Its been a while since i wrote here but life has been busy and when I put pressure on myself to write a post and it doesn’t usually happen. I have good intentions of blogging more. I’ll give you a quick update of some of the things I have been up to recently and exciting new offerings coming up.

MY Sloth for the 2021 SAQA Benefit Auction

This small 12” x 12” quilt is my donation this year to the SAQA Benefit Auction. The Studio Artists Quilt Association holds this fundraising event every year and its always fun to see what my quilt will sell for and who buys it. I usually purchase one small quilt a year from a quilt artist.

Sandra Bruce, Heidi Emmett and myself AKA Artistic Alchemy

This was the week for our annual retreat at Zephyr Point Conference Center but due to the Caldor Fire near South Lake Tahoe it was cancelled. This was a shame but with recent fires the air quality had been horrible at Lake Tahoe and ladies were cancelling left and right! We did get together this week to divvy up the giveaways and raffle prizes to those that missed out. Our generous sponsors were C&T Publishing, Quiltfolk Magazine, Mistyfuse, Marcia Derse, Turtlehand Batik and Dharma Trading. Thank you.

This year I decided to make a Temperature Quilt. If you haven’t heard of this it was started by members of the Modern Quilt Guild. Everyday I record the high and low temperature for that day. I chose a Drunkards Path block with the high being the main fabric and the low is the corner. I started this on April 1st and try everyday to add the next block rotating it depending if the temp went up or down. My plan is to add grey tones when it rains. Check back for my progress!

During Covid I have taken to hand-stitching in the evenings and it has mostly been along the theme that is pictured above. I have made a large piece that I call my Crazy Covid Stitching 2020, a sampler strip stitched on linen and these two projects; a journal cover and small purse. Its a class I plan on teaching in the future and I’ll be making kits that will be available in my shop soon.

Much of my time has been spent teaching or making custom memory quilts and so my collage work has taken a back seat. Recently I did get to finish this portrait of Rigby. Coming up in October I will be teaching Pet Portraits at the International Quilt Festival in Houston and also a 3-day Pet Portrait class at the Road to California event in January 2022.

Foothill Quilters Guild Block of the Month

I have never done a Block of the Month before and when I heard my local guild was going to be using scraps and making quilts from the book Little Handful of Scraps, I decide to join. Little did I know it was making miniature quilts! And this means cutting, sewing and pressing all has to be super precise and perfect. Not something I had really strived to do before, “perfection is over-rated!”. I have learned I have to slow down, embrace this way for quilting and try my best. You never know I might learn something!

This photo I took as one of my sunflowers was opening up. I call it my ‘Shy Sunflower’. Pattern available in my shop. They now are looking shriveled and dry as summer comes to a close. The weather is still hot, we had some rain last night but I feel Autumn is on its way.

Check out my shop for other patterns and kits I have for sale, my calendar for my teachings schedule and teaching page for classes that I can teach to you guild or group either in person or on Zoom.

Thanks for reading along.