My Blue Bayou!

Or that would be My Blue Heaven if you were taking the workshop any where outside of Louisiana!

But it wasn’t just Louisiana, we had a trio from Mississippi join us. They drove 2.5 hours in rain and drizzle to come play! And it was so terrific to see them here. What a fun group!

Quilters by nature are such givers, and I was gifted with some yummies in the form of a delightful bag made by “another” Bonnie ((We honestly could have been sisters, but I of course would have to be the older one!)) I love the selvages used in this bag and I’m using it right away!

I also received some delicious chocolates and some extra blue fabric strips to include in another down-the-road quilt. from the Mississippi gals. I’m SURE the chocolates will be long gone before it is time to pack my bags!

Our class went from noon to 5:30 which was perfect for a Sunday. It made it easy for the out of town gals to get here to enjoy the day, without having to leave the house at the crack of dawn to get here for a morning class.

This is the perfect class for learning to use the easy angle and companion angle rulers for 3 units we use all the time in traditional quilt making: The half square triangle, the quarter square triangle in the form of hour glass units, and the flying geese unit.

We had a LOT of ladies doing blues/neutrals so I was afraid the slide show would look all the same..but you know what? Even though the colors were similar, there were huge differences in the fabric choices, and it was so fun to see the variety!

I had to giggle when one of the gals took one of my suggestions from my lecture to heart! Take it from me--- if you still have MILLENIUM fabric in your stash, cut it up and CUT IT SMALL! It is not going to get any better if you keep it in the stash---it needs to GO! LOL!

We were pedal to the metal all afternoon, as you can tell by the copious amounts of dog ears falling like snow on the floor:

So here you go with today’s slide show!

If you have a mac, you might be asked to download a program called silverlight. It will allow you to see the slide show. It is available through apple, and you can find out more information on it HERE. It is a very small plug in….other than that, that’s all I know to help you.

		My Blue Heaven 1-30-2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

A bit of Mexican for dinner, an evening typing this post and watching “The Nanny Diaries” on Lifetime while sewing some more hexagons --- A good night’s sleep --- That’s what is on the horizon for the immediate future!

We have ONE more class tomorrow: Playing With Jacks! It should be a fun one, and I’m looking forward to exploring block possibilities with more Easy Angle fun! It’s another great one for swapping strips with each other….building variety and playing with layouts!

PS…Hey!! It’s a post WITHOUT food pics!! ((Well except for the chocolates, that is!))

It’s About Relationships!

I’ve often said that Quilting isn’t just a hobby, it’s a lifestyle….

And as I sit here in my hotel room on Sunday morning ((I’ve got an hour before being picked up for an afternoon My Blue Heaven Workshop with the Day Dreamers Guild of Prairieville, LA!)) I’m just pondering on the many different relationships that haved been blessed, strengthened and enjoyed by this lifestyle we share.

This is a picture sent to me just yesterday by Liz – She and her sister took one of my workshops at Road to California. You can view her album HERE!

In each and every class over the past two weeks there have been Mother/Daughter quilting duos, Sister duos, a Mother/Daughter/Aunt trio, a Grandmother, Mother, Daughter trio – even some cousins-many-times-removed and just discovered that they are related way back duos!

There was a Mommy & Me workshop given at the Road to California show that was just precious – and so necessary! We want these young girls to take over our passion once it is time to pass the torch! ((I’m not dwelling on that right now, I have too many quilts in the dream-pipeline to even think of the day when I can’t quilt anymore!))

I’ve had husband/wife duos ---and lots of “best friend” pairs who take classes together. I’m just so grateful to see relationships grow, fun times increase, and love and support flourish all while we are playing with our fabric and making beautiful quilts to be handed down. ((Or kept for OURSELVES occassionally!))

I hear lots of stories as I talk to everyone. Many are going through some tough times, but the quilting is the glue that is holding their sanity together. I’ve talked to Grandmothers who are now the main caregivers for too-young-for-school grandchildren. We do what we have to for our families. One lady I was talking to had experienced a stroke…..AND then found out she was going to have to alter her life and welcome in her 2 very young grandchildren. This is life changing, of course, but she has found that her quilting is the one thing she can do for herself that helps keep her spirits up.

Some how I don’t think it is the quilting in itself, but more the fellowship that she gets from being in close proximity of the other nurturing women in her guild. We can all stay home and sew in isolation, but it is much more life affirming to quilt with FRIENDS!

It is also much more fun to quilt with more KING CAKE! LOL!

This one came from a local bakery ((I don’t remember the name)) And it had a cinnamon/pecan filling…OHHHHHH!!! You will also notice it is not covered in thick icing like the previous one….the dough also appeared to be whole wheat. We justified ourselves that this therefore qualifies as a HEALTH FOOD and we had no guilt in eating the WHOLE THING.

Yesterday was also another braid class. I hope you are not getting tired of seeing pics of braids --- it’s the 3rd time I’ve taught it in a week! We are going to cover the lower half of the USA in colorful scrappy braids, and everyone has a great time in this class trading rectangles with each other for more variety.

I start out with one braid, using the light rectangles and the red squares as leaders & enders so they kind of get into the habit of keeping piecing continuous. It’s not easy when you are used to just ripping your work out of your machine at the end of a seam! From there, when they have enough rectangle/square units made ((I call these match sticks)) in between the lines of piecing, and they feel they are “READY” to add one more ball into their juggling act, they can start a second braid and start building two at a time. Fun fun class!

		Texas Braid 1-29-2011 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

I’ve received several comments telling me you love the slide shows and photo albums! This is a little feature that comes with writing my posts offline using Windows Live Writer. There is a tab for “insert” at the top of the page, and I can choose to insert either a table, photo, hyperlink, photo album, video, map, post tags or emoticons and plug ins. I haven’t played with the maps or the plug ins…but everything else has been really handy.

I’m being picked up in 20 minutes! I guess I better end this here and get a move on!