Quilting Together in Chicago recap

I flew out to Chicago last Wednesday to teach, along with 5 other teachers, at our first Quilting Together event. I taught a class called Designing With Log Cabin Blocks. Other classes included a mystery quilt, working with triangles, long-arm quilting feathers and fillers and quilt designs with applique and piecing.

I’ve designed several quilts where I’ve incorporated some type of piecing into the logs of Log Cabin blocks to create new designs and thought it would be fun to share my process. Here’s a sample of one block I’ve designed using this technique: Smooth Sailing from our May/June ’10 issue.

Smooth Sailing

After a little instruction and inspiration, I turned my students loose to design. I brought my computer and Electric Quilt 6 with me and after a rough draft was drawn on graph paper, we loaded each block into EQ and made virtual quilts.

Sketching a block design

Once each student was pleased with her block, the sewing began.

Friends from California

Althea brought her own computer with EQ

Eileen from Michigan

Phyllis from Mexico

Arranging the patches for the block center

The variety of blocks that came out of my 3 classes was amazing.

Finished block - pieced penguin with a star and "tracks" in the logs

Pieced flower with leaves in the logs

Pieced sailboat with waves in the logs

We checked out a couple of the other classes while taking a break:

Nancy Mahoney and Daisy Vines

Jean Nolte and Nothing But Triangles

The event was wonderful! Our event team did a great job of taking care of everyone (students and teachers) and tending to our every need.

Brooke, Emily and Joanna (check out the cute aprons that Joanna made)

Ashley manned the store

Students and teachers alike left Chicago with new skills, new friends, fond memories and lots of goodies from our generous sponsors.

Sponsors for this event were Ackfelld Manufacturing, Andover Fabrics, APQS, Aurifil, Baby Lock, Blank Quilting, C&T Publishing, Clothworks, FreeSpirit, Guidelines 4 Quilting, Hoffman Fabrics, Robert Kaufman, Koala Studios, Moda, Patch Abilities, P&B Textiles, RJR Fabrics, Rowan, That Patchwork Place, The Warm Company, Therm-O-Web Adhesives, Timeless Treasures, Westminster Fibers, Accuquilt, Northcott, Landauer, Quilting Treasures, By Design Quilting, YLI, Bag Lady, Presencia, Arrow Sewing Cabinets, Art Gallery Fabrics, Oliso and Bayou Patch Designs.