Quilt Show, My First Visit

Today was Day One of our quilt show, and I could hardly wait to go see it. Since I was busy on hanging-day, I hadn't seen any of it yet. It was so much fun to wander through and get my first look! Such beautiful quilts! Every year I attend the show at least three times, because I can't take it all in on just one visit. I'll be there again this Saturday with my knitting group. Can't wait! Here are some pictures to share with you. Enjoy the show!

entrance to the show.. other than the "title" quilt above, mine is the first quilt you see!

another look at it

someone is making Amish reproductions, with modern quilting - gorgeous!





quilt on the left is by Sandi Irish; she calls it the 'prettiest quilt I have ever made.'


This one is also by Sandi Irish; it will appear in Quilt Magazine in either June/July issue or Aug/Sept issue 2012!





recognize this one?? I've shown it to you just a few times before (sheepish grin)

Friday Books: Kevin

We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver

I wanted to hurry and read this before going to see the premier showing of the movie at a local art museum. When I checked online for tickets, I found that it had drawn too many requests; they decided to show it only to members, which I am not. I then went on a quest to find it showing elsewhere locally. The museum directed me to a place and date, but it didn't match up. I'll have to wait until it's being shown all over, and by then it will have been a better time lapse between reading the book and seeing the movie. I usually like to have a gap of time so that I can enjoy both without remembering too many of the details of the book which I notice are lacking from the movie.

Anyway, I'm not done with the book, but my impression so far is... the mom character is someone I don't like. She is telling the story of the son who commits a school shooting/mass murder similar to Columbine. From the movie teaser I've seen, they did a great job of casting for this mom character. She isn't very likeable, and she doesn't bond with the baby at all. She borders on weird, or she is weird, or at least she should never have decided to have a child.

That's as far as I am in the book. I need to carve out some reading hours in my next few days. Maybe while I pretend to watch the Super Bowl on Sunday....

A Block Challenge for a Good Cause

I'm not a regular reader of this blog, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, but maybe I should be! Someone else directed me over there, and I jumped right in to the challenge she is providing. This blogger and her friends make gorgeous quilts and donate them through their quilt ministry. The quilts go to people battling serious illnesses.

She recently got her hands on this book:



It includes patterns for quilts and other projects using your scraps cut into squares of 5-inch, 3-inch, and 2.5-inch.

The challenge is this - using the three sizes in Cut The Scraps!, create a block! Here are the guidelines:

1. You can cut the squares down from the designated sizes, but you can't use any larger.
2. You can add solids if you want.
3. Finished blocks can be any size.
4. We'd like your permission to use your block creation in quilts for the quilt ministry in the future.
5. And for you overachievers out there, yes, you can enter more than one block!

There will be prizes! One is a copy of the book, Cut the Scraps!, donated by the publisher. Three others will each win this:



I created a block tonight and will show it next week on Feb 8 when she has Linky Wednesday to share all the blocks. Want to play along? Sounds like fun, doesn't it?

Go here to read her blog to see more about this challenge as well as to see pictures of the beautiful quilts they give away (and the to-drool-over batiks that someone donated).

Quilt Show: Done and Ready to Hang!

I finished 15 quilts! Tomorrow I will turn them in for hanging in the show. This has been fun. Even though I have complained about doing bindings, in the end it is so gratifying to get lots of quilts done.

These are the last two. I picked them up from my machine quilter today.

This one is a retirement gift from her. I retired in June 2010, but I was told she was making something.. and as a fellow quilter, I did not at all worry about the time lapse. She was stuck on ... guess what... the binding! LOL. That I completely understand. (Oh, I did nothing to this quilt except receive it as a gift. So I probably shouldn't claim that "I made 15 quilts." I am showing 15 quilts, but this one I didn't make, and there's another one that I bought as a flimsy, had quilted and then bound it. You see? 15 starts to be a little less impressive as I explain the details.)



This is a pattern from All Washed Up Quilts. I can't remember the name of this particular pattern. All Washed Up Quilts likes to design quick patterns with big pieces that can showcase large prints (or not) if you desire. I made this one at our guild's fall retreat. Nice to have it done! It's a gift for a friend. I'm kind of disappointed in this picture. The quilt looks so much prettier in person! I guess you'll just all have to come to the show and see lots of gorgeous-ness in front of your eyes. I'll put a link at the end of this post.



Both of these were quilted by my friend Kristin of Moose Country Quilting.

Here's information about our quilt show.

Quilt Show: Part 2

Here are 4 more quilts that I am putting in our show. It's been a busy few days of attaching hanging sleeves and finishing bindings. I have two more quilts coming from the machine quilter.. I'll need to bind them and attach sleeves, then I'll be DONE! I'm eager to get back to my fun sewing - doing whatever I want and creating magic, more or less.

Welcome Home which you have seen before. It's about 8" x 14"

Have you seen Rainbow one before? Perhaps before it was quilted.

a simple table runner that I made for our bazaar in the fall; it didn't sell, so I kept it and used it at Christmas time


my Legos quilt - all done!! I love this quilt and can't wait to get it back after the show so I can sleep under it.

Friday Books: Long-Shining Waters

working on a binding... still have a couple bindings to do after this one... bindings: my nemesis

It’s Friday evening. I waited until now to write my Friday Books log, because I was hoping I could say that I finished my book. I’m close to done, but I just didn’t take any time today to read.

I am inundated with quilt bindings and hanging sleeves, so I didn’t set aside any reading time. Oh, I did take time to go get a haircut today. Then it was right back to bindings.

I am almost done with Long-Shining Waters by Danielle Sosin. I am going to give you my report on it, assuming I’ll easily finish it when I take the time to sit down and read (probably bed time).

The book is the story of three women who live along Lake Superior in three different centuries. They all live on the Minnesota side of the lake, which is the towns and sites with which I am familiar and which came up in one of the women’s life story. Each woman experiences a tragedy of some sort. They each have to deal with it and with life after the fact.

The chapters alternate between the women. For example, chapter one is in the early 17th century, chapter two is in the 20th, and chapter three is in the 21st. Then the chapters bounce around between the three centuries. By reading each story concurrently, the reader gets a view of the similar theme of women dealing with their ups and downs, minor and major, over the years. I tried not to feel too jolted when each chapter bounced to another story. With the stories inter-mixed, I felt a kinship between the three women, even though they would never know of each other.

Overall I liked it and would give this book 4 stars. It was a Christmas gift from my sister, and I’m glad I read this fun book.

Quilts for the Show, Part 1

I think I will have as many as 16 quilts ready to hang in our guild's show this year. I don't think I ever had that many, even the year I was Featured Quilter. Well, this year they are encouraging small quilts, and small is part of the theme, so it was easier to churn out a bunch. Many of mine are just simple, quick, unimpressive, and small. A couple of them are beauties, but most are average. Here is your first sneak peek at some of the quilts I will show this year. (Most of them you've already seen anyway... no big thrill today, I guess.) A couple of my quilts are still at the machine quilter, so I'll show those in a few days when they're done.

This one is about 50" x 70"; after the show this will be donated to Wrap Them in Love

This is my goofy one with odd stuff added to it

The slide shows up well when back lit; I think it's a shot taken in Europe.

Solid Style.. it's only about 8" x 14"

Guess what this is. duh. and you've seen it before

This is my Bah, Humbug quilt

my pet Hum Bug is 3-D

My bride doll from 1960 has become a quilter, too

You've seen this already, probably too many times

I purchased this at Aunt Annie's Quilts.. a sample made by shop owner Lucy Senstad and then beautifully quilted by Diane Schotl.. I love this quilt!

showing the center block detail

This is my masterpiece, also quilted beautifully by Diane. It's done and gorgeous!! I'm modeling it in my grunge, not-going-out-in-public outfit and hair.