Let it Snow!

I had the pleasure of going to Cleveland as a representative of The Warm Company last week to tape a segment on America Sews with Sue Hausmann and it was a great time. This was my second appearance on the show and even more fun than the first. We displayed a lot of my quilt projects and newest patterns using their products and talked about them in Sue’s sewing studio. Then I demonstrated how to make a placemat project geared toward children. Sue and the entire crew were great hosts and made the entire experience completely painless.

But I have to say that my favorite part of the trip was that I got to see snow! Everyone on the crew thought I was crazy when they saw how happy I was when the snow started falling but I truly miss it (see the disclaimer below). I’m from Des Moines, IA, originally, and have lived in the Phoenix area for the past 8 years so I don’t get to see it too often. I especially miss it at this time of year and it wasn’t easy putting up my Christmas tree a couple of weeks ago in 80 degree temps. I’m sure many of you think I’m nuts, too, but Christmastime always seemed to be snowy when I was a kid in Iowa. Memories of sledding and snowball fights and building snowmen and snow forts are what I try to bring to mind when I’m designing for the holidays and winter. Of course, snow has its ugly, dark side, and I’ve been witness to that also. I simply choose to repress those memories.

Whether you’re working on a wintertime or holiday project or not, this is the perfect time of year to shift your quilting into high gear. If your world is snowy and cold right now, use it as your inspiration to catch up on all of your quilting projects in the works! And, this is the perfect time to resolve to make more time for quilting in 2009.

Disclaimer: Snowfall must be in small, aesthetically pleasing amounts, during the holiday season, not accompanied by bitter cold, and gone, for the rest of the season, by the time I wake up in the morning on January 2nd.

Dedicated to grandmas everywhere

Here's my latest to hit the marketplace. Sugar & Spice is a table runner and coordinating placemats pattern in a warm, more "country" home look. I designed these to be made from some of my yarn-dyed Kona Colorworks by Patrick Lose for Robert Kaufman Fabrics but you could even make it in bright contemporary Christmas colors. If you have kids or grandkids around your house during the holiday season, this will put a twinkle in their eyes (similar to the one brought on by a kick-ass sugar buzz but without all of the fallout).

My inspiration for this one came from memories of my grandma's kitchen during the week before the holidays. Our entire huge family would get together on Christmas Eve at my grandparents' house and those times are my fondest childhood memories of Christmas. During the week before, my grandma and anyone who cared to help would bake cookies or make candies until there wasn't a place left to store them. (The only difference is that it was her famous molasses cookies, not gingerbread, that I remember and miss the most.) All of the cookies would be stacked in brand new shirt boxes layered in wax paper, and hidden where we couldn't get into them. Either Grandma wasn't very good at finding hiding spots or she intentionally put them where we could sneak one now and then in between the ones she gave us. She was the perfect grandma and, even though she's been gone for two decades, I still miss her and the things she would bake. So this one is dedicated to Grandma :)

I've got another one ready to show you, too, but I have other things I need to accomplish today so check back, maybe tomorrow, to see the next in line! It's one of my favorites to date.

Thanks for looking in on me :)

Introducing "Wintry Welcome"

I designed Wintry Welcome during one of the hottest weeks here in Phoenix recently...temps around 115 every day. It's not hard to figure out why I had snow on my mind.

This new pattern is a great one for anyone new to satin stitch appliqué. There are a lot of straight lines but enough curves for "turning" practice. Satin stitching in black rayon embroidery thread from Robison-Anton gives this guy a "cartoony" look. I used an opalescent white thread to quilt the entire piece in a loopy meandering path that gives the impression of the snow blowing around. It makes a great door banner for all of the winter season...not only the holidays.

I hope you like him!

A sneak peek

My knowledge of blogging is limited to this: If I type what I want to appear in a post in the little box that comes up when I click "New Post" it just magically shows up here. I can even post a pic, color the type, and create a link to another page. It's not that I'm stupid...just too busy to spend the time on learning much beyond that. (Sometimes I'm stupid, too.)

I know my friend Jami, back in Iowa, has tried to post a comment to the blog and it wouldn't allow her to. I had no answers because I'm oblivious. But I decided to look around my settings and, lo and behold, it was set to only receive comments from members. I hadn't even paid attention to whether or not there were comments because I was getting emails and that was fine with me.

I've changed the settings and, if you'd like, you can now make posts to this blog and maybe we can get a little interaction going among us. Of course, if the spammers start bombarding me, the settings will be changed back. But, in the meantime, feel free to be the first to comment.

I also found out that I could create a link to allow you to email posts to your friends. So, if you know someone who might be interested in what I have going on here, please send them a link to join us. The more the merrier.

Here's a bit of a tease. The guy in the opening photo is coming soon. Check back later for the whole picture! :)

Thanks for checking in on me and for being patient with the "oblivious guy".