Garden Party in Bloomington!

Things weren’t blooming outside by any means -

Snow flurries were still fluttering!

But they were fighting a losing battle as temps started to climb beyond the freezing point  - and we were celebrating the blossoms to come in our Garden Party Workshop hosted by the Indiana Heritage Quilt Show in Bloomington, Indiana!

After Pinwheel Fancy the day before, this was a welcome respite – NO TRIANGLES!  And a whole lot of fun with 1 1/2’’ strips.

Color on color on color – any colors you want to put together – go for it!

Spring is coming soon – and we are greatly anticipating it!

All the happy busy stitchers!

Block production – this one with black backgrounds!  Whoowhooo!

With 43 stitchers it was all fun & games -

Until we blew the power to one side of the room!

Hey folks? I think 43 individual irons is just too many! LOL!

We threw in an impromptu demo session while the Powers that Be got the electrical situation sorted out.

Truly – finger pressing can often be your friend and will work until we get things back to normal “Full steam ahead.” to flatten those babies.

Hooray!  We’ve got HOT!

Oh, all the pretties!

Thanks for coming to play, ladies!

Oh yes, these quilts are going to be gorgeous!

Thanks for coming, everyone!

Garden Party is found in the Addicted to Scraps book.

You’ll find the rest of yesterday’s shenanigans in the video below.  Click to play:

Time is flying by so quickly. I can't believe we are already at the LAST day.

We are finishing up this 3 workshop event with Wonky WIshes – Strings and crumbs and Wonky Stars – oh, my!

Today’s #IGquiltfest prompt is “Finally Finished” with the request to post a recent finish that took you a really long time.  

Some quilts take more than 15 years! This is my variation of a quilt made by Jane Stickle in the 1860s. I set the blocks with a Storm at Sea type sashing and hand quilted it with Baptist Fans in pink thread.

The brown fabrics are shweshwe and all the pinks are random scraps. The background is one fabric throughout and I am 100% sure that is why it languished- boring background!

I love the quilt however, and it resides on the guest room bed at our cabin in the Blue Ridge mountains of Southwestern Virginia. I love when the light from the window hits it just right and shows off all of that wonderful hand quilted texture.

I’ll be checking out of my hotel room during lunch time with a late check out, moving my stuff down to my class room – the other instructors and myself will be shuttled over to an airport hotel in Indianapolis this evening so we can fly out at our respective times in the morning using the hotel shuttle as transport.

Quiltville Quote of the Day

Something to ponder:

While things may look perfect online, everyone has a different life behind their monitors and phone screens. Everyone is heightening the positives and downplaying the negatives. They are only showing you their A sides, not their B sides. Smoke and mirrors. Just remember that.

Most of what you see online is only what people want you to see.

Search for those who are genuine. They are out there!

I’ve reconnected with several this weekend that I am so happy to have in my circle!

Have a wonderful Saturday, everyone!

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Pinwheel Fancy Day, the Indiana Way!

Yesterday was the kick off day of the Indiana Heritage Quilt Show!

And Day One of workshops – with Pinwheel Fancy from Addicted to Scraps as our Opening event!

Not only was I excited to teach this quilt to this wonderful group  (It has all the bells and whistles that I love: A 2 block design, and on-point setting, a strippy quilt look, no borders – and it comes from 3 simple widths of strips: 2’’, 3 1/2’’ and 6 1/2’!) but I also KNEW this day would be the bomb because I spent the night under it for hours of sweet dreaming:

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From Home to Bloomington!

I spy Indianapolis below!

Can you see it?

What a bright and beautiful day it was for flying – clear blue skies, abundant sunshine -

But don’t let it fool you – I thought I was prepared for the blast of cold air that would hit my face when Nola and I stepped outside of baggage claim and made our way to the curb where Wendy would be driving on in to pick us up -

But OH MY!!  Temps in the 20s and breezy – Brrrr, baby, brrrr!

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Indiana Bound! (And Much Show & Share!)

I am off to the Indiana Heritage Quilt Show today-

Which is a perfect time for me to share some quilty goodness from last week!

I have to remind myself that Good Fortune was revealed the first week of January – and these quilts were being shown at the end of February closing in on March 1st – that’s not quite 2 months and they are DONE!

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Inspiration at Cactus Queen Quilt Co!

Can’t you feel yourself breaking in to a smile?

Whenever I see bolts of fabric, loads of color, all of the possibilities – it’s all the good feels!

I’ve known Doris Rice for quite a few years, and had the pleasure of her company at several places that I’ve taught.  When it came down to my event with the UUMC Quilt Guild in San Antonio, she asked if I would like to stay at her Queen’s Rustic Retreat on a fact finding mission to see how her set up is.  I said SURE! Who wouldn’t want to?

You can visit my post about the retreat HERE.

What I didn’t know was that Doris’s brick and mortar quilt shop, Cactus Queen Quilt Company had just opened its doors the month before – and it is less than a mile from her retreat center in McQueeney, Texas!

When things fall into place – they REALLY fall in to place!

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No Time to Catch Up!

This is how I left things when I headed to Texas 2 weeks ago.

I need to piece a back for Jewel Box Stars.  That’s why it is hanging over the rail of the long arm.

Before I left I had been kitting up basket blocks, and the strips that need to be put back into the Scrap User’s System are hanging on the rail just waiting for me to get down to it.

I have fabric folded and ready to put away, some stacks of things, some trays for sorting, it all happens here on the table side.

That white board?  I use it for photography as in yesterday’s detail shot of the items that are found in yesterday’s Quilty Box Gift-Away.

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Home for a Quilty Box Gift-Away!

This was supposed to happen in February.

But the travel faeries were not in sync and the sample box didn’t arrive on my doorstep until AFTER I had already left for San Antonio!

Well, that’s okay by me – because we can do it on this first Sunday home!

The February Quilty Box contains a whole 2 1/2’’ strip pack of Christa Watson’s Abstract Garden line – full of bright and splashy prints and summer colors just ready to chase the remaining winter blahs away.

What can I say? I love purple mixed with orange and red and green!  Throw in some summer yellow and cool greens and turquoise and I am one happy girl!

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Straits of Mackinac in Denton TX!

I’ll not soon forget these happy faces and the crazy antics

that come with a heavy dose of scrap over load!

These ladies don’t even know how much they have added to MY life!

I love talking to folks, finding out a bit about them, their family, their former jobs if they are retirees, family life if they are still raising kids, or supporting kids through college – listening to the discussions of every day life with jobs, plans, grandkids, upcoming weddings, babies on the way – and usually there is a quilt in the planning or sewing stages for each of these occasions. 

Quilting is how we mark the momentous events that dot the timelines of our lives, isn’t it?

This was also the maiden voyage for Straits of Mackinac as a workshop – and starting out with 53 in class?  HOLY MOLY!!

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“It Can Be Daybreak....” *Singing*

I’m blaming the earworm all on Sherry -

Second chair on the right -

To be honest, I never thought of the Barry Manilow song Daybreak when I was naming this quilt, but once she mentioned that is what the title brought to mind for her – I just can NOT get it out of my head!

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