The Rockford/Hinsdale '09 Tour is over!! . . . (was it all a dream??)

My feelings of euphoria faded fast when I woke up this morning in front of the computer terminal in the office--a pile of files beside me, and a line of people with requests in front of me (ok, maybe that's an exaggeration . . . the people in front of me at least asked, "how was the vacation??" before they asked, "could you do this for me??" and handed me another file).

Did I dream it all??

Last Thursday, I repacked my rental and drove north to Willowbrook, IL, a southwestern suburb of Chicago. I had time to check into my hotel, shower and change before leaving for the Hinsdale Community House for my lecture. I got a little turned around, but managed to arrive five minutes before the guild meeting started. A woman pointed me toward the stage at the front of the crowded room (there were about 200 women there), and pointed to the digital projector. "You can just plug your laptop into here," she said.

Um, er, I don't own a laptop, and I have a carousel of slides. "Don't you have a slide projector??" I asked. "I'll go ask," she said and bustled off.

I set up my display stand with my "Mardi Gras Men" quilt on it . . . I set up my framed magazine articles . . . I laid out my business cards . . . I unpacked my "trunk show" quilts . . . all in plain view of my expectant audience.

My contact, Terri, came up to me and said, "they don't have a slide projector . . . can you punt??" I said, "I guess I'll have to, won't I??" I sat at the foot of the stage while the guild conducted their business meeting . . . my mind was working a mile a minute. When Terri introduced me, she said that through no fault of my own I'd be unable to show my slides (there were audible moans).

I took the stage, opened my slide carousel, and held up the first slide. "This is my first quilt," I said, "and here is my third," holding up another slide. There were chuckles in the audience. I replace the slides in my carousel. Slides?? Slides?? We don't need no stinkin' slides!! I talked off-the-cuff and off-the-top-of-my-head for 45 minutes about how I started sewing; how I taught my father to sew; how I started quilting; and, I told stories about some of the quilts I've made (punctuated with, "I wish you could've seen THIS quilt!!"). I answered questions as I went along (instead of saving 'em for the end). I had volunteers hold up and parade the quilts I'd brought with me. Then, I dropped the bombshell--all the quilts had been made from the same set of templates, which segued into a talk about my design system and construction techniques. Several volunteers passed out my free design tiles, but ran out (I'm gonna have to send 'em some more before their next meeting). At some point, I asked if they'd heard enough of me, and the audience burst into an emphatic NO!! LOL!!

After my talk, I sold plenty of books, templates, and muslin foundations; many also took my business card, eager to get online and see what all the fuss was about!! Many agreed it was the best slide show they'd never seen!! I was in my element!! It was a great night!!


I had a small class on Friday morning for the design workshop. We had a fun day of coming up with new patterns. I had my copier with me, so the students could make copies and color 'em in. They were eager for Saturday's construction workshop. I asked Terri if she knew how many had signed up for Saturday and she told me 14. FOURTEEN?? I didn't have near enough muslin foundations for 'em all. Friday night found me in my hotel room, stamping muslin foundations to beat the band!!


I had a pattern in mind for the students who hadn't taken the design workshop. Students bought templates and muslin foundations and cleaned out my inventory. I walked 'em through my sandpaper-back templates: how to cut 'em apart and how to use 'em to cut their fabric. Everyone fell to cutting out fabric, some quicker than others. I walked 'em through the muslin foundations: where to start and how to sew 'em. Several students who hadn't taken the design class HAD taken the free design tiles at the lecture and came prepared with their own designs. For the rest of the students, I had to bite my tongue--once they sewed enough of the squares, they started designing patterns that were not the pattern I had in mind. I gave them free reign.


I couldn't have been happier as I drove back to St. Louis . . . not because I was leaving Hinsdale behind, but because of the great people I had the pleasure to work with, and the great input, feedback, suggestions, and ideas we all shared. My only regret was not having another guild lined up for NEXT weekend, LOL!! As usual, my partner, Ed, was glad to have me back home (Rambo and Sambo could have cared less) . . .


Thank you for reading . . . please leave a comment and follow this blog (there's more to come) . . .

In Like Flint in Flint (like) . . .

This weekend, I attended (and participated in) the Flint Festival of Quilts 2009 in Flint, Michigan . . . if you ever get the chance or opportunity to attend, jump on it!! There were six different quilt shows with six different themes in six different locations . . . I attended three of 'em.

There were several rooms of quilts featuring star blocks, star fabrics, or star quilting at the Longway Planetarium (go figure) . . .

The Greater Flint Arts Council curated a show of small art quilts entitled "Nature" . . .

The Flint Public Library hosted the 20th Anniversary of the Flint African American Quilters Guild with a quilt show in the library. They also featured ME as lecturer on Saturday afternoon (you knew I was coming to that) . . .

I spoke for about an hour to a room of about 150 men, women, and children . . . I entertained my audience with tales of taking up sewing on a dare; bonding with my father over a sewing machine; and, "outing" myself . . . then, the lights went down, and I showed them slides of my quilts (they "oohed" and "aahed" appreciably, in all the right places) . . . the lights came up, and I told them about my current design system: I also gave away nearly 200 sets of my design tiles (though I'm sure some of 'em took more than one apiece, LOL!!) . . . I spent the next hour signing autographs, taking pictures, and getting a couple of possible commissions (if they follow through).

The entire lecture was filmed for Public Access TV . . . the producer, Ernestine, loved me and my presentation!! She thought me a natural, the way I interacted with the audience and kept them involved. Hey, I'm passionate about quilting . . . talk with me for more than five minutes and you'll "catch it"!! Ernestine had 4-5 markets to show the finished product; had orders for the DVD; and, promised me a copy I could embed on my website. I gave her a flash drive with jpegs of the slide show (to insert post-production).

About 10:30 p.m., I got a call from Ernestine . . . she had a problem with the jpegs: they weren't high-resolution enough!! (Did I think to take my photo album with me?? No.) She wasn't far from my hotel, and was gonna retrieve the flash drive from her technical guy and return it to me. She arrived around 11:30 p.m., but wasn't coming into the hotel because of her chemically-induced asthma sensitivity to the chlorine in the indoor swimming pool. We sat outside in our jackets and she talked about politics, and sex . . . I stopped her before the topic turned to religion because it was 1:00 a.m. Sunday morning by then, LOL!!

My flight back to St. Louis was uneventful . . .

My first stop was for some lunch . . . my second stop was to buy a new copier/printer/scanner (mine was "pushed down the stairs" years ago). Now to scan some thirty photographs so I can overnight 'em back to Michigan tomorrow . . .

Later, sweet tater . . .

Yesterday was busy . . . Today, I'm anxious

Five items of note happened yesterday: I burned the palm of my hand with some soup at lunchtime (it's better today) . . .

I mailed tax papers and promotional pictures to the Flint Public Library for next month's lecture . . .

I mailed signed contracts for a lecture/workshop in Santa Rosa next year (March) . . .

I visited an old friend in the hospital (I love that old man; I don't know what to do for him; there's nothing I can do for him; it hurts me to see him like this) . . .

I had most of a box of quilts photographed (all the quilts use the same set of templates; many are for the show this week; I'll have all of 'em added to the website next week).


I anxious for only two things today: I expect delivery of my new business cards from VistaPrint and computer memory chips from Greg in the mail . . . woo hoo!!

New Logo for NGQ!!

I've been discussing this with my designer . . . originally, I wanted the Mardi Gras Man motif as part of my website logo, but considering he only shows up in one quilt, he wasn't a good choice.

A week or so ago, I suggested using my tile, which will be showing up more and more in my quilts. And, with all the people who now have sets of the design tile, it's better recognized. (Can you say, "Branding"??)

This morning, Patrick emailed me to say the new logo has been implemented!! What do you think of it??


Thank you for reading my blog . . . please leave a comment, and follow this blog.

W.O.W.!! (What an Outstanding Weekend!!)

I send a big "Thank You!!" to all of you who took advantage of my giveaway this weekend . . . you're the greatest!!

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, back up a day or so to Sunday . . . early Sunday morning, I offered a set of my design tiles/squares to anyone who signed up for my mailing list.

Well, there were already people who had signed up a month ago, who had no idea of what was coming . . .

I had recently gone through my Yahoo! address book, making sure I had all the email addys entered from every person I emailed, going back, say 5-6 years. My address book contained over 1500 email addys!!

I composed an email that said, "Check out my new website . . . join the mailing list for a free gift." I started sending out emails 25 names at a time . . . I learned that Yahoo limits the number of emails per hour (100), and limits the number of emails per day (500). Sending my message to everyone in my address book was gonna take three days!!

While waiting for the hour to roll around, I entered data from the contact forms into the address book for my website. It was a slow, laborious process of "copy and paste" (I was taking no chances of making any typos). After every 10-15 email addys, I would email the lot my "free gift."

Names and email addys started coming in faster than I was sending 'em out . . . uh oh . . . there was a definite time gap involved. Sorry, no automated system here; just little old me, "copying and pasting" as fast as I could!!

I got my fair share of "undeliverable mail" messages . . . I assumed these were from addys in my address book, until I looked closely. Hey, wait a minute!! I just entered that addy!! You guessed it: some of the people signing up for my free gift had mis-typed their own email addy. Considering their email addy was wrong, it wasn't like I could contact 'em to say, "Sorry, but you've made a typo in your addy . . . would you mind correcting it for me??" I'm afraid I'll have to wait for 'em to send another comment like, "WTF?? Where's my free gift??" (then, I'll compare the second addy to the original.)

I belong to several groups: I could tell when a group got busy from the increase in submissions, LOL!!

I reconnected with some people who wondered where I'd gone . . . I got a lot more people who told me they were sharing the link with others.

All in all, it's been a good experience . . . once the hubbub dies down, I can get back to work on my writing . . .

New News (not to be confused with Old Olds)

The first thing you may notice is a different look for the blog . . . that's to reflect the launching of my new and improved website (sometime in the next 24 hours)!! Tonight, I pointed my name servers at my old host to my new host. Patrick Baxter at Big Name Brain (www.BigNameBrain.com) did a fantastic job!!

Next, an update on what's happening:

I've cut about 300 slightly-starched muslin squares (more to come).

The experiment with the pigment dye and the sheet of felt-as-stamp-pad was a bust (and a mess). I ordered several sheets of stamp-pad foam from Dharma Trading (www.DharmaTrading.com), which should arrive Tuesday. For the moment, I'm using black indelible marking ink and a sheet of felt . . . I'm getting a feel for the stamping. Slightly starching the muslin squares keeps the ink from wicking outwards, making the lines much thicker than desired. The ink DOES bleed through the muslin, though, making the squares reversible (previously, I had to stencil left- and right-handed muslin squares). I promise to post pics when my results are more uniform.

I came up with a pattern and started cutting fabric and sewing squares Saturday night. I'm sewing them a little differently than in the past. Again, I'll post pics at a later date.