Quilt Market, Day 2

It was the first day that people attending Quilt Market could get out on the floor of the Convention Center and shop! This is what met my eye when I stepped through the door. Yes, there is often a lot of clowning around going on, even more so with Halloween right around the corner. This is Brandon Mably, who designs amazing fabric for Westminster Fibers.

Here are Barb Adams and Alma Allen of Blackbird Designs. I have loved their patterns and their fabrics for a long, long time! They have a new book that will be out soon called "Weekend" that features their new collection of spectacular blue, white and gray fabrics. I was drooling bigtime.

Here’s a designer who was new to me; Kim Gaddy is the designer at Buttons & Bees, and her patterns were so cute! Love the owls. She is opening a new quilt shop in Manor, Texas, within the next month or so.

The enormous fabric flowers twined around the poles at Daisy & Dell’s booth were amazing! And their patterns were darned cute, too. Wouldn't these look darling in a little girl's room? The pattern is called "Daisy's Garden: The Daisies." I think that I must make some.

These darling pooch products were made by my friend Faith Cleary of Dolce Amico. She has a brand new line of appliqued pet portraits for stockings and more. Faith did a DVD with Quilting Arts demonstrating how she makes her thread-sketched pet portraits earlier this month.

This is Faith's first Quilt Market; it was great to see her take this step. It takes a lot of hard work, determination, money and grit to have a booth at Market! 

Mary Lou Weidman is one of the most optimistic, upbeat people I've ever met. And it shows in her funny, whimsical quilt designs. She was at Market promoting a new book.

 

Cloud 9 Fabrics’ peacock fabric caught my eye. They produce lovely organic cotton fabrics, and the designs are fabulous. This is Michelle Engel Bencsko, their design and marketing director.

Alexander Henry Fabrics' booth was decorated for Day of the Dead, and it looked so bright and cheerful. Well, as cheerful as it could be with lots of these skeletons and sugar skulls hanging around!

I ran into friend and fellow C&T author Rayna Gillman walking the aisles. She gave me a sneak peek of her new book, which shows you how to use your coolest fabrics — those ones you made that you feel are too wonderful to cut up? — in quilts. I'm going to grab a copy as soon as it is out! (I tried to grab her super cool scarf from around her neck, too, but I didn't get away with it.)

Sisters Polly Minick and Laurie Simpson of Minick & Simpson design fabulous fabric lines for Moda, as well as patterns for quilts and hooked rugs year after year, often in their signature red, white/cream, and blue.

If you want to buy Moda fabric, take a seat!

Tomorrow at 11 a.m., I'm signing and giving away autographed copies of my new book in the Moda booth. Thanks, Moda! If you want a book, come early and get a ticket!

Here is artist Julie Komenda in front of a large painted and stitched piece she made. Julie was demonstrating how she paints on Roc-lon, a multi-purpose cloth. I bought some to try out. It is really neat. Julie is artist in residence at Weeki Wachee Springs in Florida, where you can see mermaids… or maybe even be one. Don't believe me? Check it out!

Now this is pretty neat! This screen shows the Twitter feed regarding activity at Quilt Market. Attendees who post on twitter and add #QuiltMarket to the end of their tweets show up here.

The special exhibits at Quilt Festival are always interesting. This are photographs from the Texas’ Anniversary Photo Exhibit by Wilma Hart, VP for Corporate Projects at Quilts, Inc.:

She took photos of landmark Texas buildings and PhotoShopped quilts into them.

This is Wilma (above) with some of her photos; aren't they fun?

I heard a lot of buzz about these cool clips (above) at Clover. They are used to hold the binding in place; you can either hand stitch the back of the binding, or machine stitch. Little marks on the clips help you make sure that you catch the edge of the binding on the back of the quilt if you are machine quilting it down through the front. And isn't that doll great?

Lisa Walton of Dyed and Gone to Heaven has a special exhibition at International Quilt Festival this year, and I can't wait to see it! I had dinner with Linda, Bonnie McCaffery and Sarah Vedeler tonight at the Four Seasons. Here is the chef preparing Lisa's spectacular dessert!

Goodnight, everyone. More tomorrow!

Quilt Market, Day 1, Part 2

I didn't have time to post some of yesterday's happenings at Quilt Market, so this is a catch-up post! In the photo above, Jane Sassaman is introducing her new fabric line, "Feather Your Nest," which I really love. Her apron, and the dress behind her, are made from this collection.

Kathy Miller of Michael Miller Fabrics unveiled some of their new lines with an interesting Schoolhouse session about color trends in the fabric world.

Michael Miller displayed some of their new fabric lines on huge foamcore boards at the front of the room.

Meanwhile, on the floor of the Convention Center, everyone was unpacking and preparing their booths. Here's the Quilting Arts/Interweave booth. Boxes get tossed out in the aisles for pickup later.

That's my "Trouble in the Pumpkin Patch" in the upper left. It's in the 2012 Quilting Arts Calendar, and they have all the winning quilts displayed in their booth.

Studioe Fabrics' booth features work by art quilters that uses two of their fabric lines. Three of the pieces in this photo were made by friends of mine: Linda Stegall, DeLane Rosenau, and P.J. Howard, who are all members of Fiber Art Options. Here is my "Psychedelic Peacock" hanging in their booth:

Quilt Market, Day 1

Greetings from Houston! I’m here for the Fall 2011 International Quilt Market. It takes place in the George R. Brown Convention Center downtown, which occupies about six square blocks. The photo above shows it from my room in the Hilton Hotel that is connected to the Convention Center. 

Today, the main focus was Schoolhouse, a series of short sessions put on by industry people – book publishers, fabric companies, notions manufacturers, fabric designers, etc. There are 30-minute and 15-minute sessions all day. In the morning, you pick up the official program for Market, and decide what sessions you want to attend:

Groups of quilt shop owners huddle in the lobby areas of the Convention Center to confer. If quilt shops come with more than one person, they often split up to cover more ground. 

I attended a session where Alex Anderson showed off her new fabric line, which will ship in January. It is beautiful!

 

 Here is the quilt Alex designed to show off the line:

Some of the sessions were absolutely packed. Sessions where there are good door prizes or giveaways are always popular. Here are just some of the people in the crowd waiting for Lonni Rossi to talk about her new fabric lines for Andover:

Here’s Lonni:

 An assistant carries one of Lonni's quilts through the spectators:

Here’s Lonni:

Edyta Sitar of Laundry Basket Quilts was completely charming, and shared many personal stories while introducing her new book.

This is just one of Edyta’s gorgeous quilts:

Susan Knapp (of The Quilt Branch) and I always try to meet up and have our photo taken together!

Not enough time to show you everything from today; I'll post more tomorrow!

Another chance to win my book

Sarah Ann Smith and friend

Sarah Ann Smith, a friend and fellow art quilter whose work is featured in the gallery section of my new book, Point, Click, Quilt! Turn Your Photos into Fabulous Fabric Art, has reviewed my book on her blog. Check it out – there’s a chance to win a copy!

You can see more of Sarah's beautiful work in the galleries on her website. 

Charlotte Guild offering great workshops open to non-members

If you live in the Charlotte, North Carolina, area, here are some great quilting and fiber arts workshops you should know about! These workshops are offered by the Charlotte Quilters’ Guild, and are open to non-members of the guild. Here is information about each workshop. Prices listed are for non-members.

To register or get more information, e-mail Phyllis Tarrant at workshops@charlottequiltersguild.org, or call her at 704-545-4481.

Mary Kerr 

A Vintage Challenge – $55
plus a $20 kit fee that includes everything except batting and backing  

Thurs., Nov. 3, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Sharon Towers, 5100 Sharon Rd.

Sandra Smith  

Story Quilts – $55

Thurs., Feb. 2, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Sharon Towers, 5100 Sharon Rd.

Valerie Goodwin

Favorite Places – $110

Thurs. March 8 and Fri. March 9 , 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. each day

Location in Charlotte to be announced later

Judy Simmons 

Dimensional and off the Edge Appliqué – $55

Thurs., April 5, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Sharon Towers, 5100 Sharon Rd. 

and

Wonderful Texture – $30

Thursday, April 5, 6:30 to 9:30 p.m. (evening class)
 
Linda Cantrell 

Self Portrait – $55

Thurs.,  May 3, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

and

Fantasy Flowers – $30

6:30 to 9:30 p.m. (evening class)

My friend and fellow guild member Debby Harwell will be teaching a surface design workshop in January 2012; details will be available soon. It will be a day class, and the price will be $35 (plus a small kit fee) for non-members. 

Don’t miss this opportunity to take a class with a fabulous teacher … Come and join us!

Headed to Houston!

I’m packing my bags and getting ready to head to Houston for International Quilt Market and International Quilt Festival tomorrow! Quilt Market is the trade show that comes before Festival, and it is only open to quilt shop owners and professionals in the quilting industry. It’s where everyone in the quilting industry goes to show off their new fabrics, notions, tools, sewing machines, and any product sold to quilters. I’m going to market my new book and DVD. 

My plan is to blog each night to tell you about what I’ve seen and heard. If you can’t be at Market, please come along with me on my journey! I always bring home some loot, too, and will be doing some give-aways … so you won’t want to miss it!

Please review my book on Amazon.com

Hey, if you have read my new book, Point, Click, Quilt! Turn Your Photos into Fabulous Fabric Art, would you consider writing a review on Amazon.com? I’d be mighty grateful! Here’s a link to the page with my book: http://www.amazon.com/Point-Click-Photos-Fabulous-Fabric/dp/1607052261

I’d love to know what you think!

I’m joining the artist hosts of The Sketchbook Challenge!

I am so happy to announce that I am joining a group of artists I much admire: the women of The Sketchbook Challenge! I will be one of the host artists for 2012. 

In January of 2011, Sue Bleiweiss and a group of other artists came together and started The Sketchbook Challenge as a way to encourage others to start working in a sketchbook, or revitalize their sketching, with the belief that keeping sketchbooks is extremely valuable to artists. 

Some of us are fiber artists, and some of us are mixed media artists; we all love to write about what we do! 

Each month on The Sketchbook Challenge blog, we will announce a new theme and then post images from our sketchbooks related to that theme throughout the month. The idea is that by providing a look inside our sketchbooks, you’ll be inspired to keep a sketchbook of your own. You can work in any medium you want, and create as many pages as you wish.

The other component of this project is that participants are encouraged to post photos or scans of their sketchbook pages, and share them in a flickr group. If you do, you put your name in the running for some fabulous prizes by the group’s sponsors.

If you have not participated in 2011, I hope you’ll decide to turn over a new leaf in 2012 and join me on this journey! Participating host artists for 2012 are:  

Jill Berry :  blog    /  sketchbook profile

Sue Bleiweiss :  blog  /    sketchbook profile
Pam Carriker  :  blog   /   sketchbook profile

Jane Davies  :  blog    /  sketchbook profile

Jamie Fingal :  blog    /  sketchbook profile

Leslie Tucker Jenison  :  blog   /   sketchbook profile
Lyric Kinard :  blog   /   sketchbook profile

Susan Brubaker Knapp  :  blog   /   sketchbook profile

Jane LaFazio  :  blog    /  sketchbook profile

Kelli Nina Perkins :  blog  /    sketchbook profile
Carol Sloan :  blog   /   sketchbook profile  
Susan Sorrell :  blog  /    sketchbook profile

Diana Trout :  blog    /  sketchbook profile

Laura Cater Woods :  blog   /   sketchbook profile

Gift of October: Persimmons

This is a sketch I completed today. Yesterday, I went out to take photos, because I really need a nice landscape photo for a class I’m taking with Japanese fiber artist Noriko Endo at International Quilt Festival in Houston in about a week. I am really excited about this class… partly because it is so totally different from what I do, and how I do it. Noriko is a master at portraying woodland scenes, and I was hoping to get a shot of trees showing their autumn colors. 

So I headed out to a local state park on a lake near me. It was a gorgeous, clear day. I hiked a bit, took some photos and was almost back to my car when I spotted the most amazing persimmon tree, branches bare, with its golden orange orbs hanging like polka dots against the cornflower blue sky. I must have stood there for a half hour, shooting up. Here are some of the best shots:

When you take photographs, how often do you look straight up? Try it! 

I love how the depth of field on these photos draws attention (and focus) to the branches in the foreground.

They were up so high that I couldn’t pick any, and only the rotten fruit had fallen to the ground. According to Wikipedia, the American Persimmon (Diospyros virginiana) is native to the eastern U.S. and is higher in vitamin C and calcium than the Japanese persimmon. In the midwest, it is the key ingredient in a steamed pudding, and sometimes its lumber is used as a substitute for ebony in musical instruments.

I am not crazy about the typeface I used in my sketch. It’s a bit blocky and heavy for this subject, I think. I enjoy using type in my sketches; I want to work on better integrating it into the sketches as I do more with The Sketchbook Challenge in the next year. I also need to work on ways to handle the depth of field issue. The branches in the background are too heavy, and too well defined; they don’t recede as much as they should. 

I also think I'll try doing something more graphic with the same photo… perhaps in a more limited palate of solid black, blue and orange. The wheels are also turning while I consider ways to use this photo – and my drawing of it – in something fabric related.  

Back in the saddle

I am trying hard to get back in the habit of sketching in my sketchbook. I joined The Sketchbook Challenge at the start of the year, and was doing great until my mother died in late January. But it is something I really want to do, so I will begin again! Here is a sketch I did today. One of my goals for next year is to do more pieces of fiber art based on my sketches, rather than my photographs. This one might be really fun to do!

I sketched this in pencil, then drew the black lines with a Micron pen, then watercolored it. October is my favorite month! Here is a poem about it that I love:

October’s Bright Blue Weather

    O Suns and skies and clouds of June,
        And flowers of June together,
    Ye cannot rival for one hour
        October's bright blue weather; 

    When loud the bumble-bee makes haste,
        Belated, thriftless vagrant,
    And Golden-Rod is dying fast,
        And lanes with grapes are fragrant; 

    When Gentians roll their fringes tight
        To save them for the morning,
    And chestnuts fall from satin burrs
        Without a sound of warning; 

    When on the ground red apples lie
        In piles like jewels shining,
    And redder still on old stone walls
        Are leaves of woodbine twining; 

    When all the lovely wayside things
        Their white-winged seeds are sowing,
    And in the fields, still green and fair,
        Late aftermaths are growing; 

    When springs run low, and on the brooks,
        In idle golden freighting,
    Bright leaves sink noiseless in the hush
        Of woods, for winter waiting; 

    When comrades seek sweet country haunts,
        By twos and twos together,
    And count like misers, hour by hour,
        October's bright blue weather. 

    O suns and skies and flowers of June,
        Count all your boasts together,
    Love loveth best of all the year
        October's bright blue weather. 

– Helen Hunt Jackson (1830-1885)

Hudson River Valley Art Workshops

I’m really excited to announce that in December 2012, I’ll be teaching five days at the Hudson River Valley Art Workshops, a unique art center in New York’s inspiring Hudson River Valley in the Catskill Mountains. Since 1982, fiber artist Kim LaPolla and her husband Mark (Chef de Cuisine and Chocolatier) have been holding art workshops in the gorgeous 1889 inn, The Greenville Arms. USA Today named their program “one of the ten best learning vacations.”

My workshop will take place Dec. 9-15, 2012. Treat yourself to an early holiday gift and join me! This five-day format will give me the opportunity to work with students on pieces based on their own photos, something there is simply not time for in a one-day class. I’ll cover fusible applique, wholecloth painting, thread sketching and free-motion quilting. Beyond the six hours of class time each day, I am sure we will be spending time in the studio in our pajamas, with lots of laughter and fun.

The lineup of teachers for 2012 is impressive: Pat Pauly, Gloria Loughman, Katie Pasquini Masopust, Sue Nickels, Melinda Bula, Paula Nadelstern, Carol Taylor, Laura Wasilowski, Esterita Austin, Susan Shie, Hollis Chatelain, Jane Sassaman, Kathyanne White, Valerie Goodwin, Charlotte Warr Anderson, Rosalie Dace, Jane Davila, Larkin Van Horn, and Sue Benner. You can see when and what they are teaching here. Information about my workshop is here.