Last weekend was Maine Quilts, the annual show put on by the Pine Tree Quilt Guild (PTQG).  The judging this year was quite tough, with only five blue ribbons out of nearly 100 judged quilts.  Although I didn’t get much time to savor the show (the first day I took hubby, his first time ever going to a show with me…hoooray!…so I promised him we wouldn’t have to stay long—since it was torrential rain, it also ended up being crazy crowded, and the second day I got there late), I did have time to take pictures of the five blue ribbon quilts plus a couple of others.  (In theory, the photos should be clickable for a larger view.)

Here is the Best in Show quilt, a hand and machine appliqued quilt with a ton of quilting (Machine):

And the other blue ribbon winners, one of which also won a judges’ choice:

And of course, (blush, smile) mine:

I’ll have a couple more posts about the show… some of my favorites that I just snapped while breezing through, art quilts, and Jo Diggs’ special exhibit.  More soon!

Hallelujah, the quilt was done in time to deliver to Maine Quilts last Wednesday.  When hubby and I went up on Friday to see the show (hooray!  first time ever he has gone with me…of course, given the downpour torrential rain and the crowds inside, I may never get him to another!), I got worried as we worked our way back through the judged section:  lots of third place ribbons and honorable mentions, but FEW reds and blues…. meaning tough judging.  When I saw my quilt, though, boy did I smile:

Yep, that’s a blue ribbon (one of five in the entire show, and the other four were traditional quilts!) AND a Judges’ Choice from Kathy Kansier (website here).  When I went to her classroom to thank her, I learned she is also this year’s Jewel Pearce Patterson scholarship winner for quilt teachers…way to go!  Plus, she’s going to have a special exhibit at the Quilt Festival in Houston of her doorways and archways quilts… I’ve been taking pictures of doors and gates and windows for 30 years! Can’t wait to see it…anyway, Thank you, Kathy!

Here’s a picture of me (and yes, I have lost 18 pounds!  about 12 more to go….) looking quite happy (thanks to Paul for taking the picture):

And a “neighborhood” shot of the row:

I’ll blog about the show later in the week, and also give some close-up shots of the insane quilting…..

Last April, when I was teaching in Paducah, I had the great good fortune to meet Jan Krentz (we shared a van ride, 2 hours each way, from the Nashville airport to Paducah, and ran into each other in the teachers’ boxes room…where all the shipped stuff resided).  She gave so many wonderful tips and tidbits on being a traveling teacher, that when she mentioned she was coming to Maine to teach, I decided then and there to sign up for her class.  If I want to do the best by my students, learning from one of the best in the industry is a good thing.

Maine’s Pine Tree Quilt Guild had scheduled Jan for two classes and one lecture.  I picked the one on Friday, when the kids were in school, besides it was closest to me in Augusta (and hour west of Camden).  It happened to be a Hunter’s Star workshop.  My education in good teaching began even before the class began:  Jan had set up her projector and laptop to run a short “slideshow” loop telling students what supplies they needed to have out and how best to set up for the morning.  Great idea! Here’s a picture of Jan

I particularly liked the little table she has, which means you don’t have to stoop to see the screen…it’s at lectern height.  The whole table packs down into a 3 pound unit about the size of a large laptop.  Cool.

The class was a diverse lot… I knew only one person, Dot.  Here we are gathered around one person’s machine…. cool tip:  when you’ve done a ton of chain piecing, turn your machine sideways (or scooch around the end) to where the thread cutter is, then cut the chain apart lickety split on the thread cutter.  KEWL.

There were lots of great combinations of fabrics–some awesome Hoffman oriental prints:

A dynamic combo based around a Jane Sassaman print:

A wonderfully scrappy version:

My tablemate Mari’s selections to make a quilt for her “tween” granddaughter (not quite a teen, older than a little girl):

Of course, did I take a picture of my first mock-ups?  Nope.  I’ll do a second post with more on mine….

The tip of the day for me, and probably old hat for those of you who do more piecing than I do, was to (a) mark your rulers on the BOTTOM so as to avoid distortion from having your markings above the quilt (the thickness of the lucite in the rulers).  And even better…cut stacks of blue painters tape (about 4-6 layers), cut into narrow strips.  Stick these to the BOTTOM of your ruler at the appointed spot, and the ruler snugs up against your stack of fabrics to be rotary cut.  This ruler is one of Jan’s (she was out of stock but it was SO good I’ll have to add one to my collection…somehow hers was easier to use than the 45 degree diamonds that I currently have).  In this case, you cut your strips the width of your diamond, make the first 45 degree cut, then snug the blue painters tape up and zoom-zoom-zoom you can quickly and very accurately cut a bazillion diamonds.

Jan also used the projector during class to show variations on the theme of Hunter’s Star quilts, and I particularly liked this one:

That’s it for now!

A large envelope arrived from the International Quilt Festival folks in Houston yesterday; despite its size, I figured it had to be a sorry, no thanks.  WRONG!   I am teaching in Houston this coming Fall!!!!!!!!  I am elated beyond belief… it has been quite the effort to float down to be able to reach the keyboard LOL!

After I met yet another deadline I checked to see when applications were due…it was in six days!  So I quickly put together everything (I had last year asked on my blog for letters of recommendation and received several…thanks Betty, Jan, Mathea and Rebecca for your help!) and overnighted it ($16 well spent!) to Houston to make the deadline for certain.  Well, yesterday I received the results, and will have four days of teaching (I wanted 3 or 4):

Monday, October 12,
Fine Finishes (bindings and edge finishes)

Tuesday, October 13,
Machine Applique Three Ways
(the Blue Gingko pattern)

Wednesday, October 14
Tame Fiddly, Fussy Threads for Machine Quilting
(the More Machine Quilting class)

Thursday, October 15
Chunk and Jigsaw Fusible Applique–
total fun!  fabric postcards plus

The classes will be in the Janome machine classroom (yeah!) except for the Wednesday class, which will be in the BabyLock classroom…better go find a BabyLock dealer and see how their machines are set up!

I’ve set it up to do small kits for the classes, as that makes it a lot easier for both the students and teachers.  They get what they need that is unusual (they are asked to b ring their own fabric, batting, etc….usual items) like crisp interfacing, water soluble paper, fancy threads, that sort of thing.

So, now I’m going to go eat breakfast (Irish oats and a banana) and float again!  THEN, after I finish a project to submit for consideration for the 2009 Quilting Arts Gifts issue (comes out before the holidays) and get that mailed off, I need to start getting my set-up done to use the video camera and digital projector in my teaching.  I actually signed up for a Jan Krentz workshop this may tho I pretty much never do traditional piecing any more just so I can watch how she teaches.  She’s coming to Maine in May at the invitation of the Pine Tree Quilt Guild, and I can’t wait!

Yesterday I had a grand time!  It was my first chance to get to Augusta (Maine) for the quarterly statewide meeting of the Pine Tree Quilt Guild.  Better yet, I was the featured speaker, and debuted my lecture on Journal Quilts and Journals for Quilters.  The lady who invited me to speak said I should plan on 100-150 attendees, so I brought 150 handouts… and we ran out!   So I am going to post the contents of my handout here, at the end of this message.  Feel free to select and copy that section to print out at home!

Also, I realized I have never added my 2007 and 2008 journal quilts to my website, so I have done that today, too.  I have shared these journal quilts on the blog before, but here they are again.  The first quilt is Windows of Hope, picturing a little girl in the rubble of bombed out Tokyo circa 1946:

I’ll add the detail photos to the galleries along with technique information, otherwise this blogpost will be miles too long! (addendum:  I realized I never blogged about my 2008 journal quilts…eeek!  So I’ll do that in the next week or two….)  The next journal is Ancient Earth, which didn’t make it in to the juried 2008 Journal quilt exhibit, but I love it nonetheless.

And finally, Aslan’s Song, also made for (but didn’t get in) to the 2008 Journal quilt exhibit.  Details about the title and techniques are in the gallery section.   Click on the title for the link.

Last but not least, here is the handout from the Journal Quilts lecture:

The Journal Quilts and Journaling for Quilters
with Sarah Ann Smith

Websites:

www.quiltart.com
www.sarahansmith.com
www.quiltingarts.com
www.dickblick.com
www.mariaelkins.com
www.beadjournalproject.com

Books:
•    Creative Quilting: The Journal Quilt Project, Karey Patterson Bresenhan
•    Art Quilt Workbook, Jane Davila and Elin Waterston
•    The Decorated Page, and The Decorated Journal, Gwen Diehn
•    Journal Revolution, Rise up and Create, Woods and Dinino
•    Quilters Playtime, Dianne Hire
•    Thinking Outside the Box, Sandi Cummings
•    Quilting Arts magazine
•    Cloth Paper Scissors magazine

Ideas for journal quilts and journals:

•    Beautiful things
•    What have you collected?
•    Things that make me mad!
•    Places you’d like to go / see / visit
•    Good smells
•    Favorite foods
•    Quilts I’d make if I had the skills and time
•    Song titles/lines/phrases
•    Quotations
•    Make 100 stamps
•    Flowers
•    Groceries
•    If I looked in your closet, what colors would I see?
•    Favorite clothes/shoes you had
•    Who inspires you?
•    Tell me something good that happened to you today!
•    Cut  fabric swatches and write why you like them
•    Pictures from a  magazine ..why do you like them?

•    Focus on….

Line Circles Numbers Letters Leaves Colors…..
Bugs you love/hate (or animals, or birds)
Maps…your home, your town, your mind, an imaginary planet….
Favorite books
Hubcaps, or how to fill a circle….
Artists you admire (Matisse!  Van Gogh!)
Your friends’ best qualities

What you need to journal:      a notebook, a pen or pencil, and an eraser!  Awake helps, too…
Optional:  glue stick, camera, pens, watercolors, waterbrush

Be Inspired!  Journal, quilt, and make art!!!!