Tag Archives: inspiration

Kauai Road — done!

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This quilt began with a photograph of a road in Hanalei, Hawaii. If you’ve been there, you know the place. I used Photoshop to generate a drawing.

I made a placement overlay with the bones of the design. I didn’t use templates — I cut fabric by eye and built the quilt on my design wall.

Here it is, unquilted…

KauaiRoad-15

The quilting brings all the elements together; the quilting finishes the quilt.

I love this quilt, but Steve loves it more. It is hanging in our dining room on the wall he can see from his spot on the sofa. I suspect it’s going to stay on that wall for a long time.

KauaiRoad-Final-01-1000

What story would you want to hear?

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I am giving a lecture at the Minnesota Quilters Show in Duluth in June and they have requested that I share stories about Piece O’ Cake. Here’s my question: what sort of stories would you want to hear?

I could tell you what I’ve thought of, but I’m more interested in hearing what you think. I appreciate in advance any suggestion you have. Thanks!

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You’ve seen 007 before but he’s so much fun that I thought you might like seeing him again :-).

Meet Lucy…

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This is Lucy, who celebrated her 88th birthday on August 18 in my class at The Quilt Crossing in Boise. How cool is that!

PickUpSticks-Class-Lucy

The class worked on Pick-Up Sticks from The Quilter’s Practical Guide To Color, learning how to make this improv block the easy way. Everyone had a great time, especially Lucy!

Some of Lucy’s Piece O’ Cake applique quilts were hanging in the classroom and it was so much fun to have them there. This is her version of Spectacular Spring from Applique Delights (still available as a downloadable ebook).

Lucy-AppliqueDelights

And this is Lucy’s version of Thru Grandmother’s Window, our first block of the month. The patterns are available as downloadable ePatterns.

Lucy-ThruGrandmotherWindow

Lucy and I agreed that it’s good to have a goal and we both want to be quilting into our 100s. That’s an excellent goal, don’t you think?!

Day to night…

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I just watched Stephen Wilkes’ TED Talk. He is a photographer with a vision—and some exceptionally cool equipment.

My Photo Class assignment for the week is ‘stuck in place.’ We have to pick a spot and stay in it for an hour, taking pictures. I had the same assignment last year and really enjoyed it. I’m glad to have seen this video before I set out with my camera :-).

Outer space, all for you!

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NASA has a massive library of amazing photos and they are right there for us to use! Read the fine print because there are some restrictions but for the most part we can use them for non-commercial purposes. I have always loved this sort of picture…

This image shows the galaxy Messier 94, which lies in the small northern constellation of the Hunting Dogs, about 16 million light-years away. Within the bright ring around Messier 94 new stars are forming at a high rate and many young, bright stars are present within it – thanks to this, this feature is called a starburst ring. The cause of this peculiarly shaped star-forming region is likely a pressure wave going outwards from the galactic centre, compressing the gas and dust in the outer region. The compression of material means the gas starts to collapse into denser clouds. Inside these dense clouds, gravity pulls the gas and dust together until temperature and pressure are high enough for stars to be born.

This image shows the galaxy Messier 94, which lies in the small northern constellation of the Hunting Dogs, about 16 million light-years away. Within the bright ring around Messier 94 new stars are forming at a high rate and many young, bright stars are present within it – thanks to this, this feature is called a starburst ring.

And the earth from space is also pretty darned interesting!

A hurricane, seen from space.

I was reminded about these free NASA images by John McWade. You should watch his free video about how he made calendars using these images. I read all of his issues of Before & After, published over the last many years. I learned so much about graphic design, text, and layout from him! He is now at Lynda.com and I wish him years of happiness there.

More about that bird…

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If you get my newsletter you will have seen the Hexy Bird block I’m working on now. I still have to add a pupil to the eye, stitch the blue hexies into flowers, and stitch the yellow and orange hexies together to make the larger hex that surrounds the bird—and then applique them to the block—but you can see where it’s going. I think this will be the center of a terrific baby quilt!

Below is Linda’s Hexy Bird, which is also very cute. Isn’t it surprising to see how different a block can look in a different colorway?!

Hexy Bird Block

It may be a while before I have borders around my block, but when I get it together, I’ll share the photo. Click to see the Hexy Bird ePattern if you missed it when I showed it before.