Quilty Pleasures Blog

Reminder: Potential 100 Block Winners

June — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 18:49:38 +0000

If you received an email from Jane Flynn about two weeks ago, you need to return your affidavit to her today or tomorrow. (You can fax to 303-215-5601.) On Wednesday 3/17 we’ll pick replacements if we haven’t heard from you.

Good News for Machine Embroiderers!

June — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:32:02 +0000

Quiltmaker’s Quilting & Embroidery is back with a Spring 2010 issue. It should be showing up in shops and on newsstands now.

Quiltmaker's Quilting & Embroidery, Spring '10

It’s filled with 10 inspiring quilts, from simple placemats to elegant cutwork embroidery. You’ll find quilts for spring and quilts for kids. Finish your quilts with wonderful embroidered labels and enter “The Finishing Touch Embroidered Label Contest” for a chance to win Janome’s DigitizerJR software.

Plus, we’re introducing kits for three of these projects as well.

The Summer Flutter Kit, with delightful Flora & Fauna fabric designed by Patty Young for Michael Miller Fabrics, makes a throw that works well with or without the machine embroidery.

The Festival of Roses Starter Kit includes the OESD embroidery software for the roses and bright batiks in similar colors for the backgrounds.

The Around the World Kit has beautiful batiks from Robert Kaufman plus the OESD embroidery software for all the little people.

Take a sneak peek at the Quilting & Embroidery issue and let me know which projects you want to make!

Check Your Email

June — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 20:11:13 +0000

If you entered the 100 Blocks/100 Winners contest, notifications were sent out by email just a little while ago. Look for an email from Jane Flynn that contains an affidavit to fill out and return by 3/16. Winners will be announced after everyone has been verified.

Watch for more contests coming soon from Quiltmaker!

Cornflower Fields–correction

June — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 20:30:41 +0000

We’ve been so thrilled by your response to Julie Herman’s Cornflower Fields in the March/April ‘10 issue. Her design is fresh and fun–and she’s delightful to work with.

I deeply regret a mistake that QM made in the pattern. In the materials list the K’s are cut as rectangles. We had an alert reader ask how the K’s become the triangle shown in the pieced border diagrams. We forgot that step in the instructions. As we were reviewing the steps that followed in the pieced border, we discovered an error where we gave the cutting dimensions for the M patches 2” short.

Fortunately the yardage called for is correct and, if someone has already cut the M’s, it is recoverable with piecing.

It was simpler to rewrite Step 2 completely rather than explain where to substitute the new diagrams.

Download the corrected Step 2.

We work hard to give you accurate patterns, but will always ‘fess up and give you corrections when we discover errors. If you suspect a problem, check quiltmaker.com/corrections first. If you don’t see a correction posted, send an email to editor@quiltmaker.com.

Wiping the egg off our faces . . . and grateful this is recoverable. Still sorry that it happened.

100 Blocks, 100 Winners: Last Chance

June — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 03:54:13 +0000

We’re heading in to the last day for a chance to win one of the 100 Blocks! Identify the designer behind the block portions in this collage for a chance to win. Enter by 10 pm MST on 2/16/10.

Introducing Scott Hansen

Carolyn — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:24:56 +0000

Thank you Lissa Alexander, Marketing Director of Moda Fabrics, for introducing me to another designer, Scott Hansen. Scott’s pattern Lime Grape Fizz appears in our March/April ‘10 issue (No. 132). The inspiration for Lime Grape Fizz came from an interesting source. Read more from Scott to learn about one of our male quilt designers and how this quilt came to be.

Scott Hansen

I would have to say that I have always been fascinated with color and design, and as a kid I did all sorts of creative ventures. The first needlework crafts I remember doing were crochet and embroidery. Then in junior high I took a home ec class and made my own shirt and pillow for the sewing portions, and I thought that was pretty cool. It was right around America’s Bicentennial then, and Colonial America was really “big” and I really had this desire for old-fashioned stuff. So that was when I decided to make my first quilt. It was big and heavy and Mom and I tied it, cause well, neither of us knew much about quilting. And that was pretty much the extent of my sewing at that point.

Fast forward to the mid-80’s when my best friend’s sister and girlfriend were really into counted cross-stitch, and I thought well that is something pretty cool and to me way easier than regular embroidery because it was so “orderly”. For about 5 years that kept my hands and mind busy when I was doing other 20-something activities, like dating and getting married. When I first got married, I wanted to make my wife a really nice Christmas stocking, but I needed a sewing machine to put it together. So I cross-stitched an elaborate panel and after picking up a $200 Singer in 1990 with my first “bonus” check from work, I went at it. Sometime after that, my wife and I happened to drop in on a quilt show, and I was mesmerized by the wonderful creativity I saw there. I also picked up my first “fat quarter” pack. I think that was the turning point. I made a lap quilt for my grandma in the nursing home. The pattern was “Card Trick” in pinks, lavender, and dusty blue. I then started making quilts for friends babies, and then eventually our three babies as well. The points on my oldest son’s quilt do not match in the slightest. I was still doing cardboard pattern pieces….and well 5/8” seams….

A few more years later, and I picked up a magazine that talked about the top ten quilt shops, and since I was getting tired of my job in retail management I was really intrigued with the idea of opening up my own quilt shop, so I called and or wrote all those owners about their experiences. This would have been about 1995 now, and of all those owners I really developed a great relationship with Mary Ertherington and Connie Tesene of Country Threads fame. That next spring Quilt Market happened to be in Portland Oregon, and Mary and Connie invited me down to come help them (we live out in the country NE of Seattle). Wow! That was so exciting, inspiring, and overwhelming. I came back excited, but not sure where to go next.

Well, the next 10 years or so, we had a very busy family life, and the quilt shop dream just seemed to fade as the urgencies of life picked up pace and took over. I was still quilting and making up pretty much my own ideas, but never really doing much more than that. I did some pattern testing for a new friend Sara Nephew’s books, and went to a couple more Quilt Markets in Portland, Oregon.

I had my first original quilt design published in Mark Lipinski’s Quilter’s Home in the Jan/Feb 08 issue. I had also started a blog the year before, and that was a neat way to share with other quilters. Shortly after that issue, Quilt Market was again in Portland, Oregon, so I went down to help my friend Sara Nephew with her booth down there. This time at Market, I went around and met all sorts of wonderful people, and was more connected than before. When I came home, I kept up on those connections, and kept blogging and designing. I started doing quilt designs for Free Spirit and managed to get some more quilts published in magazines, and was so delighted to have my first Moda quilt picked up by Quiltmaker. Lissa Alexander at Moda got me hooked up with Carolyn Beam here, and I must say they have both been a delight to work with.

Now to tell you a little bit about the inspiration for this quilt Lime Grape Fizz. It’s design basically came from this old raggedy comforter “quilt” we found by the side of the road near home.

vintage print

It wasn’t great (actually it is pretty ugly), but it was freshly dumped, and it had an intriguing fabric. I am a sucker for anything old and abandoned, and it needed a home, even if it was just for the car or emergency kit. We took it home, washed it, and it has been the base for a many a picnic or snuggling under while watching fireworks episode. The print on the fabric always reminded me of a quilt, and when I saw the colors in the Eva line by Basic Grey for Moda, I thought this is the fabric to make that quilt that had been stewing in my mind for many a year. The name for the quilt was discovered at Fall Quilt Market last year by the attendees of Quiltmaker’s Schoolhouse Session, I am told…I could not even think of a name for this quilt, and I LOVE naming my quilts….but this one escaped me, and I think it was because it was meant to have this name!!

So that’s my story in a nutshell, I haven’t totally abandoned the idea of a quilt shop, but it is on a back burner for now. I have really enjoyed this designing thing, I have more quilts coming out in the next year in various magazines, and on my website I have links to free downloadable patterns that I have done for a few different fabric companies. I have big plans for 2010 for a lot of new things in regard to designing, and I hope that you will drop on by my website to see what I am up to, and hopefully be inspired by the things around you. I have this idea brewing in my head right now about how to design a quilt based on dinner tonite, but that is another story…we’ll have to wait and see if that quilts out into reality here. I am looking forward to meeting you out there in Blogland, and if you really want the day to day stuff you can follow me on Twitter too. I told myself last year, there is no way I am getting on Twitter, and now my wife thinks I need a 12 step for it….I think she may be right…but for now come on and Tweet with me..

Julie Herman giveaway winners announced

Carolyn — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 22:16:28 +0000

Here are the winners from Julie Herman’s guest blog:

Nature’s Notebook Jelly Roll: #70 Christine

Nature’s Notebook Honey Bun: #66 Alicia

Nature’s Notebook Charm Pack: #7 Cyndi

Congratulations to all. I’m sending each of you an email for your mailing address. Thank you Lissa Alexander from Moda Fabrics for the giveaways.

Hoo’s in the Forest?

Diane Harris — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 20:16:54 +0000

Our latest issue (March/April, No. 132) features a calming quilt by Julie Herman called Cornflower Fields on page 52. The Nature’s Notebook fabrics are from Moda Fabrics, and are available in local quilt shops.

Cornflower Fields by Julie Herman

A while back it was my job to find an alternate color scheme for the quilt which would create what we call a “color option.” You’ll see color options near the end of most Quiltmaker patterns, and they’re meant to expand your vision for a project by presenting a completely different look using different fabrics in the same pattern.

An interesting thing happened as I was thinking about another way to present Cornflower Fields.

Instead of the usual colored quilt diagram (above), I had a diagram with only the lines of the quilt, and no color (below).

I was surprised by how much this opened up the possibilities! Jumping right off the page were trees, trees and more trees. I couldn’t see anything but trees. And so began my inspiration for Hoo’s in the Forest?

A search through our fabric room, which is well-stocked with the latest fabrics from many companies, brought me to Robert Kaufman’s “On a Whim” owl print. Perfect! I wanted the owls to take center stage, so plenty of tone-on-tones from Robert Kaufman’s basic lines such as Mixmasters Dot to Dot and Fusions fit the bill. For the border, a fun plaid with all the right colors from Flower Child framed the quilt nicely. I left off the border sections in this version, which made it a “design option.” A design option goes a few steps past a color option by changing not just the fabrics, but also how and where they are placed.

Hoo's in the Forest?

Hoo’s in the Forest?, an abbreviated version of Cornflower Fields, is now a free online pattern. We’re excited to offer timesaving kits for Hoo’s in the Forest? as well.

I started thinking about how often I look at colored diagrams or even photos first, and I’ve decided that I’d be much more open to the infinite possibilities if I’d look at only the lines. In a future post I’ll expand on this idea and show you more examples.

One Dozen UFOs

Diane Harris — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 18:54:13 +0000

Last year I set a goal to finish 12 UFOs–one each month seemed doable. I stuck with it pretty well for most of the year and in the end, had a satisfying feeling of accomplishment. I did scramble some in December, but that’s how life goes.

Here are some of my finished projects.

I started this in a class with Peg Pennell from Nebraska, on which I wrote an article/pattern called Floribunda in the May/June ‘08 issue of Quiltmaker. I used it to practice machine quilting/thread painting and a new binding technique. It could still use a few beads and I think it looks like it’s floating in mid-air, but it was my goal so I’m counting it as finished. I did buy a vintage doily that I’m going to paint hot pink and maybe I can use that to help it stop floating.

I made these raging pink blocks in a Margaret Miller workshop and decided to sew them into a baby quilt. I was working with mostly fat quarters so I had to get creative with the borders but I like the result. Again, practiced machine quilting on it.

This adorable wall hanging, Little House in the Forest, ran in Quilters Newsletter’s Quilt It for Christmas 2007. Art Director Kath Wright designed it. I pieced mine during a retreat with friends. It was quick to finish. I love how that little house is tucked under a tree.

This might be cheating because I started and finished this one, a selvage purse for my daughter’s birthday. I used a pattern called the Swing Bag by Amy Butler. My daughter has not yet carried it. Ahem. If you’re interested in selvages, be sure to visit Karen Griska’s blog, selvageblog.blogspot.com.

These are little windmill blocks that I make constantly when I’m too tired to be really creative. I have hundreds of them. Grabbed a bunch of mostly green and blue ones and put together this baby quilt. Used it to practice machine quilting with a technique called Just Leaf It by Kim Stotsenberg. It’s a great technique, easy to learn and very forgiving. I highly recommend it.

“Happy” is a small wall piece I finished up to give as a graduation gift. I started in on a play day with friends: stamped on it, thread painted, added beads and buttons and watercolor pencil. Just freeform fun!

Coming soon: part 2 with the second half of One Dozen UFOs. How about you? Any UFOs to be finished? Have you set a UFO goal for 2010?

Meet Julie Herman

Carolyn — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 15:54:52 +0000

I’m introduced to designers in many ways—Quilt Market, other designers and also from our friends at the different fabric manufacturers that we work with. I’d like to thank Lissa Alexander, Marketing Director for Moda Fabrics for introducing me to Julie Herman. Julie is a young designer who also makes projects for the Moda Bake Shop. She’s fun and full of energy and ideas. You can find her pattern for Cornflower Fields in our March/April ‘10 issue. Read about Julie and leave us a comment for a chance to win one of the 3 prizes Moda Fabrics has provided: a Jelly Roll, Honey Bun or Charm Pack from the Nature’s Notebook collection by April Cornell, the same collection used in Cornflower Fields. I’ll randomly draw 3 names next Tuesday, February 2nd around noon.

Julie Herman

If you asked me 10 years ago what my creative “thing” would be in 10 years… quilting would have been the last thing I said! I’ve always been artistic, but the quilting bug didn’t bite me until 8 years ago. Prior to quilting, I painted, sculpted with clay, worked with beads, did graphic design and even a bit of needlepoint. My mother has been sewing since well before I was born and so I naturally had no interest in doing the same thing as her! Well eventually the quilting bug bit me and I’ve never looked back. I always thought I was the first quilter in my family. Recently I learned that I’m not upon the discovery of three quilts made in the 1930’s by my great great grandmother.

My style of quilting is all over the map. I’ve made traditional to modern… detailed appliqué with hand quilting to simple and fast, no fuss. Cornflower Fields is the largest quilt I’ve made. At 96″x 96″ it may seem challenging but large pieces enable it to come together very quickly. I normally start a design without color in mind but I worked backwards with this piece. My goal was to come up with a bold design that would have a floating on-point appearance set within a standard grid. All three borders were attached at one time using the same technique I show on my blog for mitering multiple borders. Mitering borders is much easier than most people think and gives a great finish to many quilts!

Unlike many quilters I love the math involved in quilting. I find joy in calculating how big pieces should be cut and how much yardage will be needed for a project. This skill comes in handy when working at a quilt shop, attending a show, or getting a phone call from quilter friends while they are in the middle of a project. Yes this has happened! My background in design has also helped me tremendously. I attended Drexel University for design and had the pleasure of taking many great classes including one silkscreen class where I made a quilt as one of my projects out of custom fabric.

Blogging has been one of the best additions to my quilting life. It has enabled me to share my work and meet a ton of new people. In 2009 I was lucky to be able to design for the Moda Bake Shop, attend my first quilt market, as well as work and shop at 4 other shows. I’ve got a lot planned for 2010 and I hope you’ll join along on my blog, where I post “WIPs”work-in-progresses, finished pieces, my weekly stash report, as well as all kinds of things!