Quilts at the Creek July 28 & 29 2012

An OUTDOOR QUILT SHOW??

If you’ve ever been to one, you know the appeal.. what can be more glorious than seeing all those colours and designs out in the light of day? York Heritage Quilters’ Guild is partnering with Black Creek Pioneer Village to bring this exciting event to Toronto. Help make it a success!

Other Shows
Here are some photos of quilts at the Sisters Oregon and Heritage Park shows..
Sisters 1
Sisters 2
Sisters 3

Here is a link to the Heritage Park (Calgary’s outdoor quilt show) brochure. As you can see, their show has grown to over 700 quilts, with a wide variety of quilt styles and quilt-related events too. Here are 2 photos I took in 2009..

Here is how you can participate at Quilts at the Creek:

FORMS & LABELS:
Pick up a form and label for each quilt you would like to enter. You can get forms at local quilt shops around Toronto (see below), and YHQG volunteers will be at various quilt guilds for the next few months. Check back for more locations! Remember to firmly attach the label to the quilt- either use safety pins, sew it on, or fuse it to the quilt. Deadline for submitting forms is June 1st, so get yours in soon! Forms can be returned to the guilds, shops, or mailed to Black Creek Pioneer Village (address below).

Guilds:

• York Heritage Quilters’ Guild
• Etobicoke Quilters’ Guild
• The Modern Quilt Guild
• Rouge Valley Quilters’ Guild
• Yorkshire Rose Quilters’ Guild
• East York Quilters’ Guild

Shops:

• Cock-a-Doodle Quilts
• Country Concessions
• The Quilting Patch
• Sew Sisters
• Ruti’s Needlebed

Black Creek Pioneer Village
1000 Murray Ross Parkway
Toronto, Ontario M3J 2P3
Attn Karell Pfeiffer

QUILT DROP-OFF:
You may drop your quilt(s) off the week prior to the show at the shops listed above. Quilts must be received by the evening of Thursday July 26th. When you drop off your quilt, you will receive a receipt for it. On this form you will be able to state where you would like to pick your quilt up if different from where you dropped it off. Volunteers will be visiting the shops to collect the quilts and bring them to Black Creek Pioneer Village Friday morning, July 27th. The quilts will be returned on Monday July 30th. You may also drop the quilt off directly at Black Creek Pioneer Village on Friday July 27th, from 10 am to 3 pm.

YHQG members also have the option of dropping off their quilts at the homes of guild volunteers. Sandy Lindal and Tella Visconti have agreed to accept and deliver quilts to the show. Their address and phone information will be emailed to all YHQG members in the upcoming months and included in upcoming newsletters.

Questions? Contact one of the Black Creek Volunteers in our Guild: Bev Sturgeon, Jane Cramer, Tella Visconti, and Valerie Prideaux. We’ll also have a table at each of the next Guild meetings.

Rest in Peas / by Lee Cluderay

YHQG member Lee Cluderay recently had a quilt exhibited at a juried quilt show, Art = Quilt = Art in Auburn New York. The show was held Oct 2011- Jan 2012 at the Schweinfurth Memorial Art Centre, a beautiful modern and spacious museum, affiliated with Quilting by the Lake. She was in a select group of artists, as only 80 quilts were juried in the show. There is a slide show of the exhibition on the website- click here to view.

Lee’s quilt, Rest in Peas, is one of a pair (The first in the series, Evil Peas, won an Excellence in Innovation Award at Quilt Canada in 2010. A third quilt ( Kiss Peas Goodbye ) is struggling to life.

-click on image to enlarge-

Some of her favourite things: skulls and crosses. Favourite techniques: dyeing and painting fabric. Lee also scribbles with marker pens, stitches with pearl cotton, dyes with rust, draw with her sewing machine, and uses ugly fabrics that are bright and contrasty; she warns us that spray painting is next………….. Can’t wait to see this!

Congratulations, Lee!

Battle of the Blocks

Well, the quilt show is over, and so is the Battle of the Blocks.. here are some photos from the battle.  There were 3 teams with two people per team. They were given their fabrics (purchased from Goodwill) and some embellishments, and allowed to purchase items from two vendors at the show, and give given the title of the challenge: Re-creation.

They were off!

So purchasing the extras and building the quilts was underway……

Three busy hours later, the work was done.

The final decision is yours. On Tuesday, vote for YOUR favourite quilt from the Battle of The Blocks.

Sneak Peek

I thought those who weren’t there to help with setup today might enjoy some behind-the-scenes photos….. notice the organized piles of quilts behind Dorothy.

Receivng the quilts

Starting the hanging....

Five hours later...

I know that the gift shop is the second most popular item at our shows, so here is a sneak peak there too…

Holding area for gift shop sale items

Ready for visitors. Good work Toby and the gang!

Can’t wait to see you all at the show!

Hand embroidery with Penny Berrens

Rosemary Hamlin sent us the following write-up about the workshop with Penny Berrens.. Penny gave a wonderful talk at the last guild meeting, and those who could not attend her workshop are very jealous!

Penny Berrens is an inspiring teacher.  She encouraged us all to try new ideas and to never consider an errant stitch a mistake! Included here are a few photos of sample stitching produced by some of the participants.

Many of us enjoyed the “weaving”;  and the rock embroidered onto a fabric was much admired!  Yes it looks a bit odd by itself but imagine it in the foreground of a landscape quilt.

I was particularly inspired by Penny’s notebook in which she penned different stitching and quilting ideas.  There were so many ideas inspired by Penny’s quilts and samples that my head was spinning at the beginning of the day.  My first and very valuable lesson, was to focus on one project.  I decided that a filler stitch for some birds I had stencilled would be useful and after some attempts, Penny’s “fly stitch” worked, it gives the impression of feathers.

Penny demonstrated a number of techniques throughout the day.  I tried the surface weaving since I do enjoy darning. From Penny I learnt how to improve my stitching.  It was a very satisfying day.

Thanks, for sharing, Rosemary!

What would YOU make?

We are trying something new at this year’s quilt show. On Sunday November 13th, when you come to pick up your quilt, come a few hours early. We are having a Battle of the Blocks!

The ‘Battle’ will begin at 1pm on Sunday November 13th, and end promptly at 4pm. There are three teams of two people each; each team will be working to the same theme, which will be revealed at the start. Each team will be required to create a 16″ square block based on the theme and the block must be finished (i.e. sandwiched, quilted and bound).

Each team will be provided with 2 tables and 2 chairs, a design wall, iron and ironing board, as well as two $10 vouchers, to be used to buy extras -fabric, notions, whatever!- from the vendors at the show. They will bring their own sewing machine, cutting board, rulers, sewing notions, as well as any other supplies they may need or want.

Three sets of fabric have been prepared. Teams will draw for fabric sets; in addition, each team will receive a mystery bag with various embellishments – a minimum of two which must be incorporated into their work of art.

Here is a photo of the three fabric sets..

Drop by and see the action, and cheer your favourites on!

There will be awards given out at the end of the challenge. In addition, the finished blocks will be shown at the November guild meeting on Tuesday November 15th where each guild member will have a chance to choose their favourite. First, second and third prize ribbons will be awarded.

The Story Behind the Photos…..

Catherine Schuler filled us in with this insider peek to the photos used in our publicity for the upcoming quilt show…..

For many guild members the highlight of Art for Body & Soul publicity has been the gorgeous photos of young people wrapped in our lovely quilts. Those super shots were taken on a grey day in late August of 2010 at Kew Beach. Deb Milton originated the concept and acted as photographer and designer of all our publicity materials.

Our models were five young people who grew up in the Beach and who patiently devoted a Saturday afternoon just before the start of a new school year to the whims of a trio of quilters with their pay a pizza dinner! They started out with no idea about quilts and quilting and came away with a new appreciation. In the poster you will see them from left to right: Charlotte May, Rosy McNally-Spence, Creag Munroe, Meaghan Bonkowski, and Mike McVey. 

The shoot itself was spontaneous and fun. Deb had ideas in mind as to what she wanted to see, several guild members had entrusted us with their quilts, and off we marched to Kew Beach. The weather cooperated with a break in a day of steady drizzle, but with grey skies and lake to highlight the colours of our quilts. Bev Sturgeon and I served as quilt wranglers, holding quilts and struggling to keep them out of the damp sand. No quilts were harmed in the making of these photos, you will be happy to know. We also fielded questions from beach walkers who were fascinated by the activity and keen to know where they could see more quilts.  Hope they catch our publicity posters in libraries, schools and on websites and turn out for the show.

Our models (better known as “the kids”) were delighted with the results; we caught them at a moment in all their youthful glory but on the verge of adulthood, having fun and being just a little bit goofy. They are looking forward to attending their first quilt show, and hope to be recognized as the local celebrities that they are.