Paducah Quilt Week -- 1

Did you miss me?
Sorry that I've been away and derelict of my duties. I've been to a good place, though. Paducah, KY. The one. 

Where the National Quilt Museum is. That one.

Friends waiting on me to finish my shopping at
 Hancock's of Paducah. Look they're still smiling.

I know, I've been before. But this time is a little extra special. Quilt Week and all that. Kinda important. Especially in Paducah.

Becky, Pam, me and Beth at the AQS Quilt Show

This is The Week. When everyone quilty seems to converge on the one small town in Kentucky where the fancy quilts are. Those folks are there for one reason...to make quilters happy. So there's the museum, shopping, eating, nice hotels, sightseeing, the rivers, the murals, the train, the shopping. And more.

I can't cover it all in one post, so I'll tell you about one little bit, the first morning. Hancock's of Paducah opens at 8 a.m. so we were there at, yes, 8 a.m. We shopped until everyone made a decent show of knowing how to shop for fabric. I never really made it out of the Kona solids. Really. (more on that later)

Then we happened by the Rotary building, which houses a neat little collection of antique quilts, several vendors, and a second collection of quilts inspired by the National Parks. 

I could not shop, but the girls picked up my slack. I, meanwhile, saw both exhibits twice. 

One of the bays of antique quilts had three signature quilts. I started out reading the names on the quilts and quickly realized that a few of the names appeared on more than one quilt. I was all proud and sassy, telling others what I'd just figured out. 

Then I read the information on the display. Well, my bubble was burst! Apparently the group of ladies were all friends from the same area. You've probably got it from here, so I won't be quite so sassy or so proud. Dang, for a half-second I thought I'd made a great discovery. 

I was somewhat disappointed to discover that my discovery had been made many years before and reported in the newspaper, no less. Talk about disappointed--I forgot take pictures of the signature quilts! So much for my career as a great quilt detective. 

In the end I was thrilled to get to see these and other antique quilts.  Take a look at this sunflower applique quilt. Isn't it stunning?

I'll leave you with a picture of my favorite of the antique quilts--this cotton boll quilt with four huge blocks. Each block has four cotton boll appliques and a center "flower." I especially like the way the cotton bolls stretch up into the corners. 

Which of these is your favorite?  Come back tomorrow, I owe you a post on the GSQA show in Slidell last Saturday. 

Sunday Quilt Inspiration

I'm going on a trip. In five hours. A girl's trip. Not saying where. Just a few hints but no quilts. There's no time. I'm going on a trip.

I bet you know now. (squeals) Oh, no worries, I'll be writing about this trip, I'm pretty sure. 

I so hope to see you there!

Cotton Quilters Guild April Meeting

On Monday, the Cotton Quilters Guild held it's April meeting, with little ole me at the helm. It's Friday so it's been four days, which I tell you so that you'd understand how long I've been a-bed. (I'm reading Henry James' Turn of the Screw, so expect more of that old-fashioned, British nonsense.)

I'll say I have a stomach bug, but it's possible someone in my life is poisoning me by putting something in my Gatorade. It would be believable if I weren't so darned fab. Anyway, I'm only drinking Gatorade because I'm losing fluids much too quickly. Regardless, if necessary, the computer will come with me into the camper bathroom. I am getting this post out. And that's all I'm going to say about that. 

So the meeting--we took care of guild business, then Mrs. Marilyn and Mrs. Priscilla had a hand at presenting how they created these beautiful works. Mrs. Priscilla made the wall-hanging above several years ago, based on a pattern she purchased. The pattern contained the girl, and Mrs. Priscilla added all the extras that are attached to the outer edge. She mentioned that she was going for a 1920s look. I think she nailed it! This piece was made to hang over a guest bed in her home. 

Mrs. Marilyn's rooster is also from a pattern she purchased but is a more recent piece. She used Steam-a-Seam II to make the rooster and attach it to the background. She also used only Kaffe Fassett fabrics and fussy cut them to get the look she wanted. She's a great Kaffe fan. 

I discovered that there are now tools available that I wish I'd had back in my days of applique. "Daddy's Barn" (of five years ago) would have benefited from that Steam-a-Seam, certainly. Let's not forget the Mayeaux Barn. I suppose I'll have to find a bit of that product and play. 

We also shared our first BOM--that I'm hosting. What a great laugh everyone had at my math inability. We were supposed to make 12" log cabin blocks. How hard can that be? Well, much more difficult when the pattern writer says 15" instead of 12. Plus, the pattern writer writes 2½ instead of 2. Oh, it was a mess! Someone found an error and I shot out an email to make the correction. Then someone else found a different error, and I shot out another correction. 

Somehow only two people came to the meeting with 15" blocks! I offered to rip the seams out. It was my mistake after all. Sweet sisters they declined. They said they'll just start over and make the correct size blocks.

Despite the commotion and craziness of the mix-up, I loved seeing what everyone had as a beginning to our row quilt. A simple log cabin block is a chameleon with just a few changes in color. 

We have about eight members who are going to try to figure out what a la Mary means. That's the term they say when they talk about some wild, crazy, modern quilt idea. It's French for like Mary or Mary's way. They mean it as a compliment sometimes and as a kooky, who-knows kind of way at other times. I take it as a compliment regardless of the real context. I'm cool like that. 

And we ended with a couple of show and shares, but I got so involved with something else, that I took only one picture of Mrs. Mary C. who made lots of table toppers for her daughters. She said it's a fast, easy project that uses up some of her favorite fabrics and she gets to share them with the people she loves. How wonderful is that?

Pin It Weekly #241 A Tutorial of Sorts

Have you been on your Pinterest lately? I really haven't in the last few days, but I discovered a nice little surprise waiting for me.




This is what my home page looks like, or maybe it's the header page. It's the one that shows up first when I go to Pinterest. But yes, surprised! Apparently Pinterest takes pins from your most popular board and throws them into these bricks or blocks. That's all I can tell you, but I like it. 

Other changes: the next thing I see when I scroll down is a continuous loop of my featured boards, which I chose many moons ago. But the big news is that after the featured boards Pinterest has a grouping of my latest pins, followed by a grouping of my latest boards. Note: everything here is arranged by the latest work you've done.

Then the regular grouping of boards appears. But it's possible that Pinterest is keeping track of my more popular ones so those appear first.

And just like that I found the answer: click on Boards then click on the option box next to Sort Boards. Your choices are Last saved to, A to Z, Newest,  Oldest,  Drag and Drop. Yay, finally an easy way to put boards into alphabetical order. (The librarian in me is thrilled.)

Just because I need something that makes it easy, I'm reviewing.

Those tabs right under your Pinterest name--
Overview...an overview of your work
Boards...all of your boards in the order you choose to arrange them. You have to be here to access Sort Boards (BTW drag and drop means you can arrange them manually) 
Pins...all of your pins, arranged by most recent
Activity..."These are all the Pins people saved from your site and linked accounts. This page is visible on your profile right now, but you can always remove it." Quote from Pinterest 
Followers...All the followers you have, plus a button for each that allows you to follow them back. Note: Clicking Follow means you follow all of that person's boards, but you can click on the name and follow only those boards you want.
Following...Every one you follow. Pinterest doesn't distinguish whether you are following all of that person's boards or just a few, but you can click on the name and find out.
Tries..."Pins you try live here

Add notes and photos to recipes you made, places you traveled and other ideas you tried"  Pinterest Quote

Think of this as a way of reviewing some of the pins you're interested in. For example, if you find a recipe and decide to make the food, you can come here and leave a note telling how it went. 

Believe it or not, there's still more, but my brain is packed and I'm a little under the weather. 

Happy pinning!

What people say...

doesn't always translate into what, exactly, they mean. Ha! What do people mean when they say, "We can make a quilt for so and so's birthday!" Ahh, does that mean you'll make the blocks and I'll do the quilting? No? Oh, would you prefer to do the quilting? No? Hmm, who do you mean by we?

Mostly they mean me. Me. The person frantically typing on this laptop because it's quite late. And it's quite late because we have been making blocks. Alone. 

Yes, I fell into that pit knowing it was there. I may have even thrown my clumsy self into the pit. Funny how I can't miss even the huge gaping holes that I see are ahead. I just walk up to the edge, look down and think I'm done. Then nosedive. Right in. 

Are you wondering how this happened? Fast. I attended a meeting for our church's 90th anniversary celebration, which will occur in the fall, about a month after our church fair. 

Someone mentioned that our priest will celebrate his 50th birthday right after the celebration. So we have three important events tied to our church that happen about a month apart from each other. Boom, boom, boom. Three big events. 

Father's birthday, we all nodded in agreement, needed to be extra nice. 50 years, after all. In two shakes of lamb's tail, I was making a quilt. That easy. That fast. 

The good news is that when people say, "But I don't know anything about quilting," it translates into "you make the decisions as well as the quilt." At least that's how I translated it. 

And that means I can make all design decisions. Ha! There's the silver lining. I'd be making all the decisions. Boom. 

I asked Father what his favorite liturgical season is--so I could choose colors. Since he quickly answered Easter and those times of the year when we anticipate the coming of Christ, I decided that white and red would be great colors. It turns out that he loves the color red. What is better than a red/white quilt?

I worked up a quick quilt in EQ8 and finally decided to create something of this order. The white will be used for signatures, and the red will be frames. There are no other options: this is what I'm willing to do. 

I pulled almost every red from my stash and started cutting 2½ x 8½" strips of red and 4½ x 8½" strips of white. Sew. Sew. Sew. Boom, tonight 132 blocks are ready to be signed and sewn. That will give us a 88" X 96" queen-size quilt. Two weeks later, we're here. All the blocks sewn and ready for the next step. 

I'm not sure that this quilt really fits into the improvisational definition, but since I pulled fabrics to cut as I went along, and I still don't know how this is going to work with what others have in mind, I'll say it's iffy enough to go into Kaja and Ann's AHIQ #32. The first link goes to Kaja's blog, this one goes to Ann's. (You really should visit both.)

When have you heard those words, "Let's make a quilt." If you have a way of avoiding those "requests" please share: I have nothing but a deep pit. 

More Link Up Love!

Crazy Mom Quilts (Finish It Up Friday)

Busy Hands Quilts (Finished or Not Friday)
Confessions of a Fabric Addict (Can I get a Whoop! Whoop!) 

Sunday Quilt Inspiration: Crown Royal

Are you familiar with Crown Royal whiskey? I'm not a drinker, so I don't think I've ever even tasted it. However, there seems to be a Crown Royal following among us. 


A family friend asked me to make a quilt using the bags that this liquor comes in, so I decided to do a little research. Pinterest, please.

I had no idea that there are so many projects created from these bags. Well, I didn't even know that the bags come in different sizes and colors. (That sort of makes sense...the bottles are different sizes.) Apparently people collect the bags even if they don't drink the alcohol. Huh? Why? Doesn't matter, I've discovered enough to know that it won't be that difficult. Check out what I've found. 

I have no intentions of getting this involved: cut the bags into squares, add sashing to increase the size, make a top, quilt and done. The request is for something simple and quick. That, I may be able to do.