whatnots
March 9, 2013Tutorial, giveaway and few other things…
March 11, 2013Hello all, Mary Ellen here.
Beautiful morning today. It’s the first morning in a long while when I did not need a hat or gloves while dog walking. Sun’s out, I spotted lots of tulip and daffodils peaking through the soil. Even saw a few snow drops opening up. Definitely teasers that spring is coming.
Once again I’ve got some unrelated links for you.
fun stuff for quilters, great T-shirts: click here
I can relate, but I’m working on it: click here
Just finished listening to one of the free QuiltCon lectures over at Craftsy. Because I subscribe to Mary Fons’ blog I got a nudge to go listen to her lecture, billed as one from a member of a Quilt Mafia family. I think she was truly great! Mary spoke for about 45 minutes, with very few visuals, and kept my attention the entire time. She is very eloquent on a topic about which she is passionate. You may be surprised at some of what she shared (she did not sew until she was 27 years old), and what she says about the future of the quilt industry. She makes some very valid points about the beginner quilter–how the beginner now is very different from the beginner of 20 years ago (when many of us in our guild started to quilt). I took some of it to heart as a quilt teacher myself. Points were made that never had occurred to me before. Lots of food for thought, and perhaps some points we should consider for the future of our guild. Where do we, the active guild members, want to see our guild going in the years to come? Hmmm…
I gave a lecture myself yesterday and spoke just briefing about designing your own quilt– Taking my class and not ending up with a quilt just like mine. Scary for some new quilters and exciting for others. The expressions on faces as I looked out to the ladies listening were varied. But I do think many of them want to make THEIR quilt, not MY quilt. So here’s to Mary Fons who pointed that out, and I promise to try to help make that happen.
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I don’t know what expression you saw on my face yesterday…but I’m with the group that wants to take an idea and then make it mine. I love learning new techniques and seeing new ideas but I don’t want to end up with the quilt in the pattern photo or the instructor’s quilt. The risk is that the quilt might not come together as well – but then again…it will be mine.
I enjoyed watching Mary Fons- she had some really good points.
Wish I could have come to your lecture too! (but had a class myself…and it was beginner quilters – my favorite class to teach!). I am still to sit and listen to all lovely Craftsy lectures – now can’t wait to her Mary’s! But even without hearing it, I very much agree with you about inspiring all around us to their own, unique creative expression – it is something I really love to do with my students and find it so rewarding when they DO take it up and make their creations their own. Always include in my instructions and patterns different colorways, different layouts, “what if…?” type of ideas – that always gets noticed and appreciated and evokes the “ah-ha” moments – love that! Show and share in our Guild is often that kind of inspiration for me and maybe we can have even more of that – showing our “experiments” or trials (even if un-finished) to inspire some discussion?