A Colourful Journey

The Easter holidays have flown by in a flurry of days out, painting the boys bedroom and completing my City and Guilds module.

Before the Easter madness started, I sneaked off to Bath for a bit of time to myself. Whenever I am in Bath I have to visit Country Threads. It is my favourite local quilt shop and is a MUST if you visit Bath.

After a little shop I headed off to The American Museum to visit the Kaffe Fassett exhibition.

In the garden leading up to the exhibition space there is a huge tree that has hanging lanterns and pompoms in a riot of colour:

 It really made me smile and is a great way to start the exhibition!

Once inside, nothing can prepared you for the riot of colour! 

When I started patchwork many moons, Kaffe's book Patchwork was one of the first books I bought. It was a real treat to be within breathing distance of some his amazing designs and be able to see the detail of his fabrics up close.

The exhibition is organised into colour sections with pieces of ceramics, paintings, knit wear, tapestry and quilts in each section. 

My favourites were the quilts, which were so beautiful.

This room was so calm and relaxing, with gorgeous greens and pinks. The designs are simply amazing and the wall hanging at the end of the room took my breath away!

Inside the museum proper they have his original fabric design sheets framed and hung. It is fascinating to see how he went from a painting to a full fabric range. Also the bold colours are just gorgeous!

I took LOADS of photos, but these are the ones I love the most!

If you get a chance to go, you must! The exhibition runs until the 2nd November at The American Museum in Bath.

Quilters Fantasy List

I follow so many quilt bloggers, fabric designs and quilt shops on Twitter that my feed is full of glorious fabrics, ideas and inspiration. At the moment though it is cruelly taunting me with Quilt Market.

For those of you who don't know, it is a huge quilt festival in Houston. It is the biggest quilt festival in world and is on my bucket list to visit. It has been a long time ambition to go... but I would need to rob a bank first!

I do have a list of people I would like to meet there - kinda like fantasy football, but with quilters!

I am dying to meet Jennifer Paganelli. Her fabrics are so vibrant and full of life! They just pop out any quilt I have ever seen with them in. I bought her Girl's World book and my young sewers have made a few things out of it - Jennifer even sent over badges for them to have! The girls were chuffed!

I taught an adult class in dress making from the book and one of the little girls who got a new dress keeps telling me how much she loves wearing the dress. I don't actually have any Sis Boom fabric yet, but it is definitely on my list for the new year.

If I met her, I would like to thank Jennifer for her support, generosity and friendship on Twitter and Facebook.

I am pretty sure she thinks I am stalking her, but I would still like to meet Angela Walters in person. I have taken her Craftsy course, bought her book and chatted with her on Twitter - one very embarrassing series of tweets which I won't repeat here....

I had shied away from machine quilting for many years. Fear of the machine, too many failed attempts and anxiety all kept well away from doing it. Hand quilting was the way in my house! Until a short deadline to make a 3yo a quilt for his 4th birthday earlier this year! I took the plunge the quilt is simply gorgeous.

Angela has helped me to learn the technique to make my quilts gorgeous, and whilst there is a long way to go until they are perfect, without Angela I wouldn't be doing the intricate work I am currently doing!

I have a signed copy of Kaffe Fassetts autobiography from the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham this year - it is in my must have bedside pile of craft books! I got all tongue tied when it finally came to seeing him - if you know me, you will know that doesn't happen very often!

I would like to thank him for the years of joy he has given me with his books, designs and fabric. How is life is an inspiration and how he has influenced the path my life has taken more than anyone else. His books were the first I bought 17 years ago when I started quilting and they are still my favourites to pull patterns ideas out of, or even just to leaf through for inspiration.

Of course I would need a strong coffee and a shove in the right direction before I could say these things to him!

The last person I would love to meet is Tula Pink. Her designs and fabrics are a new obsession to me! I did have a brief conversation with her at the Festival of Quilts, but that was before I had actually added any of designs to my stash.

I now have my Prince Charming quilt bee blocks on the design wall waiting to be put together and the Birds and Bees quilt being quilted. I love the intricate designs, the colours and they make me smile when I working with them. I would love to know where her ideas come from, how does she start the design process... can I buy her a mug of coffee?

I can't wait to see her new line in the shops... 

Okay so there are so many only quilting peeps I would love to meet, but these guys are my top 4.

Who would you like to meet and why?

Festival of Quilts

Yesterday was the best day of the year - it was the Festival of Quilts day!

I haven't been able to go for 3 years due to having the monsters on the weekends it is on, but yesterday all the contact days aligned and I was able to go! I was beyond excited!

All that fabric, supplies and quilts was just too much for me!

I only had a limited time in the show. A combination of the drive being quite long, the kids not being gone for long and meeting my sister for lunch (not seen each other for 2.5 years so loads to talk about!). So it was a bit of a mission affair - I knew what I wanted and needed.

I did  manage to see some of the gorgeous quilt entries. They are simply stunning! I particularly love the bright coloured ones. The traditional ones were amazing too, the contemporary section drew me most!

Taking a list and a purse full of cash worked to a point... I might have exceeded it slightly! My sister mentioned being like a kid in a candy store....

Here are the fabrics I bought:

There is Katherine's Wheel by Nel Whatmore on the top row, Prince Charming by Tula Pink in Twilight and Candy from Cotton Patch. The bottom four are Velocity from Backstitch.

It was a highlight of the show to meet Alice from Backstitch. I love her website, she is super fast with delivery and she always pops a note in saying hello!

The Tula Pink fabrics are for my blocks for the quilting bee I have organised. I am going to match them with this amazing Fair Trade Grey:

I also managed to get some thread, quilting gloves and supplies for felting:

I did manage to get some Aurifil Thread, but I was really disappointed that although Aurifil were there you could only buy the big boxes of thread, not choose from the racks on display...

Finally I managed to get an autographed copy of one of my favourite designers autobiography:

Kaffe Fassett has been part of my quilting journey since it started 16 years ago. I have made a few of his designs. I was kinda star struck and unable to talk to him really.... sad I know - it made my sister laugh!





I have some pics of the quilts which I will share tomorrow...