Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Pacitif International Quilt Festival 2014


Pacific International Quilt Festival is a quilt show that I like to attend every year.


It's a short drive from where I live, so dropping in for a few hours is low hanging fruit and a serious treat for the eyes.

This year was no exception.

I took lots of photos of quilts, ribbons won, and info sheets about the quilts and the people who made them.  The quilt above is called Celestial Splendor and was made by Rachel Wetzler of Illinois.  It was stunning in person, as were many other quilts but this was one of my favorites.

A highlight for me was meeting (In Person!!!)  Nancy Brown, amazing applique artist.  It was like meeting a rock star for me.  You can see some photos of me with her and the ladies who helped do the applique on the quilt that was in the show this year.  It was another one of my favorites and I took a lot of detailed photos of it.  There are San Francisco and animal themes in the block designs.

Here's a link to all the photos I took at Pacific International Quilt Festival 2014.

I didn't photograph all the quilts, only the ones that either won big awards or really inspired me.

Oh right and if you missed the previous nine years of the show (unlike me!) and want to see another oh say...four or five THOUSAND quilt photos from PIQF...well - look no further!!  Perhaps you should make yourself a cup (barrel?) of tea first.

PIQF 2013

PIQF 2012
 

PIQF 2011

PIQF 2010

PIQF 2009

PIQF 2008

PIQF 2007

PIQF 2006

PIQF 2005

Wednesday, October 8, 2014

Indian Summer


It still feels like summer here in Northern California.

We still need sunblock on the kids if we go out for a while during the day.

It's been a busy time with lots of soccer games on the weekends and a little creative work for me on the sidelines.

I am knitting a sweater that I am frustrated with because when I was working on picking up some stitches the yarn broke and now I have to go back and fix it.  Let it be known that weak yarn is annoying.

Knitting is an adventure.  I'm still learning its secrets.

Quilting - well, you know where you stand with it for the most part.  With any luck your fabric is good quality and will not tear when you don't want it to.  You can usually trust your thread not to break unless you really mean to break it.

In the above photo you can see my one line a day book where I write something happy that happened during the day.  Today I'll be writing that my son got his brand new copy of the just released today Rick Riordan book The Blood of Olympus

I made the pom pom above from a tiny amount of handspun yarn.  It has sparkles in it which really isn't 'me' but it came for free with a spinning tool I bought so I spun it up for fun and it's decorating my book for now.

Hope your week is well and maybe a bit less hot and sweaty than our week here.

Monday, October 6, 2014

Hexagon Quilt: English Paper Piecing


These days I spend more time running around with the family and less time quilting so it's kinda big news when I finish a quilt top.

I was not trying to make a huge quilt with this hexagon project, more of a small wall hanging. 


Now that I see it all together, I sort of wish I had made it bigger.  It's rather cool.

I have been dragging it around with me, working on in her and there so it's a bit wrinkled in the photo, but still...the top is DONE!

That doesn't mean the quilt is done, of course.  My favorite part is still to come...the quilting part. 

Next I need to put some borders on it and baste it in prep for quilting. 

Not sure if it's small enough for me to quilt it on the go, but I do have a portable quilting hoop and a huge trunk.  Hm....let's see how that goes.

Now on to the borders.  Decisions, decisions.

I'll be using more Oakshott fabrics (same as the hex shapes) to give it a consistent look.