Order the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your Wish List, and these fabrics will appear in the Fabric Selector below the pattern.
Humans are genetically disposed to look for connections, as we travel through a life full of ever-increasing complexity. We see faces and animals in the clouds. We thrill to the discovery that we have a famous distant ancestor in our genealogy explorations. When we go to a quilt show and start chatting with the strangers next to us, it is not long until we find many things in common, sometimes startlingly so. When we make those connections, it rings a bell. We love to ring that bell.
During this year which defies being tied down by any limited combination of adjectives, we are missing those connections, and therefore when that bell rings, it has so much more meaning. So when the Kilauea volcano explodes, as we are having a once-in-800-year planetary alignment, on the Winter Solstice, we want to see and understand the connections. When we’ve gone through a year of losses and isolation, having to let go of all our expectations, the holidays bring a bittersweetness and a deep yearning for…connection.
For those of us who have suffered a deep loss, such as a beloved spouse, or a child, the hole that is left in one’s heart may be too raw to make a connection. But with time, we realize that in order to heal, we must give to others….the one thing that we crave the most. That sense of being connected.
When we quilt…when we sew all those pieces together to make something greater than the sum of its parts…it is a meditation of connecting. 25 years ago today, we lost our baby daughter Hanna, and I started my journey to heal our hearts. Quilting was part of that journey, but starting this business and then committing 2% of sales to charity, was also part of that healing process. Back then, 30,000 children around the world were dying every day for lack of basics like clean water, basic nutrition and minimal medical care. So we decided to honor Hanna: we would try to do something about those children being lost…and those mothers whose hearts were being broken.
By the end of this month, we will have raised over $1.75 million for a variety of charities and non-profits over 21 years. I write this with humble astonishment, but I share this with you on the Eve of Christmas, because I feel that this year we are all contemplating the true spiritual meaning of the holiday. We wish to express our gratitude for your support for our family business and our charity program, but we also thank you to have trusted us with this vision that we can truly make a difference for those in need.
Wishing you the blessings of Peace and comfort in this holiday season, Luana and Paul
Share Post:
Posted inCharity, COVID|Comments Off on All is Calm, All is Bright….
This is a very simple 59″ x 59″ quilt design, using our panel with portraits of 25 planets and moons from our Solar System, plus coordinate prints and Kaufman Kona Solid Black. It is the perfect gift for the budding young astronaut who dreams of visiting the moons of Saturn one day.
Order the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your Wish List, and these fabrics will appear in the Fabric Selector below the pattern.
This weekend I am humming that sweet song – “This little light of mine…I’m gonna let it shine…” – inspired by the “Let Your Light Shine” collection at the top of this newsletter.
If you are an astrologer, you are excited about Saturn and Jupiter going into Aquarius in the last few days. If you are an astronomer, you are excited about the conjunction of these 2 planets, creating a “Christmas Star” effect on December 21st, the Winter Solstice.
So as we approach the longest night of the year, we will have this beautiful sight in the sky. I’ve been watching these 2 planets in the Southwest sky, tracking them moving closer and closer every single night. Astrologers know that Pluto is has been lining up with these 2 planets also, but it is not visible to the naked eye. And hey, astronomers don’t care about Pluto anymore, since it was decided it is no longer a planet. But in astrology it is a big deal.
Jupiter passes Saturn about every 20 years, but they are usually one degree apart in the sky. (about twice the apparent diameter of the moon) This time they will be so close together, they will almost merge into one star. This hasn’t happened for at least 400 years, and some say for 800 years. Either way, it is definitely a once-in-a-lifetime celestial event so I hope you have clear skies to enjoy the view, and the beauty of this inspirational lineup.
I also note on my ISS tracker app, we’ll be able to view the International Space Station gliding across the sky here in Colorado at 1:08 to 1:15 am in the early hours of December 21st. Or wait?!? Could it be Santa doing a test run with his reindeer? Download the ISS Detector app so you can watch too!
Christmas is now less than a week away, and I am sure you feel like I do. It is just surreal, and I don’t really feel the holiday mood yet. But I got an early Christmas gift – a call from my mom’s nursing home – asking for permission for her to receive the vaccine in the near future. That light at the end of the tunnel is just a little brighter now.
with Hope for the Future, Luana and Paul
Share Post:
Posted inCOVID, Trends|Comments Off on A Christmas Star on the Winter Solstice
Christmas and New Years are just a heartbeat away….and that means that Springtime is just around one or two corners…depending on where you live. Baby animals are the sweetest harbingers of Spring, and right now is a good time for a triple scoop of cute baby bunnies!
To make this 60″ x 60″ quilt design, you will use a central large panel, a block panel, 2 collection coordinates, and a Hoffman Hand-Dye. This charming quilt can be a baby quilt, a lap quilt, or a wall hanging for someone special. The added extra is the fun you will have working with these delightful fabrics!
Order the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your Wish List, and these fabrics will appear in the Fabric Selector below the pattern.
I am feeling blue tonight. In case you haven’t heard, due to the pandemic, the International Quilt Association (IQA) is calling it quits. This is the non-profit organization that has put on the quilt contest in Houston every Fall, for 41 years. eQuilter has been a sponsor of this show, and contributed to the cash awards, for many years now. I know it will be hard to comprehend for many of you, but I will share part of their announcement with you:
“Many of you may wonder if this means there will be no Judged Show at International Quilt Festival, but we have received a commitment from organizers of Festival to add a quilt competition. So, although details remain to be worked out, ‘the show will go on.’ “
We have communicated to Quilts Inc today that eQuilter will remain a sponsor of whatever new form the quilt exhibit and contest may take in the future. We know that all of you will continue to make quilts! So although this is a loss, we hope that as this one door closes, another will open in the not-too-distant future.
Thank you for supporting our family-owned business, so we can continue to sponsor quilt exhibits and contests, and also to help those in need through our charity program. We were a sponsor of the Virtual Quilt Festival last week, and we are a Gold sponsor for the virtual version of QuiltCon in February. We are committed to helping the quilt industry and these quilt events survive the pandemic, and we look forward to the day when we are all together at a quilt show again!
To make this quilt design, you will start with 2 different colors of the 60″ x 60″ Iris panel, then sew 3 Hoffman Hand-Dye colors to make the border. It looks complicated, but it is easy-peasy, and the results are stunning!
Order the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your Wish List, and these fabrics will appear in the Fabric Selector below the pattern.
The big news this weekend is that a vaccine for the Covid virus is finally going to start being distributed. Our frontline hospital and nursing home workers will receive the first doses. I hope and expect that my mother will receive a dose in the nursing home soon also. Beyond that, it is still uncertain. Paul and I are in our early sixties so we will be at the end of the line along with almost everyone else under 65. However I am focusing on the positive, and thinking about what might be the New Normal this time next year.
It is cold here in Colorado today, and we got a couple inches of snow. It helps to get us in the Christmas mood. We are going into the darkest time of the year, with the longest nights and the earliest sunsets of the year. It is a good time to stay inside to sew, bake, and sip hot drinks. I am going to make soup and bake bread this weekend. Snowy winter weekends are a good time to take a nap. I am exhausted from this year, and am glad to see the end of 2020.
We learned a lot about ourselves, our communities, our healthcare systems, and our governments this year. In the darkest times, there is a light of illumination that shines on us, revealing things we would never see otherwise. I am thinking about how I can write down these things that I learned, in a journal, and then perhaps to remember in a 2020 quilt.
Or maybe it will just be an “I Survived 2020” quilt. A hundred years from now maybe your 2020 quilt will be in a museum, and school children will wonder about what it was like to live in these times. Perhaps they will collect digital ephemera and construct 3-D holographic scrapbooks. We can only imagine. But I am pretty sure a quilt will still be something you can wrap around a loved one on a cold Winter’s night….
with Hope for the Future, Luana and Paul
Share Post:
Posted inCOVID, Quilts|Comments Off on I’ll Take What I Can Get
To make this 42″ x 46″ quilt design, you will cut up the Gnome panel and stripe, and piece with 3 colors of Hoffman Hand-Dyes. The Gnome details in these prints will make you laugh…including Gnomes on a Ski-lift, Gnomes on a Squirrel-drawn sled, and Gnomes Ice-fishing. This colorful collection is seasonal which means when it is gone, that’s it! (We literally grabbed the last few bolts from the manufacturer.)
Order the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your Wish List, and these fabrics will appear in the Fabric Selector below the pattern.
My goal each week, when we send out this Midweek Creative Nudge, is to give you some inspirational juice to get you through the week. I see about 150,000 pieces of art each year, and choose less than 10% of this artwork for our highly curated offerings at eQuilter. We’ve developed a very special clientele who appreciate art, color, design, travel, culture, and things that make us smile! You are gardeners, pet owners, collectors, doctors and nurses, musicians and sci-fi nerds, bakers and birders. You like books and bicycles, cosplay and hiking, sipping and brewing, stargazing and calligraphy. So we had to find fabrics for ALL of you.
Gosh you all have so much talent!
The last couple weeks we’ve been featuring snowy holiday themes, so now for something completely different, I’m thinking you are about ready for a little dream vacation south of the border. I wanted to make sure you saw this floral collection Dazzling Garden, which reminds me of the beautiful hand-embroidery I’ve seen in Mexico, Guatemala and Brazil. It also happens to match up pretty spectacularly with the Frida Kahlo fabrics. So I’ve put together a colorful collage with some of these fun fabrics, to add a little Cha-Cha to your Wednesday.
I do suggest that if you want to order anything for Christmas delivery (there’s still time to order chocolate along with your thread and fabric!) you should place that order this week. And if there’s something here that YOU are hoping for, you can always drop hints for an eQuilter Gift Certificate, which can be ordered as late as Christmas Eve and delivered by email to you or a fellow fabriholic.
Today is National Pastry Day, so I am going to brew some tea, bake some muffins, and pretend like I have nothing to do for an hour or so. Care to join me?
