Vermont Quilt Show ~ Class with Cindy Needham

July 2013

 

Just back from my vacation in Vermont so we could attend  the Vermont Quilt Show!   Whoot ~ Whoot !   My man made all sorts of arrangements so I could attend a class with teacher Cindy Needham; what a wonderful gift.   It was so nice to finally meet the Linen Lady in person! 

I met Cindy at the bar on Saturday morning, the thread bar that is, and she is as nice as you can imagine.  There were about 20 students and she made sure to greet everyone and spent time with each student in small groups, large groups and individually when able!  Cindy has such a generous Spirit and is a phenomenal teacher; she wants you to know what she knows!  I have been learning from Cindy through her book, e-books and classes on line, and I am so glad I was finally able to be a student, in person.

 

Following are some photos of my projects from the Open Threadbar class.   If you have opportunity to attend one of her classes, take it.  Cindy even allowed me to take photos of her work, which gave me inspiration as to how to quilt a linen I bought that was torn. 

 

 Now I am off to see if I can pool together enough money to go to her Linen class, as she will be in New England again this summer, end of July, at the Maine Quilt Festival in Augusta Maine and price out a hotel vacancy in Augusta, Maine.  Then I'll be off to visit with the soon to arrive grandchildren. 

 

Thank you Cindy for traveling so far to share your gifts and talents with us in New England.  Till we meet again.

Godspeed,

Mary

PS…

The Vermont Quilt Show was great, lots of good teachers, venders and the quilts were so beautiful.  Bittersweet Fabric Shop in NH brought brand new Janome sewing machines for all of us in Cindy's classroom to use for the day!  Thank you Mr. LaValley.

 

 My Practice Sampler which later became a mug rug

What to do with a blank quilt sandwhich

 Divide the sandwich into 6 little postcard sizes trying some highlights and metallic threads.

 This was a simple FMQ pattern I used, and not once did any of the metallic threads break!  Good instruction, nice thread and brand new machines made a HUGE difference

 This is the first of the 6 areas I FMQ using a huge range of different threads.  Tried the metallic, highlights, rayons, silks, anything fun and colorful.  Only wish I could have tried some of the bobbin quilting with some of the Ricky Tims Razzle Dazzle, but we didn't want to monkey around with these brand new machines that were to be sold for a great price after the festival was over.  Will have to get a spool of razzle dazzle next thread order.

 I did some FMQ of straight lines using a highlight thread from Superior Threads to quilt the edges around two of the quilting areas.

 I couldn't throw away this practice sample, it had too many beautiful threads in it, and will enjoy the memory it will bring of our Open Threadbar class each time I use it, for I turned this piece into a mug rug.  The other sections I quilted will probably become  a couple post cards  and another mug rug :)



Next Project in class

We took a blank piece of fabric for backing, a batt, and then

I chose an orange tie dye piece for my quilt top

 

In the ripples of color on the fabric I imagined these Large flowers which I FMQ, and then filled the background with all sorts of leaves using rayon threads in FMQ

 

I bound the little mini wall hanging and it finished out at almost 12 inches.

 

This is the back of the wall hanging.  Even though I used contrasting threads on the front, the back shows the multitude of stitches so much better.

 

When all was said and done, I received my PhD in Threadology!   Thank you Cindy,

you are a wonderful teacher with such a kind and generous spirit!

 

Home now, just in time to harvest some of the lavender from the garden. 

 

Godspeed,   Mary