Poppyprint...in print!

I'm trying to keep it under control. You know, like, not TOTALLY. FREAK. OUT.

But I can't help it!!! You see, I've been published! This is rocking my world for several reasons. First off, Canada has never had it's very own quilting magazine....until Heather took over a regional newsletter and broadened the whole shebang to a new, glossy, national magazine. Joining forces with the very talented designer Laurraine, these two gals and their many contributors have created an amazing new resource for Canadian quilters.

Here's the cover of issue 4 that arrived in my mailbox today.

The second reason I'm so thrilled to have an article in the mag is that it's all about an incredible quilt created by my friend and quilting teacher/designer extraordinaire Dianne Stevenson. Dianne has made a beautiful quilt to honor women's work and textile history in our country called "Canadiana in Cloth". Dianne then turned this experience into an 8-month quilting course that is, in my humble opinion, worthy of a university credit in textile history.

Thirdly, while I can't re-write the entire article here for you, I can giveaway my extra copy to one lucky Poppyprint reader (and you know I could never send a magazine all by itself - how lonely would that be? - so expect some extra goodies)! Normally I don't go in for those giveaways with lots of rules, but in this case, I would love to spread the word about Quilter's Connection. If we want a Canadian quilting magazine to succeed, we need to support it, people!

So, leave one comment below to enter this giveaway. If you have your own blog, post a link to this page on your blog (feel free to use the cover photo)....then come back and leave a second comment for another chance to win! I'll leave comments open until 9:00 p.m. Pacific Standard Time, June 4 at which time I'll employ the RNG to find the lucky winner.

No need to become a follower (honestly, I know there is only so much time in the day for blog-reading!), but take a look around and if you like what you see, then why not hang out and share the love? I'd be happy to have you follow along!

If you live in Canada, you can find Quilter's Connection on the mag rack at Indigo or better yet, subscribe here. If you subscribe, then you will receive the fall issue which just might have another Poppyprint surprise in it....eeeeeeeee!

Edited: comments are now closed...winner announcement coming soon! (June 4, 9:10 pm)

Meet the triplets

Why, hello there!

These three handsome fellas just opened last weekend, the first in the garden. Against the backdrop of green foliage and the dainty white Viburnum blossoms, they are really stealing the show.

Those tender, papery-silk petals that virtually shimmer in the sunlight are so gorgeous. And the size! These flowers are huge! Standing proud on their 2 to 3 foot stalks that sway stiffly in the breeze, the poppies almost dare the sky to open and fill their centres with waterdrops. Alas, they are no match for the Vancouver rains....luckily for me the sun is shining and I can enjoy my poppies for another day. When these are gone, the orange ones will open and the admiration will begin all over again.

Once those petals fall and the seed pods are fully formed, I will get busy doing some more of this! I'm going to try it on fabric this year....

I hope you are enjoying something beautiful today, too.

Blogger's Quilt Festival 2010

Hey festival-goers, WELCOME TO POPPYPRINT!

Allow me to introduce MuuMuu Bijoux to you. This is MuuMuu:

She's frolicking in the Hawaiian sun with her groovy gal pals in search of sea life...can you spot a lobster, a starfish, a scallop shell and a sea horse? They're all right there, hiding in the sand. This quilt should be new to most of you, unless you've gone way back in the archives to my first ever post. It was done in 2004 and it is by far the most favourite-ist thing I've ever made. For many reasons....here are a few (most of them representing quilting 'firsts' for me):

Free cut and pieced curves

Improvisational flying geese

A yo-yo sun (paper pieced then appliqued on)

This quilt represents the first time I made something inspired by a real person, my late mother-in-law. Almost every year, B's family would vacation in Maui. His mom would purchase Hilo Hatie (Hawaiian fabric), bring it home and make a muumuu for herself for loungin'. The 'bijoux' in the title refers to the jewel tones of the dress fabrics on all the beach girls. I wanted to celebrate the vast range of body sizes and colours you see on a vacation beach.

I learned to make the 'paper dolls' at a class taught locally by Barb Mortell, an inspiring Vancouver quilt artist. I believe this will remain my all-time favourite quilt for many years to come. I could stare at it for hours as I love all of the colours and am very proud of the quilting. I'm not sure I've quilted anything quite as well since!

Thanks for visiting....enjoy the rest of the quilts in the festival and by all means, come back again soon!

...and a few more things

Last night was May's Friday Night Sew-In (thanks Heidi and Bobbi for this regularly scheduled pyjama party where we hang out and participate in this virtual stitch group with our fellow bloggy peeps!). We started off this Canadian long weekend (thanks Queen V!) with a family dinner out followed by yummy Gelato & coffee here.

I still managed to pull off some finishes when we got home. Namely, my swap commitment for Potholder Pass 3. I went with some wonky piecing (which my partner likes), some modern prints (also likes) and some wee embroidery. The binding went on and the grommets went in last night after we got home.

Notice Ayumi's silkscreened fabric in there, too? Love it. It was hard to start cutting into my precious sheets of her fun words, but a swap partner deserves a little somethin' special, right?

For this next one, Sandi kindly donated her little cake stitchery....I started these on retreat last week and she happened to have it along in her stash. It goes perfectly with the theme!

Friday was a double-stitch-whammy because the Gathered Threads gathered in the morning and I was able to finish these off (more items for my guild's quilt show boutique).

I've admired these flower pin cushions on Flickr and on various blogs and figured I could probably figure them out. I just sewed a bunch of circles RST on the last night of retreat. Then on the way home in the van, I turned them. Employing a Starbucks straw, I stuffed as much polyfil in there as humanly possible, then stuffed some more! I used 8 wt perle cotton or 6 strands of DMC (depending on the colour) to wrap around and pull taught, creating the petal shapes. I'm sure there several ways to accomplish this...I just sort of wung it and it seemed to work!

Finally, I have BIG news!!! Remember my little feeling sorry for myself moment yesterday? Well, I didn't have to pout for long, because Trish commented on that post to let me know that I WON HER GIVEAWAY!!!! Yippee! Trish has several sweet patterns, visit her lovely Two Peas in a Pod blog and check them out!

I hope you have a fantastic weekend...the sun is trying to come out...there are faint shadows out there for sure. Tomorrow is supposed to be a beaut!

and now for the big WINNAH.....

No, so far, that's not me. And I musta entered, like, two hundred giveaways this week. Pout.

Someone (other than me, obviously) is gonna be a winner soon, though! Right here on Poppyprint. Oh yes, Random Generator, do your thang honey.....

By my count (and that means disregarding 1 'removed by author' and 1 double commentor), the lucky winner of my sweet little selvage mini with it's very own hanger is Mossy Oak Lane! This will be in the mail just as soon as I get your address!

And now the backing. I only had one small chunk of this fabric off a sample card but it was the perfect size for this little mini. It really cracks me up.

Especially this one....

The part in the green box....about her machine "serving her smoothly, quickly and happily!". I think my machine may have missed that memo. Either that, or I got the wrong instruction manual with it!

Congratulations to all the Sew Mama Sew giveaway winners and a HUGE thanks to Beth and Kristin for all the work they do to bring us sewists together in this amazing online community!

I'll be back soon with my entry for the Bloggers Quilt Festival!

Zakka Zippies

You're back! Hi there and thanks for stopping by. I am very excited to have so many new friends lingering from the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day. My butt is numb from all the computer time this week trying to make it to all the blogs participating in giveaway day. Honestly, after all that surfing, reading, posting, oohing and aaahing, wouldn't it be nice to win just one teensie giveaway? Fingers crossed! I can't wait to call upon the RN generator later tonight and find out who wins my mini selvage quilt (oh! are you here looking for the giveaway post? Keep scrolling, it's a few down there and you have until 9 pm Pacific time to enter).

So..... Zakka Zippies. Yes, this is what I made from the leftovers after finishing this on retreat. I love making zippy pouches, actually. These are going to be for sale in the members boutique at my guild quilt show in early June.

To make these, I free cut my scraps with scissors into random pieces, sewed them together into a fabric 'sheet', sliced the sheet and inserted some longer strips, then cut rectangular sections the same length as the zippers I wanted to use (umm, was that clear?). Most of the Japanese linen sections were bordered with a natural organic cotton/linen blend.

In some cases, I felt like adding a little more zip to the zippy, so using my machine's triple straight stitch and a light blue Aurofil 30 wt thread I topstitched a 1/4" from the seams. I like the weight of this stitch and by extending the stitch length to 3.5, you get a Sashiko-y sort of machine stitch. Nice.

That's not all folks! More retreat finishes coming. In the meantime, tune in tomorrow to see who wins the selvage mini and what the heck is on the back!!

Flying Fish

This project is the first one I tackled on retreat. I wanted to make something first just for me, out of fabric I love (and have been coveting on my shelf for several years...just waiting...patiently for the right pattern to come along). Presto! The talented John (QuiltDad) published his "Flying Fish Table Runner" pattern in the premier issue of Fat Quarterly (a most inspiring e-zine bursting with inspiration and patterns!). As soon as I saw the photos I knew it would be perfect for my Japanese linen/indigo collection.

I used a soft grey Kona solid for the background. White was a little too harsh and made the dragonfly wings in the border look dirty (and we can't have dirty little dragonfly wings!). The linens are a coarse weave and much thicker than the Kona cotton, so pressing was a challenge, to say the least.

I'm not that happy about all of the little wrinklies, but I think that's what happens when you use fabrics of two different weights. It's hard to avoid. Check out my points, though! (little pat on my own back).

I LOVE this table runner and would love some feedback on quilting ideas. The seams are very thick at the points, so those will have to be avoided. Sandi had a nice idea of doing circles, which might looks really great in a sashiko-style running stitch with light grey perle cotton. I am considering backing the runner with a homespun fabric and just quilting thru the two layers (no batting, no binding), so that it is more table-toppish and less quilt. What do you think?

Several of the linens with block printing came straight from Tokyo. B went there for business about 8 years ago, just when I had started quilting. I sent him with a 50 US dollar bill and asked him to very politely request that the wife of his Japanese colleague use it to purchase some fabric of her choice for me. She had lived in the States for a few years, so I'm sure she was used to the North American style of asking for favours....anyway, she happily spent my money and spent it well!

To see what I made with the linen scraps, stop by tomorrow!

Oh, and if you're here from Sew Mama Sew for Giveaway Day, that's two posts down...keep scrolling (there are some nice pix to look at on the way)!

Scenes from Retreat

Are you here for Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day? Take a look around! The giveaway is the next post down, so leave a comment there if you'd like a chance to win.

Last week I spent the most enjoyable 5 days with my lovely friends Sandi and Rossie. We drove to the Shuswap area of B.C. and stayed in Sandi's shagedelic (and here I refer to carpeting of the orange and shaggy variety, people!) 70's lake house. I love it there. It was our 2nd annual quilting week together and we've already decided to add an extra day next year!

These photos will give you a little taste of our week together that included a lot of laughs, sewing, antiquing, quilt shop-hopping, some wine & cheese, sunny walks and lock smithing:

Rossie's lovely Featherweight (both she and Sandi are strictly old-school.

I was feeling a little left out with my monster Pfaff Quilt Expression 4.0. I'm working on a Featherweight takeover and expect to be firmly in the club next year)

5:00 p.m. on the beach

Happy hour entertainment - Mama & Papa goose with their goslings

Sandi's newest acquisition thanks to her friend & local thrift connection, Merle. The local small towns are full of thrift and antique shops and there always seems to be treasure!

Merle found this one, too!

...and this!

View from our dinner table at the local marina restaurant

...a hop-skip up the road and a giggly stagger home.

And you know, I'm always saying this, so it was just a matter of time before someone put it on a sign:

Hehe.

I'll share all of my projects with you over the next few days. I can't spill all the beans at once (it was hard enough coming home, I've gotta stretch all of this fabulousness out!) but I will tell you that I made something from the first edition of Fat Quarterly and it is SPEC-TAC-U-LAR.! In fact, the swim-by of the Canada Geese was all too perfect as I was busy making their namesake in fabric.....

SMS Giveaway Day is Here!!!!

Technically I'm a day early, but the giveaways have to be posted by 9:00 a.m. eastern time and I'm not into waking up at 5:00 a.m. Pacific time tomorrow morning to make sure that happens....so if you're surfing tonight, feel free to get your comments in and secure your chance to win.....

THIS

"Flights of Fancy"

Regular readers will recognize this as my latest mini-quilt obsession. You can see my previous two here and here. So much fun to make and I'm thrilled to offer this up for one lucky winner.

The bestest parts are (a) a top-secret and super fun backing on this which I will reveal with the winner's name, and (b) a sweet little quilt hanger that will accompany this mini to it's new home.

All you need to do is leave a comment (I'll ship anywhere on Earth. Sorry space station cosmonauts, but Canada Post rates are already out of this world). Don't forget to head back to Sew Mama Sew for your next Giveaway Day destination! Good luck and thanks for visiting....you are welcome back anytime.

Better yet, follow along and don't miss a thing!

The comments will remain open until May 20th, 9 p.m. Pacific time, at which time I will call upon the talented Random Number Generator to choose a winner. Please make sure you leave an email address I can use to contact you if it is not embedded in your comment.

COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED...WINNER ANNOUNCEMENT FRIDAY MORNING!

Quilters Candy

Look at this pretty bonbon that arrived in my mailbox today from Mrs. Schmenkman (aka Amy).

Just because she is SEW nice, Amy bought me a sweet present that reminded her of this quilt I made recently. Look, it's a wee robin's nest handmade from porcelain.

It is made by Earthenwood Studio. It is entirely precious. As she said in her card, fabric was necessary to cushion the fragile cargo, so Amy also include FIVE FQ's!!! Wow, this fabric is so pretty - the colours amazing. I'm thinking a cushion may be in order. Couldn't you just see this with some natural linen?

It's Cherish Nature by Deb Strain for Moda...check out the selvage edge. I had heard here that some of the American printing companies were getting creative with their colour dots to keep up with their creative Japanese counterparts. Cool!

How incredibly sweet and thoughtful of you Amy....mwah! Thank you so much. The kindness of quilters never ceases to amaze me.

This comes at a great time, because I'm getting ready for two big things: RETREAT and GIVEAWAY (hmmm, may involve selvage)! Coincidentally, last year when I retreated with my two quilting buddies, we watched a mama robin feed her wee chicks in a nest just below the cottage window where we were sewing. I wonder if she returned this year? I'll find out tomorrow.

Be sure to come back on Monday for Giveaway Day! I'll (hopefully) have lots to show you next week....WARNING: productivity depends on the sunshine, lake temperature and wine supply over the next 5 days!

Check Out My New Undies!!

I can't tell you how happy I am to have four brand new pairs of skivvies. Aren't they beautiful? And sooooo roomy! I mean, there is almost room for two of me in there.

Finally! Some Liberty prints for me. I realize they are on boxer-short-quality cotton, but hey, us cheapskates gotta take what we can get (afford!). Thanks to my sweet friends (Susan who lives south of the border and kindly made a Target run for me, and Jennifer who lives around the corner but recently visited Susan) these Mens size XL boxers have made their way into my sewing room. Now, what to do with them? I am trying to dream up ideas for using the elastic waist bands for some clever purpose...anyone? Anyone? Ideas welcome.

It was a dreamy, sunny, warm, still Mother's Day here yesterday. The kids made me lovely gifts at school and at home. T made a hemp macrame key fob. That's so funny because I think when I was his age I made macrame kitchen wall hangings for my mom and every one of her friends - I was a macrame addict! He also found instructions online to make an origami tulip complete with stem and leaf. D's teacher taught them how to soak and then alter photographs with sandpaper scratching and paint. They are really cool. She wanted to make sure Flynn had a chance to get in on the Mother's Day action, so when he finally woke up and came bounding down the stairs, this was attached to his collar:

B made a delicious breakfast of French Toast, strawberries & cream. Yummy!

Moms Creative Day on Saturday was super fun. I never get as much done as I hope to, but seeing everyone else's beautiful jewelry, knitting, x-stitch, quilting, scrapbooking, painting and weaving is inspiration enough to come home and get busy.

On Wednesday I'm heading out of town with two fun friends for 5 whole days of quilting, thrifting, antiquing, reading, eating, laughing. Before I go, I want to let you know that I will have a giveaway next Monday! I'm participating in the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day and I'm going to make something fabulous for you to win (hint: I've recently made two, one for a swap and one for me!). There will be all kinds of amazing things to win next Monday, so set some time aside to troll the internet and check out some new blogs.

Here's to a fantastic week! Thanks for stopping by.

Our Village

The other night our elementary school held a family fundraiser. I won't even start with the sorry state of public education funding in our province, and our school district in particular. Nope. Instead I'm going to focus on the positive. The incredibly hard work and dedication of a small group of parents and teachers who made this event so fantastic.

It was a "Celebrate Your Culture" night. Families were invited to bring small taster food items from their country of origin, or ancestry, to share. Students were encouraged to play music, dance or sing as well. Major success! For $1 per taste, you could sample Japanese Sushi, Chinese friend rice, Mexican tostadas, English scones with clotted cream, Ukrainian perogies, Swedish meatballs, Dutch pannekoeken (with chocolate sprinkles of course....hmmm, wonder who brought those?), African chicken, South African sausage rolls, Korean bbq, Iranian rosewater rice pudding, Italian tiramisu, Filipino spring rolls, American apple pie an a whole lot more. Yummmmmmmm!!!

In addition to the incredible food, there was a silent auction. Each class room had painted a platter with a local 'paint your own pottery' place. They were all beautiful, but my son's graduating seventh grade class really outdid themselves. I could not resist.

Many of the teachers chose a quote as the theme for their class platter...like this African proverb we all know so well that "It takes a village to raise a child". Another one I loved was "Art washes away the dust of everyday life." The fun part of owning this piece of art is that each of my son's classmates drew their own home, many of which he has visited.

That's our little blue cottage up there on the right!

They did such a good job. No word on the final totals yet, but I'm sure we raised heaps of money towards library books, phys. ed. equipment, computers, teacher classroom allowances and many other necessities for school.

Continuing the community spirit, tomorrow is Mom's Creative Day. It's a retreat I started last year for moms from school to spend a day together sewing, knitting, scrap booking, sorting their children's art, painting...you name it, we do it. What a great way to celebrate our talents on Mother's Day!

I hope you all enjoy Sunday and get some time for yourself to create, or watch your children do the dishes for you. Wouldn't that be a gift?!

From Denmark with Love

Today is a very happy day. Through clouds of ash, my sweet swap box from Mette arrived today.

We met through blogging; you can follow her here at Erleperle. She is wonderfully talented at patchwork, crochet and knitting, too! Mette and I are both busy moms who love to create and share. We decided to do a private swap around Easter-time. I think my box for Mette is still en route...perhaps delayed by the ash cloud backlog, waiting in a warehouse in Toronto or Montreal to cross the Atlantic. I hope she receives it soon. In the meantime, I'll show you all the treasures that she sent to me!

A sweet drawstring bag and paper egg filled with wee wooden egg ornaments!

Beautiful ribbons, buttons, trims, tea and an angel stamp

Mette loves matryoshka dolls as you can see by all of those lovely creations - a doll, pin cushion, tissue holder (it even has matryoshka-printed tissues inside!), applique and fabric. That's not all, look at all of this other fabric and sweet trims:

Little toadstools, can you stand it? Everything was so beautifully wrapped and considered.

Thank you so much Mette for this very special gift. I love all of your creations and appreciate your time and thoughtfulness putting my swap package together!

xo, Krista