July 2016

July 27, 2016

a wooden quilt

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Amazing! When you see the finished quilt, even after watching the video as it takes shape from the wood, it appears to be a gorgeous creation in cloth. Such skill. Click here.
July 23, 2016

print or digital, a changing quilt world

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Have you heard the news that Quilter’s Newsletter Magazine is going out of business soon? I was caught off guard by this announcement. I started subscribing to QNM way back in the days of Bonnie Leman, its original publisher. I consider it one of the influences that made me the quilter I am now. I will definitely miss it. I am not one who is happy with digital publications, should they decide later to perhaps publish it only digitally. If there is not a hard copy print version, then I am gone as a subscriber. Even daily blog posts or e-mails are not equivalent substitutes in my book. Here is a link to an interesting post from a much more recent addition to the quilt magazine market, with some information on the publisher’s outlook, and a magazine’s writers’ take on this. Interesting to say the […]
July 10, 2016

crayola box of 64

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. When you were a kid did you find that certain crayons in the box got worn down and broken very fast, while some of the colors still had the pristine unused points from the factory? I sure did. And that sharpener built into the back of the box did not do the trick–AT ALL! I would want a new box of crayons when my favorite colors were wearing down. Did you see the article in Friday’s Buffalo News about color combinations? What combinations say summer to you? What combination is your go-to when you are making a new quilt? I find that if I don’t force myself to get “out of the box” that I will always be drawn to something with purple, and hot pink in it. I used to be drawn to shades of blue, as would be evident if you could see […]
July 6, 2016

graffiti quilts

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Finally things around here are settling down and I’m back in the quilt room more. My teaching assignments are farther apart for the summer so I’m tackling a bunch of UFO’s. I finished up some runners that were all pieced and just needed either the layering etc, or even less. It feels good to get those off of the bed in the spare room. Right now if I had a surprise guest they’d have to sleep on a dog bed! I’ve also been getting back to zentangling and free motion quilting practice. When I ran across this video in my e-mail today I really was interested. Graffiti quilting. Looks so much like zentangle–with some twists. Can’t wait to finish up the topper I’m working on now so I can try out some of the graffiti ideas in its quilting. See what you think about this […]