A Grateful Giveaway!

If you have been reading our posts lately, you will know that we had a great time in Houston for Quilt Market and Festival. We had so much fun and saw so many awesome fabrics and products that we thought we would share a little bit more about what we saw and what we bought.

During market we wandered around looking at all the eye candy available. We saw new lines of fabric, helpful new tools, beautiful silk ribbons, and threads galore. It was a bit overwhelming at first, but we hit our stride and began working through the list of exhibitors we wanted to see.

We have both wanted to try combining embroidery and English paper piecing, so we headed over to the Paper Pieces booth to see what we could find. We were warmly welcomed by the owner, Joanne, and given some sample products to try; however, we had no fabric, so that became our next quest: find fabric to use for our English paper piecing samples.

We didn't have to travel far when we happened upon the Blend Fabric's booth and were instantly captured by some of their whimsical designs. Little Red Riding Hood, for obvious reason, caught our eye, as well as many of their other fabric lines.

As we searched for more fabric—because who doesn't need more fabric—we stopped at Villa Rosa Designs. We loved the combinations of fabrics they put together to go with their pattern cards, so of course, we had to buy some of their half-yard sets.

Since threads are an important part of what we do, the Wonderfil booth was on our list of places to stop. We purchased a few sets of the Sue Spargo Eleganza thread and completed our collection of the Invisafil threads for our appliqué. While we were having fun chatting with the gals in the booth, we received a few a samples of some new threads to try.

Toward the end of our week, we stopped at the EdMar booth and tried not to drool over the amazing Brazilian embroidery threads and kits. We purchased a variety of threads and an adorable kit complete with all we would need to finish it.

 

As Thanksgiving draws near, we thought we would thank our readers with a Facebook giveaway! We are getting close to a 1000 likes on our Facebook page, and we thought it would be fun to celebrate reaching that milestone.

Our giveaway includes some of the great things we saw at Market along with some other goodies:

• A handy Through the Needle's Eye tote bag to carry your projects
• A Blend Fabrics fat quarter
• A Wonderfil 2017 calendar
• Two packages of Colonial needles
• A spool of Mettler thread
• Twelve project/pattern cards from Villa Rosa Designs
• A Moda charm pack
• One skein of Brazilian embroidery thread
• A small English paper piecing project
• Three DMC skeins of floss
• AND a handmade, wool, crazy quilt, needle book!

All you have to do to enter our giveaway is:

1. Go to our Facebook page and let us know that you have liked our page by commenting on the post about our giveaway.
2. For extra entries, you can tag friend(s) that you think might enjoy following our page.
3. Leave a comment on the blog below telling us what product in the giveaway appeals to you the most.

When we have reached 1000 Facebook followers on our page, we will randomly select a winner from all the entries. Check back often to see when the drawing will be . . . and to see if you've won!

To be eligible, remember to comment on Facebook, tag friend(s) for extra entries, and comment below on the blog. That's just two comments, and a bonus for tagging someone who likes our page.

We are so grateful for our readers and we hope that you will share our blog with your friends as we continue to share the stories that come from our needles!


NOTE: As December 8, 2016, the drawing has come to a close.

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To Market We Go!

What a weekend! We landed in Houston on Saturday morning, checked into our hotel, dropped our bags, and hit the ground, running to the George R. Brown Convention Center for our first Quilt Market experience. Of course, our first stop was in the Exhibit Hall . . . to find our quilt.  We were delighted to find it in Aisle A, just beside the "red carpet."

We decided to view the rest of the exhibit during Festival and headed directly to the Market Hall. We got so caught up in conversations with vendors in the booths that we neglected to take as many photos as we'd have liked. But here are a few highlights of our weekend.

Obviously, this was a favorite quilt, hanging in the Blend Fabrics booth,
where we bought a bundle of Little Red Riding Hood fabrics.

We were thrilled to see Jan Vaine's quilt and pattern—Sister's Garden—in the Valdani booth.

We were so excited about this sweet quilt (it really spoke to a few particular friends—you know who you are)
that we forgot to note where it was hanging! 

Tula Pink

Brand new fabric line from Free Spirit Fabrics

Michael Miller Fabrics

Of course, Kaffe Fasset's booth was absolutely stunning. And yes, we both purchased his new book!

This Kim McLean quilt starred in Kaffe's booth.

We have some fun ideas planned with the new paper pieces we received from Paper Pieces/Polar Notions. Samples below.

 

We we SO thrilled to find that there is a brand new magazine devoted to telling the stories of quilts and their makers.  Of course, we signed up to receive a subscription. When we get our first issue, we will write a review for you. For more information, go to http://www.quiltfolk.com/. To subscribe, please use promo code SHOP 1051.

We spent a good deal of time planning a project using hand-dyed wools and threads by Tracy Trevethan Designs.
She has such delicious colors! We can't wait to start our new pattern set.

There were a number of antique quilt booths, where we spent a fair amount of time studying old treasures. Oh, how we wish that money were no object! There were so many that drew us that we would have loved to purchase any number of them. 

A beautiful silk-sashed crazy quilt in the booth, Quilts from Mulberry Lane.
Chatting with Carolyn was like meeting an old friend.

A great example of a charm quilt in the same booth.

Julia, in the Piqué booth, showed us an incredible selection of appliquéd quilts,
which we will save for a future post.

This pineapple log cabin quilt from mid-1800s was in pristine condition, found in yet another vintage quilt booth.

This striking antique star quilt was the inspiration for a new fabric line by Washington Street Studios.

Detail of the star. How we would love to be able to find that Prussian blue fabric!!
(We learned that the process for achieving this color is quite expensive to reproduce
—the reason it is so difficult to find today.)

Our morning walk to the Convention center, just before the fog burned away.

Monday's class with Judith Baker Montano, creating an undersea picture using mixed media and embroidery.

Burning the edges of ribbon and fabric gives an interesting effect,
but our classroom smelled less than flowery.

We also spent a lot of time chatting with Brooke from Hanah Silk Hand-Dyed Ribbons.
On Tuesday, we created some samples of pansies for her. Stay tuned for an upcoming tutorial!

While talking to Pepper Cory in the Colonial Needles booth, she asked us to put together some
embroidery samples using Presencia threads.

The samples we finished during our Tuesday stitching session.
Featured stitches: spiral trellis and cast-on.

Cheers to an awesome first Market!
Now we are resting up for Festival.

Vintage Dimensional Appliqué

One of my (Kara's) favorite things to do on vacation is explore the local antique offerings. Antique stores of all types can be found. Some are really just buildings for garage sale-type items, or some that have "fine" as the first word of their name usually mean that what's inside will be above my budget. And some fit somewhere in the middle of that spectrum. While on vacation in Wells, Maine, last week, I took a day to see what treasures could be uncovered. I came across some interesting finds at a variety of antique shops. Some items I left behind, for obvious reasons.

I have no words for this

And of course, I am always drawn to anything with a fairy tale theme.

A very expensive Little Red Riding Hood

One store we visited was R. Jorgensen Antiques. Upon arriving, we were immediately impressed with the massive espaliered pear tree that graced the front of the shop.

Inside, we were greeted by the resident German Shepherd, a gracious store owner,  and some amazing antiques. Since I am fascinated by all types of appliqué, I was immediately drawn to these two pieces.

What a sweet little dog and such elaborate outfits

Such detail!

The detail of the second diorama was exquisite, and I wished I had taken more pictures. The owner shared that this appliquéd diorama tells a story about a friar, who raised a foundling in complete isolation from society. The picture depicts the scene when the, now adult, young man sees women for the first time.

He does look a bit shocked

The attention to detail really shows in the ladies' dresses

It was suggested that this was a common story of that era, and that this depiction might have been reproduced for decor purposes. While the price tag eliminated me as a buyer, this piece of art definitely made me an admirer. 

Not in the budget

At the next antique store, I came across another appliquéd scene that showed these lovely ladies out for a stroll.

This was not the first time I had come across a shadowbox or diorama showing fashionable ladies. I found these two in a shop in St. Joseph, Michigan.

As I began to write this post, I knew I needed to find out more about this method of appliquéing fabric onto a pre-printed paper scene. After searching the web, it appeared that this was not an uncommon art form. Pinterest yielded quite a few images, and most of them used a Victorian fashion plate as the base. 

Ebay

I really thought that there would be a lot of information out there since I had found many of these shadow boxes available to purchase online, but there was very little information as to how they were made or why. The most prevalent artwork of this type available to purchase online, seems to be those based on fashion plates from the magazine, LaMode Illustrée, a fashion magazine first published in Paris in 1859. There are quite a few different pieces available through Ebay and Etsy for any collectors out there. Occasionally, they can be found in antique stores as well for those with a discerning eye.

Live Auctioneers

Did this art form give ladies who couldn't afford a high-fashion dress an opportunity to dream a little bit? Or were they used to demonstrate available fabrics that could be used to make the dresses? Certainly, this is just speculation on my part, since I couldn't find any specific information on the web. If any of our readers are able shed some light on this art form, we'd love to hear from you.

This dimensional appliqué that I've shared is from the past, but we can certainly utilize some of these ideas for our current appliqué projects. While looking at so many of these detailed pieces on the web and in antique stores, I realized that when I stitched our Beauty and the Beast block from our Fairy Tale Album (currently in Houston), I created Beauty's dress with similar techniques. Her skirt is gathered, and her hair, made out of silk, is gathered and pleated.

A gathered and pleated skirt add dimension

Teri used a furrowing technique for Thumbelina's hair.

Furrowed silk hair

Little Red Riding Hood's cape also has a few gathers to make it stand out a bit.

Hopefully you have enjoyed seeing some of the works of art from the past and will be inspired to add some dimension to your appliqué. Again, if you have any more information about the vintage appliquéd ladies, please share!