Monday, November 2, 2009

Guess what I saw?

Alzheimer's: Forgetting Piece by Piece
traveling exhibit. Only three more stops to go. If you
have an opportunity to see it; please do!



Friday afternoon I had a lot of errands to do
in Lititz. I remembered that the Alzheimer's
exhibit was at the Moravian Manor and so
I grabbed my camera and that was a no-no.
No photographs are allowed to be taken of
the quilts but you can buy the CD or the
book with all of the quilts and their stories
in them. The monies collected goes to the
fund for Alzheimer's research.

If the exhibit is not traveling to your area
you may purchase the book and CD
Here


When you go in you receive a tag (like the
one above) and when you leave - they ask
you to write something about your experience.

I don't know anyone personally who has
Alzheimer's. Although I do know a friend and a
former neighbor who has had a relative effected
by this terrible disease. When the neighbor used
to go and see her mother she said "My mom
keeps asking me who I am." Sad

This exhibit was very enlightening and educational
for me. Each Artist has a statement next to their
quilt and tells the story of their loved one who
had/has Alzheimer's. To read the stories of these
women and how Alzheimer's had/has affected their lives
is truly heart breaking. Their quilt expresses their
heartbreaking story.
The construction of the quilts are fabulous as each quilt
tells a story visually, each one has their own way
of interpreting their feelings of this disease .
The visual impact is very emotional!

The one that really "did it"
for me was the one that said (paraphrasing)
"What if I forget that I loved you" well, I just
broke down and cried when I read that and
couldn't stop until I left.

Thank you Ami Simms for all of the work
you are doing and educating the public
(me too) about Alzheimer's and the affect
that it has on people's lives. I now have a
better understanding of this disease.






Friday, October 9, 2009

Quilt Festival - Fall 2009

See the image on my side bar----------------->
to join in and to visit all of the
participants. Oh man this is so
much fun ... I just love it!
Thank you Amy!

My favorite quilt always seems to be
the one that I'm working on at the
moment.

I picked up a copy of "Baby Quilts" by
Fons & Porter mainly because of the
quilt on the cover which was teddy
bears. The cutest little things.
My intention was to make that quilt.

But when I reached pg. 64 I just
feel in love with "Training Wheels".
Something about the pattern just
intrigued me. It reminded me of
an old pattern "wagon wheels".




As I'm studying the pattern; I suddenly
got the urge to hand piece it. It was just
like it "wanted" to be put together by hand.
(by that I mean hand sewn)
I'm thinking that it's a lot of work and
cutting out (mostly with scissors and
not the rotary cutter) I only did that
once before....and I thought "why not!"

My computer was in the process of being
repaired - by the time they order the parts..
etc. (well it took a month!) The time I
would spend on the computer; I could
sew this quilt together. And I did!








In the magazine there are templates that
I traced on plastic - I also marked for the seam
allowance. The center circle is appliqued on -
I used Karen Kay Buckley's circles.

I was undecided on what fabric I would
use until I went to Joann's store and
found some by Heidi Grace. I just
fell in love with the "little birds"!
What I bought matched some of the
fabrics that I had in my stash.



As I don't do scrap booking; I didn't know
who Heidi Grace was until I looked her
up. You can see some of her quilt fabric
here

Here's is my other quilt from the
first Online Quilt Festival

Thursday, October 1, 2009

Vicksburg Block #2

Dawn over at Linen Closet Quilts is
having a Free BOM.
Pat Sloan has set up a Forum and
also a Flickr group for our photos.
~Thanks Pat!

If you are interested in joining -
Click on the image on the right
side of the page to find out more.

Here's my Block #2


I used the freezer paper (under) method instead
of my usual back-basting method for this block.
It's been awhile since I appliqued with freezer
paper - I had to brush up!


For the rosebud - I chose a three dimensional look.
You cut a circle - fold the circle in half - fold the left
side to the middle - then the right side to the middle
overlapping a wee bit. Take a needle & thread and
about 1/8" from the bottom make a running stitch
and gather just a little. And there you have your
rosebud.

Hope you all will come on over and join us
for the fun!

Friday, September 25, 2009

Quilting Gallery Bloggers

Do you belong to
Quilting Gallery Bloggers? (see my side bar) It's a
place where you can find other "bloggers" in your
Country and/or State. It's free to join and also fun!
They are also listed on Facebook.

Quilting Gallery is having a contest called
"Nature's Best Quilt Contest" and entries
end today. So if you want to join and/or enter
your quilts etc. do it today.

You can view the contestants HERE

Voting starts tomorrow Sept. 26th thru Oct. 4th.

I kept procrastinating about entering and
decided the last minute to enter after reading
Quilting Gallery's notice on Facebook.

Here's my entry under Small Quilts



It's called Lancaster Rosebuds and designed by
Carol Blevins. Carol is one of our local teachers,
designer and started the York Quilters Guild
I'm sorry to say that she does not have a web site
(I wish she did!) so that you could see all of her
wonderful quilts.

In this Stained Glass workshop we used fusible
pre-made bias tape and applied it using a twin needle.
I love walking around during a workshop
it's always fun to see everyone's
interpretation of a pattern using
different color combinations.




I used a lot of free motion quilting in this
project using decorative threads. It gives
it a very nice textured appearance.

For a very simple design; I think it's
very elegant.




Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Over at Linen Closet Quilts
Dawn is having a free BOM. Here's the first one:



I used the back basting method for the
needle turn applique which is the
technique I like the best.

For some reason my camera didn't pick
up the colors - beige background and
a med. blue print.
I can't wait to see what Dawn has for
the second block.
We're only to use fabric from our stash.
That's good news for me. I might do this
one over again. We'll see...

Back-Basting Tutorial by Sentimental Stitches.


Today there was a meeting of our
local Quilt History Study Group.
What great heirlooms were brought
in! But my favorite was one that
Trish from
Lancaster Quilt & Textile Museum
brought
in: (permission granted)

***I have made a correction here to what I
previously wrote. ****
This quilt is from Lancaster County c. 1860,
from a member of the Keller/Brubaker family,
the quilter is unknown.
There is a similar quilt that was made by
a neighbor, Fanny S. Bucher, 1860 (we did not
see this quilt yesterday)



Here are a few more close ups:


I'm amazed at that tiny flying geese.


Square in a square "on point" no less!



I kept the images very large so that when
you click on them you can see the detail.



The collection will be on display next
March 2010. If you're going to be
in the Lancaster area for the AQS new
Quilt Show in downtown Lancaster-
check out the Lancaster Quilt Museum.


Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Computer Fixed! (fingers crossed)

I have not used my computer in almost
a month! Checked my e-mail by using
the library's computer. The problem
with my computer was that it would
freeze after it was on for 10 minutes.
I have a Gateway that is only a little
over one year old. But thank goodness
I bought an extended contract! Oh,
my monitor also went out. I had to
ship that back and now am using my
old monitor which I'm glad I saved.

Anyways, my computer is practically
rebuilt. First they replaced the hard drive
(I lost a lot of my stuff that I didn't (foolishly)
put on a CD. ) When that didn't work -
they put in a new Mother Board and fan.
Now it works great! It took my all day
yesterday to load all of the drivers and
updates from Microsoft - all 88 of them!

Without the computer; I did manage
to get a lot done.

I took a workshop from my Guild ~
The Red Rose Quilters Guild last
month from Libby Kube Hage
We did Libby's quilt "My Blue Heaven",
her own design, using
Tri-Rec rulers by Darlene Zimmerman & Joy Hoffman



I decided to make mine red, white and blue.
It still needs sashing and a border but I'm
very happy that I got this far.

The rulers are very easy to use and I always
wanted to learn how to make this star.
I think it's the same as Fifty-Four or Fight
block.

I also managed to get 2 baby quilts completed,
which I'll post during the week.

Right now I have to catch up on reading
blogs and get caught up on what everyone's
is doing.