Weekend Spoils

Paradise was...well, pretty much how it sounds!  Our motel room was quiet, and cleaner-than-clean, and the welcome from the Paradise Village Quilt Guild was warm and genuine.  Saturday's workshop just zoomed by, and I was thrilled to receive this picture yesterday of a completed project.  Judith Murty did a stellar job stitching this free motion. I hope there will be more pictures arriving soon. (hint, hint :))

Friday night I presented a trunk show of  quilts which was well attended (including a surprise carload of quilters from Clare :))  I had hoped to have "Rhythmic" back from its tour of the US in the Hands All Around exhibit at IQF, however the courier arrived after we left Amherst. Once back home,it was a treat to open the waiting box,

 In addition to the quilt, the organizers always include some goodies, such as the show books.  It's very satisfying to see your name and hometown listed.

Better still are these labels to be sewn to the back of your quilt, testimony for the provenance of your work.

I can't wait to add these next to the previous patch the quilt earned from being displayed in Paducah in 2015

 As much as I would have loved to have shown this in Paradise, I made up for it with a surprise showing at the end. It was a "for your eyes only, no pictures please" quilt and one which I will share here in a couple of weeks' time.
Off to sew on my new bling!

Thanks So Much!

Really appreciate the response I received to my last post.  Several folks responded that they took pictures for me; you can see the first of them here on Bonni's blog:
Thanks so much, Bonni!

This week I am packing workshop kits, and choosing quilts for a trunk show in Paradise, N.S., in May.  I have a lot of quilts to choose from, and I try to take different ones along each time I present.

 There are some favourites, though, that have to come each time.

The trunk show will be May 5th at 6:30 pm at the Paradise Community Hall, 10300 Highway #1 in Paradise, and is open to the public.  Who wouldn't like to spend an evening in Paradise? :)

Spread The Word!

International Quilt Festival opens in Chicago on Thursday.  Are you going?  I'm not...but my Rhythmic quilt is in the "Hands All Around" exhibit, representing modern quilt-making in Canada. 

If you are there, I'd love to have a picture of the quilt in the show. (photos are permitted,)   IQF runs from April 6 to 8, 2017, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center, Rosemont, Illinois. Please pass this along to any friends who may be going. Thank you!!!

Provenance

Rhythmic has arrived safely back from Paducah and I am thrilled to have this very cool label to sew on the back:

Paducah 2015 Semi-Finalists

AQS Quilt Week in Paducah opens today and even though I am not there, I am thrilled that Rhythmic is.  You can see the complete list of semi-finalists here. It's no small thrill to see my name among a veritable who's who in today's quilt world.

A new requirement for the show this time was that odd-shaped quilts - which mine appear mostly to be! - be mounted on a separate black backing to make hanging the quilts easier for the show organizers.

I was very unsure of how to go about doing this, and whether a single layer of black cotton would even support the weight of the quilt without puckers, but Beth from Mrs. Pugsley's helped me find the perfect fabric, one with just the right heft to support the quilt.  Basically, I measured the quilt, cut the backing a bit larger and hemmed the edges, using the hanging sleeve instructions for Paducah at the top. Then I machine stitched with black thread through my quilt at the edge of the binding to attach it to the backing. It could only be stitched along the top edge as the bottom had to be left free for the judges to see the back of the quilting. I've had my fingers crossed that this backing was properly done...otherwise, the quilt would not have been hung.  Rhythmic has had a fabulous year;  you can download the pattern here to make your own.

If you are lucky enough to be attending the Paducah show, I'd love a picture of Rhythmic to see where it's hanging.  It's in the wall-quilt, domestic machine quilted category.  Congrats to all the quilters who made the amazing winning quilts!  Here are the WINNERS!

Roxanne's Rhythmic

This gorgeous version of Rhythmic was made by Roxanne Miner of Alberta. It is exciting to see her linear quilting, as it complements the modern look of her quilt so very well.

It's perfect!  Looks like she has used the edge of her walking foot to space her lines, thus eliminating the need for marking.

Roxanne downloaded her pattern through Craftsy and posted the finished picture of her quilt in the Community section of that site, where members share photos.  You can see more of Roxanne's lovely work on her blog.  Thanks so much, Roxanne, for the inspiration!

More Rhythmic

I had some good news a while back I have been slow to share, but here's an excerpt from the press release:

Paducah, Kentucky, USA – Amherst area quilter has been selected as a semi‐finalist for the 2015
AQS QuiltWeek® – Paducah, Kentucky, April 22‐25, 2015, at the Paducah Expo Center in Paducah,
Kentucky.
Karen Neary has been chosen to display the quilt, RHYTHMIC, along with 404 others in the annual
contest, now in its 31st year. Three quilting authorities will judge this elite group in Paducah,
awarding first‐, second‐, and third‐place prizes in 16 categories, along with nine overall awards.
Winners will be announced at the 31st AQS Awards Presentation, which takes place at the Carson
Four Rivers Center in Paducah at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, April 21. Cash awards totaling $125,000
will be granted, including $20,000 for the Janome Best of Show; $12,000 for the BERNINA Machine
Workmanship; $12,000 for the AQS Hand Workmanship; $12,000 for the APQS Longarm
Workmanship; and $5,000 for the Moda Best Wall Quilt. Regardless of how RHYTHMIC places in the final judging, all semi‐finalists’ quilts will be displayed at the show, which is expected to draw more than 30,000 people.

Rhythmic has had a very good year, and the pattern has been extremely well received.  I am thrilled to have this quilt as part of the AQS Paducah show.

No Trick - All Treat!

You are so awesome!  Welcome to all the new readers of this blog, and thank you to the regulars for your continued support.

I am excited to say that Rhythmic has been chosen as one of 4 finalists from THOUSANDS of nominations in the Craftsy Pattern Designer Awards. (There were 9, 774 patterns in the running!) Thank you SO MUCH for voting for my pattern. We are now down to the final round and I am asking for your support one last time.  Kindly follow this link  and click the radio button next to Rhythmic.  If you would like a chance to win a free class from Craftsy, then add your email address (not mandatory)  Then click Submit.  That’s it! 

My sincerest thanks…and good luck in the draw for the class!

~Karen    

Craftsy Pattern Design Awards

An incredible number of you have downloaded my Rhythmic pattern through Craftsy (thank you!); it stayed in the number one spot for an extended period and it is still going strong. 

I appreciate your support a great deal and ask that you will support me now in a way that could also benefit you - in the form of a FREE Craftsy class of your choice!

You may nominate up to 3 patterns in each category (Rhythmic is in the QUILTING group), but you can only enter each pattern one time. (i.e., don't go back the next day to reenter!)

Winning designers for each category will receive a Craftsy Pattern Design Awards Winner badge to proudly wear on their blog. For filling out the nomination form, your email address will be entered for a chance to win a FREE Craftsy class. To nominate Rhythmic, copy this line below:

http://www.craftsy.com/pattern/quilting/home-decor/rhythmic/81303

and paste it into the field where it asks the URL on this page.  All that's required to enter is an email address.  

Thanks, and good luck in the draw for the class!

Welcome Aboard!

A big hello to all the new visitors who arrived over the weekend from a Facebook posting of Rhythmic, and a HUGE thank you for making the pattern the # 1 bestseller on the Craftsy site.  Some of those who downloaded the pattern have indicated they have already begun sewing!  For those who ordered print versions, they are on their way to you in today's mail.  Thank you!

The Power Of Purple

Remember my Rhythmic quilt?

The pattern has been selling like hotcakes and most of the quilts I've seen made from it have used the same colourway as the original. I have to tell you that my jaw dropped when I saw Elaine's version on her blog. Scroll down and prepare to be wowed!    

↓

↓

↓

↓

Gor-geous!

Not only is her colour choice spectacular, her quilting is fabulous too.

Elaine writes this: "I am a music major from college so was intrigued by the name and I love circles and doing feather quilting.   Win! Win!   It was so striking I had intended to do it in red even though red is probably my least favorite color.   But.....since purple is my favorite color, I tried some different fabric swatches and decided the purple was gorgeous too."

 Look at the tiny grid quilting in the intersection of the blocks.  Patience!

I confess that this is one of my all time favourite designs and seeing it so well done is music to my heart.  The pattern for Rhythmic is widely available: it is distributed by Trend Tex Fabrics to quilt shops across Canada, including Mrs. Pugsley's Emporium  in Amherst. It is also available by snail mail from my website  or as an instant pdf download through Craftsy.  If you have made your own version of Rhythmic, I'd love a picture to show here on the blog.  A sincere thank you Elaine;  you really made my day!

Rhythmic

The quilt I showed you a couple of days ago is all finished, and I am pleased with how it has turned out.  I hope you like it too. As it usually does, the design started with the fabric, from the Shadow Collection by Stof of Denmark.   I used red, black, creamy white, and a soft grey. I love how the fabrics look together - so clean and crisp.

Naturally, I went with curved seams and the piece has a great deal of movement.  The blades appear to spin like fans so I chose a quilting design to enhance the effect.  My flexible ruler came in handy to mark a spinning line in the coloured patches.  This is all the marking I did, using the edges of the block as my boundary for the feathers.

Because it was all free hand, the quilting took no time.  I started around 8 am yesterday and was all done by my 1 pm lunch break.  I used Invisifil thread top and bottom, in matching shades of cream, red and black and my favourite wool batting.

In the intersections between the blocks, I did a small feather along the curved edges and added a grid filler in the centre.

On the back is a pretty mottled charcoal grey.

The pattern is available in two formats:  a traditional  printed version available from my website, or as an instant download. The patterns will also be available at Mrs. Pugsley's Emporium, along with the beautiful Stof fabric from which it is made.
A sincere thank you goes out to Darlene Gerber, pattern tester par excellence who found the colour palette much to her liking. (If you click the link to Darlene's blog you will see it is entitled "I Quilt Scarlet & Gray". (As a Canadian, I quilted scarlet and grey *-)

New Year, New Quilt...

...and new beginnings.  I was happy to turn the calendar page from 2013.  

The year begins with renewed opportunities for personal and professional growth and my head is full of designs which I've been drawing out as fast as I can in Electric Quilt 7.  The quilt shown is called "Rhythmic" and it has awesome flow and movement for such a small piece...and a very unusual shape.  I like it a lot.  The top is finished and now I will work away at the piecing diagrams and instructions while I ponder how to quilt it.  I'll show you soon!  

Best wishes to all for a happy and productive 2014.