Houston... here comes Oliver!

It's official... *Oliver* has been selected as a finalist to be exhibited at the 2011 International Quilt Festival/Houston in the annual IQA fall Judged Show, Quilts: A World of Beauty. And according to IQA, this year’s jury had the difficult task of narrowing a field of 652 entries to 380 finalists.

So as soon as Oliver gets his tushy-tail feathers home from Quilt Odyssey in Hershey, PA, he will get shipped off to Houston... WOW!!! I can't stop saying that. HOUSTON -- the biggest and best quilt show there is... HOUSTON!!! Yes, this is my first quilt juried into Houston and in my mind there could be no better quilt for this first than Oliver. He has almost become a part of my family, everyone refers to him as Oliver, not that owl quilt. He has an identity... truly! I must once again thank Sharon Schamber, for without her knowledge and insight Oliver wouldn't have turned out as fabulous as he did! Spending a week with her and creating Oliver was an amazing experience, one that I will never forget.

PSLCQ RAFFLE QUILT

Remember the beautiful raffle quilt post, no, then click here for all the details.

If so, then guess what... TICKETS ARE AVAILABLE!!!

Yes, awesome, perfect, what do you mean the raffle doesn't go off until February 2012, yes, the raffle goes off on February 4, 2012 at the PSL Crazy Quilters Biennial Show. You do not need to be present to win, but you definitely can't win without a ticket! I know it is a long time to wait, but the way I see it, that gives you seven (yes count them, 7) months to buy tickets! Tickets are only $1 donation and wow, what a quilt to win! Just think, if you buy 10 tickets a month, that is 70 chances.... pretty good odds eh? Or you could buy them all now, but I like to space out my numbers... oh no, I've let you all in on another of my OCDs... numbers. But either way, buy some tickets - this is a beautiful quilt (80x80 square), with some really awesome quilting if I say so myself (hehehe). I would LOVE to know the appraisal value. Yes, I'm secretly hoping the guild chooses to get it appraised.

Anyway, here is another peek at the quilt:

For more information about the PSL Crazy Quilters, visit their website at http://www.pslcrazyquilters.com/

Here is the link for more info on their Biennial Show, "Quilting in the Garden".

If you have any questions, let me know, I will do my best to answer them, or at least find someone that knows!

Pattern with no name...

I had been working on some "smaller" patterns to offer for sale and doodled this up...

Well really I doodled it on paper first, then mirror imaged it, then put it on fabric, but you get the idea!

Super cute huh? So better than to keep it as a sample, I decided that I would use this as the Raffle table runner for MCQG since I had signed up as the raffle-maker for August. Pretty cool, but, it turned out so nicely and so many people liked it that I will definitely use it as a pattern and will have to make up another one for myself/sample.

So, I loaded it stitched my trapunto areas and spent the afternoon snipping away (thank goodness it was only a table runner). Then I got the bright idea to do shadow trapunto... hmmm, lime green or purple?

Purple wins, mainly because Vicki YELLED - lol (joke, FB followers will understand).

Started on the background quilting, and no, you really can't tell that there is purple back there. It kinda looks like a dull blah gray, which is okay, it is still beautiful and only we know it was purple, and we don't have to tell anyone!

Finished the quilting, cut to a beautiful shape, and binding is on (hand stitched, of course)... Happy August Raffle to the members of MCQG -- hope I (oops) you win! So to all you MCQG Members -- make sure you're at the August meeting!!

Sharing 101

I SHARE INFORMATION... A LOT. I share words, pictures, thoughts, ideas, mistakes, life, and love... it's what I do. Some people do not appreciate that I share, they have stated in the past that "I share too much". Is this even possible? In today's technological advanced society, really, how is it possible, one-click sharing to any social media, blogging, facebook, tweets, emails, text messages, phone calls, the old-fashioned snail mail, and even, the unbelievable spoken word? Is it possible to share too much? I truly don't believe than anyone can share too much. HONESTLY, I feel the people that think this are actually "over-absorbers". Yes, think about it -- some of the same people that state I am an over-sharer also claim to read multiple blogs, from other over-sharers, along with all the latest and greatest news, magazines, ads, etc. So, no I am not an over-sharer, you are an over-absorber! Besides, if it weren't for people "sharing" what good would the great world wide web be? We would all be stuck in our own little worlds not learning, not expanding, not growing, just there, being boring. The original over-sharer, the library, where you used to have to drive to and research and hope that the book would be there so that you could! Wow, thank goodness we have grown!

A long, long, time ago (way before the internet), someone told me that if you can't share what you do, what you do is absolutely unimportant. These words have stuck with me... it is so true, and it is something that has remained close to my heart and I will continue to share, forever! So here is a Thank You to all of my peeps, I love all of you over-absorbers!!!

Yes, more thoughts and posts on sharing are bound to follow... yep! PLEASE, add any and ALL comments... a lot of people need to hear them!

Lightning never strikes the same place twice...

if I say that enough it might actually be true! I have an unbelievable fear of lightning. I'm getting better at dealing with it yes, but the fear is still there. Oh no, I've released one of the 5 things you might not know about me! No really, if you even remotely know me, you know that I have a sometimes unreasonable fear of lightning! Perhaps I was struck by lightning in a past-life, or maybe it is just the fear of electricity pulsating through me -- yes, I was electrocuted when I was younger, nearly burnt my thumb and pointer finger clear off (another story/another day). For whatever reason, I do not like lightning.

Okay, how does this relate to quilting? Guess what... my machine was struck by lightning! Actually an incredibly strong surge, but lightning caused the electricity to flow through the house and BAM... right into my Gammill! Thankfully, the only thing that managed to fry was the ballast for the light and a transformer. Wow, no big deal, we ordered the parts, and my hubby fixed it in no time. Needless to say, the Gammill stays unplugged all of the time now!

What does this all have to do with this post... I have been trying all week to work on a quilt! I'd get an hour of quilting and BAM - thunder rumbles, lightning lights... of course, it is the rainy season in South Florida but you wouldn't know this because we haven't had rain in months. This week Mother Nature has been trying to catch up because we've had a storm everyday. Sometimes I wish it would rain between midnight to 6 am so that I could quilt all day and never fall behind on my schedule due to lightning!

Anyway you'll all be happy to hear I finally finished the quilt. This is Cilla's quilt it is a Kim McLean applique pattern found in Kaffe Fasset's "Quilt Romance" book.