Keep Walkin'

Sunlight through quilts and stars in the distance

Stars and Sticks and Spiderwebs!

More Pix of the Forest Walk

Churn Dash on the woodpile. by Stacey

Enter here.

3 on the line.

Pie Party, Xes and Cotton Reel

2 Indigo beauties

3 more indigo quilts

Back in the box

Whew! The quilts are down and back in the box! Actually not literally in a box, I roll mine, 4 or 5 at a time, on a tube and cover them and store them in the loft of our little house.

view from afar

The Quilt Forest Walk, which we mount for the Denman Island Studio Tour, went really well for us. We had over 150 visitors (wow!) to the forest and we chatted all day - about our favourite subjects (quilts, fabric, sewing), we visited with friends and family, we ate well, and we even sold a few things.







Stacey and I hung 45 quilts in the trees this year, with plenty of help from our spouses, family and lovely farmer-neighbours who came at closing time on Saturday to take down all the quilts in case it rained, and came back again on Sunday morning to hang them all back up again. 

Good friends, John, Oli and Stacey.

Playing nicely together. I made the quilt in the centre, and Stacey made the other two.

I will keep posting a few pictures at a time over the next little while. Then it will be like walking through the forest, coming around the bend to see the next "gallery". Enjoy!

Annual Quilt Airing

Less than a week away! Stacey and I will hang our quilts in the forest again for the Denman Island Studio Tour. We had a great time last year, it was wonderful to see all the quilts hanging together amongst the trees, and we had a fantastic turn out of people to come see them.
New this year is that I actually have a studio! Last year I was sewing on the porch, and I moved into the house over the winter. This year, I moved into the shipping container that my guy made in to a studio for me. He installed sliding glass doors in one end, insulated it, added electricity and lots of lights and put up my design walls so I could do my thing and be all messy.

I've been busy finishing things (just got 6 quilts ready) and it has made me want to make new things! Its hard to keep focused on cleaning up around here when I have new ideas.... I'm thinking of the general idea of "containers" as a series. I'll do some trials and see if it sticks, once the weekend is over.
Curious? Come to the tour, August 18 and 19, 10 - 4

some girls

 

Some girls dream of looking (or being) like a beautiful movie star, like Angelica Houston or Kate Winslet, but me? I wanna be these guys... 

Okay - let's talk this through... figure it out.... Jeff Bridges has great hair, that might be it. The wrinkles look really good on him, and he doesn't apologize for any of it, that might be it. He shows an intensity, a focus, that makes me want to be him, plus, he's hot...
The other guy is John Wolseley, a tapestry artist. He looks cool, and intense, because he has that hair (again with the hair!) and the wrinkles and the custom made waistcoat with all the pens he needs and his glasses hanging on his neck if he needs them, and then there is some kind of bag hanging on his body, probably carrying a change of clothes and perhaps a bed roll (if he needs it)  and maybe even more pens, .... I think its the nomadic, yet prepared (and not a little neurotic), intense look about him that makes me want to be him.
It looks like it boils down to intensity, self sufficiency, self assuredness and good hair - that makes me want to be these guys, even though both Angelica and Kate are quirky and beautiful in their own ways. Go figure.

Catching Up

Just so you know - the last post was written on June 10. And then...

We went on our trip, had fun, saw interesting things, 

Owls in an old beehive burner

came home, worked on more quilts, did some work, learned to milk goats, entertained company and were entertained by them, took in the Readers and Writers Festival events, enjoyed live music, walked in the woods, rode bikes, taught a class (more later) to a lovely bunch of fabric artists, processed more registrations for the big event and a bunch of other stuff.

Phew. Caught up.

Road Trip!

Very soon - perhaps Monday afternoon - we'll pack up the truck and head down the road for a holiday. Every year (we missed one due to moving house) for the past 12 years or so, we have made the  trip to Weiser, Idaho for a week of giggles, sun, camping and music. Life on the island is so good, however, its been hard to imagine leaving our baby plants and our old cat to have a vacation from a life which is like a vacation. And then I remembered how seeing new landscapes and changing the daily patterns energizes me, and how this is the best music week of the year for my husband and it always energizes him artistically. And we laugh, a lot!  So, we'll be gone for a week or so, living in the Kencraft, seeing new things, hearing and playing good notes.

On the patchwork front - I must have been inspired by the stripes on the camper - I got right down to work a few days ago and made the top for the Red Challenge. The textile art group I belong to in North Vancouver - Cutting Edge - has presented a challenge to make a quilt that measures 30" x 48" and reads as red (read?). So I have completed top #1, I have more ideas on this...