Eye candy for a holiday weekend...

Well said!!  I love this Amy Bradley quilt made by Judy.

I'm finally getting to posting more pictures from the 2012 Sauder Village Quilt Show from earlier this month.

This quilt was inspired by a beautiful children's book that came out a couple of years ago.

Excuse my poor photography!  This fishy quilt was one of many that attracted a crowd, and hasty execution of taking a picture was required.

I loved the colors, the 3-D fish and the fishing lure that is attached near the center.

There were two "Tree of Life" quilts (Edyta Sitar) present, with slightly different settings.

Have you seen these "veggie cat" patterns?  This setting was fun and well done.

Since it is Memorial Day, I should share this nice patriotic quilt.

This setting is longer...a few more tree blocks than the one above.  Both quilts are beautiful (a "Tree of Life" quilt is on my bucket list...).

A nice pictorial quilt from a Sauder Village challenge (there is a really nice quilt shop AT THE VILLAGE!).

 Tricky piecing and a use of old shirts...

 Another nice pictorial quilt...

This was one of my very favorite quilts at the show...my favorite colors, a simple setting, and absolutely BEAUTIFUL hand quilting.

My pictures don't do any of these wonderful
quilts justice, especially this one.  Well executed and designed with ceramic tiles as inspiration.

This Calico Garden quilt reminded me of one Barb was involved with a year or two ago.  This one is small, a wall hanging size.

This was clever...it is made from Crown Royal bags...they used every part!

More quilts next post...I hope you have a fabulous Memorial Day weekend!

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)

Hand quilting away...and some quilt show pictures...

Where does the time go?  I've been quilting on "Folk Art Applique"...I can tell I'm getting older...I quilt the black on black parts when the light is good, and the white on brights part the other 99% of the time...LOL!

As this quilt is smallish, I've been taking it with me as I wait while having the car serviced, sitting in meetings, spending time in the car waiting for my daughter.  It is interesting fielding the questions that arise from total strangers.  My favorite, to date, came Monday while waiting in the Subaru dealership during an oil change..."is that crocheting?"  Wow...

I entered two quilts in the AQS - Grand Rapids Quilt Show that will be in August... "All Around the Town" and "Life of Riley" (my version of the Civil War Bride quilt).  This is my first try at entering a juried, big show.  I spent a whole day trying to get good pictures of them for the required entry photo CD.  They recommend taking the pictures outside on a cloudy day for best results.  Are they nuts?  I live in the midwest...the wind is ALWAYS blowing...hence the whole day, waiting for tiny still moments in between the big puffs, to take four pictures.  

I anticipate how hard it is to have quilts accepted, but I'm still glad I went through the motions of applying.  I think it will make me a better quilt archiver for my own benefit, for one thing.  I have not been taking the time to photograph finished quilts as I should be.  As I try and gather pictures of quilts I've made, they are either TERRIBLE, non-existent, on 35mm film negatives, blurry, or the color is not true.  I am really spoiled by the digital world...now I need to learn to do it properly.

I've been working hard on my new original project I've been drafting.  I hope I can share it with you soon.  I can't share it here until I get a copyright for the designs, as I'm hoping to publish it.  As slow as I am getting things done right now, someone else with more free time might take my images and run with them, and that would make me quite sad...sorry to be such a tease about things.

Well, at least the white quilting thread shows up for pictures...I need to spend more time learning how to photograph the black on black quilting.  Maybe I should make my chalk quilting marking thicker...at least THAT would show up!  The diagonal crosshatching and outline quilting will probably show up better when I photograph the finished quilt outside.

Very slowly, I am processing quilt show pictures from Sauder Village.  Going to the show is one of my favorite yearly traditions.  I will share the pictures as I get them cropped and cleaned up.  I will start with the quilts from me and my friends.

I'm not sure I like it when they hang things on point, around corners...I can assure you that this quilt of Cheryl's is perfectly square.   :o)

Sorry some of these tags are fuzzy...there was a crowd around Cheryl's lovely quilt for her granddaughter...I had to be quick snapping pictures!

 

It would have been fun to have finished the hand quilting on "Folk Art Applique" in time to enter it in this show, but I must say I am enjoying taking time to do it without a deadline. My husband is so proud that his boxer shorts have now been seen by hundreds, maybe thousands, more women in the midwest.  "Boxer Rebellion" is back on the wall at his work place now...he insisted on having the ribbon displayed with it for a while.  I would wager that there aren't many men that have gotten second place ribbons on their 5+ year old undies...

In stitches,

Teresa  :o)

"Invisible" hand quilting...

I'm quilting along on my "Folk Art Applique" quilt...I didn't get it finished for the 36th annual Sauder Village Quilt Show.  I would of had to have it finished by last Sunday to drive it down in time for show set up.  I realized the Tuesday before that I was ABSOLUTELY INSANE to think I would finish the hand quilting in time.  Maybe, if I had nothing else to do the rest of the week, but I didn't have that luxury.  (The Wonder Woman cape is back in mothballs...)

Wow...NONE of my black quilting thread shows up in the pictures...except where I crossed the vine when outline quilting the grapes.  Those grapes are floating on a skinny piano key quilted background.  I should have quilted this in GREEN...because my  BASTING stitches certainly show up, LOL...

I am outline quilting all the applique in black, then quilting on top of the applique motifs in off white.  I am doing a cross-hatching design behind the applique blocks, then, as mentioned, the "invisible," skinny piano key design on the outer border, behind the grapes.

At least the white thread shows up!  This feels a little like the "Emperor's New Cloths" style of quilting in that I'm telling you the black quilting lines are there, but who knows...maybe they really aren't...

Does anyone out there have suggestions for photographing black quilting thread on black fabric?!?

So now I am ENJOYING the leisurely hand quilting even more...now that there is not a self-inflicted gun held to my head (big grin).

I took the two other quilts I had planned on..."Boxer Rebellion" (otherwise known as my husband's old undies...)...

...and "X Marks the Block," an original, free-pieced, "liberated" quilt that I made for my daughter.  The original plan was to hand quilt this one, but that plan changed last February.

The show runs from Tuesday, May 1 through Sunday, May 6, and I am going tomorrow (Friday).  A little bird emailed me Tuesday morning to tell me that "Boxer Rebellion" won second place in the Small Wall Hanging, Mixed Technique, Hand Quilted category (thanks, Norma!).  Being made from old underwear and stupidly quirky, the best I could have ever hoped for was an "Honorable un-Mention-ables" ribbon...hee-hee-hee.

When I called Steve at work to tell him what I heard, he was happy his underpants were being enjoyed by the judges and so many women from all over the Midwest.  HA!  You just never know...

My daughter is a self-proclaimed nerd...straight A student (in an IB program, no less!), closet novel author (we just printed initial copies of her first book!), a musician, a lover of Harry Potter, Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Who, Merlin, and horses.  When I say she loves Harry Potter books, movies and characters, etc., I mean she LOVES them!  Here she is, years ago, posing with her first Harry Potter quilt that I came up with...she has requested another, more dark and mysterious one...not "cute" like this one.

(She had just lost her two front teeth...)

Anyway, my friend Bonnie (no blog) turned me onto the coolest site for "nerd quilting"...it's called Fandom In Stitches.  This site has all kinds of great, FREE, paper-pieced blocks by and for fans of Harry Potter, "Dr. Who," "The Muppets," The Lord of the Rings, "Merlin," Sherlock Holmes, etc.  This site even has some favorite Disney, comics, games, sports, and other patterns.  You'll enjoy browsing here!

Tomorrow I am off with friends to the 36th Annual Sauder Village Quilt Show in Archbold, Ohio...I can't wait!  I'm kind of bummed that I didn't finish my "Folk Art Applique" quilt in time...next year!

I will take lots of pictures to share with you!

In stitches,
Teresa  :o)