One very enjoyable part of my job at Quiltmaker is the area of product reviews. In the most recent issue (Nov/Dec 2009, No. 130), we reviewed some interesting thread stands called Coneflowers, so named because they look like coneflowers, of course.

These beauties are made by Paul Boyum way up in Battle Lake, Minnesota through his business paulsmetalpetals.com. They’re meant to hold cones of thread and they have an additional spindle for storage of extra bobbins. They’re so pretty, they’d add a nice decorative touch to your sewing space. I have two Coneflowers to give away. One is shown above, it’s the Sara, double (meaning there are two flowers). The other is the Laura, single.

To enter, leave a comment telling us about your favorite thread: what it is and why you like it. We’ll randomly select a winner on Friday, Oct. 16 around noon Mountain time. Good luck!

. . . #126 Vickie who likes Winding Road. Congratulations Vickie–I’ve sent you an email to get your mailing address.

And thanks to all who entered–it’s sure been fun to see what your favorite patterns are in that issue. Please remember to send us your photos when you make a Quiltmaker pattern–we love to see what you create and you could end up in Sew to Speak or Spotlight! Send your photos to sewtospeak at quiltmaker.com.

Diane will be bringing you our next blog giveaway on Monday. Enjoy your weekend!

We have a new feature that you’ll be seeing occasionally on our blog. We’ll have guest bloggers who we’ll be introducing you to. Sometimes they’ll be designers who are featured in our issues or other special people we think you might like to learn more about.

Joni Pike has a wonderful collection of whimsical quilt patterns that she sells through her company, Sew Special Designs. You can find her adorable Christmas card holder wall quilt, Special Delivery,  in our November/December ‘09 issue.

“My name is Joni Pike and I’ve been designing fusible web appliqué quilt patterns since 2001 under my company name Sew Special Designs. I’m an accountant by trade but I love all things related to sewing including fabrics, notions, trims, threads, and buttons. My patterns are great for all skill levels and lots of fun to make! The use of buttons and other embellishments add a touch of whimsy. Each pattern has a button pack made especially for that design. My main goal when designing is to make people smile! Check out my fun patterns at www.sewspecialdesigns.com.

In addition to my pattern business, I’ve authored a book for C&T Publishing. Cute as a Button Quilts is primarily a project book but contains many of the “how-to” techniques for completing the book projects. This makes it perfect for beginners or expert quilters alike.  Vote for your favorite pattern and win a copy of my book plus six of my favorite patterns with buttons packs. Click here and add a comment to be included in the drawing, which will be held on October 5, 2009. 

If you’re a big fan of HGTV’s Simply Quilts, you can see my video of the Catnip quilt. The Catnip show has been very popular! 

Look for new designs in the future and visit my website for pattern updates in the coming months. I’ll also be working on a new project for Fairfield Processing, the company that makes batting, stuffing, and pillow forms you see in your local fabric and craft stores.  And, I may even have another book up my sleeve!

Happy Sewing!”

Our Sept/Oct ‘09 issue started shipping from the printer yesterday. That means it will begin to arrive in subscriber mailboxes soon. I wonder what part of the U.S. will get their issues first? We haven’t received our initial copies yet in the office. It’s scheduled to be on newsstands by August 11. In the meantime, QM staff is getting all the web pages ready to launch by the end of this week.

When you get your issue, you’ll notice in my edit letter that I’m giving away a 45.5″ x 45.5″ color option!

It’s from the Shining Star pattern, designed by Joyce Robinson. Our color option uses Cambridge Square, a Quest for a Cure fabric by Ro Gregg for Northcott, plus fabric for the binding and backing.

How do you get a chance to win? It’s simple–just leave a comment here mentioning your favorite project in the Sept/Oct ‘09 issue by 12 noon Mountain time on Friday, October 2. I’ll use random.org to select one winner. Good luck everyone!

Update: Our initial box of first-bound copies arrived in the office Friday 7/24. I think magazines should be starting to arrive for some subscribers soon. Most of our web pages for the issue are live now, although we still have a few to post.

Update #2: This giveaway is closed–Congratulations to Vickie #126.

I had the pleasure of meeting Edyta Sitar of Laundry Basket Quilts at International Quilt Market last fall in Houston.

What a delightful and extremely talented quilter! Not only does she design beautiful quilts, she also designs fabric for Moda Fabrics and her first book, Hop To It! has just been published by Landauer Publishing.

You can find the pattern for one of her quilts, Botanic Beauty, in our July/August ‘09 issue, and we’ll be working with more of her designs in future issues.

Edyta has a unique knack for combining different types of fabrics in the same quilt—from batiks to traditional cottons. In an exclusive Quiltmaker interview with Edyta, I asked her if she would share her formula for choosing fabrics for her quilts. She replied “I choose my fabrics by using my ‘Rule of 5.’ The five refer to large, medium, small, stripe and dot prints. If you’d like to learn more about my method for choosing fabrics, I have included complete details of this process in my new book Hop To It! ” Read the complete interview. For information on ordering her book, contact Landauer Publishing at 800-557-2144, info@landauercorp.com, landauercorp.com.

We’re going to give away four copies of her new book. Just leave us a comment with your favorite quilting tip and we’ll randomly choose four lucky people on July 24th to receive a copy of Hop To It!

One of the most innovative ideas out there right now has quilters creating with selvages. You read that correctly—people are cutting the printed selvages from their fabrics, saving them up and putting them into all kinds of sewing projects.

My first intro to the idea was from Karen Griska’s book entitled Quilts From the Selvage Edge. It’s full of fabulous projects made with selvages. Karen’s blog is wonderfully inspirational, with readers contributing photos of their own selvage sewing. (By the way, look for a fabulous quilt from Karen in an issue next year.)

There’s a bag pattern by Amy Butler that I love, I’ve probably made it at least a dozen times.

I recently made a selvage version for my daughter Holly for her birthday. (By the way, Holly is a writer with a great blog.)

Earlier this year, Karen made a color option for our “green” Jan/Feb issue, which was four blocks from a quilt by Mark Lipinski of Quilter’s Home fame. 

I’d like to give this piece (the four blocks shown) and a copy of Karen’s book Quilts From the Selvage Edge to a reader who submits a comment about how she has used selvages in a project. We’ll draw for a winner on Wednesday, July 1 and post the results at that time.

We had a baby shower here at the office yesterday for a member of our online team and his wife, and everyone brought a dessert to share. I brought one of my favorite summer desserts—Frozen Fluffy Strawberry Pie. As we were standing in line filling up our plates, June commented that she thought she had a better recipe for Strawberry Pie. Hmmm, this sounds like a challenge to me. We’ll let you be the judge! Here’s my recipe:

Frozen Fluffy Strawberry Pie

Combine the following 4 ingredients in a food processor:
3 oz. cream cheese
1 (14-oz) can sweetened condensed milk
2 1/2 cups fresh or frozen strawberries
3 Tbsp. lemon juice

Fold into mixture:
1 cup Cool Whip

Pour mixture into prepared graham cracker crust. Freeze 4 hours or until firm. Garnish with strawberries if desired.

June will post her recipe in a later blog. Do you have a recipe for strawberry pie that you love? Send us your favorite strawberry pie and the QM Test Kitchen will determine our favorite. No, seriously, post your favorite recipe. We’ll randomly select four names to receive a set of fat quarters from the fun, summery Wildwood collection by Erin McMorris for FreeSpirit.

Wildwood by Erin McMorris for FreeSpirit

We’ll select four names at noon mountain time on Monday, 7/6. Oh, and let us know which of our recipes is your favorite.

At the beginning of 2009, I started writing a column for each issue of Quiltmaker called Design Studio. Each column covers a different topic and encourages you to try these ideas and post your pictures in our Design Studio gallery. So far, I’ve covered working with preprinted panels and blocks, striped fabrics and blocks colored half light and half dark. Have you tried any of these ideas?

preprinted panels

preprinted squares

striped fabrics in table runners

blocks colored half light and half dark

Post a picture of something you’ve made using one of these ideas to a Design Studio gallery and leave a comment here telling us about it to be entered for a drawing. I’ll select 3 names and each will receive one of the table runners using striped fabrics from our May/June issue. I’ll draw the names on Tuesday, 6/30 at noon Mountain time.

Bonnie’s not really mysterious, but she sure has fun with mystery quilts! The QM staff have enjoyed getting to know Bonnie Hunter through her blog and in person when she traveled through Colorado in 2008 and we got to spend some time with her.

Let me tell you a little bit about Bonnie. She’s a prolific quilter, a lot of fun and she makes great scrap quilts. She has a workable system for using her scraps (Scrap User’s System in Jan/Feb ‘09) and for making one quilt while she’s working on another (Leaders and Enders in Jan/Feb ‘08). If you ever have the chance to hear Bonnie speak, go! When I heard her speak, I sat there thinking “I can do this–I should do this–It’d be so simple to set up a system like hers.” She’s inspiring.

I’m so glad that we’ve been able to introduce Bonnie to QM readers and, in our July/Aug ‘09 issue we’re starting a mystery quilt designed exclusively for us. It’s called Christmas Lights and part 1 is now available in the magazine.

Special Offer: If you’ve missed any of the previous Quiltmaker issues that feature Bonnie’s articles and patterns, we’ve got a Bonnie Hunter Special on sale now. You get 4 issues that feature Bonnie’s articles and patterns, including July/August ‘09 to start the Mystery series all for $10.99.

Book Review + Giveaway: Bonnie is also the author of a book called Scraps & Shirttails: Reuse, Re-Purpose, Recycle! The Art of Quilting Green, published by Kansas City Star Books. This book is filled with Bonnie’s ideas to recycle everything from stash fabric to thrift store finds. Bonnie will help you tame your scraps and turn them into quilts, and the book has 12 fun patterns as well. Leave a comment mentioning your favorite quilt-related blog  by 12 noon Mountain time on Friday, June 19 and I’ll select 5 different people to win a copy of Bonnie’s book!

I’m so excited that Quiltmaker is finally blogging! You’ll be hearing from the QM staff and me as we join all the blogging fun that we’ve been watching for so long.

We’ve been storing up all kinds of content in anticipation of getting things started—giveaways, designer interviews, inside peeks at what goes on in our office and so much more.

Did I just say “giveaways”? You bet I did—where should I start? Since the month of June just started (and that’s my name), let’s give away something from our May/June ‘09 issue.

Peekaboo Pixies, color option for Ribbon Trellis, as seen in Quiltmaker's May/June '09 issue.

Peekaboo Pixies, the color option for Ribbon Trellis. That’s right—I’m giving away a color option made from Dance with the Fairies fabric by elinor peace bailey for P&B Textiles—a very fun and whimsical fabric design.

The first place winner will receive the quilt top—the one you see here, along with backing and binding fabric. Bonus: 4 additional winners will receive fabric bundles from the same line of fabric.

Leave a comment by Monday, June 8 at 12 noon Mountain time and tell me what you’d like to see Quiltmaker blog about. I’m looking forward to getting to know you!

[6/12/09 update: This giveaway is over now, but you can still tell me what you'd like to see us blog about.]