Studio Assistants

Sometimes when working in the studio I regret having my trio of "assistants", especially when I am working on a deadline and need to move as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Between knocking off spools from my wall hung thread holder and trying to wrap their tails around my machine's needle (while it's moving up and down!), sometimes I have to just put them all out and work alone. I can't say work "in peace" because the constant scratching at the door and crying precludes peace of any kind.

Below are pictures of my studio assistants. Starting with Peek A Boo, she's my oldest cat and a bit set in her ways. She's not quite as bad as the younger ones, she only wants to sit on my feet, which makes it hard to use the machine's power control foot. She's 11 years old now and doesn't always appreciate the "closeness" of the others.

Now we move on to Miss Tillie. She's a beautiful ball of fur, who leaves it for me-everywhere! She loves to lay behind the machine as I'm sewing but her long tail tends to wrap around the needle housing and I have to continually push it out of the way to get any work done.

Last but far from least is Bouncer. He's one of the longest cats I've ever had and he loves to get up on my work table when I'm trying to accomplish anything. I've finally found how to thwart his tactics, if I go in the studio and just sit at the table and give him some loving for a while and give him some attention (actually more than he really wants) he'll be content and leave me to work for a while.

He always tries to be helpful, by moving things out of my way for me. Here he decided the tissue box was ready for the trash, but dang, he's having a bit of a problem trying to find the trash can!

Photo To Landscape Class

On Saturday, April 19, I taught my first quilting class! I did this for the Kalamazoo Log Cabin Quilters, Inc, the guild to which I belong.

Though I love doing landscape quilts, I was a bit nervous about teaching my techniques to others. My friend, Alta Dekema (who also took the class), was the chairman for our guild's Saturday workshops and she talked me into teaching a class. Boy was she good at begging!

Below are some pictures from the class, starting with the full class at work on their quilts. The class included Pat Shaw, Vickie Smith, Ellen Colston, Cathy Warner, Linda Mosher, Gina Irelan, Jackie Skarritt, Roberta Annsla, Alta Dekema and Sally Amador

Below are the students' works in progress.

In the morning's session we worked on the above landscapes. After lunch we worked on free motion embroidery(FME), using tulle between two layers of Sulvy water soluble stabilizer, to produce free standing appliques. The appliques will be added to the finished landscapes. I was inspired by the different looks the students produced, especially since they were all working from the photo I provided. Only one student brought in her own photo (from a book on Matisse-the piece with the bridge) to work from.

I did learn a couple of things teaching this class. It should actually be a two day class, with the first day doing the landscape and the second day working on the free motion embroidery. Everyone was having so much fun doing the landscape, we ended up breaking late for lunch, which made us late starting the FME portion of the class. Luckily, everyone was able to nearly complete their applique in the class.

I'm hoping the students will bring their finished pieces to the next guild meeting for show and tell, so I can see what else they did. All in all, this is a class I would teach again, and may decide to pitch it to several different quilt stores in the area.