Blue Nickel Studios

admin May 18th, 2013

Okay so here’s the exciting news! Coats and Clark who are, as I understand it, the parent company of Westminster Fabrics (Rowan and Free Spirit) will be coming out with their own lines of fabric as well.  With their brand on it.  To be honest, the whole the brand/ that brand thing is rather perplexing, but anyway, Eclectic Elements is Tim Holtz’s premier line of fabric with Coats.  And I got to design the below quilt for their Market Booth. As I am at Market now as this post is posting, you may have already seen some glimpses of it. I know Katy got some it to play with and posted a fun sneak peak on her Instagram page earlier this week. And Tim posted it himself last week on his site. As far as I know he is mostly known in the scrapbook world, but there is always a lot of crossover in both of those worlds.

I love the prints in this:

Especially this one:

And here is my quilt Going My Way.  Directions will be available online shortly after Market.  I simply ran out of time before!

And then I made these little bags based on Monica’s treat totes for some giveaways at Market!

What do you all think? Leave a comment and I will draw a name next week and send a winner a bunch of scraps from this project!

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admin May 17th, 2013

Thanks for playing along with Free Spirit and me!  For those who are late to the party, we’ve been trying to guess what is in the center of  Dave Butler’s World Tour Quilt that I had the opportunity to put together for Free Spirit!  I have been posting glimpse of it and letting people guess over on Free Spirit’s Facebook page to win a fabulous prize!

Here’s the answer to the Mystery!

This quilt is showing its public face for the first time at Market. You may or may not have seen pictures of it from people setting up Market already.  I wrote this post in advance and scheduled it to post today, as I have been down at Market since Wednesday evening. You probably already knew that from my instagramming and tweeting if you follow me there.

Hope you enjoyed guessing what Dave’s design was all about…..thanks for stopping by the Blue Nickel as always. Stay tuned, I have another post planned for tomorrow in regards to  another “surprise” at Quilt Market that I worked on!

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admin May 14th, 2013

And here is clue set # 3 for the Mystery Game we have been playing with Dave Butler’s World Tour line.

As in previous posts here at the Blue Nickel, the game works like this:  Check out these pictures and previous shots here, here, and here.  Then make your best guess as to what is in the center of the quilt Dave designed and I pieced (quilted by my friend Becky Marshall).

 

Make your guesses on the Free Spirit Facebook page at anyone of the posts there regarding this quilt mystery game.  The big reveal post will be here on Friday the 17th of May!  There have been some great guesses!! Can’t wait to see the next batch of guesses!!

As this post goes up….I am in the throes of last minute packing and getting things ready for Market and trying to make sure the house will be maintained and all the other “stuff” that happens when you leave the house with kids in charge….

Don’t forget to check out the blog Friday and Saturday for some great “surprise” posts regarding some of the projects I have been working on for Market…and then there will be more after too because I just don’t have time to get them all up before!

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admin May 10th, 2013

Okay Peeps! so it is time for more clues on the center of Dave’s Design for this World Tour Quilt.  Former clues are here and here. Check out the Free Spirit Facebook page and guess on any of their posts regarding this little game.  So far guesses have been: snake, stained glass window, castle, oriental symbol, celtic knot, compass points, kimono, WT or World Tour, “+” sign, map or globe, star, shamrock. I’m not saying anything on them, I am just giving you some more photos.

I will post one more post with clues on Tuesday the 14th and then the reveal will go up on Friday the 17th or if you catch a Market picture before then…. Good luck! Remember to win the prize pack, you have to go leave a comment on anyone of Free Spirit’s Facebook posts about the game!

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admin May 9th, 2013

My friend Emily Herrick sent me this sweet little bundle of  fat 1/8’s of Technicolor,  her fresh-out-of-the-gate line for Michael Miller Fabrics:

 I was thrilled to get them the day I did. I had just had some less-than-best news on two fronts in my life, one of them being my mom’s blood test not being better as we had hoped, the other being some dayjob stuff that wasn’t terrible, but not what I had hoped for. And I had already been feeling somewhat down during Easter week.  This package came at the end of a beautiful Easter Saturday. It was like a breath of fresh air.

To be honest, I had seen Technicolor online via an industry preview page, and while I liked it, I was a bit afraid the scale of the prints might be much bigger than I would like. I was delighted to see them in the scale they are! Perfect little blenders! Many “read” solid but aren’t. They are so nice and basic, they will go with Many other lines! A couple of the prints are “two for one” meaning you get two prints at a time….when you buy a half yard of that line, you would get two different fat quarters.  Other fabric companies have done this in the past, and I love this concept!! Great if you are on a budget and want just a little bit of both!

Here’s what I have been able to do with them so far.

I made these bags based on Monica’s SUPER Bag pattern found here.  I modified her bag by making the sides 1” shorter in length. I love the “tiny” feeling of them. And they make great bags for dolls. I will have to make some more and show you them with Linda’s dolls.  I made these for Quilt Market and the Generation Q booth for some giveaways.

I wanted to make up some four patch blocks and just play with them, but I just haven’t had the time….Market is one week away, and I still have to finish three bindings on quilts (no big surprise there!!) and make some more bags and pack…oh, and silly other things like work the dayjob for the next 6 days, and possibly pay some bills….nothing new for the week before Market!  Crazy….excited but anxious all at the same time!!

 

 

 

 

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admin May 3rd, 2013

 And it’s another week with another post for the FOLK Journal Challenge. 

The Kentucky Derby will be held on Saturday, May 4th. The Kentucky Derby is known as the “most exciting two minutes in sports.” What has been the most exciting moment in your life thus far?

This one is a pretty hard one to answer because I am rather a Manic personality. I get pretty excited pretty easily about a lot of things that some people just don’t get. (there’s a down side to this too, because I get upset and depressed about an equal amount of things at times….my wife calls it the roller coaster life of living with me….)

So picking one most exciting moment is kinda hard for me.  At the moment, I am very, very excited to be getting ready for Quilt Market in Portland, Oregon later this month.  I LOVE Quilt Market, not only for all the cool quilty stuff, but also for my many friends! And each time I go, I seem to make more friends…a very cool thing.

But Most Exciting? It would have to be the day I married my wife, Linda.  Life is better these days if things AREN’T exciting, but you don’t know that when you are first married, and just being so in love is so exhilarating. And exciting.  The next most exciting times would be when each of my kids were born. The first of course being the most exciting because it was such a new experience.  Yeah, I’d say those were the most exciting times.

I think as we age excitement is not as important. I am beginning to feel reflection is better. Not to the point of not doing things, because I still like to do things!  As I said earlier, I am really excited about going to Market it just a few weeks (eek!) and I am working up plans for Next Summer teaching at Sisters, OR again. Uber-excited about that. And I think I will actually be going to Fall Market in Houston this fall…a big first for me!

Today’s a pretty short post as I have a TON to do still before Market….
Like getting prizes like this: 

ready to giveaway at the Generation Q Magazine booth (#1102) just next to the Michael Miller booth  (which is always a show-stopper because they are in New York City right near a theatrical prop shop and they rent the coolest display stuff!) and the bathrooms….two really good places to be next too!!

So I am cutting this post short, as I really do have a lot to do still…and that ole DayJob that I love (but not as much as this job) needs my time too…

Cheers, all!

Scott

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admin April 30th, 2013

So the folks over at Free Spirit wanted to have some fun with Dave’s new World Tour line in conjunction with the quilt that I am wrapping up for them.  The quilt was designed by the fabulous Mr. B, and has a really unique feel to it, well branded into his Parson Gray aesthetic. The center of this quilt has something in the center that the Free Spirit peeps thought it would be fun for you to guess what it is…...AND give you a cool prize to boot!

Here’s the deets:

For the next few weeks before Quilt Market,  I am going to be posting some successively “revealing” photos of the quilt here on my blog, and then you get to go over and  make comments on Free Spirit’s Facebook page guessing what is in the center of the quilt.  Each post will reveal a bit more about the quilt, and on the Friday of Market, you will get to see the full thing here at the Blue Nickel, if you aren’t already down in Portland, Oregon for Market.  If you have the correct answer to the mysterious center of the quilt, then you will be put in a drawing for a fabulous gift package from Free Spirit!

 So go ahead make your guesses over on Free Spirit’s Facebook page on this link.

Good luck, happy guessing, and all that good stuff!!

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admin April 25th, 2013

So I had a little time between quilts, but hardly any time for this post now, but I wanted to show you what I was playing with using my World Tour scraps.  I added some reds and a solid pink to the World tour fabrics and I am working on this improv piece called Reykjavik after the capitol of Iceland. It is the first in a series of quilts I am working on in prepping some class ideas for next year.  The other two planned so far are called Paris-by-the-Sea and Danskia and I think I may have one called Dresden....but maybe not….

Anyway here is what is happening so far on this one…

It’s funny that my first piece is using mostly Dave’s World Tour line….I hadn’t planned that, but all of these quilts are based on places or make-believe places of the heart….I am very excited about this series and I can hardly wait to get to work on them some more…but right now all the Quilt Market stuff is finally flooding in, and I gotta get that stuff done first!

Now back to the Quilt Market sweat-shop in my studio…....

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admin April 24th, 2013

It’s that time again! The weeks seem to go so quickly with this FOLK Journal Challenge! Here’s this week’s prompt:

It’s time to start planning those Summer vacations! What has been your favorite trip of all time? What did you enjoy most about the trip?

The good thing is that the question doesn’t ask what this year’s vacations will be. We are hoping to head to the Washington Coast for a few days, but with our oldest son’s school and summer internship coming up, we are not sure if we will be able to get us all together for it.  We really do NEED a vacation though this year because we weren’t able to take one of ANY sort last year.  Luckily in Spring of 2011 we made it to Disneyland, even though we really couldn’t afford it then. But in hindsight, it is a good thing we took that trip because a trip like that is going to be even longer away at the moment as we try to recover from our financially “less-than” year of 2012.   But I digress…..as usual….

Back to the question.  My favorite vacation? It is a bit difficult in one sense because I just so love traveling. Even our trips to the beach are just splendid to me. Linda and I have gone twice to the southern Washington Coast just the two of us. Once for our honeymoon, and once for our 20th anniversary three and a half years ago.  And we have gone to the Central/North Washington Coast with the kids many times, but not in the last 3 years I think. And before the kids, Linda and I took some camping road trips to Yellowstone and Montana. And I find all of those trips so relaxing.  Just writing about it reminds me how much we need another vacation.

And I absolutely have been loving my trips to Quilt Markets (all Spring ones so far, I think this fall may be my first time to Fall Market in Houston….so excited for that!) I love the freedom of traveling alone even while I am very much missing my family at the same time. But with Markets, I get to see all my quilting peeps that I normally only talk to electronically in one form or another.  I treasure those trips and those friendships so much!

But my FAVORITE trip has got to be my very first trip to Disneyland in October 2007.  We completely surprised the kids with it.  Here is a video we took of waking them up for the big day!  The kids were so surprised! And they will be mortified that I am sharing their wake-up on the blog, but oh well…..

That trip was so much fun.  The kids had never ever been on an airplane before and they and I had NEVER been to Disneyland, and I was over 40 already! I felt like a little kid.  We had beautiful weather…in fact HOT…80 degrees in October. The picture above is the only one I can find, but it sure shows how delighted we all were.  I loved how there was music everywhere….and CLEAN? wow, it was so clean there!  The boys loved the Haunted Mansion, we all LOVED Space Mountain, Indiana Jones, and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad.  We drug the kids through It’s a Small World at least once….it doesn’t have the same meaning for them as it does for Linda and me. The fireworks and parades were just incredible! I really can’t tell you how much I loved that trip. I still get goosebumps thinking about it.

We went again in 2011 and it was very rainy and stormy for a great deal of our trip that time.  Not as much fun. I was very disappointed in that aspect of it, because I was thinking about the money I spent for it, and it just wasn’t as nice…..but that was probably not the best way to look at it.  On that second trip, we did get to eat at the Blue Bayou restaurant which was REALLY expensive, but the service and atmosphere was so superb, the kids really, really enjoyed that special treat so much!  And we went to Universal Studios that time too, Linda and I were thrilled to see the “real” Hollywood sign after so many years of seeing it in movies and such!

Anyway, that is just a little bit about my favorite trip so far….I really can’t wait to go again! Don’t know when that will be, but I know I will be just as excited for that trip too!  As for now, I have a lot of sewing to get done for Quilt Market….so I better get to it….

How about you? What was your favorite vacation? or is it a dream vacation for the future??

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admin April 17th, 2013

Once again I get to play with David Butler’s newest line for Free Spirit. This one is called World Tour, and yup…it’s his best yet!

The first thing that I noticed and absolutely love in this mix is the printed linen!!   First, it is just a bit thicker than the regular quilting cotton, but much more “substantial”.  And the drape and hand of this linen is just incredible!  It is perfect for bags and lightweight jackets, etc. I am thinking about getting a vest made out of it, but not sure if I will have time before Market which is when I want it for.

Each print is named after places around the globe, from Fiji to Canterbury to Osaka to Kashmir and they go great with his past lines. I am sure they will also play well with others even though I haven’t had much of a chance to do that yet.

The quilt that I am making for Market is David’s design, and you are going to love it! I am not allowed to show the full thing here yet, you are just seeing pieces of it today…...... I will post a photo of it here while I am at Market. It is great for those guys in your life! Very Dude-sanctioned!!

But I did have scraps, and you know how I can’t throw out any scraps! So I have been playing with this  “planned” improv piece tonight while the World Tour quilt is at the quilter’s, and I am waiting for the other fabrics for three other Quilt Market projects to get here.

Not sure where this is going, but this is where it is starting from.  I am thinking more and more that this one is going to be named Reykjavik. I added some hot pink solid I had floating around, and I have some  Curious Nature prints in mind as well as this red/burgundy Ombre from my stash by Blank Quilting

I have similar plans to do this with some Glimma from Windham fabrics that have been here in the studio for awhile that I have been wanting to feature…..and actually I had drawn up this idea for Glimma first…..but I had all these half-square triangles and skinny strips from fussy-cutting…..and well, a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do….. 

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