Plan b submissions - closed

Well, it is officially 12:17 am on Sept. 1st, and I have checked my e-mails for any last minute entries into our Plan b contest....and there were a few. Cori and I had our late night chat, and we have decided on one project. And trust me when I say, that it has been a painful process. It was fun and exciting to see so many projects, and we can honestly say that we wish we could do them all. (We have already started talking about our next Plan B contest..so you never know...)

And the stories! Wow, I wish I could tell all of you about them! One thing that became clear to me as I read through all of the entries, was how much quilters lovingly create and share their gifts with others. Quilters take a part of themselves, and stitch it into a quilt, and then give that gift to someone who is grieving, or celebrating a milestone, or starting a new life. These stories truly reflect what it is to be a quilter. And I feel sorry for those people who think we 'just make blankets'.

But THANK YOU to everyone who shared a piece of their (broken) dream with us. We hope that you won't put your UFO back into the closet, but look at it again in a new light, and try a new direction.

And who did win? Well, I will wait a few more hours (at least until dawn) and then make a phone call. You will find out who the lucky winner is very soon, and we will post all of her information on our other site - Plan b. You can get there by clicking onto that logo thingy on the right hand side of this blog.

See you soon.
myra

Our trip to Fort Wayne

There is SO MUCH to catch up on, that I almost don't know where to start. We had the most amazing trip to Fort Wayne to teach, then we had to come home...do laundry...fix the computer problems...do more laundry...get the kids ready for school next week...and try to ignore that fact that it feels like fall outside.

So let me start with our trip. We were teaching in Bluffton Indiana, so we flew into the Fort Wayne Airport, which is right next door. Apparently it was easy to spot us as the 'tourists' because we were taking so many pictures at the airport.

But from reading all of the touristy info that was available, we learnt that this was the home of Johnny Appleseed. Yes, he really was a real person.

We were brought down to teach in Bluffton by three quilt shops. They had decided to do our Love Joy Peace sampler quilt as their project, and to our delight, each shop made the quilt in VERY different colors. We loved seeing this, because it shows how different the same project can look. Which is your favorite version? We had 30+ students, and many of them picked their own colorways, so we spent half of our time teaching and guiding, and the other half of the time I was drooling over their fabric choices.

What I don't have space to show you, is all the quilts that were hanging around the room. I was inspired by their color combinations, and great quilting designs. This area of Indiana definitely has a collection of quilters who understand and embrace the new, bolder, fabrics that are coming into the market place. They understand how to put fabrics together, and their projects reflected their skills.

The result of seeing so may great projects, was that we had

to take a few trips down to Mary's quilt shop - Quilt's 'n Gifts. It has been a while since I have been in such a well stocked, and diverse quilt shop. This is a shop that has it all. The fabrics were very current, and tempting, and she had a great selection of patterns, and other notions. Cori and I worked very hard to restrain ourselves from taking home bolts of fabrics. It's a good thing we knew how much room we had in our luggage. But what is the best feature of Quilts 'n Gifts? The staff. If you are ever having a bad day, just go there and hang out with their staff. Even if you are not a quilter, it would be a good place to go to find friendship.

We were teaching at the local golf clubhouse, which was a great facility. We had plenty of space, good food, and a wall full of windows, that gave you this to look at.

I love quilting, but with a view like this, it was easy for me to get distracted.

We had a large group of quilters...some were experienced...some were beginners...and some were only 5 weeks old! This was baby Katie, and she is officially the youngest student that we have ever had in class.

And baby Katie never had trouble finding a pair of arms to hold her. Cori is so talented that she can teach, and baby sit at the same time. We wrote four books while having four babies, so guess the instincts of quilting and holding babies is pretty ingrained by now.

The following day, we were back at the golf clubhouse, but for a different reason. The room was full of quilters, who came for a wonderful Sunday brunch, and to hear us speak about some of our quilts. When we travel and talk about our quilts, we usually take along a powerpoint presentation to show examples of our work, and how we have designed some of our quilts - but we also take about a dozen quilts with us to show. This can be hard, because out of a collection of 125 quilts, only a few can fit into our 'quilt luggage'. (And what's with the new luggage prices at the airports?)

So we had another enjoyable day surrounded by quilters. That evening we relaxed by taking a nice walk around Bluffton, and enjoying the beautiful city. It was a good way to unwind, and relax, before we had to get ready for our our 5:30 am drive to the airport.

So, THANK YOU BLUFFTON for a great weekend, that we are still talking about. And don't forget to send us pictures of your finished quilt projects! We love getting those. And we hope to see many of you again.

-Cori & Myra

On our way

It is 6:37 am and we are waiting for our flight! What a weekend...we had SUCH a great time in Bluffton. The class went great. Everyone was very receptive to what we had to teach, I think we may have converted a few "appliquers" and took out a few myths about paper piecing too! We had a wonderful luncheon and a great time of sharing our story. One of my favorite parts was meeting the "Cori & Myra's" in the group (and you know who you are :)) Everywhere we go, we always notice that there is a Cori & a Myra in the group. When I say a Cori & Myra, I mean people who have a few of the same quirks and habits as we do. We played a game are you a Cori or a Myra and there were at least 2 of each of us! So many lovely people, such great hospitality and Bluffton was a beautiful place. Thanks for everything Mary, Deb & Linda and ALL who attended. Bye, Bye

~cori

On our way to Bluffton Indiana

This is a picture of Mary from Quilts 'n Gifts. We are on our way to Indiana in a couple of days to teach a class and present our trunk show at their annual Luncheon. So if you live in the area, come down and see us...we would love to meet you.

What else is going on? Turtle Twirl featured in Quiltmaker has been a HUGE sucess and for those of you who could not get your hands a kit, we are sorry. Thanks for all the lovely compliments and the orders, we hope you enjoy the pattern.

Summer feels like it is winding down which means that the fun is just beginning. We will be in Sioux Lookout ON, Regina SK, Winkler MB as well as Portage La Prairie MB.

Don't forget to get your Pictures of projects gone bad in to Myra. We have many people watching Plan B, so don't miss out on this EXTREME QUILT MAKEOVER!

~cori

And the WINNER is...Sue Cahill

Thanks to all of you who left comments! Sue please email me, so we can make arrangements for your gifts. Myra left me in charge of this honor of picking the winner!

~cori

HERE IT IS! The most unusall quilting contest you may ever see. We have carefully crafted an outline of what we want to do - but here it is in a nutshell. We want to find an unfinished project, change it, finish it, and return it to the owner. So...show us what lurks in your closets. We can't wait to see what we can do with it.

So tell your neighbours, and tell your friends, because we want everyone to join in the fun. (And YES, you can enter more than one un-finished project.)

Cori & Myra







































the concept

In the back of closets, hidden deep in drawers and tucked away from everyone’s sight, are unfinished projects that have gone horribly wrong. We all have them (Myra has a drawer full) and we all wish that they would go away. They seem like such a waste. These projects were once exciting and you were eager to dive in, finish and display them with pride. However…they went wrong and now when you come across them in your closet you cringe and try to ignore them. Well, we have a plan to help ONE of you!

During the 10 years that we worked in our local quilt shop, we spent a lot of time helping customers fix projects that were taking a wrong turn. Now, we want to offer the same help to one quilter out there. We have teamed up with a few of our favorite suppliers and together, we are out to fix one of the ‘hidden disasters’, and bring it out into the daylight.

the plan

We will select one unfinished project, change it, finish it, and return it to the owner as a finished project.

Submission deadline: Beginning August 1st, until August 31st.
The selected ‘winner’ will be announced on Sept. 1st
The project in its original form will be revealed by Sept. 20th.
The project will be broken down, and put into and EQ file. Alternate layouts of what could be done will be shown during the month of Oct.
The finished quilt will be reveled, and shipped to the owner Dec. 1st, and they should have it in their home in time for Christmas.

submissions
1.) Send us pictures of your unfinished project that is hiding in your closet.
2.) Send us a brief, less than 600 word paragraph telling us what was your original plan, why you stopped working on it, and why you want us to finish it for you.

3.) All submissions must have your full name, day and evening phone numbers and emails. (this information will be kept in our confidence, and will not be shared with anyone)

4.) All submissions become property of blue meadow designs and will not be returned to you. (so don’t send us your projects – just photo’s of them!!)

5.) Submissions are to be e-mailed to myra@bluemeadowdesigns.com Please do not send them to our other mail addresses, because the server may not be able to accept large image files, and it may be bounced back to you. Please try to keep the MB of the photo’s as small as possible.

6.) Submissions must be received by midnight, (central time in North America) August 31st, 2008 to qualify.

what we are looking for
Cori and I will be looking through the submissions, and we will choose a project based on what inspires us. We will love to read the stories of ‘what could have been’ but we believe that we will choose the final project to work on because it will reach out and grab us.


the rules
1). We will choose one entry, from all of the submissions. (only send photos please)

2). All submissions for entry must be made from 100% cotton. The quilt can not be vintage.

3). If you have extra fabric yardage from the original project, we may ask for it.

4). We will have the full right to change the project, take it apart, or only use portions of the original, in any manor that we see fit. We will also decide on what the finished size of the project will be. You will sign a waver/contract.

5.) The finished project will be your property, and will be returned to you by mid Dec. 2008.

6.) The owner of the selected project will be asked to give us additional information as to their personal style, color choices, and favorite quilts. This will assist us in making sure that what we create for you, will fit with your personal taste.


Sponsors

Electric Quilt Company
Working with EQ, and the programs that they develop, has enabled us to be better designers. Their computer programs allow us to ‘test’ designs, and find many of the flaws before we cut any fabric. It also lets us ‘play’ with different layout options, and color options. We will be using the latest version of their program EQ6, to show you different options of what we could do with the troubled project.

The Vintage Quiltery
When we found Jacquiline Pohl, we discovered one of the best machine quilters in the industry. Located right here in our province of Manitoba, Jacquie Pohl has created beautiful quilted projects for customers across Canada. You have to have a lot of faith in the machine quilter that you hand your quilt top too. We love working with Jacquie, because she is an artist, a skilled quilter, and she always has great ideas. We will be sending the completed quilt top to Jacquie for the quilting, and we will all anxiously wait to see how she will finish it.

Day 100 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Blessed Home

It's finally here!!! The final post in our parade of quilts. There was a little pressure (from myself) as to which quilt I would save to the end. I could have chosen a traditional one, or a modern one, or something that was beautifully photographed, but I picked this one for a reason. Because I want quilting, the simple art of sewing and stitching, to bring a Blessing into your life. In these quilts are stories, and journeys, and times of quiet solitude. And they are a physical comfort that can be given to others, so that they will feel the warmth of your love and friendship.

This is the cover, and main quilt in our 5th book, called The Blessed Home quilts. It is a very unique sampler, and it is broken down into 'lessons' so that you can practice a wide variety of quilting techniques.


And I JUST decided (which means Cori doesn't know about it) that we have a nice bundle of quilting goodies that we should give away. So, to have this parcel of 'really good stuff' showing up at your door, simply leave us a comment, telling us which was your favorite quilt from the past 100. I must admit, I will be very interested to hear what grabbed your attention. And I will give you until next Thursday at midnight to enter.

At this late hour, I could write an essay on the journey of posting some of our quilts, but I will keep it simple, and say Thank You for letting us share what we love with you. It was good for us to 'stop and smell the roses.' We had forgotten some of the great projects, and stories, and because of this trip, we had a chance to remember all of the good times. So, THANK YOU.

Cori & Myra

Day 99 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Running Bear





















Yes - I am still digging through my pile of old projects, and shaking off the dust. I do remember making this one in the spring of 1997, and thinking that we were so cleaver, by putting a log cabin in the center of a bear paw. Now I know 1000 designers have produced a pattern like this one, but in my little mind, I still like to think that Cori and I came up with it first.

Cori claims that she has a large quilt done in this pattern, made in fall colors. It sounds so pretty....so why can't I remember it? I guess maybe I should be going through her stack of quilts

See you again soon.
myra

Day 98 - of 100 Days of Quilts

How am I possibly going to finish the 100 Days of quilts by tomorrow? By posting several quilts in one day! I am sorry to rush to the finish line, but tomorrow is August 1st, and it's time to let everyone in on the big surprise.

So, last night I was running through the neighbourhood with a few quilts, looking for places to throw them down, and take some pictures. (Thankfully my neighbours have great yards.) And across the street I found these guys. Well, the color of these two little ducks reminded me of a quilt from WAY BACK when. I think that I might have made this quilt around 1995. I love making little nine-patches! The finished size of the squares is a 1/2", which means that they also have a 1/2" of fabric for seams behind them. Most quilters (I mean my mother) could never understand why I liked making these squares so small, but when they are this size, and your seam allowance is accurate, they fit together perfectly. Just try it sometime. Make a little 1 1/2" nine patch block, and see how much fun it is.

See you soon!
myra

Turtle Twist update.

Thanks to a fellow 'Manitoban quilter' I was told that the cover of Quiltmaker, with our quilt on it, can be seen at http://www.quiltmaker.com/ So if you are like us, and you have not seen the issue on your local newsstand, you can always sneek a peek on the web site.

There has been a great response to this quilt, and Cori's phone has been ringing off the hook. And yesterday, we made a custom quilt for a little girl using this pattern, and it has the yellow and pink turtle print, with a pink turtle on it. So here is another chance to be creative, and envision a quilt in another way.

myra

Day 97 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Turtle Twist - in Quiltmaker magazine...NOW!

I could pull some more quilts out of our archives for today's post...but I got this image this morning, and thought I would share it with you.

For those of you who live in the US, you may have already seen this quilt, but Cori and I have only received an e-mail of it. It is in the current issue of Quiltmaker, and it is another fun little kids quilt using our Completely Kids line of fabric. This one really is too cute! Cori and I designed it for the magazine, but it was made 'out there' so we have not seen the finished project. It is much more of a surprise when you don't see the quilt in every step of the process, and you are very relieved when it all works out, and there were no serious glitches. I even heard the rumor that this quilt is on the cover. Is that true? This issue will make it up to us in Canada (eventually) and then I can't wait to read through the whole magazine, and see what other great projects it holds.

So enjoy this project! And I will be scoping out the magazine racks.

See you tomorrow.

myra

Day 96 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Grandmother's Flower Garden from 'Traditional Quilts to Paper Piece'

Don't you just love Grandmothers' Flower Garden quilts! I do. My mother has an exquisite one that I hope to inherit someday, but for now, we have this little gem.

In fact, my mothers very first quilt that she EVER made was a queen size Grandmothers' Flower Garden, and she pieced it all my machine. Yep, by machine. I remember sitting in our home in Lancaster Co. and watching her every evening as she pulled out her sewing machine, put it on the dining room table, and slowly stitch rows of hexagons together. When the quilt top was done, she brought it to work with her, at the MCC Material Resources center. Amish and Mennonite women hand quilted it, and the finished quilt went to the MCC relief sale in Harrisburg PA. (there are MCC sales in many of the US states, so check out the one near you!) Anyway, her quilt was sold in 1983 at the sale...and I would give just about anything to know where it is now.

But I do love this pattern. The only problem is that it is a long process of cutting hexagons, preparing the papers for the English Paper Piecing method, and hand stitching every small piece together. So when we were writing our third book, we took a look at the pattern, and found a new way of putting it together. Instead of hexagons, the quilt is actually made up in rows. Every other row is paper piece, and every other row is pieced. Sew them all together, and they will look like a Grandmothers' Flower Garden. The best way to hide all of these vertical seams, is to quilt it in a traditional method, of outlining the blocks.

So why not play around with your favorite traditional block, and find a new way of putting it together.

See you tomorrow.

myra.

AND REMEMBER....this Friday starts our huge new contest! You will want to tell every quilter you know about it.....

Day 95 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Labyrinth


























My, my, my! I am digging up forgotten projects. This little quilt was made by the RJR staff to showcase one of their new collections. When they showed us the fabrics, Cori and I came up with this design. It had clean simple lines, and in it you could use a multitude of cool funky fabrics.

We got a shot of this project when we were cruz'n the halls at the International Quilt Market. Trust me, at these markets, there is so much to see (fabric, fabric fabric!!) and it is a little funny to then turn a corner, see a quilt, and saying to your self 'That looks familiar - did we do that?' Which reminds me...I was going to update our quilt inventory this summer...I guess I better get on that!

See you tomorrow.
myra

Day 94 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Country Thyme - from "Down In The Valley"

It feels like we are coming full circle! I found this picture of a table runner from our first book, and it made me smile, because lately Cori and I have been designing a lot of new table runners.

This project was from the first chapter of the book, which was called 'Prairieland'. This chapter was near and dear to us, because it represented where we live. I know that many, MANY people travel as fast as they can through the prairies - on their way to some other place, but when you live here, you can start to see the beauty of wide open spaces.

The buildings in this chapter also reflect our simple prairie dwellings. The old houses and barns have simple lines, and the church is small but quaint. What do the buildings in your area look like? In your next project, why not bring pieces of your town into your home.

See you soon.
myra

Day 93 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Flying Dutchman - 'Traditional Quilts to Paper Piece'

I just have a little bit of time today to post a quilt - so I will post a little bitty quilt.

I have always liked the Flying Dutchman block, so we made up this little quilt with a few of the blocks. It was fun, and it is just a simple example of how you can make a quick quilt by just using blocks and sashings.

And why are we so busy? If you only knew the phone call we got yesterday!! But that news is under wraps for a little longer. I can tell you that I also sealed a few more details this week for our upcoming contest. We talked to a friend who is coming on board to help with one part of this contest - and she thinks it's going to be a really, really fun challenge. SO REMEMBER TO WATCH HERE AUG. 1ST for all of the details!

See you tomorrow.
myra

Day 92 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Crayon Box

It's time for another test - to see how good is your memory. Do you remember this quilt? We've called it Crayon Box, because it is done with our fun kids line of fabric, but originally it was done in different colors, called 'Amish Bars', and we posted it back on Day 26. (we have some kits and patterns available for this quilt in the shop.)

I chose this quilt to talk about today, because it goes along with Cori's theme of changing up colors and layouts to come up with your own unique quilt. We love the original quilt, which was done in soft blue's and tans, but by changing the color, it suddenly has a completely different feel.

I know that it can be hard to get past the color of a quilt, to actually see the design, but here is a trick that I picked up when working in my mother's quilt shop. My mother has issues of Quilter's Newsletter magazine, dating back to the early 80's. Sometimes when I would look through these old copies, it was hard to see the great quilt, because you just focused on the glaring fabric colors. So what we did, is to take an old quilt from a magazine, and photocopy the picture into a black and white image. Suddenly you are more focused on blocks, and you are able to pick new colors for the quilt, because the old colors are not interfering. So the next time you need to pick new colors for a project, eliminate the old colors, and it will be much easier to make new choices.

See you tomorrow.
-myra

P.S. Jean asked a few question under our Day 90 quilt..so here are the short answers. The little girl in the picture is the daughter of a friend of ours. (we sometimes borrow small children from our friends!) And when I made the comment about fabrics that 'last longer' I made a grammatical error. I did not mean to imply that they have a longer lifespan, I meant to imply that they are available for purchase longer than other prints - which come and go from the shelves very quickly. If you have any other questions, Cori and I will be making a special section where you will able to ask us 'stuff ' when these 100 days of quilts are done. So stay tuned! Fun things are on their way.

Day 91 - 100 days of quilts

Cori's Log Cabin

Oh how this wash line has come in handy for taking pictures of these big quilts! This was my very first BIG quilt that I made. I was just married and my husband is a cowboy and that was how our first home was decorated, a little bit western (tastefully of course) I have never been a frilly kind of gal, so I didn't mind at all. I found the border print, which had a Navajo feeling and chose my colors around it. I think that Myra and I had seen this layout in a magazine at the time, but of course figured it out by ourselves.(Myra will correct me if I am wrong on that!) I used a log cabin block and the courthouse steps to create the pattern and used shads of purple, blue and of course beige. I also hand quilted this quilt and Myra and I spent a whole evening stitching on the binding so I could hang it in our local quilt show the next morning. I really enjoyed picking the fabrics and my favorite part was the hand quilting - I loved to stitch in front of the TV (oh the time I had before we had kids!) I must say this is bringing back some good memories of just being newlyweds :).

~cori

p.s can you believe that we are on the home stretch of our 100 quilts? I can't!

Taking it easy















I have been taking it easy these last two weeks (right now Myra is saying "No Kidding")as you can see. But I am back at it now. Designing, eagerly waiting to get started on the next sewing project, making plans for the fall retreat and our visits to Bluffton, Indian and Sioux Lookout, Ontario!

Our saying "inspired by the possibilities" is just ringing louder and clearer for me. There is always more than one great way to do a quilt, more than one great fabric collection to use and more sand more ways that I intend to "stretch" myself. (thinner would be good, but that's not what I mean in this case :)) Feed back from customers always puts new ideas in our heads, but sometimes "we" as "designers" have to listen to our inner creativity and just go with what we like, not that other influences are not helpful but each to their own, right? We can't all like the same things, that would be way to boring. We can however all be inspired by the same thing and create something unique from it. Our my ramblings making any sense? I guess what I am trying to say is by taking a break, relaxing and being no were near a computer or telephone made me ready to create again. Jump in with both feet and do what makes me happy, create from within my space and hope that when the project/pattern is complete, that someone else might enjoy it too.

~cori

Day 90 - of 100 Days of Quilts
Little Lady - baby size

We only have 10 more days of quilts left to show you! It has been fun going through our old files, and remembering so many of our projects, but we hope that you will enjoy what we have planned next.

This is one of the baby quilts that we designed using the RJR handsprays. It's great to use these fabrics in a project, because they will stay around for a longer time, and it is easy to make new and exciting color combinations.

Like many of our baby quilts, this one (which is reversible) is a simple design so that it is appealing to new quilters, or young mothers trying to make their first project.

See you soon,
myra

Day 89 - 100 days of quilts

Vintage baby quilt

This is a quilt that is near and dear, about 35 years old and made by my grandma Braun. Well...not exactly. The blocks are hand embroidered by her but the sashing was warn out. She had never quilted the blanket, it was a blanket cover made for me when I was a baby. My mom has not kept much of my baby stuff so a few years ago when I came across the blanket I was excited about it. I took it all apart, boiled the blocks, yep, you heard me. Boiling old linen's takes out stains and was a tip from Myra's mom. Then I searched out some thirties fabric in keeping with the old look of the blocks. I hand quilted around the embroidered motifs and cross hatched the sashing. Can you believe I had time to hand quilt??

I am glad that I have this quilt and my Grandma has long passed and she never knew that I would have an interest in quilting. I always say that it is because of my Grandma that I have this quilting thing in my blood. I used to play with her "scraps" box, play with her wooden spools and sit under her treadle sewing machine and pump the foot pedal as hard as I could. My mom has never sewn, so I am sticking to my story that it must come from my Dad's side of the family. There you have it...a little tidbit about me. Maybe you have a treasure somewhere that needs refurbishing?

~cori