Dream Big

This year my chosen word is "Focus" and so I am going to use that as my reason for being so quiet this first quarter...lol...  yeah that is my story and I am sticking to it... :-)

No seriously, I have been very focused the first 3 months of the year creating art.  My first series for the year is called "Dream Big".  It was inspired by the anniversary of man's first walk on the moon and Misty Copeland being named the first female African American Principal Ballerina for the American Ballet Theatre.  The main feature of the series, you have already seen the beginnings of and it still needs it's final touches, so I won't include it here.

Instead I want to share the supporting cast.  6, small, 19" squares....  I made all the tops first, because I wanted the energy, the emotion to flow from one piece to another.  Then I quilted them all and then of course I embellished them.  My husband thought it was an assembly line..  but for me it felt like I was in a zone..  as if they were all one piece...  connected in some way.  and I don't think I could be happier.  It is the first time I have worked like this.  Not my first series, but the first time I moved freely from one to another as I created them.  I would get so far on one and stop...  couldn't figure out the angle of the dancer or the color or type of clothing, so I would pick up one of the others, until bam, I knew what the other piece needed.  The same went for the quilting and which motif I would use where.

So without further adue...  here they are.  Only the first 2 have names that I am happy with at the moment, but that is ok..  it is part of the process....

Reach for the Moon

Leap of Faith

 On Top of MY Game

Giving It All I Have

Why Not

Yes I Did!  

I am still playing with ribbon color and ribbon length, so you can still see the pins in this pick...

I hope you have enjoyed a peak into my last 3 months...  I so enjoyed working on these...  It was actually a creative high....  This week I posted the first 2 in a couple of quilting groups on Facebook and the response was overwhelming.  It was really humbling.  Actually had a few people reach out to inquire about buying a piece.  Yes, it felt good....  I love it when others love my work as much as I do.

In addition to these pieces...  while I waited to decide how to embellish them,  I started on my next series...  the focal piece is almost done.  All quilted in fact...  and I have sketches for the 6 smaller pieces done as well.  Not sure I will go underground again as I create..  I never plan, I just do as I feel...  which is why it is important to me that the viewer feels as well. :-)

Hugs...
Renee

Art can be humbling...

I was in a business meeting for work last Thursday, when I received an email telling me I had won 'Best Innovative Style Quilt' for Let's Here it for the Girls at the Mancuso, NJ Quilt Fest.  As you can imagine I was ecstatic.  I was sitting in Chicago, but couldn't wait for the weekend, so that I could see my quilt hanging in all it's glory in New Jersey.

Well, I am happy I had those 3 days to bask in my glory.  As always, the show had some phenomenal quilts hanging.  My notification email for the award had said that the judges felt that the competition was extremely tough.  But as I walked the show floor, I was amazed at the talented quilts and the big name quilters who I had gone up against...  oh my.  I didn't even rush to find my quilt.  I decided to take my time and appreciate all the other work, because surely they had made a mistake and I had maybe received Honorable Mention.

One of the reasons I like this show is that the quilts are usually so varied, and this year was no different.  Artsy quilts hung next to traditional, big next to small, hand next to machine...  In all, the workmanship spoke for itself.  These artists put their heart and soul into these pieces... surely, mine won't look as good, or as professional.  I quilt at night, after work, after dinner, after all the other things have been taken care of.  I quilt for me, not for judges...  I experiment with all different types of techniques and yes, sometimes, I say to myself, it is 'good enough', knowing it isn't perfect.

It is funny how all these thoughts rushed through my mind as I walked the floor.  Almost as if I was preparing myself to be disappointed.  And then I saw it.  My quilt...  my ladies, on the dance floor for all to see.  And YES, there was my ribbon as well..  BLUE for first place in a particular category.  As always, I watched the people as they approached.  Almost as expected, their eyes seemed to gravitate to the other 2 pieces handing next to it....  see I was right, it didn't deserve that ribbon....  then all of a sudden, they turned around...  they stopped and looked and took out their cameras.  They noticed the finely tuned bodies of the dancers, the realistic effect of them in front of the back-drop as a result of the trapunto, the 3D flowers that had been scattered across the stage in accolades.  They chatted amongst themselves and read the description and the quilters name.  At that point, I felt it was alright to step forward, to comment that I was the quilter.  They congratulate me and ask questions about the piece. As they walk away, I breath.  Ok, that wasn't so bad.  I survived, I belong....

No this isn't the first time I have won a BLUE ribbon, and no it isn't the first time the competition was tough, but it always seems to amaze me, that others enjoy looking at something that I created, and for that I am humbled.  I quilt because I enjoy it.  It brings me peace.  I think it is wonderful that others get some joy from merely looking at it as well.

For that, I say Thank You!

Renee

Pelham Quilters Round Robin 2013 - Here is Cheryl's piece

So in June we brought in our completed round robins for the year to guild meeting.  You can see some of the progress on this years top here.  This is the top after I added my round...

I can't seem to find my picture of it with the last round on it, but you will see it in the picture of the quilted piece. This top was worked on by Cheryl, Donna, myself and Doris, in that order, all from the Pelham Quilters.

Since Cheryl has been ill, I decided to take hers home and quilt it for her.  I hope she likes it...

I tried a new quilting design, which I saw at the Kutztown Folk Festival and Quilt Show.  The quilt was amazing and the swirling design was an all over pattern on that piece, but I used in only in the white sections here.

 I also added some red Swarovski hot fix crystals from Cheri's Cyrstals over the points, to bring out more of the red.  Red is Cheryl's favorite color :-).


The rest of the piece is quilted with designs that just seemed to fit...  a meander in the mosaic, since it wouldn't be noticeable anyway: waves in the white points, swirls in the red points, half feathers in the light blue batik and an outline of the flowers in the darker blue outer border.

I used Aurifil 50 wt cotton in white and 2 different blues for the entire quilt.  Besides being practically lint free, it is nice and fine so it gave the quilt the right amount of texture, without trying to steel the show from the quilt itself :-).




All in all, I think it came out pretty good. 

Cheryl is now doing some light sewing, so I left the binding to be done by her. 

Now I hope she likes it :-).

Cheers!

El Coqui!

In Puerto Rico there is a small frog with a huge sound.  Found only in PR, the coqui, mates by finding another coqui with the perfect pitch.  The male goes 'co' and the female responds 'qui', but it sounds like one frog making one contiguous sound

My husband has a cousin, who along with his wife live in Trujillo Alto, PR.  Their backyard, or outdoor living space is a wonderful, live in garden, that is a natural continuation of their indoor entertaining space.  At night you can hear what seems like millions of coqui's chatting away in the garden.  They sound almost musical.

Well this cousin and his wife are wonderful hosts.  Whenever we are in PR, they take such good care of us, that I wanted to bring them something special when we went down last month.  Last year as I worked on my Jungle Paradise quilt featuring the parrott I would frequently post progress on Facebook and she fell in love with the quilt.  While they were in NY for the Thanksgiving holiday, she saw it in person and she made my heart sing with her praise of my work.  So, I decided to make them a nature scene featuring the coqui.  I thread painted a coqui and created a natural garden scene incorporating some of the plants from her garden that I had taken pictures of on our last visit, along with some other nature inspired greens.  I printed the plants on fabric and along with the coqui, I appliqued them into the garden scene.

I added butterflies in both an applique and 3D effect, as well as ladybugs.

As always, all of my quilting is done free motion and I used a wide variety of threads...  Aurifil 50 wt Cotton; Superior SewFine! and Nature Colors; Metler Twists (to be honest I have used this thread in yrs, but I only needed a little) and some Sulky.  As I have mentioned before, I have 2 favorite brands of thread.....Aurifil for the perfect lint free cotton and Superior for their non-cotton specialty threads,...... but sometimes, you need to pull out something that is hidden in your stash, for either the right color or the right texture.  It is called finding the right tool for the job :-).

This was the first time I tried doing circles in an inner border, where they all had to be the same size.  Remember, I don't mark my quilt tops.  I love the end result, but I must say, it took a while to get the swing of it :-).  There was a lot of 'frogging' going on in that border...  LOL!

This is the end result.

As you can see it looks like she loved it!  And, she immediately recognized the plants from her garden on the bottom right and left hand corners of the wallhanging.  She has told me it will hang over her TV in the family room, so she will look at it everyday!

Here's to family and El Coqui!

Cheers!

Kimono Inspirations

So a couple of posts ago, I shared with you the piece I was making for my Fiber Arts group, FANE's, Kimono Inspiration Exhibit at the Northern Stars Quilt Guild Show, World of Quilts, held the first weekend in May.

Well, I want to share with you not only my finished piece, but some of the other works of art as well, but since we have an exhibit opening soon, I will tease you with mine....  (details on the exhibit can be found below).

This is Pathways....

This was my piece.  I must say I had so much fun with the piece, from design to adding the 'fringe' at the end.  I am really happy that I joined the group, because they are really encouraging and since most don't focus on the machine quilting, it has opened my eyes on how to add texture to a piece with embellishments.  So slowly but surely, I will be expanding past just crystals as surface embellishments :-).  It is quilted with both Aurifil 50wt cotton and Superior Sew Fine and Art Studios threads.

There were 26 Kimonos in all and they really looked good on the stands that Jane and the team built.  The quilts are designed to be hung on stands that allow you to see front and back of  both the center piece, as well as he 'sleeves'.  But they can also be hung on a wall, although you will only see one side of the Kimono.


Lucky for FANE, two different galleries are interested in hosting the exhibit of Kimonos.  One in August and one in October.  The first is a show at The Quilt Gallery at City Quilter.  The exhibit runs from August 13 - 31, 2013, on 25th St, between 6th and 7th Ave., NYC.  The Gallery is open Tuesday thru Saturday.  All Kimonos will be for sale via The Quilt Gallery.

As information for the second exhibit draws near, I will share it with you as well.

Hope you like my Kimono and stop by the exhibit in NYC to see all 26!

It is amazing how much they control you...

I started my parrot piece at the Spring 2010 Country Quilter Retreat. I spent most of the weekend creating the bird and thread painting him, creating his background of leaves in the forest setting.  I was in love with the progress I made. The colors were gorgeous, the thread work a joy. I was really proud of myself.  He is thread painted with Superior Masterpiece thread.  Masterpiece is fine enough that it allowed me to layer on the color without adding bulk.  Plus the colors were a perfect match for the underlying fabrics.

Well the joy faded shortly after I got home.  I put my lovely parrot up on the design wall and I couldn't figure out what to do next.  I didn't think he was ready for a border, but what?  It hung there for months, eventually getting taken down to make way for other projects.  I must admit, I took him out of hiding every once in a while and starred, but I had nothing.  Not one real clue of what to do next.  Then it dawned on me.  I really didn't like the piece, him yes --- the piece no.  Yes he was colorful, yes I loved the thread play.  But something about the piece just didn't work.

So back on the design wall he went, just to be starred at for months all over again. I figured it was the background, but ughhh....  I had spent a lot of time making those leaves and doing all the thread play on them as well.  Did I really want to cut the parrot out and start again?  No, I just couldn't bring myself to do that.  So away he went....  again.

Then last July I took him with me to Quilting On the Lake.  I figured with all the creative juices flowing in that place, something would shake loose and it did.  Philipa Naylor saw me staring at it and asked me what was wrong.  Quickly we realized that I didn't need to rip it out.  I just needed a place for the eye to rest.  It was so busy that although the parrot was gorgeous, you really couldn't see him with all the leaves going on.   So I decided to take the plunge.  No one believed I was going to do it.  I cut out a section of the leaves and off I went shopping in the vendor mall :-) for a hand dyed green that had movement but at the same time, allowed the parrot to be truly seen.  What a difference it made.  I didn't do any sewing or fusing there, I was too busy in class, but I fixed him up quite nicely when I got home.

Well I made a vow to work on UFO's this year, so last week out he came.  I found the best hand dyed brown in my stash for a boarder and over the last few days added trapunto and got him all basted.  I even made a 3D bird of paradise that will be added to the side once it is quilted.  Friday evening I sat down and didn't think I would ever get up!  I am so enjoying quilting him.  He is finally coming together.


I spent some time over the weekend quilting.  The parrot is done, as are all the leaves.  I should get the piece totally quilted this week.  Can't wait! 

So far 98% of the quilting has been with Aurifil 50wt cotton.  I like the way it adds to the piece with not being too flashy,,,,  dimension and texture for interest, but not in your face :-).

He will also be accompanied by butterflies and a Bird of Paradise flower that I will add after the quilting is done.  Both will be 3D, to add some additional interest to the piece.



Oh and I have submitted him to New England Quilt Festival (MQX East).  I hope he gets accepted!

Catchng up....

So earlier this month I promised I'd share some of the things I have been working on.

Well the first project I can only share a corner as it is a challenge piece for one of my guilds.  It is another piece done with my mother as my inspiration.  This time it is a salute to her strength and fortitude.  I can't share what just yet, as it will give away my piece, but here is a quick peek at some of the quilting.  I love the piping, as the black polka dots on the fabric are random, so the sliver that shows in the piping is truly sporadic.

This piece is quilted with Aurifil 50 weight cotton.

Once that piece was done and ready to be turned in to the challenge team, I picked up another UFO from last fall (yeah, shamelessly I have more UFO's than I care to admit.  I remember when I made sure I never had more than one other piece in process.  Oh well!)....  It is a piece that was started during my semi-annual Friday Night Fun at the CQ Getaway.  Yes, this piece took more than just the Friday evening.  I didn't actually finish the top until mid-day on Saturday.  But I finally took it out of the bag and finished it.   At the retreat everyone kept coming up to the piece to see the chickens running loose in the yard (by the base of the tree).

I did a bit of thread play on the top before quilting this piece.  More than half of the sun rays, as well as the little patches of grass on the hills and all the stitching on the leaves were done on the top only.  (disregard the little bit of lint...  it is amazing where these lint balls try to call home)

I enjoyed adding dimension to the piece as well.  The beige tablecloth in the laundry basket is sticking out and just hanging over the edge, as well as the purple one behind it.  The quilt the ladies are hanging on the line is a full quilt (all 3 layers). I still have to add the handwork to represent the 'clothes pins'.

I should have took a close up of the boulders I quilted in the boarders.  I love the texture it gives the piece.


"Laundry Day" as I have named it, is a true testament as to why as a quilter you probably need more thread than fabric :-)..  This small 24" x 26" has 10 different threads in it.  Sulky solids and variegated, Aurifil 50 wt cotton, Superior Masterpiece/Sew Fine/Rainbows, Mettler Twists, Gutterman and Isacord.

 I used Quilters Dream batting in both pieces.

Cross one off the list, but I have about 8 other UFO's sitting there waiting to be finished!

Sneak Peak !!

I have been busy finishing up both my round on the Pelham Quilters 2012 Round Robin top #1 and since I was fortunate enough to be the one who got to keep the top (Thanks Donna and Doris :-) I was anxious to get it quilted.

At our May meeting when I shared my progress with the guild, I had most elements pinned in place, but not all, and nothing from my round was pieced in or appliqued down.  It was just truly a concept.  Since then, with the possibility of it making it into a gallery show, I had to steal all the minutes I could to get it finished.

Well I submitted the photo of the unfinished top and told myself if it was accepted, I would get it done.  If not, I would prioritize some other projects that I have going on...  boy is my studio a mess :-(.  Well it was accepted...WooHoo...  but wait, be careful what you wish for.  I had no idea how or when I would get it done!!  Well for the last two weeks, I had to burn the mid-night oil, cutting sleep to a minimal, but I made it. 

I posted bits and pieces on facebook as I went along, but have refrained from posting the entire quilt.  Why, because I want to drive as many of you as possible to the exhibit.  It will be a wonderful exhibit made up of 50 or so fiber artists who have chosen to take on the challenge of the folklore surrounding the Black Mermaid...  Mamiwata or the Mermaid goddess Yemaya.  There will be over 100 pieces, both quilts and fiber dolls, depicting black mermaids and the folklore which has been passed down over the years from the slave women who were taken from Africa during the slave trade era. 

The exhibit, entitled "Mermaids and Merwomen in Black Folklore: A Fiber Arts Exhibiton"  takes place at The City Gallery, in Charleston, SC.  The exhibit runs from August 28th thru October 28th, with three days of Opening Weekend festivities, September 6th - 9th.  Interestingly enough, the old Afro-Brazilian women celebrate "Boa Morte" on Wednesday, August 15th.  What is Boa Morte or the Sisterhood of Good Death Festival?  It is the celebration of the old ways and cultures, cultures that slaves were forced to denounce when brought to Brazil.  It mixes the Assumption of Mary from the Christian community with the "Good Death"...  those slaves who died free.  Well these women believe in the existence of the Black Mermaids who were the watch guards of the dead souls, those who did not make it across the seas and were thrown overboard by the slave traders.  So, guess where I will be on that day?  In Brazil!  It is as if I was meant to participate in this entire experience!

Won't you join me?  You can find all the details here...  "Mermaids and Merwomen in Black Folklore: A Fiber Arts Exhibiton" .

To tempt your fancy, here are a couple of snippets of my entry, Sirenias, A Pelham Quilters 2012 Round Robin.  The center square was done by Donna Chambers and it was two fish appliqued onto a white sparkling background.

Doris Green added the seaweeds floating around the fish on a light green background.

I then added another round of a darker green batik, with more seaweed, starfish, etc on the bottom and the mermaids on the top. 











Of course like many of my newer quilts, I doesn't have straight borders. But you will have to wait to see the quilt once the exhibit opens to see how it is finished.

Once the exhibit opens I will post a picture of the completed top :-).... 

Did I tempt you ???  I hope so!

As promised... pics are here.

So I have received pics from my friend of the final quilt.  Unfortunately, the ceiling fan was blowing so it is not a full face on photo.

I really enjoyed working with the Quilter's Dream Wool batting.  It gave my feather's such a wonderful look.  I quilted with Aurifil 50wt cotton for the entire quilt, which is unusual for me.  But I wanted to be authentic to her mother's style.  Plus, it worked so smoothly in my machine, which is rare for the 830 these days.  I am pleased to say, I marked nothing on this quilt :-), including the stems!  So I guess my feathers are finally getting there.

Of course, the quilt brought tears to her eyes, especially as she read the dedication on the label.  Here is a picture of the two of us, once she composed herself :-)...

She truly is my longest and bestest!! 

Much Love....

Deadlines are good...

So I guess I just needed a deadline to kick me in the pants and get me going!  I have made good progress on this piece.  I am loving the feathers.  One more setting triangle to go. 

Still need to figure out what to do in the checkerboard border.  But if I can get the last triangle and the outer border done tomorrow night after work, then Friday I can do the checkerboard border and block it.  Leaving Saturday to square it up and do the binding and Sunday morning to wrap it!!!

This is the first time I have quilted a whole top using the Quilter's Dream Wool. In the past I only played on practice pieces.  I love the texture it is giving the quilting.  The compass really looks trapunto'd once I outline it and stitched in the ditch of the top and middle layers of the folded compass.  The circle geese have the same effect, as I outlined them as well.

But my question for the night is....  has anyone blocked a piece that has wool batting?  Does it shrink a lot?  Anything I should be aware of?

Appreciate the input.

Night all!!!

Playing with Aurifil... first time fpr pebbles

I just finished two major projects and haven't had a time to just sit and play at the machine for awhile.  So I did so last night.  Boy was it fun!

I decided to cut a piece of fabric and play with my free motion machine quilting.  I have a couple of designs I use over and over again.  But working on Raven's piece (yes I know I owe you guys a finished picture..  just need the right light.) I decided I needed to add to the designs that I do without thought.  I also decided that I needed to play with the Auriifil Thread I have, as I have really only used the 40wt cotton.

So this is what I came up with....

I love the little leaves in the center.  This was one of the designs I picked up from 365 Days of Free Motion Quilting.  I thought it was pretty.  DH loved the spins in each of the leaves.  Not sure mine really look like hers, but I like them anyway.  I love the way they swirl, so decided to add the circular design around the leaves.  Isn't it interesting how this makes a nice little center design for a circular piece.  I will definitely need to remember this the next time I work on a circular project.  Next I decided to play with free form feathers around the circle.  I have a hard time doing feathers with a spine first, then adding the feathers.  I can always make the right side look great, but can never match the look on the left.  If I start on the left, the feathers on the right are ok, but they don't match the look on the left.  So I practiced making feathers without a spine.  Wow!  what difference it made for me.  My free form feathers took on a totally different look and feel.  It gave me the freedom to turn them any way I wanted and my feathers looked more natural as I wasn't always trying to hit the spine at the right angle :-). 

As I got closer to the edge of the piece of fabric, I decided to try my hand a pebbles.  I always like the tight look and feel they have and the added dimension they give the feathers...  contrasting the big and free feathers with the small and tight circle of the pebbles.  Take a look... 

I really like the way the pebbles frame the other quilting.  Having never played with the pebble design before, I experimented with making them all the same size and then mixing the size.  I also had to stop doing them all in a line and change up on how I circled back over the stitching line to move in a different direction.  I didn't like leaving a gap, so I had to figure out a way to ease smaller pebbles in between larger existing ones.  Fun...  I think I will start adding pebbles into my work, but will have to be careful to make sure I have even quilting across the top, so it doesn't warp the piece.

Now onto the thread.  I used Aurifil 50 wt with a Topstitch 90/14 needle.  On my Bernina 830, I dropped my tension to 1.5, which is typical for what I use with other threads.  To be honest, I wanted to use up bobbins, so there is a mix of bobbin threads.  Well to my surprise, I had NO tension problems.  I ended up using three different bobbins, with three different threads and each stitched as nicely as the last. I have never been able to do this with any other brand of thread....  NEVER!   Oh yeah, these was also almost NO LINT in the bobbin area.  Wow...  what a shock.  I usually have to clean out the lint in the bobbin area after an hour of quilting.  Not with Aurifil :-) 

I did not use the BSR functionality, I just used my round open toe applique foot and had at it!

Here comes one of my 'inquiring minds' questions....  How many people use Aurifil thread?  Do you like it?  What weight do you find works best for free motion quilting?  Do you find one needle size or type works better than the other?  Do you use the same thread in the bobbin?

Let me know.....

Magrieta's Quilt Shop - St. Augustine, Florida

I stumbled on a wonderful shop today! While driving to Miami we were planning to spend the night in St. Augustine, Fl. So while enjoying the scenery, I decided to google quilt shops near our hotel..... I was pleased to see that there was one only 7 miles away!

Once my husband settled in to watch football, I got in the car and headed to Magrieta's Quilt Shop.

Ooooohhhh, I knew as soon as I walked in the store, that I was in for trouble. Good thing we were flying home and I only had a little carry on bag :-)!


The store was just my style.... brights, batiks, plenty of eye candy to brighten your spirit, tickle your fancy and grab a hold of your pocketbook. They carry a wide assortment of batiks as well as traditional and eclectic prints.

The staff was friendly.... ... and of course I did my usual damage... but at least just enough to fit in my carry-on luggage. I loved it that they had plenty of crisp black and whites.... not those almost white or greyish blacks, but true colors. They have a whole section dedicated to just such lovely baby's.

And some pinks for a pink, green and white quilt I want to make for some lucky young lady. Maybe I will donate it to my local Project Linus Chapter... they give quilts to a girls summer camp, where all the girls are in foster care, waiting to be adopted.

Then a piece for the back of Raven's wall hanging, which I have to get finished.

The spool of thread is one of Superior's King Tut variegated threads that I liked. They carry Superior, Sulky, Mettler, Aurifil and a few other thread brands. A nice variety for all type of quilting!

They are getting ready for The Florida Breeze Shop Hop, which starts on the 18th, so if you are in the area, stop in.


It is definitly worth the trip!

Mother Natures Inspiration

Last Saturday I walked out my front door and stopped... my perennial garden was just coming into mid bloom and I had to take a picture. I was too lazy to go back in the house to find my camera, so I grabbed my cell phone and took some shots. After a week of looking at the photo as my wallpaper on my cell phone it hit me... ah ha....
I had been working on this play piece. Something to play with while I got acquainted with my 830 and the Aurifil thread my friend Alex Veronelli (link for those of you one facebook) sent me last month. (If anyone knows of an Aurifil shop in southern NY... Please let me know.) Anyway... I had been working on this piece, making feathers around the center flower (I am just learning how to make feathers freehand), but couldn't decide what to do as the background quilting, or in the boarders. Well as I gazed at my flowers (all yellow and pink and green) it hit me. The play piece was of a large pink and yellow flower... why not applique daisy's in the boarder squares and use a freeform continuous line leaf pattern for the background.... sort of flowers and leaves and feathers... all from Mother Nature.

And so this week, that is what I did. I ripped out all the original background echo quilting that I wasn't happy with and used the same pink, yellow and orange variegated Aurifil Mako Cotton thread to make the daisy's and the leaves in the boarder. Then I used Sulky cotton in a brown to match the background and did the leaves all around the center flower and feathers I had previously done.While I am still learning what tension settings to use on what thread on the 830, I was happy with my play. I've decided I like the weight of the Aurifl Mako thread for quilting you want to show. Next I need to play with the lighter weight for quilting I want to sink into the top. Anyway, here are some more pics....

This last picture I took this morning, so the color is better. It was just so funny, that Alex had sent me a variegated, yellow and pink thread.... it worked really well with the fabrics I had already pulled together. The boarder fabric is a piece of Ricky Tims hand dyes... I love this particular piece so much I bought 3 yds when at his Super Seminar this past spring. Yummm...

Ok, so not perfect, but a play peice is just that... I learned alot about the stitch speed on the Bernina 830 and tension setting depending on the thread. I guess it is about time I went back to work on all those UFO's I started in the last 6 months. I think I have at least 3 :-)... definitely not my style. I feel guilty... but hey I had to play with my new machine. RIGHT!!!

I forgot to mention!!!

While in Europe, I tried my best to find some Aurifil thread to bring home and play with. I have been hearing a lot about this thread on blogs and on facebook and wanted to try it out. Unfortunately, the closest shop that carries it by me is 2 hours away.

Since many of the bloggers I see using Aurifil are Europeans, I decided to take a look at the shop finder on their website and find a shop by my hotels/meetings in London or Paris. There was nothing real close in London, although I called one shop listed and they were closed. But I did find two business close enough to my hotel in Paris. So while in Paris, I gave them a call, as neither seemed to be quilt or patchwork shops. The first was a clothing designer, who used Aurifil threads, but no one their spoke English so I didn't bother visiting them. The second appeared to be a craft shop from the website, and even though they didn't mention Aurifil on their site, I had the concierge give them a call. I heard him specifically ask for Aurifil thread and he was told that they carried it. So I jumped in a taxi before my meeting and off I went to the shop. Well, even though it is a nice enough shop (La Boutique Modes de Travuax) they do NOT sell Aurifil. DMC (threads and flosses) and Quiterman yes, but no Aurifil. They had no idea of what I was talking about, even though I had a picture of the Aurifil display from the company website. The confusion is the word for thread is 'fil' in French, so when they heard the concierge ask for Aurifil, they just assumed fil or thread.

You can imagine my disappointment. So while in the taxi to my meeting, I posted a comment on the Aurifil facebook group page about my adventures and disappointment. Well, by the time I came out of my meeting, there was an offer by Alex Veronelli, the Product Manager to ship me some of their thread, since I had worked so hard to try and buy some. Talk about customer service! Now I can't wait until it arrives. I will be like a kid waiting for Christmas!!!

I will make sure to post some samples of my work once the thread does show up!