Bill Volkening's New York Beauty Quilts. Ooooh! Aaaah!

In September, I was honored to be able to teach at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles.  Although I only live about an hour and a half away, this was my first visit to the museum. (I know, I'm a lazy, lazy girl!)  The museum was lovely!  Our classroom was one of the small galleries, so we were surrounded by inspiring quilts while we sewed.  How fun is that?!

These ladies got a lot of great work done in class!

During a break, I was able to peak in at the exhibition, Collecting New York Beauty Quilts: Bill Volckening’s Passion.  I'm pretty sure that show was put there just for me!  I loved it!  Below are some of my favorites.

Pacific International Quilt Festival 2014

I breezed through PIQF this year.  Somehow, I did it in under 2 hours!  Here are a few of my favorites.

To see the quilts in more detail, just click on the image above!

New Pattern! Pennant Bunting Advent Calendar

Yay! Just in time for Christmas, I have a new pattern available! I originally made a few sets of these advent calendars to sell on my Etsy shop a few years ago, and got so many requests for directions that I decided to publish the pattern. Each of the pennants is a fully lined, button enclosed pouch and can be stuffed with little presents or treats to help count down the days until Christmas.  Make your own beautiful, heirloom advent calendar!

The best part of the pattern is that you don't have to wait for it in the mail - it's a digital download!

If you're not a DIY kind of person, I do have a couple of sets available this year, and you can find them in my Etsy shop.

Learning: Bojagi with Youngmin Lee

Last month, I took a Bojagi class with Youngmin Lee at the Pacific International Quilt Festival.  While the description and photos of the workshop that were posted online were a bit lacking, I was sure I would regret missing this class - and I was so right!  Of course, I didn't quite think through how I would be able to drive through notorious Bay Area traffic (made infinitely worse by a BART strike) to arrive at the class location 65 miles from my house first thing in the morning on a school day, so I was very tardy and missed the first 45 minutes of class.  I caught up quickly, though! 

You can get an idea of the stiffness of the cloth from this photo.

All of the stitching is done by hand.

This is as far as I got in a 6 hour class.  Not a very fast process!

Bojagi is a form of Korean patchwork that uses flat-felled seams to create a fully reversible square of cloth, traditionally used for a variety of things such as gift wrapping, covering food, and clothing storage.  Just do a google image search to see how wonderful and different they can be!  I was also able to work with a textile that I have never handled before called ramie, which is one of the oldest known cloth materials and is plant based.  According to Youngmin, ramie can be much more expensive than silk!

Youngmin Lee's beautiful patchwork.

As well as teaching us her stitching techniques which are made up of the tiniest stitches you can imagine, she also shared some of her work with us.  My pictures don't do them justice - they should be seen in person to be truly appreciated, but you can see more of her work on her website!

This was my favorite piece, all done in black ramie.

Can you even see those tiny hand stitches?

She has a DVD out teaching her techniques and it looks like a great resource.  You can also see more of her amazing, tiny hand stitches!

Back to School

It's that time of year again.  Time to think about school supplies (so fun!) and how to pack a healthy, yet edible school lunch (not fun at all).  But, don't let this September be all about the kids!  Get your own learnin'!  I'll be teaching two classes in the Bay Area this September.  The first class will be at the San Jose Museum of Quilts and Textiles on Sunday, September 22nd.  There's a great show going on at the museum through October 27th, showcasing the amazing collection of Bill Volckening's New York Beauty quilts. Sigh, I do love a New York Beauty, and I love Bill Volckening's blog, so  I can't wait to see the show!  (I was a little obsessed with making NYB's a few years ago.  I have to thank Karen K. Stone for that!)

The second class I'll be teaching is in Oakland on September 29th, at my favorite local quilt store (my lqs, for those in the know!), A Verb for Keeping Warm.   They have the coolest, most eclectic collection of quilting fabric around!

I promise, I won't rap anyone's knuckles with my ruler...unless you leave your rotary cutter open...So, come and learn some new skills!

Class Alert!

I'll be teaching a one day workshop on Improvisational Quilting at A Verb for Keeping Warm in Oakland on Sunday, June 23rd.

Cutting, sewing, chatting, and cupcakes right next door!  What could be better?  Click here to register.

Making: An Improv Double Wedding Ring Quilt

This is one of the things I've been working on lately.

Laying out the blocks.

 I decided that I needed to try making a double wedding ring...improvisationally.  One of my main inspirations was this quilt by Emma Hall from Eli Leon's collection.  I love the story behind this quilt, which you can read here.  It kinda sums up exactly how I feel about quilting.

Emma Hall, Double Wedding Ring c. 1948

Although I used a plastic template for the basis of my pattern, I had to do a bit of drafting as well.  It was fun!

Drafting the double wedding ring.

For the fabric arcs, I used a variety of old denim, tribal batiks, Japanese wovens, and hand-dyed indigo.  The middle sections are made of vintage linen and a couple of gorgeous, organic, hand-woven striped fabrics from India, called Khadi which I have been drooling over at my local shop, A Verb for Keeping Warm.

This is how far I've gotten.  I have this vision of striped, mitered border, but haven't dreamt up a way to do that yet.  Any ideas?

P.S. If you live in the SF Bay Area, I'll be teaching an improvisational quilting class this Sunday!  I promise, it will be fun!  You could make a whole day of it, by taking the indigo resist dyeing workshop first, and then the quilting class after!