QuiltCon 2019

If you follow us on Facebook, you already know that we attended QuiltCon last week in Nashville, TN and have shared many pictures of the quilts.  QuiltCon is the annual quilt convention of The Modern Quilt Guild. We attended our first QuiltCon in 2017 in Savannah, GA; this was our first visit to Nashville. The winter storms brought significant rain so the weather wasn't great, but it finally stopped and the sun came out on Sunday which we saved for sightseeing.

This was a welcome sign in the airport.  We took an Uber to our downtown hotel which was just a couple of blocks from the convention center and Country Music Hall of Fame.

The front side of Music City Center was designed to resemble a guitar - you can kind of see that here.  (Apologies for the thumb blocking the corner.)  In this post we'll try to give you a feel for a mix a quilts and some of the sights around Nashville.

The Best in Show quilt above is called Smile by Leanne Chahley of Alberta, Canada.  The blocks were made by members of her international quilting bee, who she asked to make colorful improv blocks.  She quilted it herself on a longarm, and says it never fails to make her smile.

Burst, by Marge Tucker of Norwell, Massachusetts, is the winner of Best Machine Quilting done on a frameless, needle stationary machine (domestic or mid-arm).  She challenged herself to improvisationally piece Dresden plate blocks.  The half Dresdens are completed by the quilting in the border. The mosaic look is the result of using the gray background in the center and layering it over navy blue which makes the seams stand out.

The Modern Drunk is by Jodi Robinson of Enon Valley, Pennsylvania.  It is the winner of Best Machine Quilting done on a framed machine where the needle moves (longarm).  This is her modern interpretation of the traditional Drunkard's Path block.  She wanted to create quilting that creates movement, in this case radiating from the center.

On Thursday evening we met friends for dinner at BB King's Blues Club, which was a great recommendation and one of the highlights of the trip.  We were treated to live music by the Mike Hayes Band and they were fantastic!  If you want a sampling, Google "Mike Hayes musician" and give a listen. Have you ever seen anyone play guitar behind their back?

The AT&T building is the tallest in Nashville and it's twin peaks can be seen from anywhere.  It is fondly referred to as the bat building.

One of the corner bars contains a very large mural of Legends of Country Music - here is just a portion of it.  How many legends do you recognize?

On our Sunday tour, we visited the former Marathon Motor Works building that now houses various shops, among them the Nashville location of Antique Archaeology.  If you're not familiar with them, this is one of the shops of American Pickers (Mike & Frank) whose TV show airs on the History channel.  Their original shop is in LeClaire, Iowa. Check out their show if you haven't seen it.

We hope this gives you a taste of our Nashville experience, and will share more in the coming days.

New Cork Project

Last November at Quilt Festival in Houston Sue bought 2 pieces of cork fabric, gray and black, to use in making a cross body bag.  She knew she had a pattern by Pink Sand Beach Designs that she previously used and hoped it could be adapted to work with the cork.  It's called the Barbados Bag.

After studying the pattern and parts of the bag, she came up with a plan she hoped would work. The problem with using cork fabric is that is thicker than cotton fabric which could pose a problem when sewing multiple layers.  The front and back pocket pieces both are intended to be folded in half, and since she wanted to make them from the cork, she knew that double cork would be too thick, so she made a fabric lining instead.  She chose to use cork for the main body of the bag as well, thinking that 2 layers of cork wouldn't be too thick. So, here we go.

This is the front pocket and accent fabric section above and behind the pocket.

Here the pockets are layered over the bag pieces (gray).  Wonder clips are great for holding the pieces together, since you can't pin the cork without leaving holes.

These are all the pieces ready to put together - outsides on the left, linings on the right.

Here the front and back are sewn together at the bottom.  The cut outs at the sides form the gussets for the base of the bag.  This is where it started to become apparent that the thickness of the layers might be a problem.  You might be able to see the topstitching along the seam; rather than decoration, the purpose was to hold the seam allowances open and flatter!  For the most part, sewing parts together was not a problem till it came to those gussets on the bottom corners.

Because of the bag body and pockets both being cork, that meant 4 layers of cork in the side seams, plus the lining layers.  There's also some décor bond stabilizer in there.  When it came to the gussets, there was also that seam at the bottom of the bag adding into the equation, and that's where the difficulty came in.  It was just too thick for the Baby Lock machine to sew through.  So Sue got out the old faithful Pfaff and was able to get across - carefully - all the layers.

The previous picture is the front of the bag, above is the back.  The final challenge was turning the bag right side out.  It was a bit stiff, but as you can see - success!

Here's the final result with the strap made and attached.  If she were to make another with cork fabric, Sue thinks she would stick to just one layer of cork rather than 2.  Since we are headed to Nashville next week for QuiltCon, Sue will get to test drive the bag and see if it performs as she anticipates. Of course, we'll have pictures to share of our Nashville adventure!

Charity Sewing

What projects have you been working on?  Sue has spent the last week working on a new exhibit project, however pictures can't be shared at this point, so instead she has some photos from her local guild's charity sewing day that was held Saturday.  Once a year we do an all-day sew-in to work on our two major charity projects which are preemie quilts for the Children's National Medical Center in DC and soldier/veteran's quilts.  We had over 40 participants and lots of progress was made.

There were quilts in all stages of construction, from cutting and piecing tops, laying out blocks, cutting batting, and machine quilting.

Above are 2 veteran's quilt tops that were finished.  Quilting remains to be done.

Sue chose to work on veteran's quilt blocks like the stars seen above.

Happily she was able to get faster at these as the day went on (3 before lunch, 7 after) and completed 10 blocks for the day.  Only 25 more to go to have enough for a complete top!

We had a delicious lunch of homemade soups, bread, salads and desserts.  It was a fun and productive day of sewing for all involved for good causes.

We'd love to see what you've been working on this year - one month almost gone already!  Feel free to share photos in the comments.

New Year - New (ish) Class

Happy New Year!  If you follow us, you know we've been MIA on the blog for a while.  Seems that after Houston, we got caught up in holiday preparations and Sue spent some time with her mom in PA, so it was easy to let the blog slip into the background.  But now that 2019 is here, we will try to be more consistent, though we may aim for just once a week to keep things going.  It's hard to know if anyone is reading what we post, so comments would definitely be welcome!

As mentioned in the title, we have revised our Thermofax printing class for the next session we will be teaching in February at Artistic Artifacts.  We have refined our focus to concentrate on the techniques and products that can be used to create images with Thermofax screens, and are calling the class "Thermofax Technique Sampler".  It is suitable for beginners as well as experienced printers, and even if you've taken another version of our class before, there will be some new techniques/products in this one.

We will be working with page sizes of 6 x 8 inches and each one will illustrate a different technique or product that can be used for printing.  Our list runs to 25, so we will be working diligently to get them all completed in this one day class.  When the pages are complete, they can be assembled into a book in any manner you choose.

These 4 techniques include white paint used as a resist, a 2-screen image that has an outline and fill, foil and glue, and a water-based resist.

More techniques are printing with multiple colors, using opaque paint, printing transparent paint over opaque, and printing with a combination of Inktense color blocks and matte medium.  

Here deColourant discharge product is used on 3 different fabrics to show variation.

Another discharge method uses bleach gel, again on different fabrics to show color variations.

Sue chose to print her labels on inkjet fabric and fuse them to the pages, but you can just as easily write directly on the page itself, and include more detail such as type of paint or specific product.

Here's the inside cover and first page.

And the page using foil and glue.

We have this and more in store for you so if you are near the Washington, DC area, we would love to have you join us on February 16 at Artistic Artifacts in Alexandria to learn how versatile Thermofax screens can be!

Elvis Exhibit at IQF

Now that we're home and somewhat back to a normal routine, we can share more from the International Quilt Festival. We arrived at the George R. Brown convention center about 1:30 in the afternoon.

It was the first trip to Houston for both of us.

We entered the center on the second floor from the parking garage and had been advised by fellow quilters to check out the view from the round windows on that level which overlook the convention center floor.  We later found out that the GRB is designed to resemble a ship, hence the round windows.

Above is a look at the vendor section.

And this is the quilt show section.

The first place we went was to see Sue's quilt in the OURstory exhibit.  However, due to prohibitions on photography, we can't share photos of that exhibit.  (not until we get an OK from Susanne, our fearless leader).  But there were no limitations on the Elvis exhibit, curated by another friend from Northern Virginia, Donna DeSoto.  The Houston exhibit included 40 of the 96 quilts in the collection that celebrate the life and career of Elvis.

Jail House Rock is by Lesly-Claire Greenburg of Fairfax, VA.  The main technique is fused raw-edge applique.

Goodnight from Elvis is by Kaye Sauer of Queensland, Australia.  It is machine appliqued, quilted and embellished.

Debra Gabel of Clarksville, MD, made Elvis: A Portrait.  She used painting and machine quilting to create the look of a faux postage stamp.

Pink Cadillac is by Susan Bynum of Falls Church, VA.  The 1955 Cadillac was Elvis' favorite and can still be seen at Graceland.

Lucky in Love 2 is by Ricki Selva of Fort Myer, VA.  Her piece represents Elvis with his most famous leading lady Ann-Margret.

Blue Suede Shoes is by Joyce Carrier of Bluemont, VA.  The famous song warns against stepping on his blue suede shoes, but Joyce imagines that perhaps there was one that could step on them.

Fever by Claire Josiak of Calgary, Canada, is based on the lyrics "cats were born to give chicks fever".  This whimsical quilt was a fun addition to the group.

All the quilts in the collection have been published in a book called Inspired by Elvis: Art Quilts Celebrating the King which is available from Amazon here.

IQF Houston - Saturday Sampler

If you don’t follow us on Facebook or Instagram, you may not know that we have been in Houston since Thursday for International Quilt Festival. This is our first time attending the festival and it has been inspirational and overwhelming at the same time. The impetus for coming was that Sue had a quilt in one of the special echibits (sorry; no photos allowed yet due to pending book publication). But we have TONS of other pictures to share!

We’ll start with an event we attended which was the Saturday Sampler. There were 28 teachers in a large ballroom, each doing 15-20 minute demos/presentations. You could choose the ones you wanted to visit over the 2 hour time frame. It was a great way to find out more about a teacher and what they do, and pick up a few tips and tricks.

We first visited with Cindy Lohbeck who demoed her process for Ice Dyed Shibori. We have both done this process but it’s always good to pick up a few tips from experts.

She gets wonderful results and was featured in an article in Quilting Arts magazine (Dec. 2017/Jan. 2018).

Ana Buzzalino demonstrated the use of Inktense Pencils on Fabric.

Melody Crust talked about the elegance of straight line quilting.

Maria Shell explained her method of Improv Quilting, which starts ny making striped fabric out of solids, and using the stripes in various ways to create other patterns.

Jenny Lyon talked about choosing threads for machine quilting on a domestic machine. She is a fabulous quilter.

Judy Gauthier’s topic was Using Scraps to Make Beautiful Quilts. She also talked a bit about color theory.

Karen Miller is an Aurifil thread educator who focused specially on Aurifil thread.

The 2 hours went by quickly and we felt it was a good way to learn a lot in a relatively short period of time.