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Monday, November 17, 2014

My First Workshop at the Stitchin' Post

I am so excited to share with you a couple of blog posts about my recent workshop at the Stitchin' Post in Sisters. You all know I'm a huge Christina Cameli fan ... totally love her book First Steps to Free Motion Quilting. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of the workshop in Sisters ... what a treat to teach at one of my most favorite places on planet earth. I have taken so many classes at the Stitchin' Post over the years ... I totally teared up when I was introduced! Truly, it means the world to me to have been asked to teach there and hopefully return some of the goodness that has been so generously shared with me by a multitude of fantastic teachers.

You can read about the workshop and see pics on the Stitchin' Post blog. Kristin, one of my awesome students and a new friend, also posted about the workshop on her blog. Kristin, a very talented quilt maker, just taught a journal cover class at the Stitchin' Post. Not only did she make a quilted zipper bag and fabric bucket, she quilted an improv quilt in class. Yea Kristin! Be sure and check out her work!




Saturday, April 19, 2014

Fabric buckets are FUN ... seriously!

I'm happily making samples for upcoming classes and am having a seriously great time making fabric buckets for my Modern Machine Quilting class that starts later this month. The class includes four projects from Christina Cameli's fabulous book First Steps to Free-Motion Quilting:



Christina blogs at A Few Scraps ... go check it out. She just made a messenger bag using Jennifer Sampou's new Shimmer fabric collection ... drool.

Before you look at the fabric buckets ... warning warning warning ... they are addictive! Fun and so easy to make ... and I can take no credit whatsoever; I simply followed Christina's excellent instructions.

Fabric Buckets
The fabric bucket on top and to the right were quilted with free motion designs but the fabric at bottom left was quilted with a decorative stitch and a walking foot ... easy as can be!

I want to make gobs and gobs ... to organize socks, scarves, gloves and in my sewing room, the fabric buckets are ideal for zippers and trims. One of my students thought up this idea:  line with a laminate for a pot of flowers. And of course they are a perfect gift container for a quilter ... just fill with a pattern and some fat quarters!

Here, one of the buckets is filled with the diamonds and triangles I cut to make a Night Sky quilt (pattern by Julie Herman, Jaybird Quilts):

Fabric Bucket full of patches ready to sew
Thank you Christina!

Happy Easter weekend everyone and thank you for stopping by.

PS ... I am now hooked on fabric buckets ... you too? You might enjoy my Pinterest board of fabric buckets, bowls and baskets.

Sunday, January 19, 2014

Tula Pink BoM First 25 Blocks

I can hardly wait to see next week's installment of modern blocks as well as launch a third class who will begin planning their quilts. Meanwhile, I have an update on our work in progress. Linda D surprised everyone last month! Not only did she bring 20+ beautiful new blocks, she started over with a completely different group of fabrics ... zombies!

Linda D's Modern Blocks

I am in love with that occasional touch of red ...

Zombies ... what fun!



Visually striking fussy cutting



Next up is Sherry W ... her modern blocks feature her collection of Australian prints.

Sherry W's Modern Blocks

What a gorgeous palette ... and those tiny dots add such sparkle to her quilt!


Auditioning a possible background fabric ...


Instead of one large quilt, some are making two smaller quilts with their blocks.

Mallory J's Blocks in Brights
Mallory J's Taupe Blocks



Kathy A's Modern Blocks ... Brights and Desert Southwest Palettes

Next up are several collections of bright and happy quilts in the making.

Carolyn B's Modern Blocks

Pam G's Modern Blocks

Detail of Pam G's Blocks

Karen B's Modern Blocks

Karlee designed an original "pair of diamonds" block for her quilt (bottom right) ... yea!
Karlee S'  Modern Blocks

Kathy S'  Modern Blocks
Charlotte and Heather are working with grays for their modern quilts.

Charlotte W's Modern Blocks

Heather J's Modern Blocks
Lana and Lynn are working with a softer palette. Lana is planning to lay out her quilt so the predominantly yellow blocks form a diagonal across the center of her quilt then blend to pale gray and aqua in the upper left corner and darker teal and charcoal in the bottom right corner ... great idea!

Lana's Modern Blocks

Lynn's Modern Blocks
I hope you enjoy their thoughtful, beautiful work!

Monday, January 13, 2014

Angels & Antics in the Winter Snow

Happy New Year! To kick off Quilts & Paws in 2014, I send all of you my best wishes for a happy, healthy, fulfilling year. Here in the Willamette Valley, early December 2013 brought heavy snow followed by a week of frigid temps. To give an idea just how much snow, here's one of the feeders we diligently kept full for our birds and squirrels.

An 8-inch snowfall is rare in the Willamette Valley





Our house in the trees looks its best while the snow is still pristine with most of the weeds and yard chores hidden from view.






Just how cold was it? A week of bitterly cold temps from the teens all the way down to zero left the creek in our back yard frozen over ... the only time that has occurred in the 16+ years we've lived here. But trust me, I didn't test it to see how thick the ice was!

Frozen Muddy Creek

No one enjoys snow more than our two goldens ... they both absolutely love it! Frankie likes to eat snow, catch snowballs, romp and roll. Even though he's 11 years old, I think he still has a sweet baby face.



Frankie is ready for a snowball

For Nickel, who will be 3 years old this spring, this was his very first snow. It was fluffy, powdery snow that wouldn't pack into a snowball so we had to make do with the Kong toys.

Nickel's very first snow


Another pic of Frankie's sweet face ...

Hi there

The canine world seemingly has no concept of "one for you, one for me" ... there is only ever one desirable toy at least so far as Nickel is concerned. Frankie, gentle soul that he is, rarely contests the possession of a toy. Nickel, however, is ever vigilant ... constantly keeping on eye on Frankie's interests.

His toy is better than my toy?

I mentioned that Frankie loves to roll in the snow; he demonstrated the proper way to make a snow angel for the inexperienced Nickel.

A snow angel tutorial

That felt great!

Just as we started to head in the house because I was freezing, our neighbor John who lives to the south of us, started doing something very interesting in his yard. Notice that Nickel has commandeered both toys.

Alert to the south!

... followed a moment later by several sharp "bangs" as one of our neighbors to the north decided the snow inspired a little back yard target practice ...an alert to the north in perfect unison.

Alert to the north!

What fun!