I recently received an unexpected surprise in the mail – two yards of beautiful hand dyed fabric by Judy Robertson! Thank you Del! When I looked at the yellow and purple one, I saw wonderful reflections and knew it needed to be water. I wanted something to divide it and considered a heron, but ended up with this sailboat, even though I know nothing about boats. Abject apologies to any sailors out there! I do know that a sail boat has a thing at the bottom of the mast to hold the sail, but this one may be wrecked. It does seem a bit wonky.

It is only 12 x 12″, machine pieced and machine quilted, and will go to the annual Studio Art Quilters Associates Benefit Auction which takes place on-line in the fall.

The whole little piece is cut from the one fabric, the main backgound from the area that first impressed me with the effect of a reflected bit of land and the boat and it’s reflection from another section. There is no seam between the boat and it’s reflection which meant I had to piece in a v-shaped bit of yellow at each end.

There is still quite a bit of the fabric left to make it’s way into other quilts, perhaps flowers.

Some of you have been wondering where I have been -Arizona – that’s where! We flew out Thursday for a quick trip to attend a family wedding – home again on Monday. It was great to see folks we hadn’t seen in a long while. Besides the wedding we went to Taliesin West and Casa Grande Indian Ruins.  Since visiting Frank Lloyd Wright’s Falling Water in PA, I couldn’t be that close and not check out Taliesin West, but in comparison, it was not so good.  Of course tour guides make a big difference and we didn’t get a very good one. I have always been interested in the ancient cultures so I did enjoy Casa Grande more.

Home again on Monday and now the concentration is on getting everything together for my next trip – GA on Friday. Starting with clothes, I emptied the suitcase and started laundry. Load the machine and start water running into the sink for a few handwashables.  While that’s filling off to the other room to take care of something else, totally forgetting the sink and not remembering until the entire utility room is flooded along with the two bathrooms on either side and the hall carpet.   Let this be a lesson to you. After a certain age multi tasking may NOT save you time. In spite of wet vac, dehumidifier and fans the carpet is still wet.

Good news though– I was totally thrilled and very honored to have my Yellow Headed Blackbird in the SAQA auction snapped up in the first few seconds by none other than my good friend Del!  She seriously wanted it and I’m glad she got it!

The number of visitors to my blog more than doubled yesterday, which must have been in response to Del’s post on HER blog concerning my (now her) “Early Birds” quilt which I am very proud to say, is in her Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection. It is indeed an honor to have a piece in that collection and to count Del as a personal friend!

There is less than a week to go for the SAQA Auction which starts September 10th at 2:00 Eastern. My donation “Yellow Headed Blackbird” will be amongst the first group offered.

Sept 10 at 2:00PM, I will be somewhere between here and Phoenix so I don’t know when I will get to know how it goes!

The last quilt that I sold was also a bird quilt- “Baltimore Album, Baltimore Oriole” and my last pattern, “Bluebird” is selling well, so I guess there is a theme here – birds have been good for me!

SAQA – Studio Art Quilts Associates- has a conference every two years in Athens, OH. in conjunction with the opening of Quilt National at the Dairy Barn.

The Dairy Barn, Athens, Ohio

I went for the first time in 2007 and have been anticipating going again ever since. When Del had to cancel her trip this year, I very nearly canceled mine as well, but I am so glad that I pushed out of my comfort zone and went alone.

This year’s conference was held at the Baker Center on the beautiful Ohio University Campus. The facility was perfect, containing space for the seminars, exhibits, banquet and the best college food court I have ever seen, all under one roof! Shuttles ran from the hotels for those who did not have their own transportation. The Saturday evening BBQ was held nearby in a lovely park and the weather couldn’t have been better. Kudos to the organizers who must have put in a lot of work to make the whole thing look so easy!

Seminars that I took were “Time Management” with Gwyned Trefethen, “Digital Designing with Layers” by Deb Cashatt and Kris Sazaki, Critiquing Art Quilts” with Sandra Sider and “Marketing Outside The Box” with Lisa Chipentine. They were all very well done and quite informative and I think that they will all be very beneficial to me. Speakers and panel discussions were also most interesting and I especially enjoyed hearing the Jurors for this year’s Quilt National discuss the jurying process.
Juror Katie Pasquini-Masopust summed it up by saying “It’s a crapshoot”. I think they had to choose 85 pieces out of over a thousand entries and some artists have entered it for many years, in fact they offer an award for Persistence for the person who finally gets in after entering for many years – this year two people got the award after having tried for seven times!

There were some very nice entries selected this year, it was hard to choose which one I liked best. As usual there were those that leave me shaking my head and wondering “Why?”. You can see the winners here.

One of the highlights of the conference is the auctioning of “The Box” and this year it went for $10,000.00, the same as last year. The Art Gallery In A Box is handmade by an artisan woodworker from exotic, beautiful woods and has 12 artfully arranged drawers each containing a 12 x 12″ art quilt by a famous art quilter.

That is out of the range of most of us, but in September you can bid on similar works from the rest of us during the annual on-line auction.

My entry to the SAQA Foot Square Auction has been posted on the SAQA site. You can see it here along with the others so far. Check back often as many more will be added. The auction is always exciting and will take place in the fall.

I see from Vicki’s post that the April issue of Quilting Arts Magazine with my article “Painting With Fabric” is out! I have not yet received my copy. If you are interested, you can see posts and photos dealing with the making of “Spring Encounter” by clicking on “fawn” in the side bar.

Due to the way I work, ruled as I am by deadlines, I almost always finish the current work before starting a new one. That is not to say that I have no UFOs (unfinished objects for those of you who are not quilters) I do have some old ones that are traditional pieces that have been bumped out of the way by the newer stuff with deadlines. I can see how they could quickly get out of hand though. Since I set the Merchant’s House aside to start the Yellow Headed Blackbird and have fabric laid out for the next piece, I guess you could say I already, in the span of a week or so, have three new UFOs to finish! I prefer to call them WIPs (works in progress).

I started quilting the 12″square for the SAQA auction yesterday and hope to finish it today. This closeup was taken after the piecing was completed. The top background fabric is a piece that I have had in the stash for years. It is hand dyed cotton damask. I’ve never found just the right place for it, but I love it here.

Oh, my goodness!  I’ve been home several days and have not caught up yet! So much to do, so little time.  Much is put away but not all.

It was such a good trip!  The Omaha Guild is a wonderful, welcoming group who turned out for the lecture with lots of quilts and my two workshops – here’s a photo of them hard at work on their Coneflowers wallhangings.  They all did an amazing job!

My fears of snow did not develop for which I am VERY grateful.  We did have a couple of rainy days and decided to spend them inside dying fabric; that was a great way to pass the time.  I don’t generally use a lot of hand dyes in my work but occasionally I do, and especially for skies. so I concentrated on dying some skies, mostly.

These are some of the better ones. keep in mind that for the way I work they will not be used as a whole piece, but cut apart so I think there are some very usable sections here.

I was specifically trying for not your typical blue skies.

While I was away I had occasion to look at my website on two different computers and was dismayed to discover that my pictures were extremely dark. I had adjusted them to look good on my monitor which I now think needs to be calibrated. I am posting the dyed fabric pictures un-adjusted. They look light on my screen, but I would be interested in feedback as to how you think the pictures have been looking, now and in the past. I realize that you don’t really know, not having seen the real thing! But do you have the sense that you have been unable to see detail due to darkness?

The real reason that I was on my hostess’s computer was to check on the progress of the SAQA Auction.  I am thrilled to announce that “Don’t Piss Off the Fairies” was purchased in the first minutes of the auction by the Thomas Contemporary Quilt Collection!!  Thank you , Del!  I am so happy that the fairy has found a good home with you, now perhaps she will get happy, too.

More good news — during the time I was gone I received word that “Mon Grand Pere” has been accepted to the “Form Not Function: Quilt Art At The Carnegie” exhibit in Albany, IN. There were 276 entries and only 39 were accepted so I feel very fortunate!

These last pieces of dyed fabric were done in a different method. I love how the crinkles and the blended colors add texture.  I think that dying could become addictive as one gained mastery over the effects that can be achieved. For me, I had no clue what I would get, but it was still fun and exciting to see what we got!