New news...

For more than a year our blog has resided on Blogspot. We have been happy with Blogspot - they are reliable and the service is free. It's easy to love that combination. On the downside, I've had a bit more trouble customizing the way the blog looks than I would like to have had. It's probably been user-error on my part but there you go. I decided a week ago to look at other options.

I found a new blog host that is easier for me to work in. I'm going to leave this blog, hosted by Blogspot, as it is right now. Our previous posts are here and will still be accessible.

So, without further ado, click here to go to our new blog!

It's hot in Texas...

... which means it's time to pull out the baby pool and the hose. It was 100 outside yesterday and we still had a great time. Jack surprised us when he started pouring water over his head - and it looks like he surprised himself too!

Enjoy the weekend!

Applique Outside the Lines...

The new book is here and Linda is shipping it out now. It's already getting good reviews! In their new issue, American Quilt Retailer wrote:

"Applique Outside the Lines by Becky Goldsmith and Linda Jenkins (C&T Publishing) is brilliantly thought out! In fact, it is so well thought out and explained, that when you use this book, Becky and Linda encourage you not to follow the directions! Can you imagine that? How wonderful!"

We love a good review! Click here for more info.

We've also added a new ePattern to our site. Jacob's Ladder didn't quite fit in the Piecing book but it's too pretty not to share. Click here for more info.

Our Jacob's Ladder is made from Japanese taupe fabric but you can use any fabric you like to make yours. Value placement is important in this quilt. The instructions in our ePattern clearly state where to put the light and dark fabrics so that you don't have to guess.

Playing catch-up...

I'm home and desperately trying to dig my way through the pile of stuff that didn't get done while we were on the road. There is hope. The pile is smaller!

I shot this while standing in Times Square last week (hard to believe that it was only a week ago). What an amazing place. Noisy, crowded, busy people going everywhere at once, taxis doing their best not to kill you, eye-candy everywhere you look - NYC is well worth a visit. Enjoy this (short) show:

Visit the Artgirlz blog...

I had a few moments in the hotel room to blog surf. I checked the Artgirlz blog to catch up on posts I missed. I found their post on the color turquoise and it made me oh-s0-happy! I especially love this photo with the stripes in reflected in the pool water.

There are so many good blogs out there and you are reading this so you know that. I'd like to encourage you to talk to your friends and see if they, too, are blog surfing. If not, tell them what you like about it and encourage them to join the fun. They will thank you for it later.

The trip is winding down...

We're nearly home and I'm looking through a few of the photos I took thinking that you all might be interested. These matted photos below were part of a much bigger piece of art. I liked the way the photos float inside the openings in the matt, sometimes on torn black paper. Nice look.

I have no idea what this is. Looks like a huge upside-down water glass. It was on top of the MOMA.
A big part of our trip included a stop in Baltimore where Jeff (our youngest son) and Celia (his fiance) live. We had a nice visit with them and left the next morning with "The Dress".

This is Celia's wedding dress that she'll be wearing on August 15 in Sherman, TX, when she and Jeff get married. The Dress spent the night in 2 different hotels and traveled, laying down, in the back seat of the car. I have to say that I'll be glad when is it safely hung up at our house.

A big day in NYC...

There are lions guarding the entrance to the NYC Public Library. These guys are resting where the ones in front of the Art Institute of Chicago are in mid-step... but they are about the same size. Notice the pigeon on this fellow's head.


We did more people watching in Times Square. It is my sincere hope that I am not nearly as interesting to look at as many of the folks we saw are.



If the trash is from a store with pretty boxes, it can be a little bit festive... This pile made me think of Christmas.


There is an installation piece at the MOMA by Song Dong called "Waste Not". Turns out that these items all came from his now-deceased mother's house. That is the skeleton of her house with the items. Seriously, if this doesn't get you get rid of the junk in your house, what will?


I enjoyed the look of the empty toothpaste tubes but I am not going to make my own set at home.


And I shopped for fabric in the garment district! I am very lucky that Steve was with me and carried my purchases all day long. I found out where to go from a page on Paula Nadelstern's web site. The shop in the photo below is N. Y. Elegant Fabrics (not on Paula's site but it's near the shops that were). Oh my, it was huge and full of luscious stuff. I did buy some cotton (great big red dots on white), and some etched fuschia velvet. It made me wish I had time to make more garments.

New York City - Day One...

We got to NYC in time to see a bit of the Gay Pride parade. It was colorful and festive and no one minded having their pictures taken.

We went to see the very fine exhibit of Paula Nadelstern's quilts at the American Folk Art Museum. The quilts were marvelous and the setting was perfect for them. Go see this exhibit if you get a chance. Next we went to the MOMA. The art was good, but I had almost as much fun people-watching. These three ladies looked nice together...

I love this photo...

Leaving Vermont...

On our way from Vermont to Connecticut, we stopped at the King Arthur Flour Baker's Store. I've been buying my chocolate from them for a while now and it was really fun to stop and find even more great baking tools. We found the hot pads we've been hunting for for years - oh happy day.

Then we went down the road to Simon Pearce. I had not heard of Simon Pearce before but this is a well-respected source for hand-blown glass in the northeast. These are photos of the outside of their home base. The waterfall you see generates much of the power that they use.


I loved the wear pattern on this rock...

Steve took the photos above from this covered bridge...


I did try to resist, but I just didn't do a good job of it. We bought one glass bowl, the smaller Corinth bowl. It's going to look lovely on our dining room table. Steve thought so too - although later he said that really, as long as I loved it, that was good enough. I think our table without a bowl would suit him just fine. But we decided that if we managed to stimulate the economy a little bit on this trip that that would be OK so there you go.

Fabric shopping at the Vermont Quilt Festival...

I have stimulated the economy by buying fabric on this trip (and some other stuff too but we won't go there right now). This is the fabric I managed to buy during my 2 hours at the Vermont Quilt Festival show. I was teaching and the show was off-site so I didn't get to the show very much. This first fabric I got at the Woodstock Quilt Supply booth. These are mostly (or all) from Westminster and are fabrics that I think I don't already own.

Isn't their fat quarter label wonderful!

I spent a lot of time and money at the Quilters' Express to Japan & The Beckoning Cat booth. The Japanese fabric was worth the money.

This fabric is one cut off the bolt. The pattern changes at the fold - positive and negative designs on each side of the fold. Very cool.

The background colors behind the swirly black print changes across the width of the fabric. There were more fabrics like each of these.


And, last but not least, Handloom Batik had a booth. They have beautiful fabric and scarves and batik stamps and more. That gray piece of fabric with the light berries on it - I'm going to find a special place for it!

Seen in Vermont...

My last class ended at 11:30 on Sunday. It was such a good few days! The ladies in my classes all did so well and a good time was had by everyone. As a quilt teacher, it always makes me happy when my students leave happy and confident that they can applique anything. Good job ladies!

Kayoko, one of my students, gave me an origami winged dragon that she made. I love it! It folds flat so that I can travel home with it. It will live in my studio. Thank you, Kayoko.


Steve and I drove to Stowe for a couple of hours. Steve hiked and saw quite a bit of Vermont while I was working so this was my chance to see some of the state. We took the scenic route and found this spot in the road. The rocks are HUGE and the road is narrow and winding. Very scenic.


These flowers were in Stowe. I should know what they are, but I don't. Let's just call them pretty.

This is pretty interesting...

Last week I found a link to The Uniform Project. Click the link and read all about it. This is a project in which the woman below is wearing the same black "uniform" every day for one year. It is a short dress/smock that buttons up either in front or back. She changes up the uniform every day. She is doing amazing things with this one dress and accessories. I'm getting some good ideas!

Look on the left side of her blog page. Click on "View Dailies" and a calendar will come up. Click on a day and you'll see the photo of the outfit she wore that day.

The Vermont Quilt Festival...

I taught at the Vermont Quilt Festival. What a great show! If you ever get a chance, go to this show. The quilts were wonderful, the quilters are happy, and there are lots of classes. It is held on the campus of St. Michael's College in Burlington, VT. The land is flat and the classrooms are air conditioned.

There were some great red and white and green antique quilts. This one, #A32, was my favorite. Here is what the catalog said about it:
"Potted Flowers with One Blue Pot, 1850-70
This quilt is an example of the pot-of-flowers quilt pattern for which there is an ongoing research project. There are very few of these intricately made quilts, the majority of them having PA or OH origins. This particular quilt, locatedin 2006, was not one of the known examples and has since been added to the project. We do not know the name of the maker, but it is also believed to have come from PA. The one blue glowerpot is a result of the yellow component of the original over dyed green being fugitive. Private collection."

Personally, I wish the blue flower pot was intentional. That color change is what makes this quilt so memorable.


#A4 was another favorite. It's named Urn with Red Feather & Mystery Flower, 1850. The catalog says:
"This quilt is from Oneonta, NY. The design is composed of elements common to many red and green applique quilts with flowers and leaves emerging from an urn. But the expression is totally original. The flowers are unlike those seen in nature and the leaves are as much like red feather as leaves. The quilting apttern on the center setting blocks is unusual - a pineapple tree with three pineapples. Private collection."

And then there was this striped stairwell spotted in downtown Burlington. The stripes dressed up an otherwise boring spot.

The Shelburne Museum...

We went to the Shelburne Museum before my classes started at the Vermont Quilt Festival. The museum sits on a large swath of land in Shelburne, VT. There are historical houses, barns, buildings, a steamboat, and a locomotive on site that have been restored and furnished. There are a variety of exhibits. The docents were exceptionally helpful and knowledgable. The Shelburne is definitely worth a visit if you come this way.

It was a beautiful day - breezy and cool. The plants were bright green, the flowers lovely. Here is some of what we saw...

The round, red barn at the entrance had a motorcycle exhibit on display.

It was interesting to go into these houses. The walls were mostly solid wood planks. 2x4 construction came along much later.


There were several lovely antique quilts on exhibit. I didn't photograph them because we couldn't figure out how to turn off the flash on my camera. Oh my. I did use my little camera to take a photo of this block. I know I've seen it before but I don't think I've ever really looked at it. The shapes are appliqued, not pieced.


This Paul Revere on his horse weathervane made me smile.


There is a horseshoe-shaped building devoted to circus things. One entire side has a carved replica of a circus parade mady by Roy Arnold. He spent 25 years carving and painting it - and he had helpers! It's pretty amazing. I think the wheels would look great as pieced blocks.

From the American side...

The American side of the falls is different. From this side you get the view over-the-top. Surprisingly, the river leading to the falls doesn't look that dangerous. There are rapids and there is a lot of mist in the distance (clouds of it in fact) and there is the noise from the falls - but if you didn't know what was coming you might just paddle on... and over you'd go.

A closer shot of the top of the American falls...

Here's the top of Horseshoe Falls...

I love these things. They look like happy men from Mars.