Lancaster Shopping Show and Tell

So here's what will be keeping me busy for a while :)

Let's start with one of the first things I picked up--I've never come across something like this before.  This is a 16-1/2" batik squre that has been preprinted with the design you see on the package. Sew Batik fabrics sells these. What you do is make yourself a quilt sandwich and then quilt on the lines.

Once you've done all the quilting you selectively paint the parts that aren't quilted with a metallic or high shimmer fabric paint. The result is an amazing artful quilt that you cannot believe is simply a wholecloth with lots of illusion.

 It's amazing, isn't it? Think mine will look anywhere near that good? One piece of cloth...that's it. Pretty cool. If you want to try this yourself, you can pick up the fabric at http://www.longarmconnection.com/. Pick the pattern and then pick the Sew Batik fabric color. The one above was done on Navy (which they were sold out of at the show)

I only bought 4 colors of paint to start with. This isn't the brand the vendor with the quilt recommended, but one of the other vendors said it would also work.  (Yep, I finally succumbed and bought a little sampler pack of Shiva paintsticks. Suz Zwizzle, Wannabee Art Quilter was along on this shopping trip and refused to stop whining and fussing until I bought some supplies for her. Anyone want to bet on how long it takes her to use them?)

Having done the one Baltimore block...well, okay, we can't technically say 'done', but we can expect that there will be more to follow, I decided that I needed some more traditional prints in my stash for Baltimore applique, and since a Dear Jane is also on my bucket list, a few Civil War prints would be perfect for both of these projects. I go more for the burnt orange/tan/forest/slate blue pallet rather than the traditional red/navy.

It was really hard to not buy twice as many as I did, but I think this little collection will go a long way for me, and it's not like you need to match anything between blocks in Baltimores or Dear Janes, so it's plenty to start with.

My winner for outstanding vendor/star of the show was one that I have never seen at any other show I've attended (the year I went to Houston was the year the date changed to October and this vendor had a conflict, but they do the Houston show every year). Let's say that last Friday I was definitely 'feeling Japanese...I really think so'.

First to grab my attention were the Sashiko patterns. Most interesting was that they were printed on indigo fabric as well as white and some other colors. I went with the traditional white as that's what I've been doing and I may want to display them all together. But I may be bold and use two colors of thread on this one. (though I'll have to have a couple of  sakis to pull off that major act of bucking tradition). They also sold t-shirt kits that had a pattern preprinted on the shirt and included the thread. If you're interested in these, or anything Japanese, they have a website: http://www.maedaimporting.com/.

This fabric is glorious (and expensive, but I couldn't resist). I love the Japanese fabrics that have a design woven into the cloth as well as the design that is screened on the fabric, and these three one yard cuts met my 'woven' requirement. The funky flowers on the left is the most popular kimono print (according to the seller).

Added bonus was the Japanese printing on the selvage of this one (you can see the woven pattern on this piece pretty well).

Now, this is another fun project, I'm looking forward to. The fabric above is a finished edge cloth called a 'furoshiki' or wrapping cloth. In Japan, these cloths are used like wrapping paper. They're practical, colorful, and reusable, and in the case of many....QUILTABLE! Add some batting, some backing, maybe a border, and quilt around the design and in the open spaces. They had quite a few on display and I fell in love with the finished product. Faux art quilts....how so right up my alley is that? I picked up this small one for practice, and I'm waiting for a larger, more abstract one to come in (yep, another item sold out by the time I got there.)

A day of quilt show shopping wouldn't be complete without a small assortment of the most recent offering of French prints fresh from Provcence.

And they fit in well with my growing collection of authentic French fabric. Eventually I'll have enough for a project, if I ever get over the horror of  taking a rotary cutter to it. Though I think I need some more greens before I commit this stack to a project.

On our way home from Lancaster, we stopped at the Gettysburg outlets and went into 2 stores. One is a shop that rents out little booths and it's full of little tchotchkes. It's fun to walk through and sometimes you come out with a treasure. I thought the bluebird above would be a happy addition to a shelf in the studio. (It makes me smile every time I look at it). The other shop, Christmas Tree Hill, was practically giving away these miniature pottery birdbaths ($2.49). I snapped one up to use as a place to toss the safety pins I'm removing while quilting.

Of course I also bought silk thread from Superior. It's the best silk thread I've used ...I go back and forth between silk and cotton for hand applique. At the moment I'm using French Broder cotton for my Piece of Cake Aunt Millie's Garden, but silk for the Baltimore. I won some Superior Kimono Silk a few months back, and just used it on the Baltimore block...it disappeared into that fabric like buttah! If you're at a show and Superior's got a booth, most definitely pick up a spool and give it a try. And while you're at it, pick up the 2 color charts so you can order it on line. You're going to want more of it once you have a taste.

And She Comes Up For Air

Sorry, spent all day Sunday putting away my purchases from Houston, had to work Monday, and picked up the new machine Monday afternoon. Spent last night playing with the stitch regulator and some of the 158 or so stitches. Did not open the embroidery module box or the cutwork. Must be able to thread this machine with eyes closed first. :)

Let's talk about the self-control I exercised today.....today was a telecommute day. Upstairs in the studio is a brand spankin' new machine and a bunch of brand new toys hand-carried from Texas. Did I go upstairs to sneak a stitch in? Not once. And unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to do much more than sit and look at her this evening, as I had to photograph some of my goodies to share with you, which required taking them all out again.

I'll give you a little taste of what shopping at Quilt Festival was like, but I really need to get into the office early tomorrow so I need to get to bed. I'll post more tomorrow evening.

Ready?

These are two different Day of the Dead fabrics (purchased from different vendors). The skull one on the left has glitter painted throughout. Pretty cool, eh? I'm thinking tote bag, or purse.

Embellishments anyone? I'm thinking something to do with the ocean and beach glass and sea spray, and long walks on the beach in the morning. I told you I wanted to be an art quilter, and the puffy green cotton candy in the middle I am dying to work with....Angelina Fiber, irridescent, fiberglass, melts into solid (or not) when ironed betwen parchment. Cool.  There's also a pliable metal mesh, recycled silk cording, raw silk fqs, kimono scraps, cords, ribbons. A nice little stash starter.

Indigo from Ghana. Same continent, but quite different from the South African Indigo I got from deGama Textile Mill.

And we've got to represent for Asian indigo.

Bonjour! The two larger yellow pieces are yardage, all the rest is FQ, which in French translates to about 3" narrower than an American fq. But I didn't care if they were only 15", they were beautiful.

Oui, there is tres more.

Whimsical Japanese fabrics (those are the lucky cat buttons on the left to go with the lucky cat fabric). Most likely these will be purses, or some other type of embellishment. The center fabric reminds me of Pez dispensers.

That's all for tonight. I'm yawning myself into la la land here. Time to boogie on up to bed and rearrange the hubs and fight the 2 dogs for some mattress space. Please, please, tell me Bailey hasn't been drooling on (or licking--whatever his oral fixation of the moment is) my side of the bed for the last couple hours.

Be back tomorrow.

Friday at the Quilt Festival

It was a beautiful morning in Houston today. The humidity blew out to sea and the temperature dropped a good 10 degrees. A lovely walk to Convention Center.

Started out the morning in the Vendor area. This is Eleanor Burns signing books. She gave a nice demo on how to make 3 quilt tops from one jelly roll, and since I have a few lying about, I bought her show special package to do this.

Here's an overhead view of the vendor area. There are 18 aisles. Don't think for a minute that you are going to remember where you saw something and go back for it later. In fact, if you're heading down an aisle and stop to browse, you're most likely going to forget which direction you were headed. At least that happened to me a couple of times.

After going upstairs and wasting a half an hour for a prearranged meet-up with members of my guild---none of which, btw, showed up for,  I headed back to start checking out the exhibits. My first impression on seeing this was 'no wonder people are afraid of clowns'.

This next quilt won one of the big prizes. It's amazing. Machine applique, machine quilted (on an older Bernina). The quilt was submitted last year and returned. Wasn't even considered. Wins big this year. (Apparently that happened to Ricky Tims a few years back...entry rejected one year, wins the next).

The quilt below was another example of some marvelous, intriquite quilting. You've got to smile when you look at this one.

This is a closeup of what I heard someone said is an Advent Calendar quilt.

 

After viewing all the quilts, as you can guess, I had to head back in to the vendor area....this time it was for a very small taste of embellishments. Houston, we may have created a monster here.....