Palouse Patchers

I have just returned from a marvelous teaching trip in Moscow, Idaho for the Palouse Patchers Spring Fling. The Palouse is a stunningly dramatic area of the country of giant velvety hills and valleys. Trees on the Palouse are few and far between and the sky puts on a show all day long. 

The Patchers really made me feel special. At the opening event every place was set with a swatch of Garden Diva fabric and a lovingly crafted fabric flower brooch. The centerpiece on each table was a tiered plate filled with colorful cupcakes.

The next two days we had class in Moscow's handsome community center. The girls in class were good sports and cut into their Sassaman fabrics, even though they didn't know exactly what would happen. Here are the awesome results of Friday's Kaleidoscope class.

I am delighted that they are all so different. Each one has a distinct personality. We didn't have time enough to work on borders, but you can still see the beginnings of some exciting quilts.

                                                                                                  

 

Some students used 45 degree triangle templates, some used 60 degree ones and others did their own "thing". I never get tired of the surprising relationships between the different fabrics, especially when they seem to blend in and out of one another.

It is also interesting what depth the black fabrics create. In many of these pieces there is an underlying  organizational principle like "mirror image", "light to dark" or "alternating". Keep scrolling down to see the rest. You may be inspired to try a "kaleidoscope" of your own!

 

Thanks, Palouse Patchers for your enthusiasm and your hospitality! I look forward to seeing your completed quilts one day soon... hint, hint!

The Kaleidoscope Experiment Continues

Well, I guess it is inevitable but the spring changes are beginning to appear. This is the same enthusiastic crowd of little snowdrops that herald the new season every year. We even have some tulips and daffodils stretching their pointy little fingers toward the sun.

I continued to do a little more play with the kaleidoscope pattern and the Garden Divas fabrics. You can refer to the previous blog for the basics, if you missed them. This tine I used the Spring Wreath fabric for the central star and the border. The Wreath fabric is so busy that the emptiness of the Willow Wands fabric give the quilt top  some needed breathing space.

Here I have digitally added black borders which give the composition some muscle and punch. This would be my preference. The black outline defines and focuses the wild prints.

Again we have the exact same diamond and border fabrics, but we have switched out the corner squares
and triangles (surrounding the star) for the Iris and Bleeding Heart fabric. This substitution added some extra movement by suggesting circles of bleeding hearts. Pretty interesting.

So now we have added the black borders again. It is amazing what those borders do! Again it tames the business and focuses the best parts of the composition. This has been an entertaining experiment, but so far I have just used fabrics with black backgrounds, which always makes thing rich. Next I am going to try some pastels and see what happens!

One Pattern, Two Looks

This time of year seems to inspire everyone to regroup and get organized and this was my direction this week, too. Greg varnished and installed the new studio shelves and I filled them with fabric. My helper, Susan, cut bolts of fabric for kits and bundles to take to class. I reorganized the studio space in to new task areas, including a zone for shipping and packing.

But during the whole time, the Garden Divas were competing for my attention. This was not the time to begin a large quilting project! But, hey, a "little" one would be OK, right? So I got out my favorite template, the Fast 2 Cut Fussy Cutter Diamond Ruler designed by Jan Krentz! This is the perfect ruler for symmetrical prints and that's why I have used it for almost every collection. The results are always fabulous.

In the first quilt top the construction is obvious. You can see the diamond, the 9" square, the half square triangle and border. The design is very clear despite the patterned fabric. The colors and simplicity remind my of Delftware ceramics.

The second top is exactly the same, except the squares and triangle have been substituted in another fabric. The effect is very different. Now we have a kaleidoscope that blends and flows through colors and textures. The pattern pieces totally disappear. The composition looks more sophisticated even though the piecing is exactly the same.

This is an exercise worth continuing. I think I will try it in some different colorways and see what happens.

All Tied Up

This week I heard the first Sandhill Crane, a sign that spring is truly in the wings. I also shipped my new fabric designs to Westminster and found the perfect shelves to store fabric in the new studio. The giant work wall is installed and covered with white paper. A little progress occurs every day.

But after so many months of designing exclusively with paper, pencil and computers I am feeling a desperate need to fondle some fabric and sit at the sewing machine. It is always best to warm up with a smaller project, so this week I am showing off these fabulous new bow ties made with Sassaman fabrics past and present.

Oh, that feels better! These are "mood altering" accessories! You can't be crabby when you wear one of these happy ties. Now I can pull out my Illinois Album quilt, the one with the salamanders, and begin quilting the borders. This week I will also be visiting the Heritage Quilter's Guild in Lockport, Illinois. It is always a treat to have work so close to home!

Back in the Picture

Yes, I will admit it! I have been hibernating in the studio since my return from three delightful classes in Florida! My flight left O'Hare the day of the biggest blizzard of the century. It was a tense day all around. But my flight managed to take off before the worst of it, so the rest of the trip went as planned.

But after three weeks on the road, I was way behind in my fabric designing schedule! So I've had to put in some mega concentration to get the new line finished by March 1. I'm very happy with the results and have been printing the designs for shipping on Monday. I seem to measure my life by projects and it is always an exciting time when one goal is completed and another venture begins.

But there has been another project brewing during my absence! My Greg is the energy behind this adventure and I was a willing, but quiet supporter. But now that it's finished, I'm grinning from ear to ear!

My studio is connected to the garage and a large screened porch. Here you can see the garage is just a door away. Since we don't have an attic or basement the garage was filled with everything but cars. So Greg moved all the "stuff" into the porch, which we don't use much anyway, so we could turn the garage into extra studio space!!!!

Here is the cold day the door came down and the new wall was installed.

Windows came next, east and south. Basically, we are replicating the existing studio, but in reverse, as the windows are on opposite walls. Lighting and saffron colored paint made a huge improvement and laminate flooring finished it all off.

The new view looks like this! Pardon the mess, but many displaced objects are being parked in my room as we look for shelves and tables to fill the new work space.

Can you believe it? Now I can spread out!!! Time for a trip to Ikea.

Quilting in the Desert

My teaching year was launched in an ideal way at Quilting in the Desert last week. It was a gentle way to break from the recent weeks of concentration in the studio. The excitement and sense of anticipation was contagious. I taught three classes and, as always, am delighted with the students willingness to try some new techniques.

The Abstracting from Nature workshop was three days, just long enough to really make some progress. Nature is our theme and I was thrilled that Betty Gilliam decided to use the Venus Fly Trap as her subject.  There have been many Sunflowers and Morning Glories, but this was a first! I'm jealous!!! Her interpretation is quite effective.

Jan Sheets did this very clean and graphic interpretation of a Poppy. Here is a picture at the "cropping" stage. Her plans are to substitute a few areas of background fabric with different black prints to add some depth and interest. Quilting will really be fun in all those big areas of color.

It is interesting how the surrounding environment affects every ones choice of subject. When I taught in Japan, many students chose familiar and traditional Japanese plants for their theme, like the cherry blossom and chrysanthemum.

Here in Phoenix the desert plants were common choices. Sharon Brooks worked on the Bird of Paradise in class. This flower is always a challenge because it is so simple to begin with... Mother Nature has already stylized it.
I enjoy the way she has condensed the orange petals into a single piece and used the unexpected turquoise to improve her composition.

The scale of each project is as variable as their themes. Becky Schroeder's Shooting Star, below, grew quickly and is at least five foot tall. The gradation of blues in the background works quite nicely. The stem fabric proved to be the toughest challenge and changed throughout the process. Then in the last half hour they changed again to a rusty wine color, which seems to be the winner.

So I'm back at home for a few days before I leave for classes in Florida. As always, my students have encouraged and inspired me, too! I will be full of ideas and energy when I get back into the studio again.

Naturescapes Winner!

Wow! Thank you all for your positive response to our first gift give away! It is nice to know who is actually checking into the Idea Book and to know there is a real audience out there. The winner of Noriko Endo's lovely new book, Naturescapes, is "momto2wasd"! Congratulations!! We are planning to do this every few weeks, so stay tuned.

While you were enjoying Noriko's work, we were enjoying another snow storm, so now the landscape is white and gray again. But here in the studio the colors are as brilliant as ever. The pastels have been irresistible this season, which is an unusual attraction for me! I was one of those women that rejected the color pink for many years. It seemed like a frivolous and airheaded color. But now I feel differently! Now I see pink as extravagant and heart achingly optimistic.

Pink and green is always a refreshing combination, so here I have teamed two fabrics
( Lively Silhouette, Blush and Dragonfly Moon, Peacock) from the Garden Divas line for the Reversible Party Napkin pattern. The coordinating Button-Down Napkin Ring is made with the Dragonfly Check, as is the old fashioned styled tablecloth. The English Tea Cozy, another of our Pint Size Patterns, teams up the Lively Silhouette, Aqua with a finishing band and yo-yo with the Dragonfly Check again.

Yes, optimism is the mood this week. I think this is a very pretty combination and I really enjoy the mix of critters, too. Perhaps the new seed catalogs have helped to sprout this spring like project.

Our house is trimmed with honey colored oak woodwork, so I am always looking for blonds baskets and accessories. But, of course, we crafters have to add our own touch. This handsome tea tray is from Ikea with a little extra decoupaged lining of Sassaman fabric... perfect for a summer celebration in January!