Festival of Quilts 2017 Report

The Festival of Quilts is a four day event and the largest quilt show in Europe with thousands of quilts to see, and way too much to buy! Plus you get to catch up with all your quilty friends! Basically it is four days of bliss and excitement, where you feel completely 'amongst your people'!

If you remember in my last post I was just finishing my Shangri La Farm Sherbert Quilt for the Aurifil stand. You can see it behind me in the shot above as I happily clutch my new Aurifil Thread Collection box 'Sherbert Dip' for the first time!

I spent some time on the Aurifil stand on Friday afternoon and gave a demo to the gathered crowd which was filmed by the lovely Jenni for Aurifil's Facebook page. You can view it here. Things didn't go completely to plan and there were a few electrical issues (!!) which just made it all the more fun and entertaining. 

The demo is for my Tendrils Technique which you can see on that lovely panel above, it's a clever and quick way to machine applique leaves and stems without any raw edges.

I had a couple of quilts in the exhibition, and here are the obligatory photos of me standing in front of them (taken by my helpful cousin Julie who I met for lunch with my sister on Saturday - quilting being quite a family affair for us!). This is my Almost Black quilt which was in the Modern Quilt category.

And here is Hot Water Microbes which I made with Tatyana Duffie for the two person category.

I think the quilts in the competition this year were the best ever, it was quite overwhelming. I took quite a few photos and shared some on Instagram, and could fill this whole post with incredible quilts, but I am just going to share two. 

My favourite in the Traditional category (which got 3rd prize, though IMHO it should have won!) is by Janette Chilver and is simply epic!

My favourite in the Modern category is 'The World is Your Oyster' by  my friend Tatyana, the quilting is just sublime and I love the colours and design. You can see some more detailed shots and read about this quilt in this post.

Apart from the competition quilts there were also the most amazing quilts and textile art at all the galleries, including some stunning quilts from Victoria Findlay Wolfe, who was there in the flesh - what a charming lady!

If you want to check out a lot more quilts from the whole festival try this excellent blogpost by Zephyre Skies.

On Thursday afternoon I taught an Academy classes for my Patchwork Portraits technique.

Gill was this class's over achiever by managing to create her daughter at her recent graduation, complete with gown and mortar board and tiny red heels!! Brilliant stuff Gill! And her daughter liked it too.

Jane brought along a piece of fabric to match her blouse (the exact same fabric!) and managed to create a pretty accurate portrait of herself!

Love the glasses! If only Jane had a lime green spotty hat...

Julia finished her 'Ascot lady' at home and kindly sent me a photo. 

Love her matching accessories Julia!

On Friday I taught another Academy class for my 3D improv Dresden Plates.

Sue was the star pupil this session, managing to almost finish during the 3 hour class (this one just needs it's centre).

Some of the other students finished at home and sent me photos. This is by Elizabeth Ann who won one of the FOQ tickets on my Instagram giveaway!

This one is by Rhonda, she got the 3D effect spot on, love it!

And Ruth made a beautiful version and then made a 'wonder cushion' with the scraps. I hadn't encountered these before but now really want to make one for my wonder clips too!!

Thanks so much to all my lovely students, you were all a pleasure to teach!

I had one more quilt on show at FOQ and it was keeping really good company! Here is the first photo I've shared of my Tendrils quilt which is on the cover of the latest Today's Quilter (expect a post about this in a few days!), with Karen Lewis's gorgeous 'Outback Wife' quilt from Love Patchwork and Quilting to the left and Lynne Goldsworthy's stunning log cabin from a recent TQ supplement above!

It's a Thread House triple whammy!!

I was very prudent with my cash and bought just one pattern and one packet of needles (too busy chatting to shop!). The pattern was for this Bubble Pod by the very talented Beth Studley. I had been admiring it for the last couple of years, wondering if I could make one on my own. But this year I took the plunge and bought it. I made it as soon as I got home on Monday (I needed some fun sewing to ease myself back to work). It is an excellent pattern which I wouldn't hesitate to recommend!

I am delighted with it and am using it for my stash of Aurifil 80wt!

The Quilt Block Cookbook

I've had some free time this week so I decided to do a little recreational sewing (as opposed to work sewing!).

I recently got hold of a copy of Amy Gibson's new book The Quilt Block Cookbook. You may know Amy from her blog Stitchery Dickory Dock (such a great name!).

There are so many great books out there and you will have heard me recommend a few of them over here, but I do think this one is a bit special.

For a start it is really gorgeous to look at, I just love the photography and styling. It's published by Lucky Spool who always seem to produce really stylish books. Also the layout is so clear and concise, with it's concept of 'block recipes'.

Amy offers 50 different patchwork blocks all made from different units and elements (a very good construction section guides you through making these). There is unlimited potential here to change and resize blocks, making it a great entry point to designing your own quilts.

And then what I really love the most are the incredibly creative and original ways she puts the blocks together, making sampler quilts with a big twist. I absolutely love Celestial below - so modern yet so classic!

Here are just some of the sampler quilts, there are more amazing ideas in the book.

And with so many fun blocks to choose from I really wanted to try a couple out.

Jennifer Paganelli has a new fabric line coming out soon called Hotel Frederiksted (another great name!) and I think it may be her best yet! And as Jen and I have a 'special relationship' I get to play with it early ;)

Look at this fabric!! It actually hurts my eyes to see so much beauty together! I will be making a quilt with this for Today's Quilter later this month but I couldn't help cracking into the bundle for a little trial run...

And so I made a few blocks from Amy's book. This is 'True North' recipe number 5. I mixed in some coordinating Kona solids for contrast.

And then I made Spin the Bottle, number 9.

By now I was thinking, hmm... maybe four would make a nice mini quilt...

So I made two more of each, getting to try a good selection of of the fabric as I went.

I purposely kept the same fabric for the corners of each block. Amy specifically talks about corners and the impact they make when the blocks go together. I was hoping something interesting would happen here.

And I think it does! I haven't sewn these together yet as I am really not sure. I may make more and try out some others. I would love to make a version of the Celestial with them, or one of the other sampler quilts in the book.

Or I may just make more of these and put them on point! I actually like them like this better.

There is just so much potential! So they are going to stay on the design wall for now while I (sadly) get back to my chores. But I can't wait to resume playing with them very soon.

Meanwhile if you have any thoughts on what I should do with these blocks then please share them here!

You can get a copy of Amy's excellent book here. I really think it would be a big asset to every quilter's library from beginners upwards.

Mystery Quilt Update

We are up to week 7 of my Mystery Quilt evening course tonight so I thought it was a good time to share the quilt's progress so far.

I shared the first couple of blocks in posts earlier this year and explained how offering this class back in December (when we launched the term) had given me a couple of extra months to plan a new intermediate patchwork course. This was of course completely dependent on my students having faith in my design abilities as they had nothing to go on when they booked this (luckily they trust me!)!

Here is a re-cap of the first 'snail's trail' block and the first block I made, top right. This ended up as block 4 as I thought students needed a bit of a 'run at it'!

So the bottom left 'shooting star' block became week 2.

And this 'sawtooth checkerboard' was number 3. Yes I have to keep coming up with names for the blocks too - not my strong point!

The idea is that we make a block in class and then at home students 're-mix' the block any way they like for their second block (giving us 16 blocks at the end). Here is my re-mix of number 3. So far the students have all amazed and impressed me with their imaginative re-mixes!

Here is my re-mix of number 4, except this is actually the original block 'storm at sea' and the first version was my remix (keep up at the back!). I have been using EQ7 for some of these blocks (the ones with FPP templates) and am finding this software really useful as I get better at it.

I have also become increasingly fascinated by this block and the way the diamond shapes give the optical illusion of curves. I have just finished a whole quilt with some of these same elements for a magazine. I can't wait to share it here but publication isn't until the end of May!

Block 5 was a mini Lone Star. Each week the blocks are getting more challenging for my class. But they are totally up for it and are rising to the challenge with no complaints!

I thought this block had limited options for re-mixing so didn't really try anything for my second one (except switching the background from light to dark). But then one of my students astounded me by rotating each of the corners 180 degrees (and making each corner have a different background) to make a totally different block!

This same student, Mags, is actually making 4 different blocks each week (for a giant quilt!) and is really shining with her different re-mixes, as are all my students. One of the most wonderful (and surprising) things about teaching is how much you constantly learn from your students!

This is block 6 and another from EQ7. They call this 'morning star' and it is all FPP and therefore quite time consuming. But I love it!

I wasn't sure how the mixed light and dark background was really going to work for the re-mixed block but actually it is my favourite block so far.

It's quite hard coming up with ideas for new blocks each week so I have talked the students into designing their own blocks for the last class.
I thought a really fun last class would be to let the students design their own blocks! I think they have acquired enough confidence and knowledge of techniques through this quite rigorous course to give it a go under my tutelage.

But that still leaves week 7 tonight. Carrying forward my 'each week more challenging than the last' mantra we are really going for it this week with a double New York Beauty type block which I adapted from an EQ7 block (there was actually even more detail in the original!) called 'Rolling Wheel'.

It is ridiculously laborious! I managed to make a quarter of the block last week to show them and I feel like it has taken me all week to finish it! And it is very far from perfect!

Poor Mags, can she really make 4 of these??!! So I am thinking I will offer an easier alternative as well. I have a block up my sleeve that I was going to use for my 'design your own block' week (yes, of course I forgot that I will need a block anyway to finish the quilt myself *sigh*).

I may also manage another easier 'curved piecing' block before the class tonight - I have a few hours to spare! Maybe this Mystery Quilt wasn't such a great idea after all...

Hopefully I will be back relatively soon with a whole finished quilt to share!

Lone Star Rising Higher Quilt

It's a bit of a Ta Da moment!
My Lone Star quilt made with Karen Lewis's new fabric is finished!

My Instagram followers will have seen this coming to life over the last month or so and I'm sure will also have heard over there about Karen's new fabric line with Robert Kaufman.

I am a huge fan of Karen's screen printed fabric (as seen in my recent Buffer Wheel quilt) so I was very excited to be let into a little secret, way back in March when Karen came to stay with me. And as those of you who read my last post will know I am really good at keeping secrets!

Karen had loved the Lone Star Rising quilt I designed for Quilt Now magazine earlier in the year and asked if I could make a version of this with some of her new fabric line once she got hold of it.

So, what seems like ages ago now, I chose some fabrics, on screen, from her first collection with Robert Kaufman, which is called Blueberry Park.

Even though I am quite familiar with Kona colours (these are all printed on Kona shades), it was quite difficult to decide!

But I was very happy when they arrived and looked so fantastic together! Something about the white pattern on top of the vibrant shades really ticks all my boxes.

I have ordered A LOT of Blueberry Park for the shop including all the designs I've used here. The fabric should be hitting shops in November. As Karen will be visiting again to teach with us in November I am hoping to organise a 'shopping evening' on Saturday 21st (so 'make a date'!). Fingers crossed the fabric has arrived by then!



This is a scaled down version of my earlier quilt with the diamonds two thirds of the size of the original. I decided to add more background to the bottom to make it the right size for a single bed and to create the effect of the 'Lone Star Sun' rising higher into the sky, hence the name. It is 180cm x 125cm (71 x 49 inches).

This extra background also meant some negative space to go to town on my FMQ a little. You can see the quilting a little better on the back.

I quilted what a call 'sun creatures' meandering all over the star part, then I quilted 'rays' coming out from the 'sun' and filled these with spirals, bubbles, mussels and more sun creatures.

This is definitely the most ambitious FMQ I have tackled to far, and I did wonder how much easier those long wavy 'ray' lines would be if I had a long-arm machine! But I managed with my trusty Pfaff.

I used Aurifil 50 in a gold shade #5015 (for the star) and a mint #2835 (for the background).

The backing fabric is a special extra wide quilt back fabric by Tula Pink. The range is called 'Free Fall' quilt backing, it's 108" (270cm) wide and comes in 6 colours and will be available in the UK in October/November. It also has a lovely 'sateen' finish. I bordered it with some Kona Cerise and the binding is another Tula Pink fabric from her Eden line.

I had some left over diamond strips so I made this mini quilt which I used to try out some of my FMQ ideas before I started quilting. I also have some left over fabric and I have decided to giveaway the quilt and the fabric on Instagram in a few days time. I am really sorry for those of you not on Instagram and I promise I will host a giveaway over here soon too! I try to alternate giveaways between blog, Instagram and Facebook to keep things fair.

I've really enjoyed working with Karen's gorgeous fabric on this project, it is perfect for the Lone Star pattern. I just can't wait to get my full order in!

I don't think this will be the last Lone Star Rising quilt I make either, I am teaching a workshop in this next month (fully booked I'm afraid!) so will probably start another as a class sample!