A Queen for Me

After the wonderful festivities of the past month, including my mother's surprise 60th with visitors from all over, the annual New York State Bar conference activities, work and life... I managed to get in some quilting time on Saturday morning and Sunday night.  Thursday my Rochester Lawyer Quilting buddy and I stopped by my favorite City shop and i decided that I would make a quilt for my bed.

So in the spirit of the intuition quilt...this is where I am as of 1:30am this morning.   Its still growing...the colors are not that great from my phone..but will be sure to post the finished from the fancy camera...smiles.


This is the first time that I am also spending time to design the back as well.  So its a Two for One. smiles.

Wish me luck on keeping it.  I tend to give everything away...hmmm...Any quilting design suggestions.

Dizzying Triangles

I had some striped fabric - so I cut triangles and had fun putting them back together -

This is as far as I got - not sure how I am going to set them.

Not sure what I will call it.. It sort of makes me a bit dizzy - so...

Eye Test

Hangover

or?????


And - only 3 days left to vote in the McCall's Design Star Contest Click and vote - I will let you know the results on Friday. And all y'all have to get your design engines geared up - the McCall's blog says they are going to do the contest again! Give it a try - there is a lot of great design work happening in this group - think about entering, you never know what might happen!

Lets name some of the many things that keep us away from our fabric

Good Day everyone,

I am beginning to resurface.  whew...I pulled off the biggest surprise known to man. I surprised my mother for her LX birthday.  Flying in family from all corners of the country, table rentals, linen and china rentals, decorating, coordinating, my brother and cousin cooking (for 30 people), it was three months in the making.  She had no clue and was thoroughly awed and amazed at the people that were in the room. 

So leading up to the festivities and the NY State Bar events that are going on this week, I have had no time to touch my fabric..or even play with my NEW MACHINE.  Yes, I have a new machine.  A great story as well.  I introduced quilting to my aunt over this past Thanksgiving.  It began with english paper piecing that I had in my bag.  She loved it, and started to take to it...So through December she started getting her supplies, I took her to an Empire guild meeting, went to my fave City shop, and she really enjoyed.  Then 2 weeks ago I received a call stating that she wanted to buy a machine.  I was thrilled and took her to a place that was open on Martin Luther King weekend Monday.  She got a great machine.  Just as we were about to leave, something said to ask about the price of my desired item.  (I had been in there about 3 months earlier and new what the costs were.)  Anyway, long story short it was a ridiculous sale so I walked out with it.

Anyway, back to the post.  All of the things that keep you from your fabric.  Excluding the obvious, i.e., family obligations, children, illness, etc, what keeps you away from fabric.

I realized surprise birthdays, bar conventions, learning how to decorate a cake to avoid paying upwards of $220 for a cake that I can bake and ensure it taste good.  See the images below...including the item that I am longingly hoping to get to tomorrow evening.  What keeps you from your fabric?

Jessica's Swap Quilt

When I received this quilt from Lisa, I was amazed at how beautiful and vibrant it is in person. Your eye just travels from one playful spot to another.

I was inspired by Helen and Lisa's small squares of color and also by the palette and curves of the fabric with the semi-circles. I added the purple strip with the squares with curves at top and 3 slices of color on bottom and an angled green strip next to it. On the opposite side, a lighter strip of pinks and oranges.

It is now off to Margaret's house and then on to Encyclopedia to play with. Who will be after that???

Pins and Needles

 I popped up to see Member, Rachel, at her New Store Pins and Needles today...

 Her shop is lovely!  You must stop up and see. She has some lovely fabrics, 

notions, and embroidery essentials.

 I need to go back and get some of the awesome Tula Pink she had...

 NYC really needs another good fabric shop, and now we do!

POP in, say HI, and tell her that your a member of Metro MOD.

Good luck Rachel!

Updates

Hi Everyone, a little color for your SNOWY day!

A Big THANK YOU, to those who sent me your ideas on the idea of modern quilting. 

It was very helpful, and I will talk more about that at our next meeting.

I hope you all can come.  We have quite a few FUN exciting projects in the works, 

and things to discuss, so if you are able to swing it, please come!  

We run this group as a group conscience, and your thoughts count.

Things to have ready for the meeting include:

Your Feb block challenge if you can participate. Click here

Filler blocks for the December cheddar quilt.  Click here

 A bunch wanted to do a SCRAP BAG SWAP again, 

so bring a bag of scraps if you want to participate in that.

Your lunch, (drinks are provided here)

and SHOW AND TELL!  

It's the best way for us to get to know you! (one or two things)

Round robins:  If you've been working on any of the round robins going around, 

please bring them to the meeting... Do we have any updated pics as tot where these are right now?

EVENTS LINK:

I added a link on the side bar where you can click to pull up all the Quilt shows going on in the area... Feel free to pass along other quilt show info when you hear about stuff,  

YOU can post it or I can, 

PLEASE LABEL the post  "QUILT EVENTS"  then when we click that link

we will see all the events. If you don't know how to do this, just let me know and I will add it.

Empire Guild is bringing their raffle quilt over for us to see,

so bring you $$ for raffle tickets!  one for $1,  6 for $5

let's support our local guilds...

 

Keep posting to the blog, 

we love seeing what your working on.

See you all soon!

Victoria

QUILT EVENTS

Half Square Triangle Fun

I played around with my half-square triangles - this is what they looked like last Monday.

After some shifting around they turned into this.

I am not sure if I am going to leave it as it is and turn it into a wall hanging, or add some borders and turn it into a throw.

Or... should I turn it on point, square it up and finish it this way.

 Or, there might be other options, not sure yet what those might be.

Inquiring minds want to know - what would you do.

new sewing SHOP in NYC!

Rachel, a member of our group just opened a new fabric, 

sewing notions store on the upper east side!

What fun!

pop over to the website, and or the store... 

http://www.pinsandneedlesnyc.com/

She offer's our guild members a 15% discount on all fabrics, sewing notions and trim!

Pins & Needles
1045 Lexington Avenue, 2N
New York, NY 10021
phone: 212-535-6222

and her blog:

http://www.pinsandneedlesnyc.com/blog/

Give this a whirl MOD quilters!

Here is a challenge you might want to try!

This year’s theme is Alliances: People, Patterns, Passion. It’s a small quilt contest and the entrants donate their quilts for a Nov-Dec eBay auction—proceeds benefit AAQ operations. All of the quilts will debut at the AQS- Paducah show this year and then go on to tour nationally—NQA and the Original Sewing & Quilt Expo shows. The prizes are great—grand prize is winner’s choice of any HandiQuilter machine—midarm or longarm. All of the quilts entered will be added to the Quilt Index for permanent archiving. 

Collaborative and individual quilts are welcomed. The size is fairly small –16” x 16” and the theme is very open-ended. 

Here’s full info: http://www.allianceforamericanquilts.org/projects/galleries/Alliances/guidelines/

Help please

Hello my MOD friends.

I have some questions for you all regarding MODERN QUILTING....

I need some help gathering INFO.

Being a MODERN quilter: If you were going to a

Talk about Modern Quilting

Who are people you would be curious to hear from?

Is it a quilter?

Fabric designer?

both?

(need names please)

When you think of Modern Quilters, who do you think of?

What to you is the movement of "Modern quilters?"

And if you were to attend a panel talk in NYC

would you come on a Friday eve?

or Saturday morning?

Would you pay for an event like this?

If you can take a minute to send me an email answering any,

or all of these questions

I would appreciate your feedback.

In March there will be many events here in NYC.

There is the red and white quilt show at the armory

The folk art museum Quilt show

And the Empire Quilt guild show at F.I.T.

Mark you calendars!

Please email me at:

bumblebeansinc@gmail.com

- Victoria

**Note:  Here are more questions to think about, please respond:

Is modern quilting to you, based on the fabric design?
Does modern quilting mean any particular type of quilt?
why do you think Modern quilt guilds are any more interesting
than say, a regular established guild?

What makes you want to attend, what do you hope to find, learn etc?
why is the idea of modern quilting appealing to you?


thanks!

Have a great weekend!

When is Fabric too Good to Use...

Hello everyone.  Hope you all are enjoying the wonderful weather the Northeast is having.  I have a question.  When is Fabric too Good to Use?  I ask this because as I was just responding to a post on V's sight , I realized that I too was looking forward to a shipment of fabric that I purchased online.  Except, my expectation was for a totally different reason.  I did not have any plans for it, and am therefore extremely comfortable/okay with using it for random play. 

What do you mean Encyclopedia, you all ask.  Well, see the pic above.  That fabric is secreted away in its own bag in a special place because I love it sooo much, and purchased it for a mariners quilt that I plan to do, one day...soon I hope..  Instead of just using it, since I don't know when the Mariners quilt will get started, i go off and find other fabric that I don't really care about.  Preferably sale fabric because it is justifiable in my mind to be used for unstructured play.

I have sooo much fabric that I purchased from various shops that did not have a purpose, but because it was the "Good Stuff" I am not playing with it.  Now, as I am writing this, I realize that it is just fabric and I should not have any attachments to random lengths (yards, 1/2 yards, quarter yards, etc)...

Isn't the whole point of this is to enjoy and create with wonderful tools.  So why do I feel this unnecessary attachment and as such am not making use of a wonderful fabric stash...I simply don't know.

My question to you all...Is it just me? How do I break this spell?

Blame it On Queen Bum Bum BumbleBeans...Smiles

Okay, in this case V its a good thing...I blame you for the image that popped into my head for a thing that speaks of New York.  Your Empire piece was sooo inspiring that I went to sleep and had Taxi's on the brain...and this is what has begun.

I have a more updated version that i will post, once I download the pics.

February Challenge Blocks

For our last challenge, the block I made inspired me to get going on a whole monochrome sampler quilt. So for this new challenge, I was excited to try some curved piecing for the first time--but now that I've tried it, I think I'm done for good! From trying to trace a simple curve, to getting that edge smooth, well, I guess it's just not for me. Which is okay, since I don't need to add another project to my list!

time to vote

 

John Kubinec from big rig quilting,  and a member of our METRO MOD GROUP

is in the McCalls design star quilt competition 

and the finals are up for voting...  

Click the link to check him out, and VOTE!

He also quilted a couple quilts for my BASICS Quilt gather,.

Thank you !

Good luck John!

My Empire landmark quilt

I loved seeing Nicole's Empire Quilt.  Her sense of humor was fabulous! So clever!

I'm just finishing the binding on mine...  I had a hard time focusing on ONE landmark, 

so instead I focused on ALL THINGS POINTY...

the Chrysler building, lady liberty and her crown, and the top of the empire state building...

And some swirly outer black fabric, relating the energy of NYC...

Feb 5th meeting updates

 HAPPY NEW YEAR NYC MOD QUILTERS!

I wanted to pop on and remind you all that the FEB 5th meeting

is fast approaching, and it will be a fun time!

I wanted to go over once again, what we need for our DECEMBER quilt project...

to get it pieced..

Please raid your stash to find other PURPLE/PINK toned 12.5" blocks

to set our FABULOUS collection of Cheddar Blocks.  

If you could bring one to two (different fabrics, not all the same)

this will be a  large quilt, so we need a bunch of pieces to pick through and layout...

 

This tone seems to be what is working best with the blocks... 

smallish prints, leaning towards dark fuchsia... 

purples and oranges look great with it...

some with even touches of turquoise in it, as several of the blocks 

have those three colors in it...

NOTE: If you made a block but weren't able to bring the cheddar block to the meeting in DEC, we are ONE block short... Please bring it to the meeting...

(not mentioning any names...DAVE... hehe! we know you made one.... Hope to see you in FEB!)

 ALSO:

FEB BLOCK CHALLENGE

The info for the BLOCK CHALLENGE FOR the FEB QUILT

is listed here.

please click to he page for all the details.

I've made a bunch just for play and experiments... they have been fun little morsels

to have laying all over my house... LOL!

 ****

 It was mentioned that a bunch would like to do a scrap bag swap again.

If you'd like to participate, please bring a Zip lock, or whatever, Filled with scraps to swap with.

I was thinking about the round robin quilts going around, and wondered about organizing partners, and do two person round robins as a group.

Janet and I are currently working on one, and we've been having a blast with it so far...

you can see it's progression here: CLICK

Jessica started the one, (CLICK HERE) that is on it's 4thor 5th person, 

(it's looking Fabulous!)

and has another that is about to start making rounds...

We can discuss this more at the meeting, 

so bring some scraps if you'd like to join in, and

we can hash out the details then...

 ALSO happening at our Feb meeting...

My pal, Jackie, 

is coming to stay with me for that weekend, so 

she gets to say Hi to you all too!  Many of you know Jackie's blog,

her fun pod casts,  fabric shop and long arming services...

Lastly, Of course we want you all to bring your show and tell

And your lovely smiling faces...

Questions can be left here in the comments or email

me at

bumblebeansinc at gmail dot com

-- Victoria

Manhattan Mini Quilt!

For the Empire Quilt Guild's upcoming show, they have a President's Challenge, where members are encouraged to make mini quilts based on a theme.  This year's theme is "Landmarks of New York."  I decided to make a mini quilt featuring a hard-working but often-overlooked icon of New York:  the hotdog cart!

I completely quilted the background first, using free-motion meandering stitches on the yellow fabric, skyline-echoing stitches on the light purple, and random lines on the ground.  Then I used fusible applique to create the hotdog cart.  As a final touch, I used some decorative stitches (blanket stitch, etc) around the fusible appliqued shapes. 

I had a lot of fun with the quilt, and it only took about a day or two to make.  It measures 17 inches by 22 inches.  Enjoy!

Goddess of Good Ideas for E

At the Dec. meeting, Earamichia gave me 8 crumb pieced coasters to quilt, made with fabrics from the scrap table in October.  They sat on my cutting table for a while, but they wanted to be so much more than coasters. 
and.. um.. last night they turned into this:

I put the Goddess of Good Ideas in the middle and I'm ready to pass it on to the next player.  (well, I may add one more border, we'll see)  Round Robin #2 anyone?

**ETA: she's getting bigger.  someone take her before I end up making this whole quilt myself!

International Quilt Study Center

I thought I would share their quilt of the month because I love it's use of vintage textiles and maybe introduce you to an interesting organization in the quilting world.

http://www.quiltstudy.org/collections/quilt_of_the_month