Tuesday, March 21, 2017

It's A Juggling Act

Life's a juggling act ... and sometimes a ball is dropped.  Well, my blogging is one of those balls. Sorry about that.

But I've been juggling lots of other fun stuff in the meantime and will catch you up on some of the goings on.

First, I finished my "Christmas Sparkle" quilt and it is now in the hands of McCall's Quilting Magazine. It will be in the September/October 2017 issue, which will hit newsstands on July 25.  I'm so tickled!  McCall's will now do their professional photo shoot of my quilt and said they will send me some pictures that I can post on my blog.  They will also be sending me a couple complementary copies of the magazine as well, and I will be having a giveaway once that happens.  Wheeee!

I've also started working on my "Razzle Dazzle" Bonnie Hunter quilt that was supposed to be the project during our Mediterranean Cruise in August but didn't happen because the company that was to supply the machines went belly-up.  We worked on hand projects instead.  I'll have more on my "Razzle Dazzle" quilt progress in a future post.

I do have something to share here now, though. I've done my first ever Bargello quilt.  We had a Quilt Gathering in early March and several classes were given.  The Bargello quilt was one of them, so I was in.  It was fun and I liked it a lot, but I think if I didn't have other irons in the fire, I would have made my quilt wider.  Just looks too long and narrow to me.  But not bad for a first go-round. Lots (did I say "lots") of seams!  Now to quilt it...



On another note, I've been approached by several members of my Guild to head-up the Block-of-the-Month this coming year (May-April).  They wore me down...  Well, since I'm in charge, I've decided to make it a Mystery Quilt and have a Clue-of-the-Month instead.  I've run the idea past several people, and everyone I've spoken with thinks it will be a ton of fun.  My main goal is to have as many people as possible participate, so I wanted to make the finished quilt eye-catching but with easy-to-assemble units so that it is also beginner-friendly.  I also wanted to make it so that it will look good in many different colorways -- that way participants can make it in their preferred color scheme, just substituting the color I reference with an alternate color of their choice, although there will be lights and darks that will need to stay the same value in order to achieve the final effect.

So far I've designed the quilt and broken it down into parts to make it easier to write the clues.  Still in the midst of actually writing the intro and preparing the actual clues.  I still also have to make it myself, and I also have a helper who is also going to make it following the clues I provide in advance, just to double-check for errors (hey, they happen).  I would share a picture of the quilt here, but there are a few people from my Guild who read my blog, so I don't want to ruin it.  Only two people know what the finished product will look like -- the Guild President and my assistant.  They both are really excited with the finished product and I believe that if the participants (especially beginners) looked at the finished product, they would think it was beyond their skills.  But it's not! It's completely made of squares, half-square triangles and corner-square triangles!

All that said, would any of you out there in cyberspace be interested in following along on the Mystery Quilt?  I could always post the monthly clues here on my blog so you can join in on the monthly fun...  Let me know.  :o)

Juggling is another art form,
Suzy

3 comments:

JJ said...

Count me in for your block of the month.

JJ said...

Sign me up!! I can't wait to get started.

Anonymous said...

I think it could be fun, though I'm always hesitant with mysteries! I usually finish and think, if only I'd know how it would look, I'd have put this color over there and ....