Cypress River Quilt Retreat

Had a great weekend with quilting friends, old and new, at Cypress River this weekend. The Tiger Hills Arts Association put on three great classes.

Saturday Geesje Baron taught Sashiko Embroidery, which is a style of Japanese embroidery that was originally done by Japanese women to mend their husbands' fisherman overalls. It is traditionally done with white thread on blue fabric. These mending stitches became quite competitive among the women and amazing patterns evolved. In this class quilters learned a few patterned stitches using a thick upper thread and a regular weight (similar colour to the fabric) lower thread. The resulting look shows the top thread and not the bottom thread thus it looks like hand embroidery.  Tricky!

Sunday Annette Young taught "Big Blooms" which had the quilters plan their own quilt design using a large print fabric combined with a few coordinating fabrics. They cut their large print fabrics to suit the design and inserted strips of the coordinating fabric. Each quilt was unique and emphasized the large print fabric. Nicely done!

Coreen Zerr taught a two day course on Saturday and Sunday called "In Living Colour". Coreen grew up in the Baldur area and travels to Cypress River from Nanimo BC to visit her mother. We are lucky to tap into her skills every spring for the past 6 years. Every time I take a course from her I learn new techniques and tips. She is amazing!

For this workshop we could either use a flower pattern of Coreen's (lily, clematis, rose, or brown eyed Susan) or bring a picture of our own. I chose to bring a photo of Don's from our Belize trip. The first step was to make our pattern then we cut out our fabric pieces and machine appliquéd them on our background fabric.

Sashiko Class:

Bev showing her Sashiko sample.

Cynthia with her sample.  (Sorry so blurry)

Doreen's sample is to become a bag for her grand daughter.


Big Blooms Class:

Beth using her pizza fabric.  Yummy!

Annette using oriental fabric with a variety of coordinating fabrics.


UFO (Unfinished Objects) Class:

Marj finished two projects and began another.

In Living Colour Class:

Coreen showing Sheryl how to create a pattern of her own sunflower picture.

Coreen showing how she creates a clear template from her pattern.

Here is Coreen showing the next step using her lily pattern as a sample.

Putting registration marks on the freezer paper pattern before cutting it up,
so that we can figure out how the pieces go back together again.
The freezer paper is cut on the dark marker lines and then ironed on to fabric.  The fabric is cut out with a 1/4 inch seam allowance and then the extra 1/4" is turned under using glue stick!!   It really works!!!

Coreen showing how to iron the freezer paper onto the fabric, cut the fabric and then turn the edge down.

Here is my Belize flower pattern.

Notice the registration marks:
* pieces are numbered for easy rebuilding after pattern is cut apart
* green highlighter indicates an edge that needs to be turned
* yellow highlighter indicates an unturned edge
* blue pencil crayon indicates joining for sides of pieces
* orange pencil crayon X indicates joining points of pieces

Here you can see my turned applique representation of the Belize flower picture off to the right.

Now I need to think about thread painting and quilting stitches.  Lots of fun!!

Triptych featured in The Canadian Quilter

I am honoured to see that my Sioux Narrows Triptych is highlighted in the Spring 2014 edition of The Canadian Quilter magazine. Pretty exciting!!

The article is in the regional section of the magazine on page 67. They have included three photos. One of me beside the triptych hanging at Donna and Craig's house.  The other two photos are close ups of me quilting the triptych on the long arm sewing machine. 

This art quilt is sure getting great recognition. How flattering. 

The cover of the magazine.
(Isn't that a gorgeous quilt on the cover??!!)

Page 67 where the Sioux Narrows Triptych is featured.

On The Road

Heading back to Manitoba to join family for Easter. It has been a long time since we were home.

Two long days of driving are done with one short day left. The first night we stayed in Dodge City, Kansas. And tonight we are in Aberdeen, South Dakota. 

Leaving Arizona in the early morning.

Sunshine on the Arizona hills.

Don is one of the cowboys of Dodge City!

Crossing the Missouri River just north of Nebraska in South Dakota.

My Favourite Quilt Store - Mad B's

My favourite quilt store in Mesa is a Bernina dealer on Southern Avenue. The store is called Mad B's Quilt and Sew. Why is it my favourite?  Let me tell you:

1.  Location, location, location. 

Mad B's is only a short bike ride from my house in Mesa on fairly quiet streets with a safe bike lane. That fact alone is worth a ton!  (In Manitoba I have to drive one and a half hours in any direction to reach a quilt store!!)

2.  Friendly Staff. 

The staff are very welcoming. Susan is a quilting over-achiever.  She even comes to the shop on her days off to take classes!  Kathy has a dry sense of humour and knows the best sandwiches to order for lunch. But best of all is the owner Madonna, she is a real 'go-getter'.  It is obvious that Madonna has a vision for her store to be the best at providing wonderful new fabric lines not available at other stores in the area and to provide wonderfully informative classes by local quilt and sewing experts. 

3.  Inspiration abounds.  

Madonna just bought the store from its previous owner in January of this year. In a few short months it has really become an inspiring shop.  Previously blank walls are now decorated with quilts and ever changing displays of fabrics. 

Get a glimpse at what I mean from these photos. 

Mad B's on Southern Avenue, Mesa, Arizona.

Look at all those gorgeous quilts hanging high up on the walls.

Lots of colourful fabrics and displays greet you as you enter the store.

The back wall juts out and has been decorated with a fence and close-line full of small quilt blocks
from one of the quilt clubs that meets weekly on Mondays at the store.

Gorgeous batik solid fabrics in a full palette of colours!

Lots of great black and white fabrics too!

A workshop happening in the classroom.

Madonna at the till.

After Dark at the Botanical Garden

Krista & Don with Dave and Jan at the Desert Botanical Gardens after dark.  We listened to the Brazillian band Novo Mundo and then toured the lit cactus garden displays featuring large blown glass sculptures by world renown  Artist Dale Chihuly.  Link to the display at -  http://www.dbg.org/events-exhibitions/chihuly

The band "Novo Mundo" on the terrace

Chihully boat

Spectacular glass display

Same glass and cactus display as in the previous blog with us in front. Now in the dark.

Huge blown glass menagerie

Large night flowering Argentinian cactus.

Red Chihully glass

Desert Botanical Garden

Toured the Phoenix Desert Botanical Garden with Dave and Jan. it was a very hot day 38C when we got there in the late afternoon. We walked some of the more shaded part of the garden and enjoyed seeing the desert blooms. 

Later we dined at the Patio Cafe and listened to Novo Mundo, a Brazilian Band. This event, called Music in the Garden is held every Friday night in the spring. Very enjoyable!

After the evening entertainment we toured the garden again to see the displays at night. What a difference!  Night lighting really changed the sights. Glad we saw thaw garden in both day and night. 

Here I have some day photos.  I will post some night photos from Don's camera later. 

Gerry Giraffe Comes to Life

I took another workshop at my local quilt shop. This one was to make a stuffed animal with fabric, polyester stuffing and wire to add sculpture and shape. Sharon, the instructor, was also the designer of the patterns we had to choose from. She has created animal and doll patterns for a couple of decades. Her work is very creative!

I learned a lot while taking this class. Cutting and sewing the body was pretty much as for any clothing sewing, but adding wire and stuffing to create the body was all new. Lots of great tricks to make the animal balanced and posable.

While I was finishing up my giraffe, Madonna, the owner of the quilt and sewing store, was selecting fabric from a fabric dealer. I think Madonna could see that I was interested is seeing the new fabrics, so she invited me to join her. It was interesting to see the new lines of fabric coming out this spring and fall. Some fabric was only at the mock up stages with a coloured photograph and a small 4" square of fabric, others were completed lines so the fabric was laid out in corresponding bundles. I was amazed to see how quickly Madonna made her choices. You can see she knows exactly what she wants for fabric in her shop.