Join Me for a Quilt Show Marathon?

Gather some handwork, and get the popcorn ready! Its time for a Quilt Show marathon! This weekend you can watch every single show on The Quilt Show for free! I have had a busy week, and have gotten some major tasks accomplished. I decided to reward myself with a marathon of Quilt Shows tomorrow. I’ve even planned out my menu for the day so I can have extra popcorn and still stay within my normal calorie allotment!

In case you look at the long list of shows, and are overwhelmed by all the choices, I thought I’d share a few that I thought were extra special, and a few that I am planning to check out myself.

 

• Show 106–Denise Labadie, on Ireland. This show is from their very first season, and I do remember being very impressed by Denise’s work. I am looking forward to checking it out again.
• Show 408–Alex Anderson on Neutral Quilts. I have a large collection of neutrals, and I would like to make a neutral quilt. This might give me a jumping off point.
• Shows 112, and 513–The incomparable Libby Lehman. If you can only watch one, watch 513, where she is awarded the Quilt Legend award.
• Show 508–Paula Nadelstern at The American Folk Art Museum.
• Shows 313 and 601–Jinny Beyer on Handpiecing, and also being awarded the Quilt Legend award.
• Show 711–Rosalie Dace, and there are also segments with Jennifer Chiavarini (the author) and Michael Cummings, which I enjoyed very much.
• Show 1102–Luke Haynes, an extraordinary quilt artist.
• Show 1308–Caryl Bryer-Fallert-Gentry. Say no more, right?
• Show 1301–Jean Wells–I love the direction her work has taken, and this show features that.
• Show 1501–Jane Dunnewald. She is an excellent teacher.
• And Show 1512–Debby Schnabel. Just in case you haven’t seen it yet 🙂  I also really love the segment on this show with Laurie Hill Gibb, who took a trip around the country in a camper, something I have wanted to do since I was a kid!

Once you are signed in to The Quilt Show, just go to the page with the Show List. From there it is easy to look through the choices of quilt artists, and click on the series, and then the specific show you want to watch.

And just because I haven’t shared any pictures for a while, I will show you an idea for using a smaller quilt as a bed quilt. Most of the quilts I make are not large enough to be considered bed quilts. But I enjoy using them on my bed. I found a bed-sized white quilt at Home Goods, well made and quite reasonably priced, and I use it on the bed, with the smaller quilt as a “topper.” I really like using my quilts this way.

Have a super terrific, quilt-filled weekend!

 

Where I Been, What I Been Doing

Wow, I knew it had been a while since I posted, but a whole month?? My lack of posting has not been an indicator of lack of work or creativity in my life!

I finished that “quilt kit” that I told you about. I’m not sure my zig zag technique saves any time over sewing all the pieces of a traditional double wedding ring together, but I still enjoy it very much. I followed my sketch exactly, so there was no time spent rearranging on the design wall.

And then I finished the smaller quilt top that I had blogged about in my “Process” post.  This was fun to do. I spent a lot of time figuring out which fabrics to use for the background. And the motifs were shapes suggested by my sketch for the previous quilt. They were free-hand cut and then zig-zagged in place. Making them one piece (instead of 12 squares) made that go a lot faster. I am considering doing some perle cotton embroidery on them.

And then, I liked some of the background fabrics I had auditioned for the previous quilt so much that I made them into a top of their own. I am going to cross-cut this quilt top and insert a cross for “The Signature of Jesus” series. I could not find a dark fabric that I liked for the cross, so I am in the process of “making” some fabric for the cross. Very fun to do, but time consuming.

Oh, and somewhere in between all of that, I volunteered to work on a project for SAQA (Studio Art Quilt Associates.) This is for a “take and make” to encourage the public to make art of their own. I cut out LOTS of little pieces of fabric, and hemmed a bunch of blanks. And then I made some little samples. These are all made of bits and pieces of designer fabrics that we got at a place called FabMo in the bay area. The samples were very fun to make. No quilting involved.

 

 

And THEN, I realized that it was only two weeks until my annual trek to rug hooking camp in Cambria! I enjoy this so very much (the trip AND rug hooking) but I do tend to put rug hooking on the back burner for months at a time. When I realized that it was so close, I put a moratorium on quilting and got to organizing my rug hooking materials. This is pretty much my entire rug hooking stash : ) (I have more, but it is all found material–suits and stuff from the thrift store. The rug I am planning on doing is going to be fairly colorful.)

I realized that I didn’t have enough pale wool, so I had a little dying session. Very fun. But again, time consuming.

And pretty much all the time that I would spend quilting or knitting I have spent working on this little “Persian” rug that I started in my workshop last fall. I don’t think I”ll finish it in time for camp, but I am very much enjoying working on it.

And in between all of that, I have been gardening, and clearing out my bedroom in anticipation of J. the Contractor coming to work on my bedroom and closet while I am away.

Ahhh. So now we’re all caught up. I’ll be back in a week or so with a report on all the happenings at rug hooking camp!

 

From Stuck to Unstuck

After the last few weeks of creative flurry, I came to a grinding halt. Nothing I had done pleased me. I didn’t know what next step to take.  This happens often enough that I no longer get quite as alarmed about it (“will I never be able to create a single thing again?!”) 

I just take a quilting break. This time I decided to quilt during my quilting break LOL. I had seen this very simple Christmasy pattern that really appealed to me. So I got out my big box of little squares, picked out all the red and green squares, and added in a few black and white ones. Voila! Half the cutting was already done. I had some really nice muslin on hand, and I knew what focus print I wanted to use. Surprisingly, I was able to locate it right away! I love this cardinal fabric.

And I made this square:

The rest of the quilt got put together fairly easily. I even got out my Singer Featherweight, and sewed on a TV tray while I watched some of my shows on my computer.

That quilt top is almost completely assembled.

But before I finished it, I got a bit of a new idea. And since it was my birthday week, I let myself play with that idea yesterday. I really like it. Just wonky log cabin blocks, with solids, and using some of my pre-cut dark strips (I love it when I am able to use up some of the fabric that has been pre-cut.)

Creativity in process:

I love the look of these, and think they will look good surrounded with more dark. And guess what was in the box of dark strips? A bunch of little 4 inch log cabin blocks made mostly out of the dark strips. Bingo!

And as suddenly as it started, the quilt block is over!

Quilting Break!

On Monday this week, I was driving around. I had a lot of extra events/chores/writing/duties in line for the week. I was thinking about how I hadn’t gotten a stitch of quilting done that day, and the thought suddenly occurred to me, “take a one week break from quilting.” So instead of being upset that I was not making forward movement in my quilting, I would feel free to get all these things done, without resenting them for ‘keeping me from my quilting.’

It has worked out great. I am still thinking about my quilting, both current projects and future plans. And I will definitely be ready to pick up where I left off this coming Monday. I got all my chores and duties done, and I do believe I enjoyed them more because that resentment wasn’t there the whole time. What I didn’t expect was that I would fill in the spare time with some of my other hobbies that I still enjoy but never have enough time for.

I have been spinning yarn:

And knitting:

 

 

 

And finally got back to my rug hooking! This is always so exciting, because as you can see, much exuberant color is involved. I do truly enjoy rug hooking, but it does take a little space to get it done. So in my small studio-house (I just came up with that. I think I will keep that description. It takes the pressure off of trying to make it a ‘perfect’ house,) there is not really enough space to rug hook and quilt at the same time.

 

These are some of the ‘tools of the trade’–strips of wool cut with a nifty cutter–it cuts three even strips at the same time. Don’t all of us artists just love a good tool?

And also taking up a little of my time this week is attending to the never-ending needs of these guys. This is a picture of them lined up by the wall heater. They love it when I turn it on.

I’ll be back on Monday, with lots of quilting! Have a good weekend, and be sure to make time to take a stitch or two!