10,001
January 25, 2007So, no taker for the 10,000th visitor. Let try the 10,001.
I am looking for someone using Firefox, with the ISP Qwest Communications. The ISP is in Seattle Washington, so the person I am looking for is probably too. They visited my blog at about 10am GMT on the 10th of January. That was about 2am for the viewer. I would love to give the quilt away, I made it and everything 
So If you think this is you, or you know someone it might be please do get in touch.
Busy busy
January 24, 2007Well I seem to be finding plenty to fill my non existent time I’ve just joined the Region 7 Quilters Guild committee. I think it will be interesting and I hope I will be able to improve the guild in some way. It needs to grow and encourage new members, ideally younger ones. If you are in Bedfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hertfordshire, or Northampton you are in our region. If not you could move, or just come and visit. Blowing our own trumpet, we do have very good regional days and a fantastic newsletter. Non members can come to the regional days to see what goes on, being a member of the guild does get you cheaper tickets though. The next one is in March and our speakers will be Shirley Bloomfield and Gwenfai Rees-Griffiths. If you want more details let me know.
I’ve also been thinking about more quilt designs. I have another one to make with the Ombre fabrics, but my brain just isn’t working. I am going to have to print up some shaded paper to play with. When I figure it out it will be good, and I think very easy to make, but working it out is hard.
I managed to get some more supplies for the weekend. No not that sort of supply, I am doing a weekend workshop. It is a residential course at Missenden Abbey, with Janet Edmonds. It will have a drawing section and then we will be making vessels. It sounds like it should have a lot of potential for future projects. As it is partly funded by a bursary I felt I should do something big that would really stretch me, and this will do that. I have calico and muslin to play with, I’ve found inspirational pictures, but I haven’t got any shells of other organic vessels. I am hoping I will be able to look at the ones other people bring. I still need to go for a walk and look for found objects to add to whatever I make, although that doesn’t really appeal to me at the moment. Still better to have and not need… While I am at the Abbey I won’t be able to pick up my email, and I am planning on having my phone off most of the time as well. I am planning on updating the blog while I am there but I can’t be certain it will work.
I wish I had had time to enjoy the snow this morning. It was so pretty. I did look a lot but I had to get to my meeting so I couldn’t take any pictures. Keep your fingers crossed for more snow for me. I would love to add pictures of it to my inspirations folder.
That magic moment
January 23, 2007Whenever I sew anything there is a moment when I know the project will work and be good. I’ve just hit it with my latest item. I am working on an Edwardian jacket for a wedding. The fabrics are being very difficult but I’ve just put the collar on. Bingo I have a jacket. It is pretty feminine and very glamorous. I just hope it’s owner will like it as much as I do.
I’ve noticed that once I hit this magic moment everything seams to move quicker. It just starts to work and come together properly. I love it. The best bit is I tend to forget it will happen before it does, so I am not even just sitting waiting for it. Wonderful. That is why I had to share right now. I had better get back to the jacket before it gets bored
Tagged
January 22, 2007Apparently there is a thing going round blogs at the moment where you get tagged and share 5 things you haven’t mentioned about yourself on your blog. You then tag 5 more people. It’s one of those get to know you better type things, and actually from following the trail back I found some quite interesting blogs, so it has worked for me, and I think them. Nellie tagged me at the weekend so I guess I get to share, and it is surprisingly tricky to know what you might like to know.
- I live in a small terraced house with two guys. I say house, but really it is now a studio. The front room is where I do most of my work, it is where I am typing this. I built a large desk into the whole of the bay window. I found that too bright, and having run out of wall space there is a row of bookshelves around the windows at the edge of my desk. The back room used to be a dining room but is now filled with a longarm sewing machine. The kitchen has mostly been taken over for dying cloth.
- I used to make electric guitars. I wanted to learn to play one when I was younger and my parents told me I would have to built one if I wanted one. So I did. After that I went on to design and make more. I have a wall full of guitars behind my longarm. I am better at making them than playing them, mostly because I never put enough hours into my practice.
- I collect Ford Capris, I love them to bits. Just as well as they are getting to the stage in their life when they fall to bits. I think I mentioned the great white having exhaust problems, but it is just one of six. My everyday baby is in need of some welding which will hopefully get done next week and I will be back driving her. Yes I love cars, but especially mine. It is a metallic blue 2 litre S, which I refer to as Kdu. I also have Atcho, my restoration project. I want to bring it back to showroom standard plus. More how Jaguar would have sent it out. This was the driving force for me to learn how to do car interiors.
- Many years ago I appeared on television unpacking a space craft. My research project was on LDEF, the long duration exposure facility. When the panels arrived at the university the local television station were there to film us unpacking it.
- I love books, I have hundreds of them. I don’t think we will ever need insulation on our walls, as hey are covered with books. It shocks people who deliver things, as even the hall is full of books. People often say we should throw them away. Apparently we will never read them again. I know I have read most of them more than once and I know I will read them again, and enjoy doing it. I’ll read anything, including cereal packets, squash bottles, anything. The really odd thing is I am dyslexic. Go figure. I do misread many things, but I’ve learned to see the humor in that, for example how do you ork a cow, it must be possible a lot of companies have coworkers. My spelling stinks, and if two words are the same kind of shape I see them as the same. I’ve also realised why older books are often easier to read, there is less contrast between discoloured pages and the text.
So there you go five things you didn’t know about me, and probably didn’t want to. Now I have to tag five more people, Digital eye, Dormouse, Penny, Beverly, and Joyce. As Nellie said on her blog when she tagged me, if this isn’t your thing don’t worry about it just don’t do it, it won’t bother me. If it is great, I look forward to hearing more about you.
Oh My!
I’ve just been asked to make a Christmas quilt. That sounds OK doesn’t it. I love the design ideas I have been given and I am happy with the fabrics that have been suggested. Can you feel the but coming? I have to have it finished by the 16th of February! Oh. There are a lot of shows coming up that I want to enter. I have several commisions I am already working on, and now another. Well you didn’t think I would say no did you?
I am still building my business and I will not be turning down work if I can avoid it. Especially when it is this fun looking. I just hope I can get it done quickly. I’ve just finished sketching the design and I think it will work well. I may even make two so I can have one as well. I don’t often do such a detailed sketch but I have so much to do right now I needed to make sure I would remember my ideas and get it out of my head. I need to be thinking clothes today not art quilts.
I have to admit to being quite flattered to have been asked as well, that probably effected my answer too Oh and the fact that I love to do the impossible.
A talk and a quilt
January 20, 2007Well I survived. I didn’t even get pelted with rotten vegetables (well quilters cook them before they go off so I wouldn’t would I). In fact I think the talk went well. People seemed to enjoy it, and the audience was very interactive. I think I will have to encourage heckling as I like having the direct feedback. It turns out that I can indeed talk for about five minutes on any of my quilts, and with the help of a clock on the far wall I managed my 1 hour talk. It is somewhat disconcerting having the crowd rush the stage to come and look at quilts. I had never thought how it must be for a speaker, I will in future. I also know why speakers seem rather disoriented when you try to catch them after a talk, they are. The crowd just adds to it as well. Weird. I think a quite positive experience though, and after the fretting I rather enjoyed it. Several people said they thought I should do more speaking and I will take them at their word. Strangely it looks like my next talk with be to a lot of the same people in April, so I will have to work hard to have a lot of new work to show them.
We did manage to finish the wedding quilt last night, and as it has now been delivered I can show you some pictures of it. It has been named ‘Grace under Fire’. I wanted a title that covered the elegance of the cranes it is quilted with and the somewhat military looking colours used. Believe it or not most of the blues are quite grey and dull looking on their own, and the other colour a kind of tan, but together they are so different. I think it is really quite vibrant. I hope it isn’t too bright now. The new owners seemed very pleased with it, and they are people who make things too, so have some understanding of the time and effort that goes into something like this. It was quite a hit with the other guests at the dinner too which is a very nice bonus.
As you can see we went for a quite subdued backing, it is actually a very dark blue with white vines on it. The binding uses the same fabric as the centers of the log cabins, and I think adds a lift to the quilt. The rest is scrappy. We picked colours that were roughly the same colour, cut the strips and just grabbed them at random. We both particularly like this method for making quilts, it adds more depth to the colours that one fabric could possibly supply. As ever in the sake of speed, a Ricky Timms binding. I love this method, and I seem to be getting better at it at last.
Robin is very proud of this quilt as he did all the piecing while I did the cutting and pressing for him. He hasn’t been quilting long but his points are great, and this is just a utility quilt! It is intended to be used, and as such there are errors in the quilting that we chose to leave. For a customer or a show they would have come out, for a working quilt I think they add character and I am sure it will be kept well away from quilt police. Ops, I just realised I forgot to warn them that after washing it will look different, oh well too late tonight I will have to try and remember tomorrow.
Art in the Mail
January 19, 2007
I really like getting quilts in the post. It’s so fun. I know, I know, you told me, but it isn’t the same as doing it. I am going to have to start working small and posting them. Here are my first two quilts made by others.
This first one is from Kate. I should have taken a picture of the back of it as well. It has a colours backing and it is great. The design is couched threads and fancy stitches. It also has sequins. Remember these quilts are only 6″x4″, and they are quite tricky to photograph well.
This second one is by Nellie Bass Durand. It is of Lake Michigan. I had to give you a close up of the piecing on this one. There aren’t any raw edges! It’s really raised the bar for the landscapes I have planned. This is the card that started me on the Art Share Meme.
I am so thrilled with both of these. I am trying to think of a good way to display them. I might try and design a quilted album to put them in. I have some clear plastic that I could probably sew into pages to make pockets for them, but I don’t know if it would out gas and damage them. I suppose I could use some sort of net or mesh and take the cards out when I want a good look at them. Either way, I want more so I will have to get to work. Thanks guys they are great.
Under the Rainbow
January 18, 2007
I’ve finally come up with a plan for the future of my blog. I wll be moving it to my own server running wordpress. It is going to take a month or so to get moved but in the mean time there will be photos I have decided to accept the terms on a temporary basis and hope I can move before they decide to use any of my images. It seems likely given this is a low traffic, specialist blog. All this means, I can show you some photos! Yay!
So here it is. I was asked to come up with a pattern for a bed size quilt, to use a range of fabrics from the Ombre range and spraytime if I needed something more plain. It had to be a quick and fairly easy project. I had three quarters of a meter of each of the Ombre fabrics. I was told I could ask for more, but I like a challenge so I set out to design something that would only use what I had and some spraytime. The black is spraytime so is mottled, I really like it.
The biggest challenge was how to stretch a 44″ width of fabric to the width of a bed. As you can see I did manage it, but boy it took some thought and fiddling. Remember I also had to be sure other people would be able to recreate it, and believe they could.
As ever I used a Ricky Timms style machine binding. I don’t know what I would do without it for urgent quilts. The one on the frame now will have this type too. The main body of the quilt uses a Dave Hudson pantograph, and the borders are also a panto. I hadn’t used either of them before, but I quite like them both. However I am already planning my own designs to do the same job, but the way I want. I am thinking of doing a series of patterns starting with one inspired by the watery pattern here. Rest assured you guys will be the first to hear about it.
I know the pictures aren’t great but hopefully they will give you the idea. I was in a hurry to deliver it and couldn’t wait for better light. If you want to see some good pictures, I guess the magazine will have them. It will be in the March edition of Popular Patchwork, which I think comes out about the 15th of February.
Wow, progress
January 17, 2007Well I think these plans are finally coming together. We have all the blocks done, and ready to assemble for the present quilt. It just needs the block joining and I can get it onto the frame. I chose a design that didn’t need borders as I wanted to use an all over design for the quilting. This quilt is having to combine two very different design specifications in one quilt, and I hope we have managed it.
I’ve sent of the mother of the bride skirt today. I am surprised how much I like it. It really isn’t my colour or my style of fabric, but I suppose it is a design of skirt I really like. I just hope she likes it as all she has seen is a small sample of the fabric. She hasn’t seen any pictures of the skirt design at all. Scary. Still it will fit perfectly with the brides outfit, and I guess that is what most mothers would really care about.
I’ve finally found a scrapbook to put all your supportive comment in. I’ve had so much support from the Internet in the last year, and I want to keep making good use of it. On days when I don’t believe in myself I can look through it and see that there are a lot of other people who think I can succeed. I found a purple faux suede photo album in the sale and I love it. It matches my quilt design notebooks so I think it was meant to be. Even better it has those peel and stick pages so I don’t have to worry about finding a glue that will work. It’s been great reading through the comments and has helped me with preparing my talk for Saturday. It is rather daunting going and talking to a room full of people for an hour, but I have lots of support, I won’t let you (or me) down.
I am working on plans to get pictures back onto my blog. I can’t switch to WordPress right now as they don’t have a tool to move the new blogger blogs over yet. They also don’t allow blogging by email, which is what I do from my mobile phone. The do have moblog, but my phone doesn’t. What I may do is host the images elsewhere and just code the html myself. I am working on it. I will also try and get my new works put onto my main site then you will at least be able to see them there. Thanks for bearing with me while I figure it out. If I get really desperate I may accept the terms I don’t like and hope Google never notice my site. After all I am sure this is a very low traffic blog and if they are going to use any ones images it is more likely to be the more popular ones right?
Finally (for now) I still haven’t found my 10,000 visitor. If they haven’t come back here by next Monday I will post details of the 10,001 visitor and see if I have better luck with that one. Who would have thought that giving something away would be so difficult.
Why is it….
January 16, 2007… that when you sit back and admire the finish on something it always seems to have to be taken apart and redone. Or is it just me this happens to. I’ve just put a waistband onto a skirt. It looks great. I will be taking it back off later, to put it on correctly. I somehow managed not to leave the under lap. Which is odd as I remember marking it and lining up the edge of the skirt with the mark. I guess at some point I moved it, but why I have no idea. I think I will leave it for now and do something else. I have plenty of cutting out to do that should be fairly simple. At least the skirt looks good I suppose.
Last year at the Festival of Quilts the organizers asked if they could use one of my quilts for advertising the Festival this year. I agreed but then heard no more, and I had forgotten about it. Today they got in touch, they are still interested in using my work to advertise the show. I am thrilled, not only because they like my work and have remembered me, but also because they are keen to push quilting forward. They want to make it clear it isn’t old and boring and encourage younger people to have a go. If I can help achieve that I will be very pleased. I think this is possibly the most important thing for the show to be doing, we need more quilters.