"A Quilters' Gathering"

I was able to convince my DH to watch the kids so I could go to the NH annual show, "A Quilters' Gathering" last Thursday. He watched the boys but I had to take my almost 7 year old daughter with me but she loves quilt shows and I was glad of the company :)

The photo above is Diane Phalen signing a calendar for me - she was so lovely and she was the one that suggested I take a photo! I had told her about the first time I saw her work - it was about 15 years ago in NZ and my mother's friend had gone to the States and bought back a set of notecards for my mother and I by Diane Phalen. I thought they were gorgeous - quilts and fields and country cottages - so beautiful! I also told her that those notecards have been all around the world with me as I always intended to frame and hang them. They are still sitting in an unpacked box in our basement. I must get them out! I never imagined 15 years ago that I would meet the person who painted those cards that helped to spark my interest in quiltmaking!


And below are photos of quilts from the show - I was impressed, as there were a lot of quilts that were my colors and style. Here are some of my favorites...

"Wreaths" made by Nancy Henry

"Hypnotic Hypotenuse" made by Maria C. Shell


"Applique Sampler" made by Connie Krause

"Thanks, Suzanne!" made by Nancy Hahn

"Tilted Mountains at Sunset" made by Margey Keskin

"Pennsylvania Palette" made by Wendy Caton Reed

"Lady Liberty" made by Jane Raymond
"Baltimore Blues" no name

"Finding the Right Dance Partner" made by Valarie Maser-Flanagan "Spectrum II made by Fay & Merl Pritts (my daughter voted for this as her viewer's choice"!)

"Piecing the Color Wheel" made by Maria C. Shell

Happy Belated Halloween!

I have been flat tack since Halloween so thought I would catch up and start with our Halloween pics! We did the usual - kids got dressed up (my Batman son is still wearing his costume - I had to wrestle it off him to wash it!) and my hubby took them out while I got to stay home and hand out candy. It is so nice living in a family neighborhood!

Our decorations are quite tame compared to our neighbors - they go all out - theme music, fog, the works! It was just fantastic. And I promise they're not as scary in real life as they look in these pics!

And here are some photos of me - we had a Halloween party at our church where we did a "Trunk or Treat" and I dressed as someone who'd rather be in bed LOL! I wore my PJ's and rolled my hair in rags - when I took them out the next morning I swore I was back in 1986. Wow what an image! Funny thing was, my hubby went crazy for it - he just loved that it was something other than straight for once. So now I know, I may have to channel the '80's more often!! Well, once a year at Halloween anyway :)

Oh and how could I forget - I carved my first ever Jack O' Lantern! I stuck with a simple generic design - next year I will increase the degree of difficulty - maybe it will get eyelashes or something!

Another oldie

I'm really digging into the vault this week....but I suppose even though my quilts are old to me, they are new to you, so that's how I justify it to myself!
Tonight I'm showing you my Be Thankful quilt, (complete with my wonderful MIL's feet!) a quilt I made in a class back in 2004 at the Utah Annual Meeting event. It is a Pat Sloan pattern and though I love the more country/prim colors of the original, I just had to do something different and wow was it ever different! It is a mostly appliqued quilt, but I used the freezer paper/machine applique method - this was when I was still in the, "Oh no, I could never do needleturn" phase. But if you put your mind to it, anything is possible!

Below is a photo of the blocks in progress while in the class...

Here is a photo of some of the other fabrics being used by others in the class, along with the samples from the teacher...I wish I could have seen the finished red and yellow quilt with the above blocks - I think it would have been beautiful.

Busy busy

This has been, and is going to be a busy week for me, (my hubby has the week off - yippee!) so I will do some nice short posts without the usual monologue. OK OK I can hear you all yelling and cheering so I'll stop the writing and get to the photos of the day!
Above is a quilt I made for a friend who had a baby girl last year back in UT - now if you have had a look through my blog you will know that I don't do pretty and pastel. Even though I love pretty colors, when it comes to making quilts I am just so drawn to brighter fabrics. But I had this line of fabric and loved it, and think it is just perfect for a baby quilt.

And below is a pic of me taken yesterday wearing the jewelery my friend had made and given to me - see one of the below posts for more on that...and it was so lovely to wear! Big bonus - it didn't make anything turn green or irritate my skin so it must really be made of good stuff lol!! And by the way, my 4 year old son took the photo - hence the odd angle ;)
And believe it or not, for me this is a short post :)

Applique Houses

I am feeling a little guilty for not doing many quilting related posts on my blog (which has such a quiting related name!) but I just haven't done any quilting this last week. So I am going to pull out some old photos of things I have previously done and share them with you when I only have time to do a quick post - like tonight since it is 12.30am and I am tired!

The photo I have tonight is a row of houses I made for a row by row swap way back in 2002. These are appliqued, but it was before I dared to do needleturn! I did these using the good old reliable method of gluing to freezer paper and using the machine blind stitch. Ahhh the good old days! But even now, in 2007, I still think they are cute, and it makes me want to make some for myself since I sent these away to a lady in New Zealand for the swap! If I remember rightly, the pattern is a Piece O' Cake design from their book "All Around the Neighborhood". I'll see what other photos I can dig up for tomorrow!

Fall and PIF friends

Fall has arrived here in NH, and this year is just glorious - it has been very warm and the show of color has been late coming, but wow it has come with a vengence! Right now everywhere you look it is orange, red, and yellow. Did I mention it is gorgeous yet?!! We went for a drive yesterday and had a picnic in the middle of all the gorgeousness (is there such a word?!). This is definitely the place to be at this time of year!

This is our house and some of the trees surrounding it...

This is the spot where we had our picnic yesterday...

And I suppose I should mention that the Red Sox are going to the World Series! I, not being a sports fanatic, or even American, didn't realise the enormity of this until I watched the whole of Boston celebrating late into the night on TV last night. My husband assures me that it is quite an exciting thing, so I'll believe him, and add the obligitory...GO RED SOX!

I have my 3 PIF's! Yay! The first two posted here on my blog, and the third was pretty much decided for me over the weekend. My daughter had a play date at a new friend's house on Friday after school. I hung out with the mother, and we got talking about our hobbies, mine being quilting of course, and hers, which is beading. She pulled out trays of the most beautiful home made beaded jewellery I have ever seen! She used to sell it, but hasn't really done anything with it for over a year now. I was admiring it and before I knew it she forced (!) it on me! Despite my protests (I mean this stuff isn't cheap - she uses real gems, silver and gold, not plastic!) I came home with a gorgeous necklace and earrings set, a beautiful watch, and several pairs of Winter themed earings. She had nothing to gain by doing this - she did it purely to make someone else happy, and that to me is what PIF is all about!

So like I said, my 3rd PIF friend has been decided! Even though she has already done her part, I will do something for her using my skills.

The other 2 PIF friends are Flip Flop Mom (Terri)- check out her site, here - she has the most GORGEOUS photos of the Fall foliage happening here in NH right now.

And also, Donna, who I don't know too well yet, but I'm sure that through the PIF process we will get to know heaps about each other

Quilting Mecca

Today was a pretty slow quilting day for me (that means I did none - zero - zilch!) so I thought I'd show you a couple of photos of the Mecca of the quilting world - Keepsake Quilting!

When we decided to move here over a year ago, it didn't even register that I'd be living in the home state of this shop until my fabulous Mother In Law (yes some of us DO get on with them!) told me. Of course it was on my to-do list, and I've managed to get there twice now. It's about 1 1/2 hours drive from here so it's been strictly for special occassions only :) But it is every bit as fabulous as you would imagine and huge! Pretty much everything you see in the photo on the right hand side is part of the store. I love their Batik selection - a whole room of just batiks. Gorgeous! The only thing I don't like are that there isn't much on sale, and you know us quilters love a good sale, but it's a definite must-do for any quilter in the area, if only to say that you've been there!

And one of the best unexpected things - the beautiful bathroom! Check out the wallpaper...(yes I stood in the bathroom and took a photo of the wallpaper lol!)