I Am So Very Lucky!

     This is what I woke up to on Christmas morning.  Let me  backtrack a bit.  I went to Houston Quilt Festival this fall and while walking around the merchants mall I saw a booth that had beautiful trunks to display your quilts.  Well, there was no way that was something that I could cram in a suitcase and bring home.   But I do have a very handy husband,  so I grabbed a brochure and when I got home pinned it on the fridge as a subtle hint.  I have done this many times and things sit on the fridge for years, so I really didn't have my hopes up.  The thing that floors me is that I had no idea he was doing this.  Mind you I haven't been home much lately, but he really was good at keeping it a total surprise.  Needless to say I had it filled in no time.  It will hold a dozen quilts comfortably.




Quilt  Display Trunk



Another View Of The Display Trunk

     When it reaches it's final home I will post a picture.  Bye for now!

Quilts By The Creek

 I went to a  fabulous quilt show yesterday.  York Heritage Quilters Guild  www.yhqg.org/ partnered with Black Creek Pioneer Villagewww.blackcreek.ca put it on. What a great place to display quilts.  The majority of the quilts were hung outside (Thank goodness it didn't rain). 

I had two quilts hanging in the show.  The first one I call "There is a Snowflake in My Kaleidoscope"

There Is A Snowflake In My Kaleidoscope

This quilt is an original design that I designed in EQ7 using the traditional kaleidoscope block worked from the centre out. I made the quilt entirely of  Kaffee Fassett Fabrics (one or two Brandon Mabley fabrics might have slipped in).  The second quilt is made up of Northwind blocks.  The fabrics used in this quilt were from a fabric exchange where 3 women including myself exchanged fabric squares for a year.  I have seen beautiful  Northwind quilts made up with small  traditional prints, but these fabrics were mostly larger kind of funky prints, so I was a little nervous about how they would work.  Some of them had to be discarded, but the majority of them worked out quite well.

Northwind Block

Just seeing the quilts hanging from railings, blowing in the breeze just felt like you were stepping back in time.

The Doctor's House Pioneer Village

                                                                             

Quilt by Sandy Lindal

Beautiful Quilts Blowing In The Breeze

Quilt By Shirley Dawson

More Quilts

Black Creek Pioneer Village

Quilt By Linda Hemming

Quilt By Shirley Dawson

More Quilts

Quilt By Joan Lester

Town Hall

Cabinet Maker Shop

 Val Prideaux and Jane Cramer 

Thanks Val and Jane for making it happen, you did a great job!  There were many more quilts than I could possibly photograph.  It was a lovely show.

Lots of Hand Sewing

We really do take our health for granted.  I had a minor surgery on Tuesday and was told not to lift anything heavy for 4 to 6 weeks.  I must say not doing laundry or cutting lawns or shovelling compost onto my gardens hasn't broken my heart.  But all my DIY projects, longarm quilting, that is another story.  The bright side to all of this is I get to hand stitch.  And there is no shortage of hand stitching in my project bins.  This is where I am currently hanging out.




My Hand Sewing Station

Jaxy and Albert

And my two pals that I am hanging out with.  My latest project started out at work with this pattern.

It is so pretty when it is finished.  Because I am still in my Japanese neutrals phase, I thought I would use them in this project.  I also thought I would make more than the nine blocks that they called for.

Hexagon Blocks

    Changing the shape of the block to a hexagon  might  be a  little fussier to assemble but I think it will be worth it in the long run. Stay tuned, this is a long term project, I will keep you updated on my progress.

     I bought my very first jelly roll the other day.  I needed it like a hole in the head but it was so beautiful.  It is one of the Kona Solids.  I have a huge stash of solids and believe it or not only a few of my colours were duplicates.  I am not sure what I am going to make with it yet, but  I have wanted to make a solid quilt for a long time.  When I am not stitching I can be dreaming .....for the next few weeks anyway! 

Off To France!

I am very excited!  This quilt is off to France next week for a show  called" Tradition in Transition".  It is being held in the town of Sainte-Marie-aux-Mines, in the Alsace area of France in the fall.  Many thanks goes out to Sandra Reford www.sandrareford.com who is organizing this show.  I know alot of hours have gone into this, and I am honored to be included.  When it returns the same show will be displayed at the Joshua Creek Heritage Art Centre in Oakville  in November 2012. 

This quilt is made up entirely of hexagons.  I machine pieced 2 strips of different fabrics together being sure that they were different values. Then cut them into hexagons and hand pieced them together.  Initially this was going to be the border of another quilt, but when I put it together I didn't like it.  So I made more blocks and voila! another quilt is born.  I still have the body of the other quilt to work on and figure out what to do for the border.  It is a good thing I bought lots of Japanese taupes.  Anyone who knows me, knows how much I looove colour.  So this is a real departure for me.  I am quite enjoying working with taupes and just concentrating on value.  I feel there is more to come in this neutral series.  Bye for now.  Jeannie

Up And Running

I know i it has been awhile since my first post.  I had great intentions, but technology let me down.  My computer was giving me problems, my camera broke, and I fried my printer trying to put flimsy paper for paper piecing through it.  Computer is fixed, bought a new camera, but I still need to deal with my printer.   I also had to say good bye to what I thought was going to be my dream closet that husband built  for me. We live in a small house, so the only place that we had room for it was in the only unfinished room in the house, which is the laundry room.  Then plans changed, with two teenagers (plus friends) one bathroom just doesn't cut it.  After trying to re-configure  this small room to accommodate a laundry room, bathroom and my treasured closet, I realized it just wasn't going to work.  Then it came to me, maybe I could use it in my studio.  I took the measurements and voila, 5 of the 6 units will fit.  It really looks like it was custom built.  So that opened another can of worms!  Spring cleaning of the studio, which is never a bad thing.  Things turn up that you have missed placed months or years ago, as well as things you forgot you had.  Anyway it is all done, except for a few small piles that I will deal with today, but I thought you might like to see the results.

Closet Re- purposed for Fabric Storage

 I made time to make a small project.  I needed a bag for my camera and I am not thrilled with the ones on the market, so I thought I would make my own.  I have some great cartoon fabric that my friend Tina gave me for Christmas for the outside of the bag.   The lining fabric is an older Jennifer Sampou fabric.



It is a beautiful day today and my garden is calling me, so I will say good-bye for now.

Newborn

2 Many Leaves

Hi Bloggers,  I'm Jeannie and this is my first post.  I have been following blogs for some time and wanted to start one of my own.  My good friend Debra offered to help and I jumped at the chance.

I have been quilting for 22 years, teaching quilting for 17.  Last year I bought a Gammill longarm quilting  machine which I am really enjoying. I work at Sew Sister's Quilt Shop in Toronto.  Sew Sister's also has a blog that I am posting a block of the week. It will run for 52 weeks resulting in a  beautiful sampler quilt. Check out that blog for our progress. Must go and finish renovating my studio.  I will post pictures when it is presentable.  Bye for now.
Jeannie