace

Ever since I did some spring cleaning last week, I have been thinking about upgrading my space: paint, shelves, clearing out more junk, eh-hem unneeded, perfectly good items. Of course, in my travels around the web and other media I keep seeing different workspaces. I saw this one and this one and this one (another view here here). How these artists work in their lovely chairs? Don’t get me wrong, they look gorgeous! I need an office chair with lumbar support and adjustable height otherwise my body hurts and I feel like an 85 year old. And all of those sensible shoes kind of chairs don’t fit with any decor. Yes, I drape fabric all over them, so what does it matter?

Various & Sundry 2011 #6

Doing Good
Modern Relief Japan has their first few auction quilts up. Check them out, buy and donate.

Remember Christchurch had an earthquake as well. Have you made and sent your Hearts for Christchurch?

Other Artists & Fun Crafts

I recently kept Twitter open for a few hours and was actually enable to enjoy the conversation. In the course of popping back and forth between other stuff and Twitter, Little Bluebell pointed me to Carina’s Craftblog. I popped in and saw this GREAT cake post. You know I am a sucker for felt food and this piece of cake is just wonderful. I want one. Will you make it for me? 😉

As an aside, Carina has some lovely embroidery patterns – cheerful colors and designs I would want to have in my house. She makes me think about picking up my embroidery floss again.

You all know that I am making lots of Jane Market totes these days. The bottoms are really on my mind. Without some kind of stiffener the fabric bottoms hang down in a kind of sad floop. I have a lot of options: cardboard as Alicia, the designer suggests; plastic canvas with mailing tape wrapped edges; Timtex (or equivalanet) inserted in the bottom before handsewing the turning seam, interfacing. I haven’t tried all of these solutions yet, so I don’t really have an opinion on which I like better. At work the other day, I was look at the website of a new client . One of their offerings was replacement bag bottoms! WOW! They don’t have great colors, but if the bag bottoms are the right size, I might be able to overlook the color. The description is: “Size:12” x 8” to fit inside the standard reusable shopping bags.” Stay tuned!

Spring Cleaning Continued

I worked a little more after work on Monday and also after work and a meeting on Tuesday. My workroom doesn’t look fabulous, but it feels much better. It feels like I have space to move around and work. I need to take Kathy’s Order Week over at Bliss Habits to heart and clear out some of the unused stuff so I can get to the stuff I want to use.

I have been talking on and off about finishing small projects, which I realized was a kind of spring cleaning as well. Perhaps I was gearing up for Sunday’s ‘big’ spring clean? I don’t think I will ever be a one project at a time kind of girl, but clearing the decks of having too many projects feels good as well.

After all my talk about spring cleaning, I was excited and saddened to see Anna Maria Horner’s new space. Excited, because it is gorgeous and looks amazingly useful. Saddened because it doesn’t belong to me. I now have a goal to work towards. First step: move out the junk!

Julie put up a video of her year long project making a small quilt every week. Great work. Check it out.

Quiltmaking Discussion

I am really bad about keeping up with blogs. I haven’t found a great reader that fits my workflow, or quilt-flow, as the case may be. Google Reader, and other readers, are fine and I have several set up, but I just don’t go to them enough to really keep up. As a result, I nearly missed the Piecemeal Quilts discussion. Pam, the Head Rhombus from Hip to Be a Square Podcast, pointed me to this blog post the other day and the post made me think. (I seem to be doing a lot of thinking about quiltmaking right now! Not sure what that is about, but I digress. ) The writer, Sandi, of Piecemeal Quilt blog, was responding to a post on another blog that suggested that half square triangles were an intermediate to advanced technique. The Piecemeal Quilt blog writer’s contention was that half and quarter square triangles are not an intermediate to advanced technique. I like the spirit Sandi displays in this post. I liked the fact that she was willing to put herself out there and write this series of essays. I have felt for a long time that the magazines are not providing skill building techniques and are actually making projects so easy that they don’t challenge people at all. Not everyone wants to be challenged and that is fine. I don’t always want to be challenged and sometimes my quiltmaking challenges don’t have to do with piecing. There is absolutely nothing wrong with being a beginner or just wanting an easy project. I, certainly, have done my share of rote sewing in the not too distant past and appreciate the meditative qualities of not having to focus too much on complicated piecing. A friend makes quilts using squares and does really amazing colorwork. Her challenge is the colorwork. A challenge it something different for everyone.

I find that even just reading about magnificently advanced quilts can stretch my mind. Perhaps Sandi was imagining that there are standards for quiltmaking – defined skills on a list somewhere that make a quiltmaker intermediate or advanced once mastered? I think, in the past, many beginning classes were Sampler classes that enabled beginners to learn a variety of different techniques. I think learning using sampler blocks is still a good idea, but sampler classes take a lot of time, people are busy and most people want to learn quickly.

I did take a look at the Single Girl quilt-a-long Photostream on Flickr. These quilts are not easy nor have the makers used all white backgrounds. I saw one with a chocolate brown background that looked very rich. I think there are more complicated pieces out there and people are stretching in their own ways. Still, I applaud Sandi for putting herself out there and responding with the Skill builder series.

I received the fabric from Julie of the Intrepid Thread. Isn’t this a pretty package? The bow (real French ribbon!) will end up as the tie for a gift bag. The service was fast and who doesn’t like getting packages in the mail?

I also received my rulers from Soft Expressions. I was disappointed to find that the 60 degree Creative Grids triangle I ordered has the tip cut off. Normally that is a good thing, but it doesn’t work for the hexagon project (from an early BAMQG meeting) on which I am working. Oh well!

Various & Sundry 2011 #5

Media
I listened to an episode of Pat Sloan’s Creative Talk Radio with Amanda Herring of the Quilted Fish. She described her new fabric line from Riley Blake. It is called Sugar & Spice. THEN the Fabricworm sent out a teaser a week or so ago and I can’t get the fabric in the teaser out of my head. ERGH!!! Those fabrics would go perfectly with my red & aqua quilt even though I am not buying them.

I heard about Matt and Shari on Mark Lipinski’s Creative Mojo and was so impressed with all the information on their website. They have all sorts of different projects, info about color, lighting, etc. They have a section on framing a quilt block, which includes the book I learned to quilt with, Diana Leone’s The Sampler Quilt. I have the original edition, which I still use for the binding lesson and the newer edition, which has great blocks.

Creative Mojo is growing on me. Mark is interviewing a lot of interesting people and telling me about a lot of interesting books. I hope I can meet him someday and have some of his fortune rub off. 😉

I was looking at my Google Reader for once since it was pouring rain and I didn’t want to go out for my usual lunch time walk. I saw a post from Fresh Lemons showing the Sugar Pop line of fabric. It looks so much better in her photo than it does in my workroom and I am starting to think that if this rain lasts much longer, I am going to have to breakdown and paint over the life sucking beige that still exists in my space.

Bari J, who is getting lots of press right now for her relatively new book, was the guest hostess on Wednesday Night Live with Lisa Fulmer of C&T publishing. She was demonstrating embroidery stitches and tools. There is more information on Creating the Hive.

On My Mind-Revisted
A few weeks ago I made a list of projects. I did that because those projects were cluttering up my mind. They are, with their status:

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

Other things I finished recently:

binding for FOTY 2010
binding for Frosted Stars
binding for Frosted Stars leftovers
Grab Bag for Grama – finished, mailed and sent

I am not bragging, really. I seem to need to feel like I am accomplishing something!

Shows
I am so sad that I am not rich enough to run off to NYC for the weekend, because I will be missing the Red & White quilt show at the Armory. The Lizzie B Girls have a great post with lots of fab photos on their blog about it. If you go, tell me how you like it.

Doing Good
Last call for Stars for San Bruno! I know the Sendai and Christchurch earthquakes have overshadowed the fire in San Bruno, but any contributions you make will be greatly welcome. See more information on my 3/24 post.

You can also help the modern quilt community with relief for Japan. Check their new site. Tamiko is also doing her part. You only have until the end of the week, so click this link now!

Making
Here is a tutorial for making wonky cross blocks. You never know when you might want to make wonky cross blocks!

Need some kimono?

Project Selvedge
I saw an ad for a Michael Miller contest for fabric design. I have the perfect design, but I uploaded it too late. The directions said it could be done through 3/24, but on the West Coast, we often get shortchanged on the timezones. Oh well. Perhaps next time. I did put it up on Spoonflower, but can’t sell it, because I haven’t ordered a swatch.

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.

JayeL on Various & Sundry 2026 #7Friday, July 31, 2026
I agree. It might be one I want to hang up somewhere.
JayeL on Finished: EPPic BagFriday, July 31, 2026
Thanks! Thanks for working on the UFO challenge.
JayeL on Still More Potato ChipsFriday, July 31, 2026
They go very quickly, as mentioned, but can get a little boring as well.
JayeL on Finished: EPPic BagFriday, July 31, 2026
Check the Forum for this month's pattern. You can use the search feature.
JayeL on Back to Making FlowersFriday, July 31, 2026
These blocks are a challenge for me, too! There is A LOT of trimming.