Sunday, April 5, 2009

Solo Show at Bank is Up; Camping in a Snowstorm

My mother helped me hang 14 of my quilts at the Rocky Mountain Bank in Stevensville on Wednesday.  They will be on display, and for sale, for the months of April and May.  Then on Thursday I received a notice in the mail that one of my quilts, "Twist of Lime, Pinch of Purple" was accepted into the Denver National Quilt Festival.  It is a juried show which means I had to send in digital images of my entries and knowledgeable jurors determine which entries they will include in the show.  That show will be April 30 through May 3.  This quilt is an innovative piece using a traditional block (log cabin) as a base.  I believe it will make a better statement hanging in this show than the two pieces they accepted last year.   It is much bolder and more colorful.  Now I have to go through the agonizing process of determining how to ship the quilt so it doesn't arrive there with folds and curling corners!

We went camping last weekend to Freezout Lake and had a great time except for having to stay an additional (and very chilly) night because of a snow storm.  There were probably 100,000 snow geese and more people than we have ever encountered in the nine years we have been going up there.  We explored the area as is our usual activity for this trip, seeing such sites as Benton Lake Refuge, some Indian teepee rings, and of course the camels next to the highway in Fairfield (two humpers).  We had a wide range of weather conditions and it was more wintery than any other year has been, but we were able to enjoy ourselves and it was a good trip.  My son who is six had a great time and just loves camping in the trailer.  Luckily for him he climbs into his sleeping bag and turns on his personal body furnace and stays warm all night---even without socks!  I had two pairs of socks on and was still cold all night.  

Today I started working on a challenge piece that I need to finish for the Bitterroot Quilt Guild show in June.  It is to be a monochromatic piece and each of the participants was given a piece of fabric that we have to use in the piece.  Luckily the color of my fabric has inspired an idea and I'm hoping it will turn out interesting.  The quilts have to be rather small (maximum of 144 sq. inches) so that will be a challenge for me.  No pics of this one as it is supposed to be anonymous.

My son entered a watercolor painting in the Montana Junior Duck Stamp competition so we went to the award ceremony yesterday at the Lee Metcalf Wildlife Refuge here in Stevensville.  I was impressed with the whole event, although much of it was outside in their amphitheatre and it was very cold.  They treated the kids really well and I think all had a great time.  They got very nice prizes and ribbons.  Michael received an honorable mention which is what all the kids who didn't get 1st, 2nd or 3rd get.  He was at the bottom of the age range so he has years to get better.  We were very proud of his effort and the quality of work he does. If we can just get him to keep working at it and practicing I think he will be very competitive down the road.  I asked him if he likes painting and he said he really likes his lesson with his grandpa every week, but he doesn't like practicing at home.  I guess we'll have to work on making that more fun and not a chore!  His prizes from the contest included some new painting supplies, so maybe that will help motivate him--this week anyways!

I have discovered a magazine that I had never heard of before (it is only a couple of years old) which focuses on home machine quilting and is very good.  It has been coming out quarterly but I understand that now they will be combining it with their longarm quilting magazine and publishing it every other month (I think they have shared articles in the past anyways).  The magazine is called Machine Quilting Unlimited and I think it has some of the best articles about quilting that I have seen.  It is not on any of our newsstands around here, but the website is www.mqumag.com.  I ordered all of the back issues and have thoroughly enjoyed them.  Very informative, in-depth articles with lots of good pictures.  If you do your own quilting it is definitely a worthwhile read.  As one who does all my own quilting on a Pfaff machine, I highly recommend it.

By the way, at the bottom of this page I always have a photo of one of my quilts and I change it every once in a while, so scroll down and take a look!

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