I hate it when I fall of the face of the earth

Ha ha! So yes, again, I have fallen off the planet and only have recently returned to post pictures of my quilts. Due to my acceptance into the Pennsylvania National Quilt Extravaganza XVI, I was whisked away on Cloud 9 and can't seem to come back down!I booked a flight to Philadelphia to visit my quilt on display. That should be fun as friends from the Baltimore Heritage Quilters Guild may also attend and visit with me! Yay!
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So... onto the quilts for August. This book is delicious. Did I mention that before? The sample photos just give you a small taste of what wonderful things you can do. Also, Project Runway started this week, and I'll get to that in a moment, and how it ties in with this book.

I tagged my book with those little flags on things I want to try, and there's more that I want to try than weeks in August, so I am thinking that I may want to explore this book next year in a monthly format. I'm going to suggest it at Divas tonight, to see if anyone wants to come along to try it with me.

Again, this book is great if you have previous experience with fabric and you like to experiment. If you don't... well, I'm sure there are other books for you.

These 3 inch squares took HOURS to do EACH. Especially if you want them to look "just perfect", which I had in my head for them to be. I liked some applications better than others, such as the quilted tabs vs. the filled cording, and the losenge pattern on the smocking was too far apart, but lots of lessons were learned.

Back to Project Runway... It started back up this week and one of the contestants has no previous fashion school training, and asks what "smocking" and "godets" are. Now, I knew from costuming what these were, but a lot of people may not. And to tie this all together there are 2 chapters in this book about smocking and godets! Which when mentioned on screen, I smiled a little smile...

August - The Art of Manipulating Fabric samples

I know I haven't posted June or July's mini quilts yet, but here is the start of August's. (I'm away on business again, so sorry for the sparse updating).

This is my first attempt at two projects from the book. I have to preface these with a couple of notes:
First, the one side that looks like woven strips is not woven, it's a series of manipulated tucks. It was pretty easy to sew, but very hard to get the tucks to do what they are supposed to do. It has a lot to do with the fabric you choose.

Secondly, this is not a book for beginners. I liken myself to be pretty good with fabric. I can hold fabric in my hands and know what it will do when sewn. You need to have this instinct when working witht his book. Also, it is not written with the novice in mind. You must have a good idea of the basics of sewing in order to accomplish the directions, which can feel sparse at times.

These things said, I am really enjoying the exercises. Hope you like it as much as I do.