too cute!

It's still nasty hot here in California...hotter still in my sewing room with its 3 windows and always-on steam iron.
All those windows may sound nice, but 2 of 'em are little squares which face west which do nothing except make it almost unbearable to be in the room in the late afternoon.

Yes, I guess I really am complaining, but it's the heat that's getting to me--certainly not the projects.

I was asked to make a couple of additional things for Lecien's booth, and how could I refuse? Especially when I get to play with "Grandmother's Flower Garden", the super adorable new fabric by Rosalie Quinlan. It's been so much fun to fussy cut the little motifs.



I'm making two new bags from Pam's latest patterns plus a couple of quilts from existing patterns (At Home and Hopscotch).

Aren't these fabrics fun?

I was up until 1:30 am piecing Hopscotch last night...I discovered to my surprise that you can hear the occasional dog walker in our park even that late. And they discovered that crazy ladies are still sewing at that hour as well.

Hope everyone has a great weekend! You know what I'll be doing...

another sneak peek

If you follow the daily blog on The Quilt Show, you already enjoyed Alex's tour of P&B Textiles and got a peek of her latest fabric line, "Elizabeth Anne". This line will debut at Quilt Market next month and will be available at your local quilt shop sometime after that.

Alex is, of course, VERY busy and asked if it would be ok if she had P&B send her sample yardage to me so that I could make a quilt for their booth. Who would be crazy enough to say "NO" to that? Time to regroup and get ready to add another project to my list.

I've made quilts for this purpose for Alex in the past and it's a little different than the process I usually use for designing. A booth quilt really needs to show off the new fabrics--preferably all of the fabrics in a colorway.



"Elizabeth Anne" (weird to type since that's ever so close to my name!) is a beautiful, soft collection of very painterly prints. The large scale floral is amazing. It would be easy to use these fabrics to decorate an entire bedroom...



Anyway, here's a peek of what I came up with--super simple blocks with a little detail on the border. Can't wait to see it finished and then in the P&B booth!

well, THIS should be interesting!

So it looks like we'll be driving from the SF bay area all the way to Texas!

I guess I'll be channeling my inner Stig...

Anyone have any advice?
We'll probably need it!

On the off chance that you haven't been to Pam's blog yet, you might want to hop on over there...this will make more sense.

Probably.

this is also the time of year...

to be trying to do too many things at once.

It seems as if every designer has fallen in love with French General's line "Rouenneries" for Moda...and I'm not an exception.



I've been a huge fan of pretty much everything French General for years, so how exciting to have lots of fabric to play with!



The colors are so rich and lovely...just had to add a touch of embroidery to the plain squares.

Now I'm off to figure out the border!

this is the time of year...

When I get to show off bits of wonderful new fabrics!

I've been having a great time working with Brenda's new line for Lecien..."Celebration" is simply beautiful!


After I took the pic of the cut out bits, I changed my mind...hey, it happens!
This pattern will have a simple pieced item plus at least one additional design...maybe two if I can find the time! Hey...Pam is finished with her 143 leaves, so maybe I can rope her into some more blanket stitching!

GEARING up for Market

Was Labor Day labor-free for everybody? Probably not for any quilt designers out there...but I'm not complaining. I'm a little late on getting my act together, but it feels good to have definite plans in the works.



I'm very excited about my next project--I've always loved Joanna's fabrics and am thrilled to see how well her latest line goes with Brenda's first collection!

The plan involves roses. No surprise there, right? When you have roses, you have leaves. Lots of leaves. While I love fusible web for applique, all that tracing gets tedious. I don't have a tv in my studio--and the only place I could fit a tv is where Melvin lives.

So I rely on my laptop to keep me adequately entertained.

Honestly I wouldn't know about a single show on tv without Pam's help, but my very favorite show in the world was introduced to me by my kids. I'm sure every designer has their preferences, but I can't live without this one.



Pam is getting anxious--she does much of my blanket stitching for me and the clock is certainly ticking. So yesterday was spent tracing leaves. And fusing leaves. And cutting leaves. 143 leaves, to be precise, with possibly more for the border.



Pam enjoys blanket stitching--says it's relaxing. Which it is. Not sure she'll find 143 leaves "relaxing", so please don't tell her, ok?