This week’s exclusive eQuilter Free Quilt Pattern will send a delicious shiver of cold sweat, as you start your preparations for this year’s Trick-or-Treaters at your door. We are loving the graphic Raven illustrations, and the whimsical Pumpkins, that make up this Halloween collection.
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the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our
thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your
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pattern.
We just got home from the Sacred Threads event Monday night, and our weekend gave us a lot to think about. Somehow we had several conversations about Left Brain and Right Brain, so it seemed appropriate to share this quilt by Judith Roderick – “Heart-Brain Coherence” which talks about the need for balance, for Mental, Emotional, Physical and Spiritual Health. This hand-painted quilt (in the center of this collage) is also embellished with applique and buttons. Judith’s brilliant eye-catching quilt is hanging just to the left of my quilt, in case you go to see the show this week!
We had such a jam-packed weekend, as I described in our Saturday newsletter. On Sunday in Washington DC, Sophie and I went to the National Portrait Museum, and then to the Holocaust Museum. We have visited both of these several times, but we both noticed that the first part of the Holocaust Museum was packed with a serious silent crowd that moved very slowly, and seemed to be reading every word about the events that led up to WWII. It made quite an impression on both of us.
Monday we had a very special visit to the Peace Tech Lab at the International Peace Institute. This beautiful new building with soaring sculptural architecture is full of white marble and glass, and we had a breathtaking tour of the facility. Then we went next door to the adjacent building which houses the Peace Tech Lab. I had asked the founder of Engineers Without Borders if he would suggest an appropriate place for my “Mothers of the World” quilt, and he immediately suggested this organization. So this quilt will be installed in one of their meeting rooms, to inspire their staff as they plan ways to spread Peace in refugee camps and impoverished shanty towns, via apps and cell phones and social media.
In particular we talked about three 13-year old girls who live in a slum in India. They designed an app that will send out an emergency alert to their local community if the app user is threatened. These brilliant girls sleep on slabs of cardboard at night. We discussed putting together a batch of donated comfort quilts to send to these girls and their community. When you have no home, no bed, no possessions…you can’t imagine the meaning of a handmade comfort quilt that is donated by a stranger on the other side of the world.
We will have several opportunities to donate quilts to those in need, going to places like Pine Ridge SD, India, Guatemala, Nepal, and hopefully an orphanage in Africa. If you are working on charity quilts, keep us in mind over the next few months. We are focusing on mothers and babies, and children at risk. Together, we CAN make a difference.
sharing your Passion for Fabric… Luana and Paul
* The collage above features Judith Roderick’s quilt in the Sacred Threads exhibit, open through July 28 in Herndon VA. Also featured on the left and right – Rainbow Digital, plus Black and White fabrics in stock now.
**************** Luana’s Travel Calendar: July 30 – Aug 6 – Birmingham UK – Festival of Quilts Oct 16-22 – Winnipeg & Churchill, Manitoba Canada Oct 25-31 – Quilt Market & Festival – Houston Nov 13-17 – Color Marketing Group – Tuscon AZ
Classic Roses by Jackie Robinson are featured in this week’s Free Quilt Pattern. These exquisitely detailed fabrics have a timeless style and are enhanced with rich, pearlescent metallic.
Contrasting Rose Bouquet frames are set between coordinating pinwheel blocks, to create a dramatic day/night garden effect. The Hourglass-Stripe outer border frames the quilt and gives the illusion of a marvelous scalloped edge.
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the pattern as configured, or customize it to your liking with any of our
thousands of fabrics. Just place your desired fabrics in your
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This mystical panel displays a majestic Unicorn prancing and playing. The surrounding ocean waves and gray slate coordinate with the heavenly and ethereal theme of this magical design.
Make this stunning 63″ x 53″ quilt as a wall-hanging or lap quilt. Children and adults will cherish their enchanting Midnight Unicorn quilt.
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.
Sophie and I have
been attending the Sacred Threads weekend event in Herndon Virginia near Dulles
Airport. In addition to seeing the quilt exhibit, there is a concurrent SAQA
event, and Quilt Alliance activities going on during these few days. We are enjoying
visiting with the artists whose work makes up this very special exhibit, on
display through July 28. (My quilt “Chautauqua Sanctuary” is near the
front, if you take the first left turn.)
Friday we went on the DC Textile Bus Tour, which Sacred Threads has organized
for several years. We started out at the fantastic quilt exhibit at the DAR
Museum, with curator Alden O’Brien giving a lively walking tour through the
gallery. This current show is called “A Piece of Her Mind – Culture &
Technology in American Quilts”. I have been to the DAR many times, in fact
I have a 2014 video tour and interview with Alden on our video page
under the “Festivals and Shows” heading. Look for Parts 1, 2 & 3.
Next we went to the National Museum of Women in the Arts. This gorgeous space
was created from an abandoned Masonic Temple. It houses the collection of
Wilhelmina and Wallace Holladay who spent 20 years buying and studying art by
women. There were artworks from the 16th century, to contemporary 21st century
pieces. We were thrilled to see a Faith Ringgold quilt about Josephine Baker in
the galleries upstairs. We had a lovely lunch on the mezzanine also.
Finally we visited the Renwick Museum, a Smithsonian Museum which is just
kitty-corner to the White House. There are always several temporary artist
exhibits in this beautiful building, originally built for the William Corcoran
collection. The most impressive was the Temple from the Burning Man artist David Best.
Established as a sacred space for reflection and prayer, this installation has
massive, incredibly intricate, wooden cutout panels.
There is always plenty of art to be seen in the Washington DC museums, and I
hope this gives you a few ideas for a future trip here. Sunday we are going to
the National Portrait Museum and the Holocaust Museum. Monday I am presenting
my quilt “Mothers of the World” to the International Peace Tech Lab.
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.
When I was a girl, I loved to spend time with my Great Aunt Temple. She was a rebel painter who loved to paint purple flowers, especially Violets and Thistles, just to rile up the neighbors who thought thistles were weeds. (It is the Scottish National Flower) She thought purple thistle blossoms were beautiful, and I agreed!
Aunt Temple lived in a trailer on an acre of land in Temecula in Southern California. Her acre was planted with fruit trees, and as I remember it, stuffed with a rainbow of annual and perennial flowers. Something was blooming all year round. When I went to visit her, we would squeeze lemons from her tree, make lemonade, and then take a sketchbook and watercolor paints out to her garden. Our intention was to catch some fairies and paint them.
The first time I visited her blooming paradise, she gave me a copy of Cicely Mary Barker’s “Flower Fairies” book with full color plates. I studied them carefully, so I would recognize the fairies when they decided to show themselves. While we were waiting, she would show me how to draw and paint tiny Violets.
In 2009 when Michael Miller came out with their first collection of licensed Cicely Mary Barker “Flower Fairies”, I was just beside myself. I was instantly transported back to Aunt Temple’s secret garden, and those long hot afternoons sipping fresh lemonade in the shade….watching for a little sparkle of fairy dust among the Poppies and Birds of Paradise.
Sophie and I are traveling to Herndon VA this week for the Sacred Threads/SAQA/Quilt Alliance weekend, and we look forward to seeing many of you on the Wash DC bus tour Friday, or at the events Saturday.
sharing your Passion for Fabric… Luana and Paul
**************** Luana’s Travel Calendar: July 18-22 – Sacred Threads & Not Fade Away (VA & DC) July 30 – Aug 6 – Birmingham UK – Festival of Quilts Oct 16-22 – Winnipeg & Churchill, Manitoba Canada Oct 25-31 – Quilt Market & Festival – Houston Nov 13-17 – Color Marketing Group – Tuscon AZ
This week’s Free Quilt Pattern seems to capture that moment in the famous Christmas Eve poem by Clement Clarke Moore – “Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!”
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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 last 4 days have been full of Fun and COLOR with Ice-Dyeing goddess Cindy Lohbeck. I knew what to expect because I met her at the Quilting Arts TV studio a couple years ago, but it was still a thrill to hear the students gasp as she showed her class samples, and later when the students unfolded their class projects.
If you are a longtime eQuilter customer, you have probably figured out that we really encourage YOUR creativity, and try to offer classes, products and free editable patterns that you can make your own. We love to see the crazy genius creativity that comes out of our classes from our students.
Jacqueline de Jonge’s workshop registration is OPEN now, and those of you on the waitlist were notified yesterday. We expect this class to fill up with a wait list. Jacqueline has quite the international fan club!
Sophie and I will be flying to Dulles Airport (DC)on Thursday, and will be at the Sacred Threads events in Herndon VA on Friday and Saturday including the dinners. We sure hope to see many of you there!
eQuilter is a longtime sponsor of Sacred Threads, Quilt Alliance and SAQA so this is a fantastic triple-header event for us as a sponsor.
sharing your Passion for Fabric… Luana and Paul
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Luana’s Travel Calendar: July 18-22 – Sacred Threads & Not Fade Away (VA & DC) July 30 – Aug 6 – Birmingham UK – Festival of Quilts
This generous 60″ x 70″ quilt design uses the dreamy Digital-Printed ‘Sea Serenade’ collection, with a gorgeous range of liquid colors that will bring a sense of peaceful magic to any space. The mermaid silhouettes float on contrasting backgrounds, giving the effect of a backlit figure suspended in the ocean.
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.
