Your chance to check out TheQuiltShow.com

I’m in episode 901 of TheQuiltShow.com

If you have never watched the online television show “The Quilt Show with Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims,” now is your chance! Alex and Ricky are celebrating International Quilting Day beginning today – Friday, March 14 — through Sunday, March 16.

Everyone who signs on to TheQuiltShow.com will have free access to more than 160 shows featuring some of the top quilting instructors in the world. It’s the perfect way to watch and decide if you want to subscribe (I think you will; it is a fabulous value for everything you get.)

You can also enter a prize drawing for a chance to win wonderful fabrics; the grand prize is a Bernina 550QE!

You can start with my show, Episode #901. I demonstrate a traditional needleturn block, and a small art quilt, both featuring nests:

New thread sketching article in Quilting Arts magazine!

I have an article in the new issue of Quilting Arts magazine! If you don’t subscribe, you can order the April/May 2014 issue here. The article includes instructions and a pattern for making “Red-Spotted Purple” (below). I’m writing a series of articles on thread sketching for beginners; the second installment is scheduled for the next issue, June/July 2014.

“Red-spotted Purple”
19.75" x 16.75"
Copyright Susan Brubaker Knapp 2013

“Lepidoptera” on the cover

A slice of my piece “Lepidoptera” is on the cover of the February issue of Genetics in Medicine, the magazine of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics. A friend from my graduate school days at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill's School of Journalism, Karyn Hede, is News Editor, and suggested they use my work on the cover. Thanks, Karyn! 

It is based on a photograph I took of a Painted Lady Butterfly. It is a wholecloth quilt, painted with acrylic fabric paint and then quilted. Lepidoptera is the order of insects that includes butterflies and moths.

More “Beauty on my morning walk”

If you’re my Facebook friend, you know that I try to post photos each day of “Beauty on my morning walk.” Most are photos I take around my neighborhood when I walk my dog. Some are photos I take where ever I am traveling. It’s my way of encouraging my friends to seek out the beauty around them, and to feel grateful. Here are some recent photos. If you are on Facebook and have not found me yet, please send me a friend request here!

Interview with “the Dishcloth Diva”

Deb Buckingham, the “Dishcloth Diva,” interviewed me today on her blog. You can read it here. She interviewed me after it was announced that I’ve been named as the next host of “Quilting Arts TV.” Deb is a full-time knitting pattern designer, author, and fiber fanatic. She enjoys knitting cowls, socks, afghans, scarves, and dishcloths.

I told her that I make super-simple knitted dishcloths, too. Here are some of mine:

And after I looked at her beautiful designs, I think I need to run out and get one of her books, because her designs are fabulous!

The Sochi Olympics patchwork quilt

My husband, who works for Street & Smith’s SportsBusiness Journal, and I always have fun looking for crossover topics between his line of business – sports – and mine – art and quilting. Here’s one! Have you noticed the beautiful graphics at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia? It is a patchwork quilt!

I absolutely love it. You can go here to read more about it, and see examples of the beautiful handcrafts from Russia that went into the design. Here is information from the press release:

“The Olympic patchwork quilt, developed by Bosco’s creative department and given to the Sochi 2014 Organising Committee, will be the official Look of Russia’s first Winter Games.

Our goal was to represent a diverse range of emotions and feelings, connecting concepts like Motherland, Family, Culture, Time, Olympism, Peace, Nobility, Friends, Memory, Honour, Dreams, Beauty, Freedom, Pride, Warmth, Happiness, Greatness, Reliability, Victory, Creativity, Hospitality, Creation, Future, Russia, Planet Earth.

Every region in the world is proud of its unique origins, and it is no different in Russia. That is why there are so many different local traditions, songs and crafts that highlight the individuality of their creators, each valuable in its own right. Bosco had a wealth of choices to represent Russia’s rich diversity, but in the end we settled on something familiar, warm and welcoming: the patchwork quilt.

In the concept design, every patch was infused with the history and personality of traditional crafts from each of Russia’s 89 regions: in a single tapestry we combined Uftyuzhskaya painting and Vologda lace, Gzhel and Zhostovo painting, Kubachi patterns and the flowers of Pavlo Posad shawls, Mezenskaya painting and Khokhloma, Yakutsk patterns, fabrics of Ivanovo and other distinctive Russian patterns. That is how we arrived at a modern, distinctive and unmistakeably Russian Look of the Games.”

I’d kill for a jacket with these graphics (but at 19000 Russian rubies, the equivalent of more than $550, I think it is out of my price range!). You can check out the apparel by the company that designed it (BOSCO) here.  

I have several handcrafts from Russia, brought back by friends and family. But I really want to go to Russia now, so that I can collect more!

I’ll be on Mark’s radio show Wednesday

 

I’ll be a guest on Mark Lipinski’s “Creative Mojo” radio show Wednesday! Tune in and join us!

NOTE: The show didn’t air on Wednesday, Feb. 12, as the other guests were affected by the snow storm on the east coast. I still did my segment with Mark, and it will air on Wednesday, Feb. 19 instead!