Newsy stuff!

I have exciting news for all my blog readers! Sometimes I don't get around to to announcing stuff here that's already been shared on social media, but this first bit of news is a big deal so I want to share it as much as possible!

I am one of the Aurifil 2018 Design Team!

This means I get to design one of the blocks in the Aurifil Block of the Month next year! Hooray! I absolutely love the theme and my mind is already buzzing with ideas. Which is a good job as I am up quite soon as my month is March!

And look at that crowd of awesome quilters! I can't quite believe I am included in such a group, I feel incredibly honoured.

The whole thing is hosted by quilting legend, Pat Sloan, who is just as warm, friendly and fun as she looks in her photos. Each Month Pat interviews the designer and participants have one month to make the block and enter at her website to be in the running to win a BOX of thread!  

You can read all about it on the Aurifil blog here. And I'll post more about it in the New Year when it starts so you can all join in if you like!

My second bit of news is that I have been nominated in two categories for the British Craft Awards!

Last year I won second and third prize in the Best Quilt Blog and Best Quilt Designer categories respectively, which was a huge thrill! I have been nominated for both categories again and if you'd like to vote for me please click here and choose the quilting category. Voting closes Sunday 17th December, so you have a bit of time yet. By voting you will also get the chance to win £600 of Amazon vouchers!

Thank you so much in advance if you do take the time to vote for me, I really appreciate your support!

Announcements Galore!

I've been meaning to publish a newsy post for ages and now my 'news bag' is full to bursting! So I am going to get everything out there in one big announcement splurge! 

Did you know it is World Craft Week this week?! 

Check out the Facebook page to find out how to get involved with this year's challenge:

"Share your craft crush and take part in World Craft Week's inspiring challenge!

To celebrate all things crafty, we're challenging you to post a photo, or share a short crafting video, of something you've made on our Facebook page. Tag someone or something that inspires you and your craft, encouraging them to take up the World Craft Week challenge as well. Remember to use the hashtag #worldcraftweek when you share your craft crush with us"

Plus there is still time to sign up for more info and get a free digital magazine with 25 craft projects!

That lovely little 'yarn bee' above is the logo for the Indie Burgh Yarn Crawl, brain child of Jessica from Ginger Twist Studio. In previous year's this has been a yarn shop crawl around Edinburgh, but this year it's expanded to include all sorts of fabric and craft shops too, and myBearpaw is taking part (plus we do sell yarn!).

It takes place on Saturday 17 June 2017 and is a great way to support local craft shops and get involved with the crafting community. Each shop validation on your 'Craft Passport' counts as a raffle entry. Check out the Facebook page for more info. Passports will be available from myBearpaw and other participating shops soon, plus look out for some special offers and other excitements that we have planned for the day!

This year's Thread House Retreat was such a great success that we are repeating the event at the same time and at the same place next year! This is a residential weekend retreat hosted by myself, Karen Lewis and Lynne Goldsworthy for around 40 participants, held at Folly Farm near Bristol. Take a look at the retreat page on our website for more info about last year's event and sign up for news about the next one. We'll be releasing tickets sometime in June, more details soon!         

And speaking of Retreats... 

Get ready everyone! Stitch Gathering 2017 tickets will be released on Friday at 1pm. This will be our 5th event and takes place on Sunday 8th October at Napier University's Craiglockhart Campus, Edinburgh. As in previous years we won't release details about workshops, teachers, ticket projects or swaps until the summer. If you are new to the event and would like to know what all the fuss is about check out my report blog post from last year, and this page featuring last year's classes from our Stitch Gathering website. Tickets will cost £120. 

The second Knitting and Stitching Show Edinburgh is coming up soon! 

It's at the Royal Highland Show Ground, just by the airport on 27th - 30th April. Last year's event was a huge success and this year there is even more reason to come - our Edinburgh Modern Quilt Guild have our own Gallery Space and will be exhibiting a number of our member's quilts!

Plus I will be teaching a class every day to make this Patchwork Storage Caddy. You can buy tickets for the workshops here. I will also be demoing twice a day in both Origami bags and Log Cabin Tote Bags - all demos are free!

If you haven't already bought a ticket to the K & S show then you can get £2 off each ticket (£1 off concessions) by quoting code DISC3 at checkout .

If you can't make it to Edinburgh then perhaps I will see you at the Festival of Quilts in August! 

I am teaching there again this year - my Patchwork Portraits Workshop and my 3D Improv Dresden Workshop. Tickets and booking is available already to Quilter's Guild members with general public release very imminent. Check out all the details here.

Plus don't forget to enter a quilt this year! I will be entering a few including one to the new Modern Quilt Category that launched last year. The quilt exhibition is not juried so if you enter your quilt it will be hung!

We have some new fabric which I actually managed to list online! This is Denyse Schmidt's Winter Walk and Joel Dewberry's Modernist. We have it available it FQs, yardage and bundles! Check out our website here.

Lastly a huge thank you to whoever voted for me in the British Craft Awards! I came third in best Quilt Designer of the year and second in Best Quilting Blog of the year!! The last one makes me especially pleased as I guess it means some of you really like to read my ramblings over here. 

Thank you so much, that means such a lot to me :)

P.S. If you haven't had enough of me yet then why not read an interview with me on Judith Hollies blog, part of her Meet the Maker series. It was published a month but March went by in such a blur that I only just got a chance to read it!

Stitch Gathering Words Quilt #1

At the Stitch Gathering 2015 we sent attendees fabric and asked them to embellish it with their favourite word. This would then be their ticket. We asked for words to be positive and life affirming.

You can read more about the ticket words project inception here.

Our amazing retreaters brought along fabulous works of art using so many different techniques! They were all displayed on the day.

Prior to last year's event I made two quilt tops from the words and basted them. At Stitch Gathering 2016 we had a group hand quilting session in the afternoon and the quilting was started!

Of course it was only started at the event, and I had planned to machine quilt the remainder of the tops at home (as hand quilting is a bit of a no-no to me these days - with my dodgy hand!). But then my lovely assistant Lynsey, offered to hand quilt the WHOLE of one of the quilts!!

Lynsey handed the quilt back to me just before Christmas and I finally bound it a few days ago.

So now it needs to be donated to somewhere suitable - like a hospice or other institution where it can inspire and spread love through stitches. I have had a few suggestions already which I will be chasing up (in case they can't take it for some reason like space or sterility) and I hope to compile a shortlist which can then be voted on by everyone that had a hand in making it.

But I would love a few more suggestions, bearing in mind there will be another quilt coming along! If you have any ideas, please email me. Anywhere in the UK would be fine.

And what about that other quilt? Well the totally amazing and generous Lynsey is now hand quilting that too!! Talk about a quilt hero!! 

And speaking of quilt heroes, I happen to know another one! 

At last year's Stitch Gathering the ticket project was to make your 'dream house' block. At the end of the event four people took away 20 blocks each to make into quilts for Siblings Together. The amazing Sheila (@budsmam on IG) finished this quilt a few weeks back - thank you so much Sheila!

 Lynsey also took away 20 blocks to finish a quilt, however as she is doing all this heroic hand quilting she doesn't think she can also finish the house quilt. So, would anybody like to volunteer themselves to finish a quilt? The blocks are complete, they need sewing together (perhaps with sashing like the quilt below, but not necessarily) and then basting, quilting (anyway you like - it's a great way to practice FMQ) and binding. 

If you feel like being a quilt hero too then please let me know in an email - hello@mybearpaw.co.uk

One more thing - our store won runner up in the Best Independent Store, Scotland, in the British Sewing  Awards yesterday! Thank you to everyone who voted for us! We will display our badge with pride!!

A little more news... and a fantastic community quilt!

Let's get the news bit out of the way first! I know I asked you to vote for my shop a couple of weeks back in the Sew Awards but like buses, two award nominations have come along at the same time!

I found out this week that I had been nominated for not one but TWO British Craft Awards in the Quilting category - Best Quilt Designer and Best Quilt Blogger!!! And The Thread House has been nominated in Best Quilt Brand! I am really blown away by this and so honoured to be in the company of such fabulously talented quilters and bloggers (most of whom are really good mates/business partners!).

So if you do decide to head over here and vote for me then I completely understand if you change your mind and vote for someone else when confronted by the rest of the list! If you do vote for me then THANK YOU very much!

I thought you might like to know about this wonderful quilt project that I took part in for the Museum of Childhood which is on the Royal Mile in Edinburgh. They have a new exhibition called Bedtime Stories which is all about memories of bedtime stories. Part of the exhibition is a special quilt made by over 60 adults and children from across the UK.

I contributed this cute deer block which was from a pattern by Shapemoth and available on Craftsy here. It was a great little FPP project and I love how it turned out.

Here's what I wrote to accompany it:

"When I was six years old I had a very powerful dream about a deer. I can't remember anything else about it now apart from the deer, but the memory of how the dream effected me has stayed with me through all of my life. At the time I had probably just seen Bambi at the cinema (which I loved) and this was probably why I dreamt about a deer. There was also a favourite sit-on ride at a nearby supermarket which was of a deer. I used to think about all these deer at bedtime because I wanted to have this dream again, but I never did. However I still have amazing dreams and often write them down, and I still love deer, and think of them as a kind of totem animal for me."

If you are in or around Edinburgh then you should definitely try and get to this exhibition, it's on till 24th February. If you want to find out more about the exhibition click here.

One more little thing, I am having a giveaway over on Instagram for this gorgeous big box of Blueberry Park Aurifil and some lovely BP fabric!! Head on over to IG to enter!

News News News!

I seem to have lots of news to share, so this post will be a bit of a round up!

First of all myBearpaw, my Edinburgh store, has been nominated for the best Scottish independent shop category in the British Sewing Awards!!

How exciting and surprising! Apparently the nominations were all made by readers, so thank you to whoever nominated us. The awards are organised by Sew Magazine and the results are announced next spring.

You can vote for us here! Obviously only if you want to :) But if you do - a huge thank you!

The latest issue of Sewing World Magazine includes a fantastic four page feature all about The Thread House! We were interviewed by the lovely Kerry and she has done a great job - it's a really good read.

You can find out all about our history and our future hopes and dreams. Plus it's a fabulous magazine with some great projects and a piece all about bag designers that includes Katy The Littlest Thistle.

One last piece of news!

I entered my Conkers Quilt into an exhibition called 'Modern Quilts - Redesigning Traditions' at the Ontario Museum of History and Art which is (confusedly!) in California, and it got selected!! So this is off to the USA in a few weeks time and the exhibition starts in December.

Hopefully this means it will have a chance in getting selected for the QuiltCon exhibition too! And if you want to make your own version of this quilt you can download a pattern from The Thread House Store.

More news to come next week (well I guess every blog post is news!), meanwhile I am off to London for a girly weekend - woop woop!