Here is the beginning of my Kathmandu project. I just couldn’t wait to show you! It’s going to be a wholecloth quilt, embroidered and embellished into a colorful banner-size wall-hanging.

The fabric is that ruddy red with gold designs printed in blocks (I’m going to use 2 blocks x 4 blocks; from the Katmandu line by Mark Lipinski for the Troy Corp.). I’m going to fill in those lines with embroidery, then sandwich and quilt it and later embellish it with beads, sequins and/or shisha mirrors.

It’s so exciting to start a new project!! I know this will be a long project that I will work on many, many hours…but it is already fun to look at and enjoyable to do, so I’m looking forward to working on it a long time.  Some projects I do because I want the finished product, but this one I’m really doing for the process…and I hope it will be a beautiful masterpiece in the end.

Thanks for looking!

A quick Wikipedia search for “Kathmandu” turned up some beautiful imagery!! I was looking for a color scheme for my newest embroidery project using a fabric line called Kathmandu by Mark Lipinski. I found out the sky’s the limit for colors! Those hats are my new desktop wallpaper, aren’t they pretty?!

Stay tuned to see what I’m going to do with all these colors…

I’ve been quilting clouds this afternoon! It’s a fun and easy shape, and I think it’s finishing off my birdie applique quilt quite nicely. I just have to show you my progress.

Thankfully, the sky outside is almost this blue and it’s starting to warm up outside, so I was able to spend some time in my studio today…without cranking the heater too bad!

Here’s looking forward to spring birds on my lawn!

I want to show you my new studio curtains!

They do exactly what I was hoping they would do…
1. Look pretty
2. Not block out too much of my wonderful sunshine, but reduce glare
3. Replace expensive custom blinds that were breaking and looking plain

…and they say to everyone who enters, this is a creative quilting space. (not to mention there’s a pocket for my empty bobbins to hang right next to my bobbin holder! I’m happy!!

If you haven’t yet, click the second photo and see it bigger. My boys thought the layering of lots of squares was so cool that they insisted I make the whole curtain like that…but I followed Doris’ advice to just do a three row strip on the other ones. The rest of those two curtains is made with a white on white cotton print which has an opaque floral design, but you can’t really see that effect in these photos.

Thanks for looking! I’m so glad to be back to blogging!

No, I didn’t take a vacation in California…I just need to look at a pleasant image now that I can actually upload one!!

My blog has been not working in various ways since early February…and I think I’m finally getting it back up and running. New server, fresh software, same old good stuff is all there. I think you should be seeing some new posts showing up here now!

Thank you for your patience while I’ve been having technical difficulties!!
Talk to you soon!
- Emma

I got all excited about two weeks ago when I thought up a new product (A Quiltie Pillowcover) and the first one turned out great! But wait, there are no pillowcovers in my shop?! Well, it turned out too great! I’m keeping this.

My rationale is that I got that brown flowered fabric as a Christmas gift from my mom. And I love it! I have two other quilties in the works using other fabrics from that bundle, but I don’t want to give them ALL away! So, I think I’m going to be making more pillowcovers. It’s a great idea, practical-minded and just as easy to make as a quiltie (frankly, easier!), so I’m excited to have come up with a new product. I’m just not ready to roll it out yet.

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Oh no! I found something new and fun to do in all that spare time I have to waste!! Well, I don’t think it’s going to be my umpteenth hobby, because it’s a little too much like work…but it was a lot of fun, thanks to my sister-in-law, Jennifer.

Here’s what I’m talking about, a digital scrapbook page.

Jennifer is very into “Digi-scrapping” and even makes pages to sell/give away to lots of folks on the internet. I used a “kit” she came up with to make this page. She told me about it because I helped her with some of the quilty elements in the kit. I sent her some scans and photos.

You can see her blog and read about the kit here.
Download the kit for FREE (although you have to register to for the forum to get it)
Here’s her preview of the kit:

Conal saw me working on Brennan’s page and wanted one for himself. Here’s the page he helped me make. He likes things a little more colorful!!

Pretty fun, Jennifer, I think we’ll be making more of these pages someday!

Just a quick little update to my post about the Medallion Quilt project, Doris posted pics of all of them from our first meeting.

Here’s a link. Thanks for being our photographer, Doris!!
And, while you’re there, bookmark her blog! Doris is an amazing quilter and her blog is quite entertaining!

The window blinds in my studio have been breaking one by one. It’s a sunroom, so there are 6 of them to go! I’m taking it as an interesting challenge to come up with some homemade curtains!

So far I have two ideas, one is from Kaffe Fassett’s book “Passionate Patchwork”. It’s a shabby chic pastel patchwork curtain which I’ve already started. Here’s a peek.

As you can see, I’ve got three rows done, well actually now it’s four, but this is the photo I took yesterday. I love the way the sun shines through and makes an extra pattern of squares. (click on the first image to see what I mean!) The squares are purposely a little rough and raw edges are all exposed, but that’s why I say “shabby chic”, it will fit in well in my place of work!  But I’m afraid a whole wall of all these little squares would be a little overwhelming, so I think I better just do one window…then something else on the other windows. Maybe solids with borders or valances made of those squares. What do you think?

The second idea is a curtain with some pockets for small lightweight storage. (needlebook, tape measure,  spools of thread, little scissors, etc.) I saw the idea on Ikea.com, but I don’t want it to LOOK anything like their version, which is primary blocks of color. So I’m still working this idea out. Any suggestions?

I just started a new project with my guild small group. It’s a medallion quilt. We each made a center, that we will pass around and add borders to each month.

Here is the center that I started. It’s fused on and machine appliqued. I used a pattern from the book Birds of a Feather (with a little alteration to fit).  The background fabric is a beautiful white on white medallion print.

We had a meeting last night to swap centers. There were some great medallion designs I can’t wait to work on, everyone was very creative! Doris did a little bird theme too, and I got to get her medallion to work on first. I love looking at these cute little spring birdies! Aren’t they cute? Good job, Doris!

I think I can show you the centers for now, but after this, might not be able to share these until they are done…we’re going to try to keep the progress a surprise until we reveal each others completed quilts.