I request the pleasure of your company in a totally uninhibited, majorly deliriously insanely happy snoopy dance…… (cue the drums and trumpets):  MY BOOK COVER IS OUT!

Yes, folks…. it is really gonna happen!   The major editorial work is yet to be done, but the projected publication date is Fall 2009!

The book covers using thread by machine on the surface of the quilt, so it touches on applique, free-motion stitching (I can’t bring myself to call it embroidery) and quilting, plus lots of tips and tidbits and good stuff–choosing threads, understanding your machine’s tension and all that.  The book is also written so that both art and traditional quilters can use it and find inspiration and technique.

I was surprised at the quilts AQS selected for the cover, but understand why:  both of these teaching samples showcase the stitching, and the photography is simply outstanding.  (And the one on the left is in a class I’ll be teaching in Houston in October about using Fiddly, Fussy Threads!) And I really love the dangling thread on the “d” … after all, quilters come with threads attached!

Much closer to actual release date, I’ll have information here about how/when to order (yes, I will be selling it from my store page….but that’s still a few lifetimes away…like October or November).  Hmmm…timely for Christmas gift giving???? Heh heh…..and now, back to jumping and flailing wildly (and making my kids grateful I’m doing this inside the house and not  in public LOL!)…let’s CELEBRATE!

After years of hinting to me that her customers would love a landscape class, I finally agreed to teach one at Maine-ly Sewing (www.mainelysewing.com) in Nobleboro, Maine.  (Contact the store to sign up, etc.)   The class will be Saturday, Feb. 28th, from 10-4 !

Birch Pond, Summer

As usual, I figured why make one quilt when you can make two…. So I made the fusible applique quilt two ways, autumn and summer.  I am so pleased with the results that I think I’ll do the four seasons, write it up as a pattern and sell it…let me know what you think?   The pattern is actually quite easy, finishes about 22×25 inches (depending on your border and your final composition of the scene…there is definitely fudge-room here!).  PS–photos are clickable for a slightly larger view.

I did easy quilting so that beginning quilters and machine quilters won’t feel intimidated…I PROMISE, it really is easy to do the quilting on these patterns even when you are new to it!  Here is a detail photo:

Initially I did the autumn version… I just love the glorious colors of Maine in Fall.  However, given that Fall is behind us, and it has been winter for quite a while, Marge and I decided to use the Summer version (hope is eternal!  It WILL come again!) to advertise the class.  But, I wanted students to see that they can make the quilt in many ways.  Frankly, I kinda think it would be fun to do it another time in totally wild colors, like plum and turquoise and mango and lime…. wouldn’t that be a hoot?  Anyway, here is a more realistic, autumnal version:

And a detail of the Autumn version; note that I did the leaf canopy two different ways… in summer I used the twist-and-chop way to cut chunks, for autumn I used the slice it into confetti method!

Hope you like the quilts, and hope to see some of you in class!

Birch Pond, Autumn, detail

If you’re like me, you’ll hear Bing Crosby’s voice as he sings to Rosemary Clooney on that one…. For those of you who don’t love the old movie White Christmas, Bing and Rosemary are the older of a pair of war buddies (that would be Bing, to Danny Kaye’s younger corporal) and sisters (with actress Vera Ellen of the impossibly tiny waist and very fast dancing feet).   Theirs is a somewhat rocky courtship, aided and abetted by Danny and Vera’s characters.   Rosemary goes to get a sandwich at the inn, and Bing shows up to make her a liverwurst sandwich with buttermilk (BLEAH…how could anyone think that tastes good?????).  She says she can’t sleep, so of course Bing breaks into song about counting your besslings instead of sheep, and the refrain ends “you’ll fall asleep counting your bleeeeeeesssssss-iiiiiinnnnnnngggggggggs”.

So I decided I should count some of my blessings:

1.  My family is alive and well, and we are blessed to be together.

2.  Mom agreed to move to Maine, and now lives 5 minutes instead of a continent (or more as it has been in years past) away.  Best of all, she has become nice again, and I have my mommy back.  The dementia is getting worse, but she is much kinder,  she gets my sense of humor, and best of all she seems to be happier!

3.  Joshua is alive, well, fully recovered, and seems to have (we think/hope/pray) passed through some of the more tumultuous moments of the teen years.  He is a responsible employee at his job, and is bright and learning.

4.  Eli is a stupendous student, cool kid, devoted son and brother, and great dog-parent to Pigwidgeon.   He is (hooray!, we’ve bred two of them) an inveterate reader, curious, polite, kind, interesting… OK I’ll stop now.  I know I’m biased.  That’s my job.

5.  Paul and I celebrated 25 years of marriage, and we’re still bubbling along. As in all marriages that last, we are always there for each other, and he is my best friend and the first person I go to for most anything (well, except for quilting advice!).

6.  Pigwidgeon (the pug) and Thumper (the 26-toed calico cat) follow me around the house and bring furry love, joy and hair to my life.

7.  Pigwidgeon makes EVERYone, and I mean EVERYONE, smile.  Just last night, when I took him out for nighttime walkies, he had me laughing out loud as he cavorted and chased a snow clod!

8.  Joyce came to visit; my late half-brother’s wife, Joyce is like a sister to me.  I remember her from when my family and I returned to the US when I was six, and she has been a part of my life ever since.  T.J. gets major bonus points for bringing the best person in the family into it.

9.  The Frayed Edges:  Kathy, Kate, Deborah and Hannah make my life and Maine a better place to be (even tho Deborah  is currently in the wilds of Texas).  They are friends, artists, confidants, and just plain FUN and interesting and wonderful.

10.  Marie is one of those friends that will last through the ages… you know how maybe six or seven times in your life you meet someone and you know you will be friends forever, no matter where you are?  Well, Marie is one of those!   Even tho she is still in Washington State, and I am in Maine,  we are still close….and even tho we can sometimes only keep up by visiting each others’ blogs (hers is here), we are always in each other’s hearts.

11.  The Coastal Quilters:  my local quilt chapter is filled with wonderful, fun, diverse, interesting women (no men yet in the group).

12.  QuiltArt ( click here for the website) is the most wonderful online group (like an extended family spread ’round the world) of kindred (and not so kindred) souls, all of whom love art quilts.   QA was my door into art quilting, my master’s degree, my continuing education, the source of untold friendships and inspiration and ideas…. it’s a great place to be.  Thanks to List Mom Judy for creating such a home, to all who make it the best place in cyber-space….

13.  Kit Robinson, on both the QuiltArt and Janome 6500/6600 groups (the latter is a yahoo group), who invited me to write an article for Machine Quilting Unlimited magazine.  In talking over the proposed subject, tension, I mused that really I needed to write about needles first, because you need the correct needle to get the correct tension.  One article turned into two, then….

14.  Vicki Anderson, publisher of MQU and the sister-magazine for long-arm quilters, Unlimited Possibilities, asked me to be a regular columnist for them… WOOOOHOO!!!! For the first time since 1997, I have predictable income with each quarterly article.  Best of all, I get to write about quilting AND get paid for it… life is truly wonderful.

15.  Quilting Arts magazine accepted two of my ideas for short lessons in their e-Newsletter, Embellishments; not only was I paid a modest sum, but they put my name under theirs and in front of something like 50,000 subscribers!  WOW…. THANK YOU Pokey Bolton (top editor and big kahuna, even tho she is a tiny little thing!) and Cate Prato (editor) . For info on how to subscribe to the e-Newsletter, click here.

16.  Quilting Arts / Cloth Paper Scissors  invited folks to submit ideas to participate in Open Studio, where you get to demonstrate a technique, at the large Quilting Arts zone at quilt festival in Houston; they invited me to participate!!!!   I am thrilled at their confidence in me, and I had a blast.  I hope to be able to do it again.

17.  Festival in Houston:  I get to see great quilts, meet old and new friends, see folks I have originally “met” online mostly on the Quiltart list.   Thanks to Karey Bresenhan and her hard-working cast and crew for all they do for all quilters…. Karey is truly in the business of making dreams come true for so many of us!

18.  Iris Karp of Misty Fuse has been so kind and generous, and I had a ball demonstrating in her booth in Houston….. would LOVE to do it again!   Thanks Iris!

19.  SAQA, the Studio Art Quilt Association. Despite the somewhat steep annual dues, I decided a while back that I needed to join.  Boy was I right!  I’ve had at least one exhibit opportunity thanks to being on their site, and think that at least a couple of the work opportunities that have come my way have been due to being in SAQA (and on their website).  Then, last Christmas Marie (see #10) sent me a copy of Portfolio 14, a SAQA publication that is aimed at galleries, museums and collectors.  I knew within about 20 seconds of seeing it that I needed to upgrade to Professional Artist Member status (if they’d take me) and be in the next one.  Well…. I was accepted as a PAM, and got into Portfolio 15 (now available for sale here) and (drum roll) a thumbnail of my quilt even made the back cover!

20. As a result of adding some information to the SAQA wiki (an online information data base for members), I came to Lisa Chipetine’s attention, and she very kindly invited me to be the fifth person in an online Critique session with quiltartist Sandra Sider.  WOW!   I can’t believe how much I learned, perhaps even more so from listening to the comments and discussion about other quilts being critiqued.  If you’re interested in learning more about the upcoming critique sessions, click here.

21.  The manuscript is nearing completion!  More on that when I can!

22.  I was FLOORED when I pulled up Creative Quilting with Beads early this year on Amazon.com  looking for a publication date…as longtime readers know, I have two projects in the book, and Kate (1), Kathy (1) and Deborah (3!) also have projects.  The COVER was MY pomegranate notebook! Talk about a pipe dream come true!

23.  About this time last year, I wrote a quick note to Bonnie Browning, who is a big kahuna at the AQS quilt shows, related to a posting she had made on the QuiltArt list.  She must have clicked on my signature links and visited my website, and she invited me to apply to TEACH for AQS!  The kicker:  this was Sunday, and applications needed to be in her office Monday.  I quickly turned my brochure into a PDF and e-mailed her all the info.  The result:  Bonnie and AQS took a chance and hired me to teach in PADUCAH (Paducah and Houston are the two biggest, most prestigious quilt shows in the US and honestly, in the world!).  I had a ball, student reviews were good, and I did it….hoooray!

24.  Lowell Quilt Festival (Massachusetts) also hired me to teach, and I had a ball there, too.   That show is only about 4 hours from me, so I was able to take LOTS of extra goodies since I could drive.  I had the most amazing time, and they treated the teachers like royalty!  I learned so much from so many amazing teachers…. Nancy Prince and Joanie Zeier Poole were incredibly generous in sharing tips and tricks of teaching on the road…. all of us who ate dinner together… totally fantastic!

25.  Blogging and the internet and all of you!  One of the joys of my mornings is checking flags…. I use a couple of sitemeters, and I LOVE looking at where people are who visit my blog… the sitemeters don’t tell me your e-mail, but they do give a location (more or less… depending on the company, my address in Camden shows up as Camden, Rockland, Tenant’s Harbor….at least it is a general location).  I’ve now had visitors from over 129 nations and every state in the US and almost every province in Canada.  WAY COOL!   I love how the internet has brought us closer, how I can e-mail my friend Lisa in Sydney (literally almost halfway ’round the world), hear back a moment later, reply, and carry on an instant conversation.  I love how those of us who worked in isolated splendor can now share and learn, so THANK YOU for being out there and surfing in to here!

I could go on, but I will stop here, or I really will put all of you to sleep.

Thank you and blessings and peace to you and all of yours,

Sarah

To my utter astonishment and delight, one of my newest pieces–Fields of Gold– (finished in the nick of time) has been juried into Art Quilts XIII at the Chandler Center for the Arts in Chandler, Arizona.  Actually, if I tell the total truth, the facings weren’t even completely sewn down when I took the photos for my entries!

I am mind-boggled to find myself in the company of so many of the leading art quilters today…. the list of those in the show is here.

A little bit about this piece:  I had designed the center part, which I called Sunset Trees, for a project / exercise for the applique section of my manuscript.  It is 9×12 inches (or thereabouts) and I intended for it to finish at that size…small and easy to manage as a learning exercise.  Then, I was able to help my friend Lisa Walton of Dyed and Gone to Heaven (Sydney, Australia) get an entry into the IQA / Festival at Houston when she unexpectedly got a quilt finished and photographed in time, but not enough time to mail reliably (i.e. quickly) from Australia to Texas.  I told her not to send anything, but she did anyway…a metre of her glorious hand-dyed fabric that ranged from rust to gold to green.  I pinned the fabric up on my design wall, next to Sunset Trees, trying to figure out how to make a journal entry for this year.  I couldn’t think of anything that wasn’t trite (the black silhouette of an Aussie cowboy and outback house against the glowing sun…been done well by others, and too many times).  Then I realized that if I used one section of the piece, it meshed PERFECTLY with Sunset Trees’ background.

Then I mulled over the quilting… at first I thought of blowing grasses.  Then, in the back of my mind, the song Fields of Gold by Sting came to mind.  I knew I had seen a quilt named after that song somewhere…and when the Frayed Edges got together in early September I mentioned it.  Deborah piped up:  it was on my blog!  I did one!  So here is Deborah’s version!  To me, the wheat fields of late summer /autumn are Fields of Gold, so I googled wheat images, learned that some wheat has the really long whiskers, other varieties have shorter, fewer whiskers, etc.   I think my favorite part of this entire quilt is the wheat quilting!  Once again, I seem to be moving toward nearly wholecloth pieces that are drawn with thread…. Here’s a detail:

Enjoy…now back to working on the Elusive Crested Batiki Bird, a small piece I’m doing for another Lark book on small quilts.  Cheers!

You may have noticed (or not, but I sure have) a dearth of quilty posts here the past many months. I really miss my studio and making art! Between family, exhaustion and a little working on my manuscript, I haven’t been able to create much. And the two pieces I’m working on now are for the Journal Quilt Exhibit this coming year, and can’t be shared (unless they don’t get juried in, or if they do get in, not until the show opens in Houston in late October–the hotlink is to the 2007 journal quilts… you can see mine on my website and on page 9 at the hotlink). BUT, I think I can share a little bit of the book samples I’ve been slaving over for my manuscript for Unraveling Threadwork (tentative title).

(Earlier blogposts about the book, in reverse chronological order, are here and here and here.)

Anyway, the book is about using thread on the surface of a quilt, so that covers applique, decorative stitching, free-motion stitching (at the quilt top stage) and quilting. Here I’m making samples of various ways to applique, including illustrating the need to reverse somethings …here’s the “reversed” S shape:

Here’s a mock up of the photo I’d like in the book on how to dampen the stitching to make removing freezer paper easier:

One thing I didn’t realize, but which makes sense, is that if you want the book to come out the way YOU want, you need to give the publishing company real guidance on the photos by doing mock ups. Of course, this is a LOT of work… you don’t just make the sample, but in my case put the camera on the tripod, set up the photography lighting, take several shots , select the worst and delete the extras, re-size the photos, then (when inserting into manuscript) relabeling all the dang things, and making sure the labels and numbers and whatnot correspond! Talk about time consuming…. so I’m only nearly a year late due to life etc.

Another pretty photo is to illustrate visual texture in cloth, from plain (nearly solid) on the far right, to LOTS of visual texture (on the far left…larger designs, lots of contrast in both line and value).

And on that note, I’m gonna sign off, do some reading, and hopefully get back to work!