eQuilter Blog

The last week or so there seems to be a Space theme in the news but also here at eQuilter. We found out Jeff Bezos is taking an 82 year old female pilot into space. Richard Branson moved up his launch date so he could beat Bezos into space. And…Karen Nyberg…the Quilting Astronaut…has a licensed Thread deal with Aurifil!

In the meantime I’ve been chatting with Jean Wright of the Sew Sisters – the Sewing Team for the Shuttle program in Florida. And today I had lunch with astronaut and author Ron Garan, who I met many years ago at the Johnson Space Center because of eQuilter’s support of the NASA chapter of Engineers Without Borders.

If you’ve read my e-newsletter for awhile, you probably know that our family are Star Trek and Star Wars nerds. I was going to photograph Cosplayers at Starfest and ComicCon before it was cool in our industry. I had my photo taken with Captain Kirk….er….William Shatner. Every year when I am in Houston I go hang out with my EWB friends at NASA JSC. And I have an uncle who had a very close encounter in the Fifties. My dad worked at Lockheed for awhile. So, you know, it’s in the blood I guess. Fabric and Space…go figure.

When the kids were little we visited Kennedy Space Center several times, (see photo above) and more recently I met Victor Glover (first Black astronaut to stay on the Space Station) a few years ago in Houston, where our EWB friends arranged for us to tour ISS Mission Control. All of this is thanks to your support of our eQuilter charity program, and our continued support of Engineers Without Borders projects in Rwanda, Kenya, and Nepal. In fact when Ron was up on the ISS in 2011, our friend Dr. Jack in Mission Control was telling him about our massive quilt drive for victims of the tsunami and earthquake in Japan. Many thanks to all of you who helped us to send 2500 comfort quilts after that disaster, coordinated by Mission of Love.

Perhaps you’ve seen the “Fly Me To the Moon” quilt exhibit or book, on the topic of astronauts and space. One of my quilts in that fantastic project was tapped for an exhibit at NASA several years ago, where I finally met Dr Karen Nyberg.

We are excited to carry Karen Nyberg’s thread set which just arrived TODAY, and to tie this story together in a neat bow, today Ron sent me photos of him and Karen together on the Space Station. Small world huh?

…sharing your love of fabric,
Luana and Paul

p.s. We’ll be uploading a Dairy Barn lecture I gave on ‘International Quilt Trends’, some time tomorrow on our video page.

This week I had to make the sad decision not to travel to the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham UK. It is especially sad because the exhibit that I curated, “For the Love of Gaia”, will be there without me. You may recall that this exhibit was at the Intl Quilt Museum in Lincoln Nebraska last year, but none of the artists were able to see the exhibit in person. We did however enjoy gathering at a virtual opening, which you can see in this video.

Fortunately 2 of the artists will be in Birmingham for the festival, so we will rely on them to tell us about the event. Sheila Frampton-Cooper will be there for her own personal artist exhibit, and Cas Holmes will be there in another gallery. I do hope that if you are planning to attend the FOQ the end of this month, you will take photos of “Gaia” and send them to us, or post and tag them for me. Another pandemic bummer, but this time we have that silver lining that some of you will see those quilts.

This group of quilts will also travel to the New England Quilt Museum in Lowell Mass, and I do plan to travel there in person to give a lecture and perhaps meet some of you in March. (see calendar below)

We are having a 3-day holiday weekend:
The Fourth of July is Sunday, but Monday is a holiday so we will re-open on Tuesday. The Independence Day holiday will be different this year. Many western states have fireworks bans due to wildfire danger. Our Boulder Fireworks have been cancelled. We are hoping that we don’t have fires started by those who insist on breaking the fireworks ban. Fingers crossed.

However it is still a good weekend for watermelon, ice cream, picnics and barbeques….and maybe some of you are swimming, hiking, or going to outdoor concerts. For myself, I celebrate America’s long tradition of generosity and compassion, and that is how I express my patriotism on such a holiday. This weekend I celebrate that as an American, we are in a position to help others in need…with your support.

How lucky we are.

…sharing your love of fabric,
Luana and Paul

Quilt Calendar:

July 29 – Aug 1 – Festival of Quilts – Birmingham UK – “For the Love of Gaia” quilt gallery
Aug 7 – Zoom lecture “Intl Quilt Trends” for Birmingham Festival of Quilts
Sept 27 – Anchorage Log Cabin Quilters Guild – Lecture.
Oct 23-30 – Houston Quilt Market & Festival
Dec 4 – Zoom lecture “Intl Quilt Trends” – Quilt Canada
Jan 12 – Apr 9, 2022 – New England Quilt Museum (NEQM)
“For the Love of Gaia” quilt exhibit
Sat, March 19 – “International Quilt Trends” power point lecture – NEQM