Bernina Sewlebrity feature

http://www.berninausa.com/webautor-data/589/BERNINA-LindaTeufel-082011.pdf

This month I’m featured in the Bernina blog as a sewlebrity! (Don’t you love that word?)  They also reposted the blog article on making the Koos mobius spiral scarf if you missed it before.

I am fortunate to be a member of the Bernina Artisan group for the past 7 or so years.  They had meetings at their offices in Oklahoma City and Chicago areas where a group of us would learn about new things in the industry and work with Bernina products and it was always fun. I met many nice artists in this group too.

We also gave input into many aspects of marketing and especially into the design and features of the revolutionary 830 machine.  That entailed a free trip to Switzerland and their Steckborn headquarters which was wonderful!  They treated us like royalty, fed us well, put us up in a beautiful hotel by the lake, took us to a fashion museum, shopping, chocolate store and picked our brains! It was a trip of a lifetime!

Confetti Naturescapes class

Remember in April I wrote that Noriko Endo, author of Confetti Naturescapes was here to teach our guild her fabulous confetti class?

We had the finished ones on display at our local store, Quilt Trends for the high traffic months of June and July when everyone is in town for all the quilt shows and conventions.

The amazing thing about Noriko’s class is that everyone made a successful piece. How often can you say that? Her technique was easy to do and she guided us to make some great pieces. Of course it would take lots of practice to be as good as she is but it is fun to do and I’ll try it again.

Thought you’d like to see some of the finished work.

Noriko is teaching at Quilt Festival in Houston this November but you must sign up fast, the classes fill up so fast!

A Visit to Quilt National 2011

As I said before, it’s great to live in Ohio in the summer when all the quilt shows are going on in town!  Quilt National is every two years and is my favorite! It’s a juried show with 85 quilts accepted and shown in an old dairy barn in a cute rural town.  For me, it’s only a 1.5 hr drive from Columbus and so I go every year.  The town of Athens is the location of Ohio University and has many great little places to eat too…a quilter’s second favorite thing to do.

I just got back with my friend and we loved the show! So many beautiful quilts of wonderful color palettes and techniques. We quilters are looking closely at techniques and found many inspirational ideas so that was exciting. Looking at the quilts we are trying to memorize easy quilting patterns for the ‘free-motion impaired’ as well as color combinations that are particularly striking.  You can’t remember it all so the best thing to do is buy the book of the entire collection.

Lucky for me, and you, Kathleen Dawson, the director of the show sent us these photos of the gallery to share on the blog! They arrived at my IN box the moment I got home and sat down at my computer!  A big THANKS to Kathleen since you aren’t allowed to photograph the show and a blog without photos is not as interesting!

They ask you to vote for your favorite quilt and above is mine/the Dandelion one by Kate Themel. Close up you can see the stitching lines on white tulle that make the whispy part of the dandelion and gives it that lifelike effect.  Of course it was impossible to decide on a favorite and I changed my mind ten times but thought I would like to have this hanging in my house!

 

On the left is a piece by Elizabeth Brimelow from the UK in 3 long panels that go up, over the rod and down the other side. The piece on the right is the Best of Show by Bonnie Bucknam.

Many of these quilts are for sale but the ones I loved were already sold or optioned. The gift shop has many smaller quilts that are reasonably priced and nice samples of the artists’ work.

This is only a small peek into the show and nothing compares to seeing the quilts in person so try to visit if you can before it ends Sept.5. Check their website for times www.dairybarn.org.

And if you still can’t make it to the show, buy the hardcover book, Quilt National 2011.