Woot, good post.

I got my letter from IQA Celebrate Spring today. OK that might not sound very thrilling but it had my finalists ribbon in it. and to me that is very exciting. I love the idea of giving every quilt in the show a token to celebrate it. I am trying to encourage UK shows to do the same. I am sure it doesn’t cost that much and it does make me feel valued. The idea behind the Finalist ribbon is that you can attach it to your name badge at the show, so everyone knows you have a quilt in the show. Again, I think this is a lovely idea. Just think you would know if the person criticizing the quilts has actually made the effort them selves On a more positive note you can spot the artists and talk to them, but I have to say I would love to know how many of the people who are harshest about quilts make and display their own.

I thought this was a good time to get out the labels I got back from Road to California and photograph them. Again a lovely idea. They are cloth labels to add to the quilt. Yes I will be putting them on. I can imagine collecting a whole set of these on a well traveled quilt. It would be fantastic to have a permanent record of where the quilt has been. It is even nicer for anyone who buys the quilt, they have the proof of what the quilt did before it came to live with them.

By the way if anyone has lost a cold I seem to have found it. I am quite happy to return it to it’s rightful owner. I don’t think I really need it right now.

Sushi Picture

I realised there was a picture I wanted to show you and that I am allowed to. The amazing sushi roll we had at wanKara. By the way if anyone knows what wanKara means I would love to know. This was a little something the chef made for us. He says it doesn’t have a name yet. I wish I had taken a picture from above so you could see the rainbow effect better. It is eel and sesame seeds in an inside out roll. The outside of the roll is wrapped in squid, tuna, salmon, avocado, prawn and cuttlefish. So the colours are fantastic. The outer layer was at an angle so you got multiple flavours on each slice. It was very tasty. Even the ends were artistic with tufts of rocket. I really hope this sushi place does well. I love the food there and they really seem to care about what they do.

Published Author

I’ve done it, I am really published., OK it’s only a magazine, and it isn’t a terribly long pattern but I am excited. I am a subscriber so I got my copy yesterday but it will be on sale in the shops about Wednesday. For those of you I have promised copies to that is when I will get them and send them out. Given I had been told it had been changed I am surprised by how close to my original it is. In fact I would have to get the original out and compare it to be sure what had changed. So if you get Popular Patchwork Issue 2 2007 keep an eye open for Under the Rainbow.

I tried to wash Ginko Typography this morning. It is a big quilt with 2 waddings in, but I thought it might fit my machine. Remember that in the UK most machines are front loaders and don’t have massive capacity. Well I was nearly right. It is about two square feet bigger than my machine. I guess I will be finding a laundrette. I’ve never used one so it will be a new experience for me. Hopefully not too scary. I have no idea how long it will take or how much it will cost, but I can’t see an alternative. wish me luck.

Quilts from the Vault

I’ve finally had time to look through the images from the photo shoot. I handed over the bridal outfit tonight, so I have time to post here.

These are three of the quilts we use on the bed. Although I am thinking about retiring two of them. The first one is called ‘Flame On’. I made it before I had seen any bargello quilts, so I am pretty pleased with coming up with the same idea. It was strip pieced and then the strips shuffled. I didn’t think of offsetting the seams thought. It would have been easier and I think more flamey. Still we live and learn. I also didn’t know how to bind a quilt, so this one was done with satin ribbon, put on with a binding foot. It has done fine so it wasn’t a big deal. It is quilted in invisible thread as I wasn’t sure about quilting.

The second one was made as a black quilt no colour. It meets the spec, just. I made it on the overlocker because I thought it would be quicker (it was) but when you strip piece then cut the strips apart it weakens the overlocking considerably. This can be seen by the holes in the quilt. Again I hadn’t worked out the quilting, so it is very minimal, and the binding is cotton tape. These are the two quilts that I think need to retire. To do that I need to replace them. I have plans for a new ‘Flame On’ but I haven’t decided on a replacement for ‘Monochrome’.

I knew ‘Star Of Scotland’ is a big quilt. It fits a king size bed, but not quilt frames at shows. However having seen the huge studio we were going to work in I had thought the quilt would fit. If it just touches the floor it just misses the ceiling lights. Still it is by far the best picture I’ve managed to get of it. All the fabrics in this quilt came from a trip to Edinburgh. I had gone there for a Linux conference and decided to see if I could buy any fabric. Bear in mind that I hadn’t found my local quilt shop yet. I found three good shops and made full use of them. I knew I wanted to make a quilt with a rainbow on it, but I hated green. So I came up with this rainbow without green. I love it, but if I was going to do it again I would use all the colours.

This quilt is quilted in metallic silver thread, and I had a great idea for the design. I wanted to accentuate the spiral effect, so I thought I would quilt a spiral. It wasn’t easy to draft an appropriate spiral, but quilting it was a real pain. I didn’t think I could free motion it (I still don’t think I could) so I had to rotate the whole of the quilt several times to quilt the spiral. I did get the effect I was looking for in the end. The edge is finished with prairie points. I would have put more on, but having run out of fabric I was kinda stuck with what I had. It has been much loved and seems to be dealing well with it.

scarves and rust

I am sitting here on hold, so I thought I migh as well show you guys what I have been up to. I’ve just realised I should have taken a picture of the Road 2 Ca labels, but I didn’t. Maybe later.

Still here is the second longarm scarf. This one is mine, it is very thick and warm. It is made from just 2 hanks of yarn, but each one is made up of many different types of yarn. It is very cool. I think it would be a nightmare to knit with so it is just as well I have another way to make it into a scarf. As you can see the tassles on the end are quite uneaven. I haven’t decided yet whether to leave them like this or trim them. I figure there is no hurry to decide. I can cut them anytime.

You may remember that I broke the esxhast manifold a while ago. Well it didn’t go to waste, I wrapped it in fabric and stuck it outside. I have been keeping an eye on it and today it struck me as done. So I brought it in and gave it a rinse. I think it looks really good. I seem to ahve an explosion, and some faces. There are parts that look like somke and some that remind me of aged paper. I think I might be able to use some of it for a map project I have been thinking about. I have re-wrapped the bits of manifold and added some other items, so in about a month I will hopefully have some rust dyed fabric available for sale. I’ll be sure to post pictures here first.

Wanders Return

Wait and Miss Baltimore are back from The Road To California. They were well packed and arrived home in good condition. I was so thrilled to find cloth labels to add to the quilts saying they were displayed there. That is so cool. I wish our shows would do something like that. They also included a show guide. They got my name right and everything. I also have my judging sheets. I am surprised how brief they are but they do confirm my thoughts on the problems with the quilts. For Wait they mention the bearding and with Miss Baltimore that query the fabric choices. I think they are thinking of the show through I have on some of them. It was really good to have confirmation about my quilts problems, as that tells me I am thinking the right way.

I spent yesterday in a photographic studio with a very nice young lady and a lot of quilts. I now have some good pictures of some of my quilts. I will get them uploaded and post some here. It is scary to see how big some of them are. the studio looked huge, as did the backdrop, then I put up a bed quilt. Everything vanished! It is nice to have a picture of Start of Scotland though, it is a much loved quilt.