Blue Nickel Studios

admin May 29th, 2008

Well, not really running out of time…actually time is about all we really have….but the list of things to do in a day do not give blogging or design or art a large priority, but I am trying to give it more time

Any way….here is a brief potpourri of things to look at…and explore

   I painted this bench two years ago, and had so much fun doing it…I didn’t do any creative painting last summer at all…I hope I get to it this year…

 Here is my Grandma’s planter that I never saw plants in my entire life, until we had it…hoping to fill this with geraniums this year….it actually would be the first time my kids actually see plants in it too…and we have had this with us….oh about 10 years….it usually gets filled with crap that we don’t want to see on the porch!!

  I made this mini 4” x 4” “quilty” thing for a friend and just mailed it to him….He is fairly famous quilting wise, and you can probably figure out who it is if you read my blog, but for now I am leaving him nameless…for now….I am hoping he will like it enough to put it on HIS site  Shameless gift-giving, well, kinda, but I do want him to like it whether he puts it on his site or not!

 My mother in law picked up a pair of these great peacock metal wall thingies, and gave us one…I was thrilled….Linda was not as thrilled but did allow me to put it on the wall of the front porch…..right next to Linda’s “peacock” chair from the 70’s….I didn’t realize that when I put it on the wall, but when I started taking the picture I figured it out…

And then one last thing.   I am officially adding Melissa Averinos to my blog links….Melissa has great pictures, finds great stuff, and is a brand new fabric designer for Free Spirit.  I have emailed her a couple times, trying to not seem like a “stalker”.....she seems very genuine and creative….I think  you will like her stuff!!

I also wanted to put a cool link here for a technique on hanging mini quilts on the wall, but the time I mentioned above is cracking the whip over my head, and I gotta get finished….so you can come back for that later…

Anybody out there reading this???

• color , primitive , quilting , shiloah cottage
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admin May 28th, 2008

Okay, first the 2 things…

Here is a teapot that Linda picked up at a garage sale…..  Pretty cool dragon spout.  Linda liked it cause it looks like McCoy, although I think it is much newer than that.   Regardless if it is the “real” McCoy, it is pretty cool.   Number 2 of the “2 others” is this photo of 2 doll quilts that are finished and ready to donate to my guild Busy Bees for their doll quilt giving this coming Christmas.  

Now on to the 7 things.

These are 7 things about me that not everyone knows, or do I necessarily care if people know or not….Feed Dog tagged me awhile ago to do this list so here it is:

1.Even though my studio is named Blue Nickel Studios, blue is NOT my favorite color.   That is reserved for Red or Green, and not Brown as my dear wife teases me.

2. I don’t like diamonds. They lack color for me.

3. I used to eat Mustard on Graham crackers for a snack as a kid….really, and I did, and I didn’t think anything of it…..(were we poorer than I thought?)

4. I don’t like ketchup on my hashbrowns.

5. I liked and still like the Donny and Marie show (I saw a clip of them on YouTube, and still laughed at it)  It was campy, but fun and wholesome.

6. My favorite Muppet is Sam the Eagle.  He is like me, trying to be reserved in a world that is going nuts around him….(of course I can be like Gonzo too…totally out of touch with reality….Linda can vouch for that)

and number 7…...I really like Musicals, and I thoroughly enjoyed High School Musical 1 and 2…..here are my daughter and I (she also loves HSM) posing the gang from HSM3….   

There now you know more of me than you want….and none of it about quilting for those of you who were getting bored with that subject line….

• color , musicals , quilting
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admin May 26th, 2008

Here are a few more notes on Quilt Market.  Yesterday I posted a picture of these cute Japanese prints that I picked up at Market, here is her card   Her name is Angela Milliman, and she is just starting to distribute these fabrics here.  They are very unusual, I haven’t seen anything like them locally that is for sure.

Another set of fabrics that I picked up down there come from the Lecien company.  This is one complete set of the red/pink/brown colorway   

here they are closer     there was a quilt there that was done in same fabrics, but the blue/grey colorway, and it was simply incredible….but I didn’t get a photo, much to my dismay….Next Market I go to, I will take a great deal more photos that is for sure.   

• color , quilting
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admin May 26th, 2008

I have more to write about Market, but I really didn’t take enough pictures, and I didn’t get to see nearly enough of it…...but I am certainly craving more   I found this great blog by Melissa Averinos who actually has her own line of fabrics coming out soon too.  Melissa did a great job of covering much of the show, but again not nearly all of it.  At least she has more pictures

I did pick up these prints from the land of Oz (Australia that is)... They are very busy, so I am not sure what I will make with them, but I had to have them, as you just don’t see things like that around here. 

I also picked up some small charm squares from a company that is just starting to distribute these cute little japanese fabrics.        I don’t have her card with me, but I will post that later too, as she has a great card   So all I remember is that  her name is Angela, and she hails from Texas, and these prints are great…..I may be working with them in a new pattern for the market, but we will have to see how that works out.  I don’t know if my friend Mark Lipinski would like them, as I don’t think he goes for the “cute” look too much, but they are not your typical Strawberry Shortcake type prints that are out there!!

A REALLY cool thing I did see on my last day at Market was the recylcled green plastic bottle batting.    I don’t know how well this really works in quilts, but the concept of recycling here is great  You can read more about it at Quilter’s Dream. 

That is it for now…I have some other more boring regular non-quilting work to attend to, so I really should get to it

Okay so you twisted my arm for one more thought….I briefly VERY briefly met Tina Givens at market as I was rushing to a train, but on Melissa’s site (mentioned above) I noticed a fabric in Tina’s booth photos that I thought was marvelous…so I thought I would mention it here.  After some quick research it is from the upcoming Chloe’s imagination line, and has the coolest bees, lanterns, and birds.  Good job, Tina!!

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admin May 23rd, 2008

It is already Thursday, and I am just getting to write about a great weekend at the International Quilt Market in Portland, Oregon.   I took the train down there on Friday morning   This the great new train station in Everett Washington. It is a beautiful new building. Having never taken the train before, I was excited and anxious at the same time…..as usual it was for naught as it basically was a glorified bus ride, but much more comfortable and bumpy at times.  Went by the water a lot, and the train tracks give you a much different perspective than driving.  Getting on the train in Everett was pretty easy and comfortable, by the time we got to Portland it was pretty packed, and the Portland train station was very busy at 3pm in the afternoon.  I was in a hurry to get to Market, so I grabbed one of the cabs out front and asked to go to the convention center.  Alex, the driver, told me in his Russian accent that there were FIVE convention centers downtown!  I had no idea that there were so many.  I called Marci Baker, my employer for this gig, and asked where they were.  She was not sure what the name of it was, but said it was near the Rose Quarter which I had mentioned on the phone while we were driving by it.  So I had the Alex drop me off there with my bags.  Upon walking up to the building immediately in front of me, I realized that no one was there…..so I kept walking,  finally I recognized these two glass towers from when I had been to Portland Spring Quilt Market in 1996 and 1998 and made it into the delicious air-conditioned air (it was in the low 90’s I heard later, and the air conditioning on the train had started to fail on the way down).  

I got to see a little of Market that evening, and went to bed in my hotel room tired.  Saturday, I got my picture taken with Kaffe Fasset   as he was just down the row from our booth at Alicia’s Attic/Clearview Triangle.  The quilt behind us is made of his fabrics, and in Sara Nephew’s latest book, Not Your Grandmother’s Log Cabins 

 I spent the morning working Marci’s booth, and then spent some time going around and meeting people and taking in the scope of the market.  A big goal of mine was to meet and talk with Mark Lipinski.  I talked to him a couple times, but he was getting pulled a “gazillion” ways and didn’t have much time. 

  I did pin down Mark  long enough for this photo and not much longer.  He is one busy man.  I hope that I can be that busy in this field someday soon.  Mark has been a great encourager in that area, and I acutally met a few other people too, who were wonderful….

Among those I met was Amy Butler, albeit was for only less than five minutes on Sunday as I was racing out of the market to catch my train back to Everett.  What a sweet lady she is. And TALL Her words to me that I will remember for a long time were “Go for it!”  I just love her stuff, and I hope that when I “make it” I will be as kind and as encouraging as she is.  

 I think the best part of Market was on Sunday going around with Marci from Alicia’s and having Marci introduce me as one of her designer’s.   I think that is the phrase she used, and my head is still reeling and loving that title.  Mark told me he could see me having my own booth at Market someday, and I sure hope he is right!!  How will this work itself out?  I have no idea, but I am trying as hard as I can to give it to God, and work my best at what I know to do, and seeing what He and I can work out together.   And with the help of all these new and renewed friendships that I am developing.

 More later…..

• color , ducks , quilting
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admin May 4th, 2008

Okay, so I really don’t even like lots of extra Quilting tools, but this tool looks cool. I have tried it yet, but I saw it demo’d and I think it is pretty cool.    This was shown today at the Saturday Sampler class at Ben Franklins in Monroe by Cathy Wierzbecki of Time to Quilt.  Cathy showed us how to make great corners on the binding of the quilt.   I have never been too satisfied with my bindings, and this sounds like it will really work well…  I am going to send this entry to Mark Linpinski ‘cause I think he really needs to do a blurb on this in his magazine Quilters Home. As soon as I try it out, I will let you know for sure it is a great tool…..but I feel quite confident in advance that it will work….for me to try it, I really need to finish something, huh?  I am working on great many things right now…look for more postings coming up…..

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admin April 21st, 2008

   I made these blocks for my class ”The Parts Department” based from the book Collaborative Quilting. They are variations from parts in the book.  The big pink and black star came out much bigger than I imagined (18” square), as I didn’t really do the math for the overall size…but I rather like it, and I think it will become the center for a mandala style quilt based from the parts department.  Pinks and blues (with a bunch of black and white), what do you think?  The flower? I am not sure but I think a row of three of these with a fairly simple border would make a nice bold wall hanging.

   These 4 blocks are the beginning of a 49 block quilt for my wife’s cousin’s firstborn baby coming soon.   The parents are calm, very “planned-out” people, so I decided to stick to their chosen colors for the baby’s room in a very subdued, slightly planned, but not completely symmetrical quilt.   They will find out soon enough that babies really don’t fit every plan created by parents, and they are seldom “quiet”.....but that will be in due time.   I am excited to make this quilt, as it is back to my “original” palette of earthy, country colors. 

There have been so few entries in here this month, as my work and home have seemed to call me to other things. I wish I could tell you what they were, but I don’t really think I know.  The previous entry shows the chicken coop portion of the month, but it seems like there was more than that going on.  Probably it has just been emotions of the job situation.  Being caught in two worlds where I do not feel comfortable in either at present, but the family still needs to be fed and sheltered.  Pretty tough…..but I will hang onto the promises that God will always take care of me, and that He does love me and my family more than I could ever comprehend.

• color , folk art , primitive , quilting
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admin March 28th, 2008

   These little guys get forgotten on top of my cabinet of lights/neutrals, but they are great little buddies that hang out in my studio. I think three of them are Jeff Goldblum from his Jurassic days, but the Wolfman is my favorite.   Somewhere else in the studio jungle Tarzan from the Disney movie is hanging out, but I don’t know where I last spotted him.  These are some photos of the main area of my creativity. Needs cleaning still, but I thought I would post these fresh pictures.

  light cabinet open    main stash area    

    this shows both the stash area and the sewing area 

    This highlights the sewing area.

 So inspite of this plethora of fabric and supply, I acquired this assortment of fabric    from my friend Jovita at Peawink and Periwinkle when I helped her take down her shop at the Quilters Anonymous quilt show a couple weeks ago.  Jovita is dear woman, who is always happy to see you and tells it like it is, and I really like her genuine-ness.  She lives in Belgium now for the most part, but she has an American showroom here locally…I think I may tootle over there this weekend if I get a chance to see what she has in there.  She normally has great woven ribbons and duponi silks as well as some great actual European fabrics not found too often on this side of the water.

• art stuff , color , quilting , shiloah cottage
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admin March 11th, 2008

     These are pictures of the studio that desparately needs cleaning today….never got to it yet!  I had two very long paragraphs posted above these photos, and somehow they became all links that wouldn’t work, so now there is nothing for all that work, and I REALLY have to get cleaning…hopefully tomorrow’s post will be better…right now I better not write anything for it will be very full of expletives….

 (the below playlist was from earlier in the day when I was in a much better mood….now I am VERY grumpy….)

Today’s playlist so far…. Pink Martini playing Bukra Wba’do, Kenny Loggins playing Footloose ( I had to stop everything to dance there…LOVE that song!), Deniece Williams playing Let’s hear it for the Boy, Fine Young Cannibals singing She Drives Me Crazy, Jars of Clay playing The Valley Song, Raze playing More Than a Dream, Audio Adreneline playing Big House, Sting singing Shallow Brown from a CD of pirate songs (It barely sounds like Sting, but I can tell it is him), Jerry Rafferty singing Baker Street, Jars of Clay singing You Were There, TobyMac singing I Was Made To Love You, The BeeGees singing Staying Alive,   Transiberian Orchestra playing Christmas/Sarajevo  (what force that song contains!), Sade singing Smooth Operator, David Crowder Band playing Turkish Delight,

• music , quilting , randomness , studio
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admin March 3rd, 2008

Here is the newest quilt top that I am getting quilted by Judy Irish this week.  It is based on the ideas presented in the book Collaborative Quilting by Freddy Moran and Gwen Marston.  I only really collaborated with myself, but I had a blast doing it.  I made it to send to Connecticut for the Connecticut Piecemakers Quilt Guild quilt show. I was invited to send a quilt to their invitational show entitled Man-tastic: Fantastic Quilts from the Hands and Hearts of Men......so this is the quilt that I am sending.  It is just a little over 4 feet square, and much brighter than I usually make for myself (I do make Baby quilts like this, but we tend to be a bit more subdued here at home) I am looking forward to finishing it as I do look forward to every quilt at the end, I love the final product   My machine is acting up big time as the foot pedal airhose seems to be giving out.  After 15 plus years of sewing, I am not surprised, but I am a little irritated a the timing of it.  I have class to teach this coming Saturday, and I need to make some samples.  I end up holding the cord pushed into the machine.  Right after the class, I am going to drop my machine off for it’s overdue service, and for a week try to concentrate on figuring out my quilting machine and frame system.  By the time my regular machine is done being serviced, Judy should be done quilting my quilt, and I can bind and finish it for the Connecticut show.

Totally non-quilting wise, it is pouring outside today, the frogs are still croaking in the evenings, and it is less than a week to daylight savings time.  I have to be at the new job at 1pm, and the new job I thought would be great is very much un-great, and I am longing for the old job that drove me nuts, but did afford me a lot of flexibility that, at the time, I apparently took very much for granted.  I am now in the process of getting back to my old job and positiion, which may take awhile, but not too long, for I was pretty good at it.  I always felt a little “trapped” by the old job, but in hindsight, I think that the bars of that “cage” were very fluid, and that was not a bad thing.  I did not burn any bridges behind me that I know of, so I don’t feel bad going back, and I think it will not be too hard to get back in the swing of things there.  I will still do real estate on the side, along with designing and quilting.  I hope to someday even be designing my own fabric line….dishes….everything someday….that is my real dream…..

for now, I keep plugging away on all the things that need to be done (well, except cleaning in the studio, I manage to avoid that fairly well).

• color , quilting
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