A Wee Bit of Sewing Time

Dang... It's State Board of Equalization Sales Tax Reporting Time so I'm buried in receipts and paperwork... but did find time to finish up a gift for a friend celebrating 50 years of marraige... to the same man!!!!! :-) My friend Carol's hubby is a great fellow, full of fun and life. They are a great match. Our Wanabe Quilters friendship group made a beautiful table runner for them and I had wanted to have embroidered napkins done. The cost for that was outrageous so I printed their names (Carol and Ed) on fabric and blanket stitched a small label onto each napkin corner. This approach was over $98 dollars more practical than the commercial solution. In these times, we gotta be creative with our money, right?

NOT a Black and White Photo

This is the view from my bedroom window and what I awakened to yesterday a.m...Snow and ICE! Yesterday was my hubby's 70th birthday with a family dinner planned at my studio... Bottom line, I HAD to go down the mountain and slid my SUV a good portion of the way despite 4WD. Dinner was great tho and I'm told the ice has melted so I will return to the hilltop.
You may have noticed some new links to this blog...One for my Calendar of what's going in and one for upcoming retreats. I'm always looking for easier/faster ways to keep things current so we'll try this approach. Hope it helps.

Look at This Beauty

Winner of Best Art Quilt at Road To California. This group quilt piece is danged breathtaking. These are all fabric collaged portraits. Click on photo for a detail view! Such Talent!!

What a week!

Ever get tired of hearing your own voice? I demo'd and conducted impromtu training during the Road To California show. Lots on quilters to talk with!! What a wonderful, exhausting, hectic week. Road to California was spectacular. The skill level and creativity at this show is right up there with Houston IQA. What a great experience it was to work in the judging room and see quilts up close. 2nd year in a row an art quilt won Best of Show. Check out the winners at www.road2ca.com. One of my personal favorites was a black and white quilt (I love 2 color quilts) where the black was done with gel pens. Gorgeous. Double click for a closeup. WOW!

Road To Ca. Preview Night in 4 hours

They are still hanging the show which will open this evening. My featured quilter exhibit is up and ready so I ran home to freshen up. I hung my display with an invisible quilt show hanging system by HangUpsCompany.com. It's pretty slick! Hope some of you can come by and visit. I'll be in aisle 600 all week. Thanks for reading.

Road To California has me speechless

No pics today but hopefully tomorrow. 'Have spent the last 2 days helping out in the judging room at Road To California. Every year the quality and creativity steps up another notch. WOW...just WOW! Quilts will be hung today so hope I can have some pictures for you soon. I hung my solo exhibit last night, but did I bring the camera in with me NOOOOO! Duh! Charged and ready to go today! :-)

On The Road Again- www.Road2ca.com

Well here we go again on a fun and wild ride. Mon and Tues will be judging at the Road To California Quilt Show.... very efficiently handled by Stevi Graves and Phyllis Morrow and gang. Then the show fully opens Thursday (I think there's a preview Wed night) and runs through Sunday. Carolyn Reese is honoring my work as the featured artist this year so this will be a quick note as I need to organize the hanging plan this afternoon. I hope you get to stop by my exhibit as I will be there all week. .... I'll have some old and new pieces. Shown here is "First Call" from an earlier Grand Prize from a Sulky Challenge. See you there!

Stage Six: A Quilt Show Sleeve

Position the smaller seamed side of the sleeve against the quilt back approximately 1/2 inch from the top edge of the quilt. Hand stitch sleeve to backing. The quilt is ready to hang. This method will allow your quilt to hang straight down from the hanging bar, eliminating the potential of a distracting hanging bar bulge at the top.

Stage Five: A Quilt Show Sleeve

Carefully press the seam to one side then flip over and position the sleeve with the raw seam down. Note that the top curved half of the sleeve is larger than the bottom half which will be placed against the quilt back in the next stage. That original press guide line is unimportant now so if you feel it important to do so, press it out being careful NOT to affect the outer pressed edges which will also become the hand stitched edge in the final stage.

Stage Four: A Quilt Show Sleeve

With "wrong" sides together, machine stitch raw edges in a quarter inch seam.

Stage Three: A Quilt Show Sleeve

Now, fold and press one raw edge to have it meet the center guide line from Stage Two. Repeat for remaining edge too.

Stage Two : A Quilt Show Sleeve

Fold the strip in half lengthwise (wrong sides together)and press the fold that will become a pressing guide in the next step. After pressing, open flat with wrong side up.

Stage One : A Quilt Show Sleeve

I had to do this today for a Road To California exhibit so thought I would document for you. Quilt Shows usually call for a 4 inch sleeve with enough slack in it to allow for the shower bar size rod that goes through it. I make all my sleeves this way so here goes. First, cut a 9 inch strip of fabric that ideally matches the backing fabric... the length of this 9" strip will be that of your quilt width. If you have a heavy wide quilt (like greater than 70 inches... you may chose to put 2 sleeves on your quilt with a 1 1/2 inch gap in the very center of your quilt between 2 sleeves. This would allow for an additional center hanging support if necessary.) Next iron press a double fold (approx 3/4" each fold) on each end and stitch by machine.

Happy New Year!!

My beautiful grand daughter flew back home to Mom yesterday evening after 2 great weeks with a now exhausted Grammie. Now I am busy getting ready for the Road To California show in Ontario, Ca. next week. I am gathering for a large solo exhibit so I best get with it. I just found the Photo Booth Pop Art feature on my new Mac. I'm probably the last person in the world to know about it but it's fun. Technology! It's incredible. Any way... Happy New Year.