Amherst Quilters Guild – Page 15 – Amherst Quilters Guild

August 23, 2013

still more modern

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Still cogitating on those modern quilt ideas. Got an e-mail today from Craftsy.com about a Joe Cunningham class called Pattern Free Quiltmaking. Hmm… Went over to have a look. Signed up for it. I have always been a rule bender. Not so much a rule breaker, just a bender. I never, even as a kid, wanted to blindly follow rules unless I could see the point. (I have a terrible time with speed limits!) I think this is caused by the other hemisphere of my mathematical, analytical brain wanting equal time. This appears in my quilting from time to time, as it does in all of the other parts of my life. Sometimes the perfectionist geometer is in charge wanting perfect points, symmetrical layouts, and precision in the measurements. Other times not so much. Love to create with random width selvage strips, like to make […]

August 22, 2013

more on modern

Hello all Mary Ellen here. Since our guild meeting last week with the “modern” visitors, I’ve been looking at my latest magazines and blog subscriptions through a different lens. I’ve been thinking, as I shared in an earlier post about the show and share projects at that meeting, that many “standard” or traditional projects have a modern look, or could easily be modified to look “modern” with just minor tweaking. This link to a “tweak” of Dresden Plates, one of my favorite blocks, illustrates my point well I think. Before you click on the link get a mental image of a dresden plate block. I’ll bet it’s a fairly “traditional” image you have in mind. Now click on the link to the modern dresdens. Whole new look, but still very recognizable as a dresden. Cool beans, I think. Modern Dresdens: click here. Still gathering celebrants in our 40,000 visits party. […]

August 16, 2013

It’s time to celebrate!

Hello all, Mary Ellen here again. We had a very nice presentation by the WNY chapter of the Modern Quilting Guild at our regular guild meeting last evening. Many of us had some of our questions about “modern” quilting cleared up for us. Those of us who consider ourselves to be “traditional” quilters have more in common with the “modern” girls than we might have thought. Several of the quilts that they brought along to share didn’t look “modern” to me at all. Some of the fabrics used looked like repros to me more than brand new designs, which is not to say that others of the fabrics did not have a really fresh new look to them. The use of solids in many of their quilts reminded me, and perhaps many of the others in attendance, of the days of old (now I’m really aging myself) when solids and […]

August 8, 2013

More Joe

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Not too long ago I mentioned quilter Joe Cunningham in a few posts (search for Joe if you didn’t see those posts). We also have been mentioning modern quilting quite a bit of late. Today I came across a posting at the Generation X blog (August 7 posting) interviewing Joe. There is an upswing in the interest in hand made work, and in many of the “traditional” quilting patterns. Will hand quilting be the next “new” thing? Read Joe’s thoughts on this, from his 34 year history as a hand quilter. Click here. We’re coming down to the wire for our fall seminar. Please sign up soon to join us in the fun. All classes still have spaces.

August 1, 2013

why smile?

Hello all, ME again. After finding yesterday’s link to the “dispatchwork” completely by accident, I decided to see what else I could find about this urban art. First after examining the map carefully, I noticed that there are some spots not awfully far from us. Not requiring a passport anyway! Perhaps if you are visiting Troy, NY or Albany, you might come across these bright spots. Secondly here’s a link to the background story. click here Thirdly I’ve been mulling over “vandalism vs art”. Recently in the Buffalo News a graffiti tagger was shown serving his community service sentence, given for his repeated spray painting of public spaces. I’m trying to decide where the line is between destructive “art” (as the taggers call it), and this sort of Lego art. How far could an artist go before becoming a vandal? Finally I wonder if more of this sort of “harmless” […]

July 31, 2013

just a smile opportunity

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. Do you know what yarn-bombing is? I’ve never seen a yarn-bomb “in person” but have viewed many posts about them in my internet travels. Yarn-bombing is the placement of knitted works in surprising urban settings. For example, putting a knitted sweater on a fire hydrant along a busy street. Just introduces a pop of color into an otherwise gray environment. Maybe one would call it knitted graffiti? But somehow I don’t find “yarn-bombing” to be damaging to another’s property. After all if the owner or caretaker of the property doesn’t want it, the yarn-bomb is quite easily removed. Disagree? Personally I would love to come across one of these installations of yarn-art. That brings me to a loosely tied group called “Dispatchwork”. They install Lego art in surprising places. Again it doesn’t seem to be vandalism in my scope, but you might disagree. I think […]

July 30, 2013

Summer inspirations and catch-up

Hi everyone, time to get out of summer lull and get blogging again! :) It is mind-boggling to me how in the summer, when days are longer and all that, I seem to have less time for everything? When I say “everything”, I guess I sub-consciously mean quilting, sewing…all that kind of favorite fun, he…he… Does that happen to you? I know we all spend more time outside, tend to our gardens…but still, I always think I should have more time? As I said, mind-boggling. Speaking of garden – this was definitely the year for roses? Mine were just exploding everywhere and making me so happy! I guess the years of protecting them, feeding them, cleaning them from pest do pay out sometimes… “Forth of July” is one of my favorite rose and I think it will make me do a red and white quilt one of these days – […]

July 30, 2013

quilting supplies-cheap!

Hello all, Mary Ellen again. Before I retired it would really frost me to start to see “back to school” ads in July. The summer isn’t even half over yet! Now I don’t mind at all because some of my best quilting supplies are bought in the back to school aisles. Probably my number one supply purchased at this time of year-in quantity-is Elmer’s washable school glue. I buy both the glue sticks and the liquid glue. It allows me to avoid pinning in many projects, and actually has increased my accuracy. The most frequent use of the glue is for “basting” my bindings to the back of the quilt before I sew them down by machine. When I first learned to stitch a binding on completely by machine, I was not happy with the way the back would look. Despite my best efforts at pinning or basting in the […]

July 28, 2013

looks too good to resist

Hello all, Mary Ellen again. Was trying to catch up on my e-mail and blogs this morning and came across a photo of this recipe at Pat Sloan’s blog (our upcoming seminar teacher). (BTW have you signed up for your class yet? We’ll be mailing supply lists out soon, if you want to get yours the easy way please register this week!) Anyway this recipe really appealed to me. I have loads of fresh basil in the garden waiting for the right recipe, and have been overdosing on fresh spinach in my toss at salad bars. If you made your own bread crumbs from Fiber 1 cereal (click here), this could be a very WW friendly recipe. Have a look at the photo and see if you can resist. click here. The text in the blog entry that goes with it is amusing too. I think the ingredients will definitely […]

July 27, 2013

I’ve been MIA

Hello all, Mary Ellen here. I’ve been MIA for a while now. Taking care of an elderly mom who has had several strokes. Things are beginning to come around; keep her in your prayers please. This post was in an e-mail this morning; since we’re having a visit from some of our WNY Modern Quilters to an upcoming guild meeting I thought this would be a perfect quick post. Look around at their website while you’re there to get a peek at what some modern quilters are about. Click here.