Blooming Today

It's May 26th, and here is what's blooming near my house:

Forget Me Nots

White Flowering Crabapple

Pink Flowering Crabapple

Wild Stawberries

Trillium

Pin Cherry

Serviceberry

Blueberries

and this little beauty, called Gaywings!

Lilac Lane Quilts

I visited Lilac Lane Quilts this weekend. This is a lovely quilt store in Alliston, Ontario. It was the perfect weekend to visit, as the lilacs in Alliston were in bloom and the fragrance was wonderful! Owner Liz Schueler has a large display of my quilts and patterns.

Tree Frog Peekaboo Bed and Wall Quilts, Hibiscus and Porcelain Wall Quilt, and the very popular Pansy Wall Quilt!

Small quilts, patterns, and kits

Lilac Lane Quilts carries all my patterns, as well as many kits. Liz's husband Carl quilted the Tree Frog quilts on their long-arm machine, and did a beautiful and very creative job. Carl also made a sample of my Sugar Maple Dance quilt, which hangs in the shop. I think his sample is nicer than mine!

Liz is planning on having me teach a class on Tree Frog Peekaboo sometime this year. She's working on kitting the patterns, and I'll post the class on my website when we settle on a date.

CreativFestival Spring 2009

CreativFestival is the largest retail craft show in Canada. I've visited as a customer in the past, but this spring I took the plunge and had my own booth.

My friends Sherri Hisey of Border Creek Station Pattern Company and Jean Boyd of Patterns by Jean Boyd occupied the booths on either side of mine. Our husbands were all there to help, as well as visiting with each other!

Sherri peeks during booth set-up day

My Botanical Art Quilts booth, view #1. My new Tree Frog Peekaboo quilt on the right was a big hit!

Botanical Art Quilts booth, view #2. I had patterns, kits, beads, and many other products related to my designs for sale.

An action shot of Jean Boyd in her booth. My daughter Sarah plays hookie from helping me to browse through Jean's beautiful memory quilt samples.

Sherri Hisey demo's her techniques to make her gorgeous designs.

Despite the economy, we all had an incredible opening day. The shoppers were lined up to start, and we didn't slow down until 5:30 pm. In fact I sold out of several items by noon!

The next two days were slower, but we still did well. All in all, it was a great success.

How to Photograph Quilts Outdoors

My new pattern, Tree Frog Peekaboo, is a single bed size quilt and matching wall quilt. I needed to photograph the bed quilt for the pattern cover, so my hon came up with this great idea!

Materials: 2 sheets of rough plywood (cost - $15.77 each)
- 1 cotton painter's drop cloth (available at hardware or paint supply stores)
- wood tacks to attach the drop cloth to the plywood
- deck screws to attach the plywood to the deck railing
- a deck (if you don't have one, ask your hon to build one for you or build it yourself)

Tip: photograph on a bright overcast day - avoid direct sun, hot spots and shadows.
Bring your dog with you so you can take a photo like this:

Find A Quilt Teacher.com

Ami Simms (funny lady and American quilt artist) has come up with a great idea - create a website that showcases quilt teachers from around the world. As of today, almost 100 international teachers have registered - me being one of them.

Any one or group wishing to hire a quilt teacher can visit the site, register to log on, and obtain workshop and bio information. You can search teacher's names and geographical area. There are six of us from Canada so far. Check it out!

www.FindAQuiltTeacher.com

CBC Radio One Sudbury Gardening Phone-in

I'm doing a gardening phone-in this afternoon between 4:30 pm and 5 pm for my favorite radio station: CBC Northeastern Ontario on 99.9 FM!

I did these for 2 summers previously, until I got too busy with other commitments.

Spring has sprung, lawns are lumpy, hedges are shaggy. Time to spruce things up...

Pieceful Nights Quilters Guild Lecture

I had the pleasure of giving a lecture/trunk show at the Pieceful Nights Quilters Guild in Toronto on Wednesday. The guild is a small but welcoming group of quilters who meet in the afternoon to work on projects, then have their meeting in the evening.

Showing my Asiatic Lily wall quilt

The Sugar Maple Dance wall quilt

The members asked lots of questions and we had a nice visit afterward. Thanks for the invitation, ladies!