The Vermont Quilt Festival...

 Mary Jane just sent me pictures of her booth at the Vermont (USA) Quilt Festival which is on from the 27th to 29th June. How exciting to see so many of my designs on display.

I spy...my new 'sweet christmas ornaments', the tablerunner from my book Stitch It For Spring.

 I spy more of my things...'The Cherry Tree' quilt, the 'My Garden' quilt from my book Country Cottage Quilting. 
Oh and the very lovely 'Love Letters' quilt, that features 9 x 18" house blocks, its called Love Letters because on each block there is a bird with an envelope in his beak that has a tiny embrodiered heart on it.

 I spy... 'Christmas Fun' and I know that Mary Jane has the patterns, button packs and Starry Night fabric bundles. Plus I can see one of my favourite christmas pillows which is called 'Christmas Eve'.

 Hope you enjoyed the virtual visit, if your are close enough to go to the show apparently its really lovely. 

Chateau Hexagon - Quilt Camp in France

 The days are flying past and as promised I am working on three brand new, never been seen before projects. There will be one new project for each day of my Chateau Hexagon workshops. Its been an exciting adventure so far and the best is yet to come. I still have a couple of places in workshop 2 and 3, or if you want to join me for all three days then we can do that.

Can you come and join the fun? July 31st, August 1st and 2nd 2014.

 one of the projects has a christmas theme.......

Hmmm, I can see Hugo and Felix in this design....what else can you see?

 Project three is still in progress, its looking so cute you are going to love it. I will show a peek of this project later this week xx 

The girls in Little Quilt Store have been busy cutting kits for those ladies who have ordered them....we will be sending out more information about what you need to bring next week.

Emma has been busy making these exclusive specially designed wooden thread holders which each participant will receive. I have got mine already!!

 If you think you might like to join me for a workshop in France then you can read more about it here.

Or you can book online here.

There are lots of places to stay close to the Chateau where we are holding the event. Here is a listing of places nearby that Francoise and Phillipe, the owners of Chateau de Bessey have sent me.

Hotel de TROUHANS 21170   (15 km of the chateau)

tel:0626573730

 

Chateau hotel de SAULON LA RUE (10 km of the chateau)

TEL 0380792525

 

HOTEL LOSSET     (15 km of the chateau)

FLAGET ECHEZAUX 21000

 

Hotel de la marine à LOSNE (10KM of the chateau)

 tel :0380270327  

If you have any question please email me [email protected]

Amish buggys and washing lines...

Bedford, PA in the USA is home to this museum and I have to say I wasnt sure what to expect when we first arrived but after my tour I was intrigued and in love with coverlets.

The coverlets are made from wool, the patterns are created on jacquard looms.

 I have hundreds of photos as the coverlets were unique and so nicely displayed.

 

 This was our guide who was very knowledgeable and is quite a character as you can see from the cheeky grin he gave me for this photo (this was before our tour started and I had bombarded him with a zillion questions!)

 The coverlets were truly amazing, I really enjoyed visiting and learning their history.

 

This was my first attempt at getting a picture of a horse and buggy....from the car window!

 My second attempt as you can see was much better, what a gorgeous horse this one is. So proud looking and I love his/her blinkers.

 I think whoever was driving this buggy was judging by the speed (look at those hooves flying) they were going was late to pick the kids up from school. Another good picture from the car window!

 

 I  wanted too but I didnt come home with one of these sweet kittens.

Vince (@quiltsherpa) was very patient with me as I wanted to visit a few quilt shops.....I spotted this one and we found a place to park right outside.

 Before I went in the door I met one of my lovely French friends, Marie-Claude who had finished her shopping and was off to find some lunch. I hope to see her again at Chateau Hexagon Quilt Camp next month.

As I stepped in the door of the quilt shop,  I was greeted by the lovely Ruth and her son. Ruth recognised me and  invited me to teach in the store next time I am in Pennsylvania :) I felt very proud and slightly shy, the shy feeling didnt last long, you know me!

 Vince who was driving took us off the main roads to see what we could find that was Amish. I love how the washing is hung on long high washing lines, this was the longest one we saw.

 How about this line of washing that spans the driveway! So neatly hung too.

 Country Life at its best...

 I think these girls have been told not to talk to strangers! Oh and look out Lynette...too late...there is an electric fence that your about to lean on for that better photo...ouch!

 What a wonderful time we had, great company and the accomodation in Mary's retreat house was fantastic. The retreat accomodation is upstairs, above the quilt shop. Lovely bedrooms and bathrooms, the attention to detail was lovely.

If you are in the are and want beautiful accomodation then contact Mary's Quilt Shop in Bedofrd, PA. You wont be dissapointed and there were lots of lovely places to eat in the street so you although there is a wonderfully set up Huge kitchen in the retreat house you dont have to cook if you dont want to.

Pretty Flowers Everywhere...

....who had that line in a song? I have remembered but can you??I  will tell you at the end of this post :) Meanwhile I am going to catch up on a few more of the lovely places and people that we visited when we were in the US last month.

 This old church caught my eye, I have always loved old wooden churches and am very attracted to them. This particular one is now someones home.

 The flowers in the grass at this cemetery were so beautiful and being close to Memorial weekend there were flags everywhere.

 Tall timber buildings that stretched to the sky... I like how the timber has been left to weather, it ends up a rather interesting colour.

 Covered bridges are so cute and we managed to find a few near where we were staying with our friends Joe and Mary Koval in Pennsylvania.

 I loved the aroma from the lilac tree near this covered bridge.

 

This bridge has that weathered timber look .... I like it...

 We shared some lovely long evenings with home cooked food (thanks for the recipies Joe) with friends at Joe and Mary's home.

 We peeked at a few of Mary's quilt treasures, if your after an antique quilt I would reccomend talking to Mary about what you want. 

One of the quilt had a quilt label which had been added in 1996 with all the information the owners had about the quilt and its maker. I see an 'Anderson' in there, probably not a relative but its nice to dream.

 We saw alot of these log cabin homes in this area, very cute.

 Vince and I had dinner at an amazing little resturant one evening, where the food was divine and there was live music. Sadly it eventually rained as you can see from the clouds that are in the background but luckily for us we were undercover!

 These gorgeous pansies (or if not pansies flowers from that family) were hanging in baskets on the veranda where we were sitting for our dinner, they were so pretty.

 Oh look...my new/old home awaits....

Want to Listen to the song I remembered as I typed the title for this post.... follow the link and enjoy stepping back in time...

Stitch it for Autumn

As you all know I love it when you send me pictures of things you have made from my patterns or from a book.....so, here is the latest story and pictures from one of you x 

 Stitch it for Autumn  is one of the books from my mini book series (mini in name only because they have 7-8 projects in them)

 We have such fun doing the photography for the books.... 

I was so thrilled when Elyte emailed me about a group of ladies from the Northern suberbs of Melbourne that she stitches with. These stitchers meet fortnightly in each others homes, one of whom (Jo) keeps hens who apparently have alot of attitude...so the other girls decided they would join forces and make her this gorgeous version of the table centre piece thats one of the patterns in the book.  

These are the hens with attitude!! Although I have to say they look pretty peaceful to me..also I notice a disctinct family resemblance to the hen who posed for the cover shoot of my book...cousins perhaps!

 Anyhow according to the hens who emailed me privately, these are the girls with attitude...hmmm, I think I can see what they mean! From LtoR, Anne, Anne, Jo, Robyn, Angie, Christine and Elyte

 

Photos from Elyte 
teafabricandotherthings.blogspot.com.au

Thanks girls for the photos and I am so glad that my designs inspired you to create something, its projects like this that really make our lives more fulfilled and the stories we can share about these projects mean so much to us all x x 

While we were in Pittsburgh one of the store owners Song Noh showed me the pictures of her tea cosy, the pattern for which is from the same book. She used fabrics from my  'Quilters Garden' collection...makes a great hat too dont you think!

 

To buy a signed copy of 'Stitch It For Autumn', follow this link if you would like it personalised with your name pleae leave me a message.

In the USA and want to see my stuff?

 Here I am with my friend Mary Jane borrows some of my samples and has lots of my patterns and buttons available on her booth.

Mary Jane will be having a booth at the following places this year, be sure to stop by and say hello from me.

June 27 - 29, 2014 Vermont Quilt Festival, Essex Juntion, VT

July 24 - 27, 2014 Quilt Odyssey, Hershey, PA

July 31 - August 2, 2014 Bayberry Quilt Guild, Harwich, MA

August 20 - 23, 2014 AQS Grand Rapids, MI

Sept. 18 - 21, 2014 Pennsylvania National Quilt Extravaganze XXI, Oaks, PA

Oct. 16 - 19, 2014 Pacific International Quilt Festival, Santa Clara, CA

Nov. 6 - 9, 2014 The Gathering, Manchester, NH

Please take some photos and send them to me if you visit her.

In Stores now….christmas 2014

 I love designing for Christmas. Christmas is a time when families gather together to enjoy each others company, good food and very often the exchange of gifts. The little designs in Starry Night are focused around the feature print which has sweet images of things that make Christmas alive for me, puddings and jolly gingerbread men, decorations and tress and most importantly Santa flying through a sky of scattered stars making his special deliveries on Christmas Eve. 

I have mixed the traditional reds and greens of Christmas and given them my soft muted twist plus I added crushed iced cranberry, a soft mint and faded blue to make the collection alive and fun to work with. 

Visit here to see a list of stores stocking my new fabric range

Using just the red prints from my Starry Night fabric line, there are 12 different designs for you to stitch in this collection of Sweet Christmas Ornaments, you can choose to make them as individual ornaments for your tree or join them together and add some borders to make this wall hangining.

How differnet do the fabrics look when you use the smudgy blue as a background instead of cream. The Flying Santa Tablerunner has jingle bells on it and a gorgeous raggedy braid.

Kate Webster has re-made one of my favourites Waiting for Santa  using the new fabrics and we all think the new version of this favourite quilt looks great, thanks Kate X

Fun and simple this strong quilt which dies not look at all Christmassy would be great for the men in your life...Star Bright Star Stripe

 

Falling Water…Frank Lloyd Wright

 On our way from Pittsburgh to visit our friends Joe and Mary Koval in Beford we stopped to visit the Frank Lloyd Wright house, FallingWater

 We were lucky, it was a beautiful day and there were only 8 people in our tour group so we really did have the house to ourselves.

 This is the peek at the house from downstream a bit, the sound of the water runing under and around the house was so peaceful and relaxing.

I fell in love with all the flowers that were in the grounds.

 A kind Facebook friend tells me these are called bluets, they were so pretty.

 

Bye for now

Rosa from Apliquick..

 It was so nice to catch up with my friend Rosa in Pittsburgh, Rosa is the developer of Apliquick tools. We have promised ourselves dinner together when we are both at Festival Of Quilts in August later this year.

Rosa showed me a few new clever techniques with the tools and I am practising so I can show off to you all soon.  If you havent seen the tools in action yet please follow this link to my tutorial page, or have fun wathcing this little video that Emma and I made.

 

I came home with yet another big batch of Apliquick tools which are available online again, we had run out. This pack (shown) with one of everything is the best value but you can buy all the items indivdually too.

 

Giveaway...

 I was rummaging through some of the things Lynette brought back with her from her recent trip to Quilt Market in Pittsburgh and I found treasure!  - these lovely Zook's Fabric calico bags.   The good news is, if you send me an email [email protected] telling me why you simply have to have one, you will get the chance to win one for your very own. Congratulations to Anita, Susan and Fiona. Please be watching your inboxes for my email. Thank you to everyone who sent me an email :)

Poor Vince has come down with a nasty cold and Lynette has been busy nursing him back to health so she hasn't had a chance to do any blog posts lately but she still has so much to share with you and hopes to do that soon...stay tuned!