What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

The sconces in our house have made me crazy for years. The shades were made to fit on the old rounded incandescent bulbs…the ones you can’t find any more. The wires didn’t fit well on any of the smaller bulbs that suited the size of the shades and the fixtures–they were always tilting and crooked. And the “old West” look was SO not me! It was Candy Glendenning of Candied ...

Boo’s portrait is the third part of this trio of quilts. I had considered doing a self portrait, Sarah and her muses, with the selfie for my local Coastal Quilters challenge due next May. But then hubby, who has never ever asked me to make an art quilt, said when he saw the ones of Yoda and Widgeon, “you should make one of Boo, too.” Boo, you see, is his Very Special Cat. So I did that instead. Much nicer than a selfie! And it turns out the portrait challenge doesn ...

What a delight it was to be invited to tape a show for the Ricky Tims and Alex Anderson online “tv” show, The Quilt Show (TQS)! In the past I have taped for two seasons of Quilting Arts TV (on PBS) and did a video workshop for Interweave (Art Quilt Design from Photo to Threadwork, available as a download), but TQS is on a whole other level of professionalism. It was filmed in the Comcast center near Denver…as you walked by the main office there was an entire cabinet of awards including a few Golden Globes! And to get ...

Another SQUEEE–this time ProChem! I am delighted to share that I will be teaching a 3-day Paint on Cloth Workshop from August 5-7, 2020 at Pro Chemical & Dye in Fall River, Massachusetts. Think kindergarten for grown-ups with paint and cloth: silk paint, transparent, opaque and pearlescent textile paints, as both the Movie Star and the Supporting Cast. I’ll be developing course materials over the next 15 months, so if you’ve got something you want to learn, TELL ME! And if you’ve got a brilliant title, I’m sure I’m gonna need suggestions on that, too ...

In our last installment, I showed about 30 masterpiece quilt from Road to California 2019. Below are 30+ more. They come with the same disclaimers:

• I didn't come close to photographing everything I adored, because truly, I adored everything, and there were more than 1000 quilts at the show.
• Some fabulous quilts aren't here because the photo I took was so bad. Even my acceptable photography is off-kilter. So please - forgive me. If you want a better view, I suggest googling the quilter's name. Artists who are skilled enough to get quilts in this high-skills show are ...

Sometimes you need to do something else. You totally love your main “thing” (in my case it is clearly art quilting), but you need a break. And sometimes, that makes your main “thing” even better. I’ve learned over the years that good design is good design, whether it is landscape, interiors, architecture, photography, painting, sculpture, apparel, the principles are the same. So I have taken online classes in drawing and photography and been enriched.

OMG, Road to California 2019, in Ontario, California. I was beyond honored - stunned, really - to have this English Paper Pieced quilt in this show; the icing on the cake was that my stunning DH came with me to see it!

Better. I finally got a little time in the studio (and the hammering on the roof is more muffled down there–we are having a new, metal roof put on–who knew they could do that in Maine in January?). I had thought the Rosehip top was done when I left it on Sunday evening but, I’m learning I need to let things set a spell, after I looked at it with fresh eyes realized it needed some help. I made a small rose hip quilt ...

Off and on for the past couple of weeks I have been dyeing fabric, drawing or photoshopping images to make thermofax screens, and finally working on collaging the background for the rose hip, the large (36″ square) version. To those of you have landed here from my new newsletter, thank you! To those of you who don’t know about my new newsletter, please go here to the home page and sign up! I will write about mid-month and will never share your info!

Happy Solstice to one and all…at last the days no longer get shorter! To celebrate and as a Christmas gift (whether you celebrate it or not, it’s a gift of the season) to one and all, I thought I’d share a video I recently uploaded and just shared with those on my Newsletter List. (To sign up for the newsletter, go to my home page and fill in the blanks—about once a month I’ll pop in with this ‘n that.)

That’s what I’m learning over and over every day I don’t have to worry and the struggle is optional. My husband has a great inner compass when it comes to letting go, he doesn’t get crazy. I need help from friends and support groups to stay in that zen zone..not complaining I seriously don’t know what I’d do without the men and women in my village. I count on my tribe for necessary counsel to come back from the edge but whats wonderful is after years of asking for help and learning to ...

You all remember the scarves I made from scraps I’ve been posting about, well here is a quilt in the same vein. I sewed some squares I had from previous projects together into 25″ squares, then took a bunch of scraps I had and started sewing them down onto the panels. It was not easy to make this happen without stiffening the hell out of my fabric. I didn’t want to use and kind of permanent stabilizer because I do want this as a bed quilt, so instead, I got creative…

I always keep my scraps of water ...