Quilter's Birthday

This has been a very busy week. Monday was my birthday. On Tuesday I took a class at My Little Quilt Shop to make a pattern for a jacket. I learned a lot and after a little more help will have a pattern made to fit me perfectly. On Wednesday, Linda invited a bunch of my quilting friends to her home for a delicious lunch to celebrate my birthday. Thursday, I had another class in Millington, Lenore Crawford taught us how to use her fusing and painting method for art quilts.

I would like to share some of the neat sewing presents I got for my birthday. Linda gave me the mug, emery board and earrings.



These cheery hot pads were from Pat and Elaine. The fabric is folded and then stitched between the folds. I'm going to have to look for the pattern.



Amy, Pat and Elaine gave me these quilting note cards.



Linda took a picture of me wearing the apron Dena made for me. Dena also decorated the towel with dragonflies to match.




I put the Christmas ornament that Cheryl gave me on my sewing room bookcase next to the cute Christmas sewing mice Jenny sent me.



I also received other presents and cards from friends and family. I'm grateful to have so many good friends and such a wonderful family.

Lenore Crawford in Millington

Lenore Crawford was our guest speaker at the Millington Quilt Club Invitational last Wednesday. She shared her techniques and then showed us some of her beautiful art quilts. The first style of work she did was watercolor using 2 inch squares.



Later she added applique to the watercolor quilts.



Most of the work she showed us involved fusing and fabric painting. The painting was a small part of the work and mainly involved highlighting or adding a tiny detail, like the fuzz on the stem of a poppy. Lenore is the lady on the left. Club member, Julie helped display Lenore's gorgeous quilts..

In the below photo, Lenore showed us the same quilt with different backgrounds.

Lenore said she had many scraps from making watercolor quilts so she shedded them. She then made quilts by placing the shreds under tulle and then stitching and adding touches of paint. The two photos below are examples of this technique.

I learned a lot listening to her speak and seeing her quilts was like looking at art in a museum.

Happy Halloween!

The pillow above started out as a sweatshirt. I didn't like the way the sweatshirt fit when I was done putting on the applique. It seemed like a waste not to use the applique.

The computer will not cooperate with me in uploading the rest of my photos from the Invitational. I will try again another day. I think the weather seems to affect our service, of course, our provider doesn't agree.

Millington Quilt Club Invitational

On Wednesday the Millington Quilt Club had it's Invitational. Lenore Crawford spoke to the guests and then lunch was served. The club member's quilts, wall hangings, bags and items of clothing were on display before and after the presentation and luncheon. We had wall hangings and table runners in the room where lunch was served.

One of our members, Julie made some beautiful fall cakes which we served for dessert. My photo of the table doesn't show the cakes off well.

Lenore Crawford's presentation was in the church which is attracted to the room where we ate and hold our monthly meetings. Members draped their quilts over the pews which were going to be empty.

Quilted items were also on display in the entry to the church.

This is our president, Julie welcoming everyone to the Invitational.

This is Carole, she was chairperson of the Invitational. She is introducing our speaker, Lenore Crawford.

I will post pictures of Lenore and her work in my next post.

New York Weekend

I have some more photos from our shopping in the garment district of NYC. The picture below is Ang amid the trims in one shop. I've never seen so many colors and sizes of ric rac in one place.



More trims in another shop.



The collection of beaded fringe was so colorful, I had to photograph it.



These are the trims I purchased with crazy quilting in mind.



I bought some fabric to make a vest. The shop I found this paisley fabric did not have prices on their fabric. When I asked the price....$10 a yard. When I buy fabric locally, it is carefully measured and then cut straight on a flat table. In this store, the salesman laid the fabric next to a yard stick and cut the fabric with scissors with one end of the bolt on the floor. The price when I checked out....$10. No sales tax????



I bought this fabric in another shop. I want to test the vest pattern before making a crazy quilt vest. Again I had to ask the price...$10. This time the salesman didn't even measure, just held the fabric out an arm's length and cut the fabric in the aisle. When I looked a little questioning about the length, he showed me that I had more than a yard, using a yardstick that was on top of some fabric. Well, one end was over a yard but the other end was a lot shorter. Again when I checked out the cost was exactly $10, no tax?

On Saturday, Ang and I went to the Museum of Arts and Design. They would not allow photos so all I have is a picture of the pin that came with the entrance fee. We saw a lot of detailed paper art. Part of Madeleine Albright's pin collection was on display. I thought I have a lot of pins but she had 200 in the display. I read she wore different pins depending on where and whom she was meeting with. The pin display drew a large crowd.

I had a great time in NYC and I'm happy I got to help Ang shop for her wedding dress.