Whew! It's Been a Busy Summer!

     Goodness me! I feel so very fortunate. I have had such a fun and busy summer that I don't even know where to start!

     This past month I have been working on a custom quilt order that I got through Etsy. My client wanted the pattern of this quilt:

Galapagos

     With the palette from this quilt:

Sand and Sea Glass

 
      It sounded easy, but when I went to buy fabrics, I realized that there are places for 17 fabrics in the Galapagos quilt and, I don't know how many colors in the Sand and Sea Glass quilt, so it was a bit of a challenge to get all of the colors represented.

     This is the gradation that I ended up with----> 








     So, now the quilt top is pieced and ready to go to Regina to be quilted.

     I have this quilt hanging in landscape orientation, because that is how it will hang on the wall of her new home.

     In addition to that I had a wonderful time at my booth at The Yellow River Jam, which is a festival that happens every October in my lovely town of Porterdale. It involves kayak paddling on the river in the morning, followed by an afternoon of live music, food, and artists booths in the park beside the river. So Much fun! My dear friends Mary Beth and Eleanor joined me for the weekend with Mary Beth's pottery,  and we had so much fun!

     In September, I went to spend some time with Baltimore Heritage Quilters Guild. I did a trunk show there, plus I taught an A Maze Zing class. It is so much fun to see all of the color variations they came up with! 

       I had such a lovely time with this group of ladies!


     BTW: I will freely admit that I am not the most tech savvy blogger around. When it comes to technology, it seems like I am always struggling and bungling. I just started an Instagram account. I am excited about this because it means that in future I can post class photos to that account directly from my phone on the same day as the class, instead of waiting until I get around to uploading photos to my computer. Maybe now it will not take me a month and a half or more to post photos from my classes. Hope springs eternal anyway! Now, if only I can get my Instagram account to add my posts to my Quilt Designs by Candace page, instead of my personal Candace Hassen page.... one day.....


     So that is what I have been up to lately, I hope your summer has been fun filled and productive. Thanks for stopping by! Linking to Oh Scrap! and Main Crush Monday
     
 

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone has been having a lovely holiday season!

Now that the New Year is almost here, my thoughts are drawn to what I can do to make the most of the coming year.

For a couple of years now, I have wanted improve my technological skills. Navigating the digital world has not come very naturally to me. A couple of years ago, I felt completely lost. Then I learned that you can find videos on how to do almost anything imaginable on YouTube. That helped some. I have since discovered https://www.creativelive.com/

They have classes geared towards people who are trying to pursue some type of creative endeavor. There are always many classes about photography. I have learned many things about my digital camera that I never knew. There are also a lot of classes on using Adobe Suite programs, and different aspects of digital marketing for creative people. I have always wanted to figure out how to add computer drawn figures to my patterns, instead of the hand drawn figures I have been doing. That way it would be easier for me to sell a digital copy of my patterns if someone prefers that to a hardcopy. The classes there are quite meaty. They are not too expensive, and there are lots of sales. Also, they always have about 6 classes you can watch for free. But, to see them for free, you have to watch them when they are on, like old style broadcast TV. To watch them on YOUR time schedule, you have to pay for them.

So here are some goals I am planning to work on for 2017:

1. Synchronize imagery in my blog, FaceBook page, Website, Pintrest, and Etsy site. Notice the new banner?

2. Add rest of my quilts to my Website.

3. Learn InDesign, and use it to layout patterns, and add illustrations to those patterns.

4. Start a YouTube channel-I already have several quilting related video ideas. First I am gonna have to learn to make and edit a video. Before I do that, I probably going to have to get rid of this pesky cold. 

5. Make an email newsletter so I can let people know when I have uploaded a new video, have a new pattern, or quilt. 

6. I have always wanted to write a book, but my quilt designs tend to be pretty varied, and I struggle with tying enough of the together with a cohesive concept. I might try to write an ebook. That way I can experiment, and not be restrained by a publisher's idea of what will sell.

7. I want to add projection to my trunk show. Sometimes I want to show a quilt I no longer have to make a point. It would be really nice to be able to project a photo of a quilt I no longer have on hand. 

8. Last I hope to be a better, more consistent blogger in 2017. 

So that is what I will be striving for in 2017. What will you be working on? I would love to hear what your goals are. 

Here are some quilts I finished in 2016:

Sand and Sea Glass-complete

Hoopla-pieced and quilted, still needs binding hand stitched, sleeve added, and photographed

Burgeoning Spring-likewise, piecing, quilting, and binding machine attached, but I still need to sew the hand sewn side, add the sleeve, and photograph it.  

Ablaze-pieced and quilted, partially bound, but still needs binding hand sewn, sleeve, and to be photographed. I have also added a boarder since this photo was taken.

 
 Dresden plate-I haven't gotten it quilted or named, but the top is done. It will probably be the first to get quilted in 2017!



Baby quilt for Dori-completed and delivered.

Baby quilt for Madelyn- shame on me, I finished this quilt, but forgot to photograph it. In a year when I have so few finishes, I am not about to exclude it anyway!

I hope you all had a good 2016, and best wishes for all of us for a 2017 filled with good times, good friends, and good quilty fun! Thanks for stopping by!

Odds and Ends and Design Wall Monday

     I have been working on many odds and ends this week. 

     First, I finished sewing together the center of my Galapagos ll quilt. So I have to set it aside until I find time to buy some border fabric for it. I didn't want to choose the border fabric until  I could audition it next to the finished center.

     It is a pretty simple pattern, just pinwheels and plain blocks.

     I am working on some more pillows for the person I made the Let's Polka quilt for this summer. These pillows are going downstairs in the parlor. She chose the solid quilt block, but with a couple tweaks to the color scheme. I sewed and pressed all of the HST for that today.

     She wants 2 more 24" pillows for a different room; so I have been working on some drawings.

   





  I had a friend who wanted some pot holders for a Christmas gift, so I made 2 large pairs and 2 small pairs in her color scheme, so she would have some to choose from.

     As you can see, I have yet to hand stitch the bindings on most of them.

     While I was working on those for her, I pulled this combination of scraps out of the scrap box as well.













     I got this quilt back from my quilter, Regina Carter, in January. Can you believe I am still doing the hand work on it?  Shame on me! I am still working on stitching down the sleeve. I will show a picture of the whole quilt once I get the sleeve finished. It is 75% done. I had better hurry. I am scheduled to get a lap quilt back from Regina, this Tuesday. I am planning to put both of these quilts in the quilt show that my quilt guild is having at Art Station in Stone Mountain Village in January.

     When ever I am writing these long  blog posts, I always think I should make shorter blog posts more often, but somehow, it never seems to actually happen. I thought one of the good things about trying to link to Design Wall Monday, would be that it would cause me to get in the habit of writing 2 blog posts per week. Oh well, maybe next week. 

     Don't forget to check out all of the other beautiful things at Patchwork Times, on Design Wall Monday, and; thanks for stopping by!

Design Wall Monday

     I hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving holiday. 

     I am going to try to link this post with Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times. We will see if my technologically challenged self manages to pull that off. I  usually get these linky things eventually. Anyway, it is a very interesting opportunity to see what many people have on their design wall every week. Sounds like fun, doesn't it?

     So I will start with my Galapagos quilt from my last post, since it is what I am working on most right now; though clearly, I did not get far enough along on it to buy the border fabric this weekend, as I had hoped. Last night the whole center was on my design wall.

      Since then, I have about half of it sewn together. I hope to sew the rest of it tonight.

     In person, it is less yellow than this. More towards orange.


    
















Oops! I almost forgot to tell you the best thing! Someone bought one of the quilts I had posted on Etsy.  I just heard back from her that she has received it and loves it. It was one of my favorite quilts; but you never know when someone is buying something off a computer monitor, if it is going to turn out to be what they expected. I always have my fingers crossed until I hear back from them. The quilt she bought was Double Star ll.  

     So that is what I have been up to. Check out some of those other design walls at Patchwork Times.com

     I have a meeting with a client this afternoon about some pillows for her living room.

     Thanks for stopping by!

Blocks for Galapagos ll

     I have continued to work on the lap quilt I wrote about last post. For now I am calling it Galapagos ll since it is the same pattern as a quilt I named Galapagos, but that may need to change eventually, since that doesn't seem like an appropriate name for a quilt of these colors. 

     I have made all of my pinwheels and put them up o the design wall. The blocks are ready to be sewn together. I would love to get the center put together in time to go shopping for border fabric during after Thanksgiving sales, but I don't know if I will have that kind of time in the next couple of days.

     I tried taking a photo of all the blocks on my design wall, but I had a bit of trouble getting the colors to come out right, and I don't really have time to play with it right now. With the lights on, it is coming out too yellow, and of course, without the light it may be a bit dark. I will probably get a better photo of it when it is all in one piece; and I can take it outside. Part of the problem is also where it is on the design wall. In future, I need to remember to use that end of the design wall last. It is furthest from the window, and natural light, and it is closest to the loom, which I am accustomed to looking around, but it is really difficult to take a good photo without taking it at a weird angle. That said, here it is. These are the 2 best photos I can manage for now.

 

     I have also gotten all of my solid units sewn together, pressed, and ready to put into large blocks of 4 by 4, and 5 by 5 units. I need 3 more of each to have enough to finish the quilt.

     I got a delivery yesterday. I had sent away for a few more solids for the pillows for the person I made the large quilt for this summer. She wanted 2 pillows made from this same solid pattern. i have a meeting with her next Monday. I had many of the colors I needed, but I thought a few important ones were missing, and they will be handy to have since I have a couple of other solid quilts in my head Here is what came in the mail.

     And with that I am off to throw myself into the Thanksgiving holidays. I hope yours are happy, and safe, and filled with lots to be thankful for. I am sure thankful you stopped by!

Galapagos

     I started a new project today. I have been meaning to start this quilt for a long time. A few years ago, I made this quilt.

      I named it Galapagos. Then I made a pattern from it. I sold the quilt at a show, but then I didn't have a sample anymore. I have always wanted to replace it. This was a queen size quilt, and I thought it would be nice to make the new quilt is a completely different colorway. Since people often tell me they like my quilts, but they don't want to make something so large; I thought it would be a nice idea to make one of the other sizes on my pattern. So I am making this one a lap size.  Also, there was some interest from Angela, at A Scarlet Thread, in my teaching this as a class there if I made another sample.

     So, I bought this gradation of fabrics.        














      I made myself a cheat sheet. I find that this helps me to remember what order I decided to put the fabrics in, especially, since I wash my fabrics; and the paper tags i pinned to each fabric to signify their order, would never have held up in the washer and dryer.

     The center of this quilt is made from diagonal rows of plain blocks that alternate with pinwheels that are made from the fabrics of the plain blocks on either side. Oooh, I don't really like that last sentence much, but I can't think of another way to say it; so hopefully, the photograph of the quilt will do the talking for me here.

     I have cut out all of my plain blocks and put them on my design wall. I wanted to see if this would help me decide if I like the gradation. So far, so good.

     I had to take this picture at a funny angle since my loom is in front of my design wall for now.

     All of the squares for the HST that will go into making the pinwheels are also cut out, and I am currently working on marking them. I am counting on this quilt to go together relatively fast.

     By the way, yes, I am still working on my solid quilt. I got all of the units sewn. I will show you a picture of those once I get them pressed nice and pretty.

     I have also sorted fabrics and ordered a few colors to use for the pillows my customer ordered for her living room.

       That is what I have been up to lately. Thanks for stopping by.