Blue Ridge Folklife Festival & Mountain Comforts Quilt Show in Ferrum, VA

This was the scene in beautiful Woolwine, Virginia this weekend as Blaise, Sabrina and I attended the Folklife Festival & Quilt Show. Only a two and a half hour drive from Raleigh, Ferrum, Virginia is in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains just off the Blue Ridge Parkway. Months ago I made reservations at a charming Bed & Breakfast -Old Spring Farm - which is a lovely French Country Inn situate on a working Llama and Apaloosa horse farm. We arrived on Friday, got a good night's sleep and headed off to the festival all day Saturday where we not only experienced a wonderful quilt show, but coon dog contests, coal miner music, a tour of an early 19th century farmhouse, mule jumping and border collie sheep herding contests. It was a wonderful day!

Highlights of the Mountain Comforts Quilt Show - Virginia

A Purple Picnic Table?????

I decided to breathe a little life into our worn out old picnic table with some purple paint. My family hates it - but I LOVE it!

Now -- my favorite picnic table won't have to hide it's head in shame while standing amongst the fuscia peonies and magenta tulips that surround it in the Spring. Instead -- it can stand proud knowing that commands a spot of honor in my garden. And when autumn bites the trees and their leaves fade and tumble down -- my beautiful Purple picnic table will be a reminder of natures colors of life sleeping beneath those leaves -- and of wonderful things to come!

Next weekend's Project: I plan on using my husband's router to route out a paisley design on the top of the table and inset stained glass!!

A Wonderful Mother/Daughter Day at the North Carolina State Fair!!

LOTS OF FOOD...... LOTS OF ANIMALS....
Sabrina said, "LOTS OF ICKY ANIMAL SMELLS!"
LOTS OF FUN....

Fall Leaf Challenge Finished!!

A group I belong to issued a "leaf challenge" wherein we were to create a piece of fabric art encompassing the theme of leaves. Originally, my thought was to create something abstract with leaf shapes. However, during my experimentation I ended up making some interesting leaves that were more realistic than abstract. Here is a litle wall hanging I came up with utilizing those leaves and a little squirrel that I sketched out on muslin and free motion embroidered. Sabrina immediately fell in love with the squirrel and after our meeting tonight -- he will promptly be hung on her bedroom wall to celebrate the onslaught of Fall!

Fractured Art Quilts.....

I have been neglecting my blog as I have been furiously working on my "section" of a fractured art quilt project that is due at the next meeting of Cyberbee (a spin off group of our local Capitol Quilter's Guild.) A group of five of us are participating in a year long "fractured art quilt" project. "What is a fractured art quilt you ask?" Let me explain. Each member of our group (5 in this case) has selected a picture, print or photograph that we would like to have made into a fractured art quilt. Here is JoAnn's picture -- we drew names to see whose quilt we would work on first and JoAnn won the draw.
Before our first meeting we took our picture to Kinko's had had it blown up to the size we would like our finished piece to be. After having it enlarged, we were to cut it up into pieces (in our case the picture has been cut into 5 pieces as there are 5 participants). Each participant selected one piece of the picture to replicate putting her own artistic spin on her interpretation of the piece in "fabric." Here is the piece I picked...

As this was the first project of this nature that I have ever worked on -- I had no idea what I was in for! It is absolutely critical that the pieces are placed on your rendition "exactly" where they are on the photocopy. Why?? Because if you do not make an identical replication (as far as placement goes) then, when the owner of the pieces goes to assemble the quilt -- things won't line up. Having said that -- I put together and took apart my little "slice" of the fractured quilt at least three times -- trying to get things to line up properly. After many attempts and revisions, here is my "slice" of JoAnn's quilt....

This was truly a learning experience. Here is a picture of my interpretation and actual photocopy - side by side...

JoAnn will receive my piece, as well as all the others at our next meeting this Thursday. Eventually she will assemble the pieces, quilt, bind and complete it to her liking. Here is a picture of all five participants' pieces (the quilt's ownder did two slices). I can't wait to see it all put together. This was a really great adventure.

BOOKWORM!!!

My daughter makes fun of me and calls me a nerd and, in honor of my "nerdiness" she made me this wonderful piece of art -- appropriate named, "bookworm!" Accordingly, "bookworm" is currently housed on one of my jam-packed library shelves -- next to a wonderful little piece written by Descartes!

Mom.....

.... your favorite rose bush is once again alive with blooms. Every time I walk by and smell them, I think of how much you loved the roses from this particular bush.
I miss you.