Say My Name: "In War Time, 1863," by Jane A. Stickle

Good morning, Quilty Peeps!  Today's post is another in a series exploring and organizing my thoughts around the many quilts I hope to make "Someday," in order to deter myself from wasting time chasing the so-called Squirrel Projects that sometimes distract me.  The idea is that, before I purchase a new pattern or project materials, I'll consult my new Future Quilt Plans page at the top of my blog and decide whether I really want to invest the time in that new distraction project, or whether I really would be happier digging into one of my Bucket List quilts instead.  It has recently dawned on me that I probably won't live long enough to make every single quilt that strikes my fancy, so I want to be more intentional about which quilts I admire from a distance and which ones I choose to make for myself.

"In War Time, 1863" by Jane A. Stickle

"In War Time, 1863" 80.25 x 80.25 Original Antique Quilt by Jane A. Stickle

So much has been written about this iconic quilt.  You can see it in person at the Bennington Museum in Bennington, Vermont (check first before traveling as it's not always on display) and the best history of the quilt maker Jane A. Stickle can be found in the Summer 2013 issue of the Walloomsack Review on the museum's website here.  I know some of you have already made one or more versions of this quilt and others of you have it on your own Wanna-Make lists, but you're likely calling the original antique quilt by a different name.

Jane A. Stickle Named Her Quilt "In War Time, 1863."  NOT "Dear Jane"

One of the many remarkable things about Stickle's quilt is that, very unusually for the period, her quilt includes a label that names her quilt "In War Time, 1863" as well as the number of pieces in the quilt (5,602) and her name, Jane A. Stickle.  The "Dear Jane Quilt" moniker derives from a 1996 book by Brenda Manges Papadakis in which the author extols the virtues of the Stickle quilt and presents self-drafted line drawing reproductions of the blocks interspersed with extensive imaginary correspondence with the quilt maker.  Papadakis was so smitten with the Stickle quilt that she was inspired to learn everything she could about the quilt maker, the world she inhabited, and what was happening around her during the time she made the quilt.  However, Jane Stickle was an ordinary woman of declining fortunes living in times when ordinary women's lives tended to go undocumented.  We know she was childless, we know she was married but living apart from her husband at one point in their marriage when the census listed him as living with some other, much younger wife.  Later censuses show Jane living with her husband again, filing for bankruptcy, and ending her life as a ward of the state.  "In War Time, 1863" was a project she devised to pass time when she was bedridden.  

Papadakis' book Dear Jane: The Two Hundred Twenty-Five Patterns from the 1863 Jane A. Stickle Quilt  and the many classes she taught have been instrumental in sharing Stickle's exquisite masterpiece with hundreds of thousands of quilters worldwide, both challenging and encouraging readers to attempt reproductions and variations based on the original.  If Papadakis had not written about and popularized this quilt, I probably wouldn't even know it existed.  And, to her credit, Papadakis herself refers to Jane's quilt reverentially as "The Quilt" and only nicknames her students and their quilts as "Baby Janes."  The quilt only became known as "The Dear Jane Quilt" colloquially subsequent to the publication of the Papadakis book as quilters around the world fell in love with the quilt and began the journey of making “Dear Jane” quilts themselves.  

Which is all well and good, except what would that look like if Jane Sickle had been a male artist, working in a highly esteemed medium like oil painting rather than the oft-denigrated “women’s work” of needle craft?

The Dear Leonardo Portrait

The "Dear Leonardo" Portrait (instead of Mona Lisa or La Giaconda) by Leonardo Da Vinci?

My beloved Leonardo,

         I dreamed of you with longing today whilst working on my replica of The Portrait.  Who was this woman you painted, and what did she mean to you?  She must have sat in your presence for hours on end as you painted, close enough to breathe the same air, staring directly into your smoldering eyes and inhaling the intoxicating scent of your manhood.  Was she your mother, as some have supposed, the wife of your father's merchant friend Giaconda, or your own secret paramour, smirking at you playfully?  Perhaps she tried to keep a straight face as was customary in portraits of the time, but your ribald stories and dirty jokes broke down her maidenly reserve.  You lived through such an amazing time, what with the Renaissance and the Medici family's campaign to Make Florence Great Again...  Oh Leonardo, if only we were not separated by the centuries, I know you and I would be lovers as I am truly your soul mate now that I am copying your painting and thereby gaining access to your very soul!  I long to lick your paint brushes clean and will never stop searching for more of your precious paintings.

                                                     Your Playmate,

                                                      Rebecca Grace

Now seriously -- Isn't that WEIRD when it’s me writing letters to Leonardo Da Vinci instead of Brenda Papadakis writing letters to Jane Sickle?  Writing to "My beloved Jane" and signing off "your playmate Brenda" comes straight out of the Papadakis book.   (There are no sexual overtones in Papadakis’ letters to Jane, however.  I got carried away with my letter to Leonardo…)

When Pythagoras Met Jane: Ancient Math Magic Comes to the Rescue of a Damsel In Distress

NOPE, I haven't been working on my Jingle BOM, my Pineapple Log Cabin, or anything else that I promised the whole Internet I'd be working on this week.  Instead of sewing, I've been busy designing a NEW project, one that will use up leftover strips that had been cut for pineapple log cabin blocks.

I have a whole Pinterest board dedicated to quick-and-easy, down-and-dirty string pieced projects that would be oh-so-sensible for this purpose.  But alas, I am not a sensible girl.  I'm an impractical, wish-upon-a-star, dream-up-something-different-to-drive-myself-crazy kind of girl.

And so I have camped out in my office with EQ8 quilt design software, brainstorming, browsing the block and layout libraries for inspiration, exploring all of the cool design tools like Merge Blocks, Clip and Flip, Add Frame...  Finding photos on the Internet that simulate what my string-pieced fabric sections will look like so I can treat those areas as if they were a single fabric...  Trying out different layout and color schemes and oodles of different colors and fabrics...  

And after all of those hours of design labor bliss, I ended up with three quilts that I might (or might not) make with my leftover 1 1/2" strips of fabric.  In an effort to get away from the computer and up to my studio sooner rather than later, I'm going to share one of the designs with you today and will share the others over the next few days.  This one is my current favorite:

Option One, Great-Grandbaby Jane, 52 x 52

This design began with one of the 4" applique blocks from the historic "Dear Jane" sampler quilt.  I blew up the scale of the applique and will be using strip pieced fabric for the petals.  Then I added a Storm At Sea frame around the giant applique  (I will be strip piecing the large diamonds as well), and set that block on point in the middle of my quilt.  There are smaller versions of the Dear Jane applique block in the four corners of the quilt, with different pieced frames around them, and the borders of the quilt are from my strip-pieced pineapple scraps as well.  In real life, my scraps will be more mixed up than they are in the design picture, using my leftover blue and green pineapple strips as well as some bright solids, and I think I'm going to chop up some pink and orange strips out of stash fabric as well.  I don't want to be working off the exact same color palette as the pineapple quilt -- enough is enough, if you know what I mean.  I'm so excited about this one that I have already printed off cardstock templates for the center applique and foundation paper patterns for the Storm At Sea border.

Some people will tell you that design software takes the math out of quilting, and that's true to a certain degree...  I mean, for most users it's probably true.  It depends on what you want to design.  But my personal experience is that math skills + fab design software  = QUILTING SUPERPOWERS!  When I tried to print foundation paper patterns for my Storm at Sea border directly from my quilt design in EQ8, this is the wretched print layout the computer came up with:

EQ8 "Doing the Math For Me"

Yuck, right?  Because the block for which I'm trying to print foundations is on point in my quilt, EQ8 plops my foundation sections down on the paper oriented exactly how they are in the quilt -- in this case diagonally, rather than aligning them so their straight edges are parallel to the edges of he sheets of paper.  Normally, quilters are not trying to paper piece gigantic blocks that do not fit on sheets of paper like what I'm trying to do, but I love the accuracy of paper piecing and I have my heart set on doing it that way, so there you go.

I have already adjusted this whacked layout the best that I can using the Rotate option to turn my sections in the screenshot above, but EQ8 only lets me turn the pieces in preset "chunks" -- it's not an infinitely adjustable rotation, and there's no "snap to grid" or "fit the bleepin' page" option.  Sometimes we are grateful to our computers for doing the thinking for us, and other times we need to put on our thinking caps and figure out how to outsmart the computer!

I went back into my project file for this quilt, called the Sketchbook, and opened up the center block I'd created all by itself in the Block worktable, to see if EQ8 would print the foundation sections straight if it didn't know I was secretly planning to set the block on point in my quilt.  YES!!  However -- (don't you HATE when there has to be a "however"?!) -- since I was no longer printing the block from my beautiful quilt design where everything is the right size to fit together nicely, in the Block worktable EQ8 is looking at that center medallion as if it's any old ordinary block, and the default size was something like 6".  And of course, I can easily change that -- but only if I know the actual finished size my block needs to be to fit into my quilt design.  Helpfully "doing the math for me," EQ8 tells me (when I'm looking at the Quilt Worktable) that this block measures 48" x 48".  Unfortunately, however, that is a corner-to-corner measurement, NOT the length of the block sides.  I need to manually enter the length of the SIDES of my block, not just the diagonal measurement, in order for these foundation patterns to print out at the correct size.  It's time to put on my Big Girl Panties and do the math myself.

The Pythagorean Theorem Saves the Day!

When I was sitting in a high school geometry class so many years ago, bored out of my mind, I had NO IDEA how useful all those formulas would be for art and design.  They should offer a course called Math for Design Majors that would cover all of the same content as the regular algebra, geometry and precalculus, except all of the problems would use examples from art, architecture and design instead of those dumb word problems about calculating batting averages, trains traveling in opposite directions at different speeds, and the likelihood of winning at dice games.  My math class would be team taught by the Art Department and the Math Department, would have twice as much class time as the regular math class because students would be actually applying the math they were learning to hands-on art projects for reinforcement, and the class would satisfy both the math requirement as well as an elective fine arts credit...

Today's EQ8 Tech Support Solution is Brought to You by Pythagoras, c. 570 - c. 495 BCE

Anyway, did you see that crazy number my magic math came up with?  My center block needs to measure 33.941" x 33.941" in order to fit in my quilt.  Not exactly ruler-friendly, is it?  And that's where it's such a godsend to be able to type a weird measurement into EQ8 and print out foundation paper piecing patterns of the exact size needed, with no rounding or fudging required.  Here's what the print layout for my Storm at Sea block frame looked like when I printed it from the Block Worktable, setting the block size to 33.941":

THAT's More Like It!

MUCH better!  Now each of the Square-In-Square corner blocks fits on a single page, and each of the diamond sections will be taped together from only two sheets of paper.

What Paper Does Rebecca Use for Paper Piecing?

Carol Doak's Foundation Paper on the Left; Saxs Newsprint on the Right. EXACTLY the Same Stuff.

When I write about paper piecing, I often get emails from readers asking what kind of paper I use.  I have tried LOTS of different papers, and my favorite is newsprint.  Some people recommend vellum because you can see through it, but my paper piecing method doesn't require see-through foundation paper and I find that vellum is awfully stiff.  The thicker weights can actually crack along the stitching line as you're sewing the seam.   Plus vellum has a slippery coating that encourages your fabric bits to scoot around without your permission.  Newsprint paper is ideal -- like the kind of paper that cheap children's coloring books are printed on, and that's what kind of paper that paper piecing superstar Carol Doak's recommends as well.  Newsprint is strong enough to hold up throughout the paper piecing process without tearing easily, yet thin enough to tear away once stitching is complete.  Newsprint also has a slight rough texture that helps to "grab" your fabric and reduces slipping -- that's a huge help since you are "sewing blind" when you paper piece, with your fabric completely covered by a sheet of paper under the presser foot of our sewing machine!  

The only challenge with newsprint is that our modern printers are spoiled by printing on fancy copy paper all the time, and sometimes they throw a little tantrum when we ask them to print on lowly newsprint.  For instance, the printer may beep at you and complain that the paper is jammed when you can see with your eyes that there is NO jam, or sometimes multiple sheets will feed through instead of just one piece at a time -- it's that slightly rough texture of the newsprint that "grabs" the fabric and holds it still, so we LIKE that quality in our foundation paper!  Check your printer's paper type settings.  My moderately priced Epson WorkForce inkjet printer/scanner has a Recycled Paper setting that seems to feed newsprint more smoothly than the Plain Paper setting does.  And if an extra sheet or two of newsprint gets stuck in the printer occasionally and gets wasted, I don't worry about it anymore because I found a SUPER cheap source for my newsprint foundation paper. 

At first I was using Carol Doak's Foundation Paper, and it's great stuff.  Although it doesn't say so on the package, it is definitely newsprint and it comes in a pack of 100 8 1/2" x 11" sheets that retails for $12.95 (but Amazon usually has it discounted).  You can probably find that at your local quilt shop or even at JoAnn's.  But then I found the exact same paper at a fraction of the cost -- instead of getting a dinky pack of 100 sheets of Carol Doak's newsprint paper for $12.95, you can get a whole ream of 500 sheets of Sax Plain White newsprint for only $9, with free shipping.  

Now, I love Carol's design aesthetic, I have purchased several of her books, and I would be thrilled if I ever get to take a class with her, but I am not going to pay seven times as much for my foundation paper just so it can have her name on the package.  Newsprint paper isn't fancy stuff, y'all -- it's the stuff your newspaper is printed on, it's the cheap scrap paper they used to pass out for standardized tests in elementary school, for goodness' sake.  It should not cost more than regular copy paper!  I bought my 500-sheet ream of Sax newsprint two years ago, and I still haven't even made a dent in it.



This is the book by Carol Doak that taught me how to paper piece, by the way.  Unlike her newsprint paper, her book was worth every single penny.  She has a paper piecing class on Craftsy that has stellar reviews, too.  So, buy Carol's books and sign up for her classes, but get your newsprint from Sax!

Okay, kiddos (of all ages, including ME!) -- somehow it is now after midnight and my "quick little blog update" has spiraled out of control once again. I actually have a red owie on the edge of my wrist where it has been rubbing against the edge of my laptop keyboard as I type!

So, NO TYPING for me tomorrow!  Instead, I'll be either:

• Working on my Jingle BOM, tweaking the pieced block border, trimming the center medallion and adding inner borders
• Starting the new design I shared with you today using the foundation patterns I printed out before getting sidetracked by a neverending blog post
• Removing the foundation papers from my pineapple log cabin blocks and joining them into rows
• Breaking my no typing vow, and writing another post about the SECOND cool design I came up with today using my EQ8 software!  ;-)

Happy stitching, and have a great weekend!  I'm linking up with :

• Whoop Whoop Fridays at www.confessionsofafabricaddict.blogspot.com.  
• ·       Oh Scrap! at Quilting Is More Fun Than Housework http://quiltingismorefunthanhousework.blogspot.com
• ·       Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts http://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com  
• ·       Main Crush Monday at Cooking Up Quilts http://www.cookingupquilts.com/
• ·       Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt http://lovelaughquilt.blogspot.com/
• ·       Moving it Forward at Em’s Scrap Bag: http://emsscrapbag.blogspot.com.au/
• ·       BOMs Away at Katie Mae Quilts: https://www.katiemaequilts.com/blog/  
• To-Do Tuesday at Stitch ALL the Things: http://stitchallthethings.com
• WIPs on Wednesday at Esther's Quilt Blog: https://estheraliu.blogspot.com
• Let’s Bee Social at www.sewfreshquilts.blogspot.ca/
• Midweek Makers at www.quiltfabrication.com/
• WIPs With Friends at www.mamaspark.blogspot.com

Farmer's Wife Block 58: My Mother Dreams of Dragons

Hello and happy Saturday!  We are all in high spirits at my house this morning because Son the Younger, a.k.a. Anders, is returning from Confirmation Camp this afternoon and we have all missed him.  Yay!  Even Lars tells me that he keeps walking into Anders' bedroom to tell him something, and then remembers that he isn't there.

I finished another 6" sampler block yesterday, Block 58 "Mother's Dream" from the Farmer's Wife book. 

Farmer's Wife Block 58, Mother's Dream

Isn't it CUTE?!  I think these simpler blocks with larger center squares are perfect for fussy-cutting random novelty prints that live in my stash, like this dragon print.  And so, apparently, MY mother dreams of dragons...  I am having so much fun with these little 6" blocks.

I also started another one of those huge 17 3/4" pineapple log cabin blocks yesterday, and I plan to finish that up within the next hour or two.  That will be block 24 of 36, if I'm not mistaken.

And yet, new projects keep bubbling up in dark corners of my mind.  These 6" blocks are so much fun that I'm thinking about starting a few of those 4" Dear Jane blocks.  I have seen so many Dear Jane quilts that I love, and what I love about them is the variety of intricate, tiny blocks and the unique scalloped triangle border.  This is my favorite Dear Jane quilt, pieced and appliqued by a quilter named Gwen and quilted by LAQ Judi Madsen:

Gwen's Gorgeous "Dear Jane" Quilt

Gwen's Quilt, Judi's Quilting, completed in 2011

What I do NOT like about making a Dear Jane quilt is that thousands of other quilters have made their own version of this quilt already, and I am not sure I have anything unique to add to that tradition.  I mean, I love everything about Gwen's DJ quilt, from the crisp white background fabric to the bright, splashy Kaffe Fassett prints (I have a lot of these exact same fabrics in my stash), right down to Judi's spectacular custom quilting.  I don't want to copy someone else's quilt, do I?  But my Farmer's Wife blocks aren't coming out looking the same as everyone else's, so maybe my Dear Jane would come out with its own personality, too.   I could always start making some blocks for fun and see where it goes.  It's not like I don't have enough fabric or anything...  Ahem!

Another project I'm tempted to begin is the Amish Baby Storm at Sea quilt that I designed in EQ7 back in 2014:

Amish Baby Storm at Sea, Coming Soon to a Studio Near Me

At the time, I was worried about whether my skill level was up to piecing these Storm at Sea blocks, so I opted to go with my other baby quilt design using 54-40 or Fight blocks instead.  But after paper piecing all these itty bitty 6" sampler blocks, I feel like the big Storm at Sea blocks will be a piece of cake.  I already have the fabric for this quilt, so why not, right?  It never hurts to have a baby quilt on hand, especially since it takes me longer to finish a baby quilt than it takes to actually gestate a baby from conception to delivery!

Anyway, I've got to go hop in the shower and get ready.  My mom is picking me up to take me to see the musical If/Then at the Belk this afternoon, and although matinees are more casual than evening performances I'm pretty sure that my nightgown won't pass for a sundress.  Enjoy your weekend, everyone!

I'm linking up with Esther's WIPs on Wednesday.  Which reminds me of even MORE projects on my Wanna Do list, like Hazel and Love Entwined...

Spinning My Wheels, and Dreaming of Grandeur

UGH.  I feel like Ugh.  Does that happen to you?  I had this great idea about how I was going to start working on multiple quilts simultaneously, switching back and forth between projects according to my mood, whether I felt like doing hand applique, paper piecing, traditional piecing or whatever, and this was going to be a great thing for productivity and for creativity, blah blah blah.  And so, for the first time ever for me, I set aside a quilt that I had not finished and started working on another one... and another one... and another one. 

Guess what?  It's not working out for me!  I feel lost when I walk into the sewing room, and each time I switch projects I lose my groove and have to relearn whichever technique I haven't done in awhile.  
There was the Jingle BOM, with blocks designed by Erin Russek of One Piece at a Time:


Completed Center Medallion for my Jingle BOM UFO

I set that aside when I realized that I wanted to set my center medallion straight rather than on-point as per Erin's original design, and I was unsure how to calculate the additional pieced borders I envisioned going between the center medallion and the on-point border blocks.  I can't believe I haven't touched this since APRIL!  :-(


My Jingle Border Blocks, Languishing Untouched

Then I decided that I should learn needleturn applique, since I had so much fun with starch and press prepared applique for my Jingle blocks, so and I started working on a Frankensteined Whig Rose applique block consisting of several magazine patterns that I cobbled together.  That one stalled out when I realized that I do not yet know a good method for appliqueing the tiny circles that I imagined going around the center of my flower:


Whig Rose Thingy, Stumped by Rosebuds in Center

Here's the issue with that one: I liked the idea of appliqueing the fussy-cut rosebuds from my Vervain drapery fabric around the center of my flower, but the rosebuds are an odd shape, not really round.  So I can't use the Perfect Circles templates to make these.  I don't think I can needle turn them and get the edges of these tiny shapes perfectly smooth -- and what's more, I'm concerned about making sure that no ivory background shows at the edges of the rosebuds against the brown background.  I got this block to this point by mid May or early June, and then set it aside so I could mull over the rosebud dilemma for awhile:

Stalled Franken-Whig Rose Applique Block

"Let's do something EASY next, to rebuild that confidence," thought Moi.  So I made 9 Bear Paw blocks at the end of May and then decided they needed little 4" sawtooth star blocks as sashing posts. 



My Bear Paws

First, I paper pieced a 3" star that was a pain in the tushy and too small anyway.  Then I tried to make some 4" sawtooth stars at the beach and realized I can't sew anything at the beach because I can't SEE at the beach.  Then I sewed two lovely red sawtooth stars once I got back home...  only to have the red hand marbled fabric bleed all over the white background fabric when I tried to steam and press the finished block.  Bummer!

Bloody Sawtooth Star

One would THINK I might have learned my lesson when one of my red batik fabrics bled in my Jingle blocks.  One would THINK I would have tested this fabric for colorfastness before sewing it to white fabric.  Whatever.  The photo above shows what the block looks like now, after I soaked it in warm water with a couple drops of Dawn dishwashing liquid.  I was able to get a lot of the excess dye out, but dye is still bleeding from the seam allowances where the fabric is stacked up and I am not sure how to get all of that out without fraying or distorting the edges of my blocks.  I made two little star blocks out of this fabric and I used up all of the fabric, otherwise I would make new blocks after rinsing all the loose dye out of the uncut yardage.  And of course I chose to make stars out of this fabric first because it was my favorite...  

Meanwhile, in another fit of inspiration, I started making paper pieced pineapple blocks for a King sized quilt.  Two of those are finished.  I will need to make 34 more of these blocks to get the California King size I want for my bedroom:


EQ7 Mock Up of Pineapple Quilt from Scanned Finished Block

So I've been working on all these quilts for months now, and I have nothing finished to show for myself except for the school fundraiser quilt and the kids' projects.

And yet I find myself longing to start on two more quilts, both of them totally unrealistic choices for me given my current skill set, my family responsibilities, and the amount of time I actually am able to spend sewing.  I have officially lost my mind and have set my heart on making not one but TWO unbelievably challenging historical reproduction quilts:


"Love Entwined," updated color palette, by Esther Aliu

The first one is called Love Entwined, and it's Esther Aliu's free BOM based on a 1790 British quilt.  Esther fell in love with this quilt after seeing a black and white photo of it in an old book called Patchwork.  The current owners of the quilt refuse to allow anyone to see it or photograph it, so Esther has devised her patterns from enlargements of the black and white photo in her book.  We don't know for sure what colors were used in the original, but Esther's mockup of bright fabrics against a dark background is captivating and reminds me of Scandinavian rosemaling.  Look at this gorgeous Love Entwined quilt currently in progress, made by a Dutch quilter:

Dutch Quilter's "Love Entwined" in progress, from Juud's blog

Isn't that insane?  I have been downloading and printing off the patterns as each month's installment is released, and they are all neatly stored in a binder.  Me attempting this quilt today would be like a failing Algebra I student deciding to take Advanced Honors Trigonometry.  However, it gives me something to work towards, and although the project is overwhelming when you look at the whole thing, how bad can it be if you just take it one piece at a time?

The other historical reproduction quilt that I am recently obsessed with is the Civil War era quilt with 4 1/2" miniature blocks and a striking, unusual pieced triangle border made by Vermont quilter Jane A. Stickle in 1863.  This is the "Dear Jane" quilt:

Original Sampler Quilt by Jane A. Stickle, 1863, Photo by Ken Burris

This quilt was popularized and made accessible by Brenda Manges Papadakis' 1993 Dear Jane book, including all 256 block patterns that she painstakingly redrafted.  In the years since Papadakis' book came out, thousands of quilters have created faithful reproductions or modern reinterpretations of this quilt, and EQ sells a standalone Dear Jane software program that allows you to print out the block patterns in any size for rotary cutting, hand piecing, foundation piecing, or applique.  I really love the border on this quilt, and how fresh and modern it looks when it's made up in bright contemporary fabrics:


"Dear Jane Revisited" made by Gwen, Quilted by Judi Madsen of Green Fairy Quilting

I think Gwen used all Kaffe Fassett prints for her version of Dear Jane.  She did a phenomenal job, and of course Judi Madsen's long arm quilting is magnificent as usual:

Detail of Madsen's Quilting on Gwen's "Jane Revisited"

Madsen's Quilting Completed, Ready for Gwen to Finish and Bind

Madsen spent 70 hours quilting this masterpiece.  Doesn't this just take your breath away?  Please check out Judi's Green Fairy blog here to read more about this beautiful quilt. 

Ah, but what business do I have contemplating Love Entwined and Dear Jane when I have so many more attainable projects underway, and can't seem to make progress on any of them?!

And so, UGH!  :-)

Have a great weekend, everyone!

AQS Quilt Week With the Kiddos: A Belated Recap

Lars Test Drives a Gammill Long Arm Quilting Machine, as Anders Looks On

I just realized that I never got around to posting about AQS Charlotte Quilt Week!  I schlepped my whole family with me, and as you can see, the boys found plenty to interest them at the show.  After terrifying the Gammill sales reps by reprogramming their $30,000+ computerized long arm quilting machine, my 13-year-old son Lars was redirected to this manual long arm machine, which they graciously allowed him to play with for a LONG time.  Lars thought it was cool, and he did a pretty good job for his first try:

Custom Quilting by Lars

No, Mom did not buy him a long arm machine of his very own.  :-)  I did sign him up for an EQ7 Intermediate to Advanced Pieced Drawing class with Barb Vlack.  Barb's class was fantastic, and she was very kind and welcoming to Lars.  If any of you quilters out there own EQ7 software and you have kids or grandkids who enjoy art and computers, I highly recommend that you get those kids into an EQ software class if you ever have the opportunity to do so. 

Lars had already completed all of the workbook exercises that came with the quilt design software, and he had no problem keeping up with the class.  He created some really nifty quilt designs, several of which I would consider making into a real quilt:

Designed by Lars in EQ7

Designed by Lars in EQ7

Aren't those cool?  That boy needs to learn to sew up his quilt designs (and he WILL learn, but he has to finish his cross stitch project before he starts something new).  My mantra as a mother is "Do as I say, not as I do."  Ahem.

Now, for the eye candy from the show floor:

"Roses for Katrina" by Gail H. Smith, North Barrington, IL

I have a soft spot in my heart for antique red and green applique quilts, and this one by Gail Smith struck a chord with me.  I really like the way the borders were quilted, too:

Detail of "Roses for Katrina" by Gail Smith

"Roses for Katrina" took home a 2nd place ribbon for its meticulous workmanship and truly striking design.  I'm sure those white chains in front of the quilts were there to stop people like me from drooling all over them.

"Adagio" by Dianne S. Hire, Northport, Maine

Next to catch my eye was another applique quilt with extensive but artfully subtle beading and surface embellishment, "Adagio" by Dianne Hire.  This is probably what inspired me to add beading to my monogrammed sewing machine cover.

Detail of "Adagio" by Dianne S. Hill

Detail of "Adagio" by Dianne S. Hill

See what I mean?  The beads and tiny buttons aren't what you notice right off the bat about this quilt, but it draws you in for a closer look and THEN you see the meticulous detail.  Perfection! 

"Fiesta Fireworks" by Julia Graber of Brooksville, Mississippi

I enjoyed seeing Julia Graber's "Fiesta Fireworks" raw edge applique quilt as well. 

"The Acacia: A Tree of Life" by Sue Gilgen of St. George, Utah

Anders and Bernie both really enjoyed "The Acacia: A Tree of Life" by Sue Gilgen. 

Detail of "Acacia" by Sue Gilgen

The detail and energy in that quilt are just incredible.

"Monument Valley at Sunset" by Cathy Geier, Waukesha, Wisconsin

Anders asked me to take this picture of "Monument Valley at Sunset," by Cathy Geier.  He liked how it was done in three separate sections so it looked like you were seeing the sunset through a triple window.

"Pi" by Cheryl Brickey of Greer, SC

Naturally my kids were excited to see Cheryl Brickey's "Pi" quilt, but Anders questioned why the quilter didn't use any circles or curves in a quilt that was supposed to be about pi.  Interesting observation -- perhaps someday he'll make his own Pi quilt with circles in it.

Anders also found the above posted notice hysterically funny.  He liked the part about how our likenesses could only be used throughout the KNOWN Universe, and pointed out that if they find any ADDITIONAL places in the Universe, they will need to get our permission to include our voice and likeness in whatever photos or videos we might have accidentally stepped into. 


"Autumn Journey at White Oak" by Kathryn Zimmerman, Mars Hill, NC

"Autumn Journey at White Oak" by Kathryn Zimmerman was another 2nd place ribbon quilt that I adored.  Look at the gorgeous dimensional ruched applique flowers:

Detail of "Autumn Journey at White Oak" by Kathryn Zimmerman

Finally, after ignoring the Dear Jane craze for SO long, I was smitten against my will by this beauty:

"Jane as a Teenager" by Anya Tyson, Wellsboro, PA

The faithful reproductions of Jane A. Stickle's famous Civil War era quilt never did it for me, but seeing this version of bright, sparkling miniature blocks against a dark background won me over.  Here's the original quilt, made by Jane A. Stickle in 1863.  The blocks are 4 1/2" and there are over 5,000 pieces in this quilt:

Photo by Ken Burris, courtesy Bennington Museum & Vermont Quilt Festival 

I had to order Brenda Manges Papadakis' Dear Jane book immediately when I got home.  I won't be STARTING this immediately, since I'm already in the middle of four other quilts and it might be nice to FINISH a quilt this year.  But I have added a Jane quilt to my Wanna Do List.

Meanwhile, if I keep writing such epic blog posts, I won't get ANY quilting accomplished!