And lastly on a lighter note—–for all of you football fanatics—-we do hope your favorite hometown team wins this weekend. Here we’re routing for the University of Washington Huskies. It’s hard not to be, if you live in the Puget Sound region (and most particularly if you grew up in Seattle).  However, those from the other side of the mountains will be routing for the Washington State cougars. Oh, it’s such a rivalry! So Saturday should be quite frantic in Seattle, as well as every other place in this country that is playing a football game with team rivalries.  It will be tailgating heaven!

We will get back in touch with you after the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.

Susan and Coni, owners of Glacier Quilts in Kalispell, Montana are currently sponsoring  a food drive for their community.  If you are a quilter in the Kalispell area and have the ability to do so, please support their food drive.  If you bring in 1 non-perishable item, then they will give you a 10% discount off 1 in-stock, regularly priced item.  If you bring in 3 food items, you will receive a discount on 3 items.  These lovely women say there is no limit! Wow!  That’s very, very  generous.  Perhaps some of you will take in a whole bag full of wonderful food—-and smilingly let Susan and Coni know you only want 1 item at a discount——-or perhaps 2. 

Glacier Quilts is located at 125 Hutton Ranch Road.  The food drive runs this week through November 19th.  Thanks to all of you who will join Susan and Coni in the gift of giving  at this time. 

Thanks so much, Susan and Coni for sponsoring this food drive for your community. We applaud you!

Quilt images are parts of Charlotte Warr Andersen’s quilt We Give Thanks, a quilt featured on our homepage this month.

FOOD FOR FATS

Receive a Fat Quarter for every item of non perishable food  you donate—

What a GREAT  IDEA!

We want to give a great big shout out to the QuiltBug Quilt Shop. They are having their 6th annual FOOD FOR FATS FRIDAY on November 25-26.  They will trade you a Fat Quarter for every item of non perishable food you bring to the store for their community’s local food pantry. The QuiltBug Quilt Shop is on the border of Schoharie and Schenectady Counties at 169 Main St. Esperance, New York.  If  you live nearby, do consider stopping off and adding to the QuiltBug food pantry donations.

We think this is a great idea. If you  are the owner of a quilt shop, would you consider copying this idea? What about extending  it through the month of December? Times are tough for so many people right now. If you have a similar program or want to  begin such a program, please let us know.  We’d love to hear from you and spread the word.

And quilters—— If you take a big bag of non-perishable food to your local quilt shop for a food for fat quarter donation, would you consider doing a 1 for 2 or even a 1-4 trade—-giving more than you received?Also, if you are friends with a shop owner, perhaps you can help jump-start such a program. Offer to volunteer your time to set it up and keep it going.  It would be a great help to your shop owner and a wonderful contribution to your communnity. If you are not fortunate enough to have a quilt store nearby,  think about donating to your local food bank or food pantry as much as you can this winter.

Thanks so much for sharing your time, effort, and food—whatever you can afford with the people in your community who are finding it so difficult to put healthy, good food on their tables this winter. And again, thanks QuiltBug  for your effort, time, help, and generosity.

We are featuring parts of Charlotte Warr Andersen’s quilt in this post, as it has such appropriate meaning for us at this time of the year.  You can see the quilt in its entirety on our homepage and in its pattern page We Give Thanks.

We have three great projects for your customers to make. They are easy, fun, and ever so wonderful.

Have you ever wondered what to do with those wonderful buttons you have in you store? Well, we have the answer: We have three wonderful button projects just for you:  button bracelets, button fashion pins, and button napkin rings.  Below you’ll see a selection of button projects designed by Teresa Fields.

These button patterns are debuting at quilt market this week. If you are heading for Houston, we’re in Booth 333 – 335.

Isn’t this Christmas bracelet super?

Teresa has created many types of theme bracelets, including fall, Thanksgiving, Winter, Christmas, New Year’s Eve, and Valentine’s Day.  She’s also made some non-theme button bracelets. Here’s a couple of beauties:

Here’s  a beautiful dress-up bracelet.

Teresa’s been busy these past few months making more than bracelets.  She decided buttons made really wonderful fashion pins. These you can put on your blazer, purse, scarf, shoes, hat, etc.  Here’s a fashion pin Teresa uses with one of her beautiful scarves.

Here’s another one of her many fashion pins:      Very cute, don’t you think?

Teresa’s mind has been going overtime this summer. She decided buttons make perfect napkin rings. So, here’s one example of a napkin ring.  We agree with Teresa.  Buttons make great theme napking rings.

If you’re a shop owner, you can purchase these three button patterns from us as soon as we return from Quilt Market. We think you’ll love them. Purchase from your favorite distributor or purchase directly from us. Our office is closed until the afternoon of November 3, 2011.

Have fun!  Enjoy.  See you in Houston….

In my earlier homework post about painting the color wheel, I should have added a few comments about the paint for the color wheel, but the post was long enough and I didn’t want to try your patience with more “stuff” to think about. Today’s question by Dianne reminded me to talk a bit about the paint selection for the color wheel.

Before I begin, I also want to make a clarification: The color names turquoise, turquoise blue, and cyan are all names for the same primary color. Many people prefer the term cyan; others prefer turquoise blue, while others use turquoise. I tend to use all three terms. However, whenever you see one of those names, it always refers to the blue primary color. Use  the term you are most comfortable with or use them all.

Information about the Paint Colors used for the Primary Paints

1.  First, acrylics are easy to use, as they are water-based and I think forgiving. Please purchase from a tube rather than a jar, as it will be easier to mix the paint. I think Liquitex Cadmium Yellow Light is the right yellow paint in coloration and satuation (brilliance) for primary yellow. It does not lean  toward green nor golden-yellow; nor does it have black in its mixture.

I believe Liquitex Brilliant Blue and Liquitex Medium Magenta are a tad bit on the soft side to be a true representation of either primary magenta or primary turquoise blue/cyan. I feel these two paints lack the full intensity of the two actual primaries. Even though these two paints appear less intense (or less saturated) than I would like, these paints are the closest I have seen to representing these primaries. Realistically, it may be very difficult, if not impossible, to duplicate these primaries in coloration with regard to the exact pigment, the exact value, and the exact saturation (brilliance). If this is so, then we must opt for the best current choices, which I think are Brilliant Blue and Medium Magenta..

The Old Way of Working with Primaries

2.  In a painting class I took in college, we could only use the three primaries, along with Titanium White, Mars Black, and Neutral Gray 5 to make all of the colors we used in all of our course work. In those days, there was no Brilliant Blue or Medium Magenta in a tube. Instead we had to use a formula to mix paints to create primary magenta and primary turquoise blue/cyan (unfortunately I have misplaced these formulas). If memory serves me correctly, I believe the paint mixture for primary turquoise (cyan) was Phthalocyanine Blue (phthalo blue), Cadmium Yellow Light, and Titanium White and a mixture of Acra Violet (or possibly Acra Magenta) and Titanium White for primary magenta. The problem with mixing paints to create the primaries is that having a formula doesn’t guarantee each batch of primary magenta or primary turquoise will look exactly the same (measuring with measuring spoons is not necessarily accurate). Consequently, I was delighted when Liquitex came out with Brilliant Blue and Magenta Medium because they are stable, good representations of these primaries.
This morning I went to the Liquitex website to see if they had updated new tube “primary” colors. After looking over their current paint selections, I still think Brilliant Blue, Medium Magenta, and Cadmium Yellow Light are the best choices. If you look at Liquitex Phthalocyanine Blue, you will notice how very dark it is and also it is lacking the warmth needed to be an accurate representation of primary turquoise/cyan. Also, the Liquitex Quinacridone Magenta (the old Acra Magenta/Acra Violet) does not look at all like  primary magenta should look. So, again, I am quite happy Liquitex still carries Brilliant Blue and Medium Magenta.

I hope this helps to clarify any paint questions.  However, if you have more questions, let me know.

Happy Coloring!

Joen is a color enthusiast who teaches and lectures on color. She has written three color books: Color Play, Visual Coloring, and The Magical Effects of Color. Her Studio Color Wheel is used to illustrate color concepts in many of these blog posts. She is also the designer of the 3-in-1 Color Tool. Her upcoming book Adventures in Design will be released in September. All books and products are published by C & T Publishing.

http://www.allpeoplequilt.com/radio/index.html

We are SO happy to have our new website FINALLY finished—-there are still things to do, but we’ll work on them as time allows. I hope you find this webiste clear, well organized, and easy to navigate. That was my goal. You’ll find some special features wandering around this site……some for shop owners, some for teachers, and others for quilters. More will follow.

Other tidbits:

• My upcoming color blog is scheduled to begin in July. If you have color questions or ideas for me, let me know.
• Speaking of blogs, Teresa Fields is more than ready to begin blogging on a new group of wonderful products. She’ll have two product review blogs per month. Her first one will be posted this week. If you have any ideas for Teresa or would like her to find something in particular, let us know. She’s great at hunting things down, believe me!
• Also, send us a jpg picture of your quilt projects made from our patterns. We’d love to put as many onto our upcoming gallery as possible.

It’s a happy day for us:  The sun is shining, the flowers are blooming, and the new website is up.  Wow!

Joen

One of the organizations that is dear to my heart is Project Linus. If you do not know what it is, let me give you a brief summary. Project Linus is comprised of hundreds of local chapters and thousands of volunteers across the United States. Each local chapter and volunteer work together to help achieve the mission, which is to provide love, a sense of security, warmth and comfort to children who are seriously ill, traumatized, or otherwise in need. Project Linus provides gifts of new handmade blankets and afghans, lovingly created by volunteer blanketeers. Together over three million blankets have been distributed since the inception of Project Linus in 1995. That is great news, but what does that have to do with Skip-Stitch? Read on…..

I was in my local quilt shop, the Little Scrap Quilt Shop in Kokomo, Indiana when my eyes stopped. What is a Skip-Stitch™? It is a blade that can be used on most 45mm rotary cutters. It perforates your fabric, making perfectly spaced holes. It comes in three sizes. The holes are a perfect size, so that you can add fringe, crochet around a blanket, or do lacing. The Project Linus website provides several ideas for making fleece or flannel blankets and then finishing them with the Skip-Stitch.

Now let me tell you how this great idea came about. I spoke to Joyce, the co-owner of Skip-Stitch.  (To digress, I must say she has the best Georgian accent. I am always go, go, go, but her slow, relaxed voice just slowed me down for a minute or two.) One day Joyce was making holes for fringe on the edge of a fleece blanket for the Project Linus. She was using an ice pick and was at her dining room table. You guessed it; she slipped. It made her start thinking that there had to be a better way. Joyce came up with the Skip-Stitch tool. Her co-owner husband makes this tool one by one in his garage.

Joyce, this is a great idea!

Everyone, please check this wonderful tool out at www.skipstitch.com. Then, after you have purchased it, make a blanket for Project Linus. See ya later.

Teresa

Recently I was the guest speaker in Marion, Indiana at the Philanthropic Educational Organization luncheon. WOW! That is a mouthful. I guess that’s why they go by the name PEO. There were about 30 lovely ladies there and we had a wonderful lunch. The PEO mission is to raise money for scholarships for young women entering educational fields. This year’s theme is Women Moving Onward and Upward. Since I am a new woman in business, they wanted to hear how I got started with my business, what I am doing now, and what I have planned for the future.

I told the ladies how I came up with the idea for the Sole Cool Hot Iron Bag pattern and my newest pattern release, Snap, Grab & Go. They loved both of these products. They especially liked Snap, Grab & Go because the pattern comes with a quilt and bag all in one. They also loved the snap-in and snap-out vinyl liner in the bag. (I love it too!) I had a wonderful time at the PEO luncheon. At the end of the program, my friend Cindy Beall presented me with a bouquet of roses.  So nice!

Now, I know you want the tip of the day:

Do you sometimes have leftover binding?  If you save your leftover binding, you can use it to put around potholders or placemats. I sew my leftover binding all together. Then I use this multicolored binding around my placemats or other items.

Last weekend I was invited to go to the Winter Woolen Workshop in Kokomo, Indiana. What a treat! It is put on by the Howard County Historical Society and Beth’s Main Street Folkart. It is held the last weekend in February, so mark your calendars for next year. It takes place at the Seiberling Mansion and the Elliott House in Kokomo. This year there were day workshops and demonstrations in early samplers, colonial painting, punch needle embroidery, rug hooking, spinning, weaving, hand quilting, tatting, rug punch, needle felting, knitting and crocheting. Wow! What a weekend! And there were 22 vendors! The mansion….. oh my gosh…. it was sooooo beautiful.

Let me tell you about one thing that I did learn while I was at the Winter Woolen Workshop:

Kumihimo? Know what it is? I didn’t until last weekend. It is where you weave ribbon on a braiding loom to make cords for necklaces, bracelets, etc. They use eight bobbins and a loom. The loom is about the size of a large grapefruit. You bring the ribbon up and across― and the next one down and across. Thankfully the loom has numbers on it, so you don’t get confused. It was really cool to watch and it looked pretty easy to do!

Tip of the Day is something we should all do…. Put things back where they belong. It sounds so simple, but sometimes we get in a hurry and we don’t. When we do put things back, what we are looking for is always there waiting for us the next time we need it.

See you next time! Keep quilting!