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Hello all, Mary Ellen here. I’ve seen clips of this artist’s work in the past, but never had heard him talk about his process. Quilte a few of his thoughts about the inspiration process for him sound like they could be spoken by quilters as well. And at the end when he’s walking up the mountain for the big reveal, I recalled the feeling of putting a finished quilt up onto a design wall and standing back to get the “big picture”. I hope you’ll enjoy this as I did. Click here.

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Despite the very cold temps today, the bright sunshine is making me think it’s going to be a lovely day. (Of course that will probably change when I first go outdoors!) Do you have quilts for the seasons? I try to change up at least a few of my quilts for the holidays or the seasons. One of my favorite ones for spring is a small wall quilt where I learned my first bits of Seminole piecing. I’ve thought I should make it again now that my 1/4 inch seam is much more consistent. It’s rows of cabbages and carrots with a picket fence across the bottom. I added a big white pom pom between 2 of the pickets to remind me of Peter Rabbit. Here’s a link to 14 patterns for spring.  click here Several of them would be great for using fabrics from […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Came across a very nice free quilt pattern this morning. A woven ribbon type bay quilt which has spaces perfect for featuring large prints that you don’t want to cut into little pieced. I’m guessing this could be a weekend project if you knew there would be few interruptions. Have a look here: click here. How about entering a comment? Remember there will be prizes (presents) at our March birthday party. What is your most frequent source of quilt patterns? shared with friends? magazines? purchased at quilt shows? design your own? …

Hello everybody, Mary Ellen here. It’s been a long time hasn’t it? Let’s get back to it! We have our guild birthday party coming up in March and I have some “presents” to give away. Each time you submit a comment, from this post forward until the day of our party, you will be entered in a random drawing for one of the prizes. I’ll give you prompts for the comments sometimes, and other times they will be open ended. Here’s the prompt for today: Other than your rotary cutter, cutting mat, and fabric what tool or supply is a must have for your quilting? Do you have any special quilted pieces that you get out for the month of February–maybe it would be a Valentine piece, may just features the colors red and/or pink, or maybe it’s just a cute wintery snowman holding a heart? If you have something […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. It’s been a long time since I’ve written a post, hasn’t it? The summer has gotten away from me. How about you? Let’s get back to it–me writing and you commenting so I can give away some more prizes. How about if you give short updates on the quilting bucket list from earlier this year? If you’ve been to a guild meeting that counts! Or have you taken a quilting class (we’ve had a couple at the museum)-that counts! How about finishing a UFO? That counts! Check over the list of bucket list items and let us know if you’ve got one or two to check off. Maybe throw down a dare to the rest of us. Do you find that you have no time to quilt anymore? Here are a few suggestions I found in a new bloggers post. Try out her ideas to […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. This week one of the quilting world’s very influential teachers passed away. Gwen Marston, perhaps the mother of improvisational piecing, gave many of us permission to ignore some of the edicts from the Quilt Police and to try things which made some traditionalists gasp. I love her work-both her traditional beginnings and even more her free form second act. Rest in peace, Gwen. How are you all doing on your bucket lists? Updates anyone? I got some good ideas at our guild meeting this week for finishing up a long time UFO. How old? Well I know I bought the pattern at Pine Grove when it was out on Stone Road beyond Lockport. Hoping to finish it up before next month’s meeting…Yah, right!? Well maybe before our quilt show is more like it. What are you working on? Did you ever take a class from […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Let’s take care of business first. At last evening’s guild meeting the 2nd prize for blog commenting was awarded to Kathy Tomasulo. She won a coffee mug whose handles look like scissor handles–hard to describe. I should have taken a photo of it so I could show you. Perhaps if Kathy see this, she’ll send me a photo (or put one in her comment) which I’ll share with you. Starting with this post will be the collection of names for our next drawing in April. Also several members told me that they receive 3 notifications for each time I post an entry. That is being addressed with the provider of our blog services. I hope that will be solved soon-I know how annoying it is to have your mail clogged with repetitive posts. If you would like to get e-mail notifications when something new is […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. You might have been intrigued by the bunny and carrot blocks shared a few posts back. There are lots of cute free block tutorials under the tutorial tab when you visit that designer’s blog. To make it easier, if all you want is the directions for the carrot block, here is the link to those directions. Enjoy!

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. It’s been an extra long winter, it seems. I need some color to mix with the drab grayness that is left after the snow melts, but before things begin to green up. I’ll be taking a trip to the Botanical Gardens for the Easter flower show soon. Have you ever gone? I highly recommend it! Not too long ago I went to the Botanical Gardens’ orchid show. Here are a couple of the photos I took. Think about how they might inspire some aspect of your quilting. For me one inspires a double Dresden plate, and the other a color combination I might not have thought about. I will be drawing another winner for a blog commenting prize at our guild birthday party this Thursday evening. In order to enter (remember you can enter multiple times, every comment gets you another entry) for this week’s […]

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Certainly could not let Pi Day go by unnoticed. How do you feel about sewing curves? Are you one of those who thinks they are very difficult to get nice and smooth? If so, I’ll bet you were taught to pin the heck out of your curves-15 or 20 pins in a 4 inch seam for example. I find that 3 pins will usually do the job quite well. One pin at the beginning of the seam, one in the middle, and one at the end. I have found that with more than that, you actually end up pinning the tucks into the seam, rather than smoothing the seam. There is actually some math behind my theory (retired math teacher of course), but we won’t go into that here. Try using just 3 pins and your stiletto to match the edges in between. Of course […]