A Chance......at a chance

Over the past few years, I have entered the annual block contest at Joseph Schneider haus. The Friends of Joseph Schneider haus, is a dedicated group, always striving to contribute to the growth and health of this historic site.  One of the ways they raise funds for various projects, is by holding a raffle, the prize is the quilt that is made from the blocks submitted to the contest each year.

My entry, 2nd row, 3rd from the left

I have tickets....I am going to purchase tickets and give them away here.....so you see, you have a chance...at a chance....to win this quilt.  You don't have to be in the region to win......if your ticket number is the lucky number drawn, the quilt will be mailed directly to you. It is a chance to own a quilt containing original work by 20 different Canadian quilt artists, expertly hand quilted by women from the local Mennonite community.

Hot off the quilt rack

here it is ready to be trimmed and bound

The draw for this quilt is not until early December, meaning, I have lots of time to have random giveaways in the coming months........So would you like a chance....at a chance?  Just leave a comment for me in this post. I'll draw a name.... or maybe a few, on the weekend

Please note that the winner (or winners) of this giveaway.......need to be willing to provide me your address and phone number so that I will be able to properly fill out the information on the ticket stub.....I promise that information will be used for this purpose only and NOT be shared. I will send the winner a scan showing the ticket and stub 

All about the Colour

As many of my readers know, I LOVE challenges, there is just something about challenges and themes that drive me to create.
Each year, one of those challenges is a block contest held at Joseph Schneider Haus......a theme is chosen, criteria laid out, blocks are entered, a quilt is made, hand quilted during a day long quilting bee by amazingly gifted Mennonite ladies...said quilt will be finished and then later raffled off to raise funds for many of the ongoing projects at Joseph Schneider Haus.  I really need to practice my hand quilting skills, the ladies offered to allow me to take a place and the frame and add some stitches but I declined.....my skills are not on par with theirs....not even close  :-).....but maybe one day...maybe

Photo snagged from The Friends of JSH facebook page

This coming week is Quilt Festival time in the St. Jacob, Kitchener, Waterloo area....if you are, or will be in the area, you can find a long list of wonderful events here

For this year's block contest, the theme was "From the Stash"  at least 50% of the fabrics used by the maker were to come from the "stash" also, the colour Orange needed to be incorporated.

I chose to use up prepared bits and pieces leftover from an earlier applique project. 100% of the fabrics in this block came from my stash. I created a small bowl for the flowers added a little hand stitching and called it      "Bowlful of Leftovers"

I was delighted and quite honoured to learn that the block earned a first place finish.  I am sorry that I don't yet have photos of the actual quilt as it was still on the quilt frame, nearing completion  (I hope to get and post one here later) 

This is the 6th year that I have participated in this block contest, if you are curious about some of my other submissions you can find them here

A Block, a Ribbon and a Prompt

Those of you who have been long time visitors here know that I like to enter challenges. For the past 5 years, I have entered the quilt block contest held annually at Joseph Schneider haus in Kitchener On. This years theme was "What's in a Name" The rules stated that the title must have a "proper"name and that there be some use of gold in the fabric or embellishment. My entry is called Sarah's Garden. It is hand appliqued and embroidered......birds, vines, blossom, melons and garden tools

 I generally find that the most difficult part is composing the statement that must accompany any entry. Since this week's CPP word #157, is Write .........I thought I'd share what I wrote for this block

Welcome to Sarah's garden, where perched on lacy vines, 

birds sing among the blossoms while watching over the days work. 

Delight in the beauty and feast on the harvest.

of course, for the prompt response, I also had to toss in a doodle.

as you can see, these birds are very small

a 1st place reward

Ribbons

Who doesn't LOVE a pretty quilt show ribbon? I am the proud recipient of these beauties.
Imagine my delight to learn that the block I entered for the "Memories in Black and White" annual quilt block contest held each year at Joseph Schneider Haus in Kitchener ON., had been awarded First place honours.
I blogged about this block here.
Each year a quilt is made from the submitted blocks that is later raffled to raise funds for various projects at this historical museum. Here is the quilt on display after a quilting bee in which Mennonite women from the area expertly applied their beautiful hand quilting. It will now go off to be bound and will return to hang in a place of prominence until the raffle winner is chosen in Dec of 2012The comments from the judges just blew me away!
and if that wasn't exciting enough, I got quite the surprise during the Scottish Tea last Wednesday evening at a gathering held at McDougall Cottage in Cambridge ON., where the annual "Wee Quilt Challenge" is on display until Labour Day. The theme for this year's challenge was DIY Plaid, entrants were asked to create their own plaid. With not much more than plain cotton and colour pencils, I created my plaid, which I then fashioned into this fully functional wee kilt. It is titled "Kuilt".........what is a kuilt? well, it is a quilted Kilt, of course!
here it is hanging on the wall at the Cottage.
This ribbon will hang along side it during the show.
I plan to show more details of this piece and how it was made in my next post.

Black and White

Working in greyscale is an interesting exercise. You can certainly learn a good deal about value this way. I seem to be in a black and white mode these days.
This year's block challenge at Joseph Schneider Haus in Kitchener was themed "Memories in Black and White" Each year a quilt is made from submitted blocks that will later be raffled as a fundraising project. This is the block I submitted. It is done completely with black, white and grey fabrics. I chose to design and hand applique a block using my version of Forget-Me-Nots.I made the best use I could with the few prints I had. The "buds"are almost all a bit different even though they came from the same fabric. The main flower's centers were created by being very selective about cutting this Mark Lipinski print. As you can see, I never hesitate to cut holes in the middle of a piece of fabric

First and Third

Nope, not talking baseball. Do you remember this hockey guy I appliqued?......... well he was created to enter a block contest and was chosen as the 1st place winner.
The theme was "Snow on the Roof....Fire in the Hearth" My block represents the guys who play in a local senior hockey league age 55 and up into their 80's who play 3 times a week, they actually play 90 minute games.
So even though they have "snow on the roof" there is most definitely "fire in the hearth"

I would love to show you the process on this one but can not find the photos so a description will have to do. I began by creating this drawing based on an old hockey trading card, then broke it down into small sections. The striped effect on the socks and jersey were created using red SetaColour paint on white cotton. The face detail was drawn with pigma pens and colour pencil. He is entirely hand appliqued with dimension added to the hair by thread painting using white and pale grey thread. Some simple embroidery takes care of details like skate laces and blades.

Each year the Joseph Schneider haus Museum in Kitchener has a quilt block contest with a different theme. Blocks are entered, a quilt is made and then raffled off as part of their Fundraising efforts. Yesterday was the Quilting Bee, where these lovely ladies got together and spent the day deftly laying in all those beautiful hand quilted stitches.
Here you see the quilt right as it came off the rack.

Last year's quilt was also on display, it's theme was "Wash Day Blues" and it is a gorgeous quilt. I also have a block in this one which earned a third place.( middle row, second from the right)

And yet another third place award came at this years President's Challenge held at my guild. We were asked to do a 12" square finished quilt depicting something that represents London, Ontario. The idea is that we can display them as a "welcome" at next May's CQA event Quilt Ontario 2011. I choose to do the logo design as my entry, you can read about the process here and see some of the other fabulous entries here
(I think some of the ladies were to shy to have their photos taken.)

Wash Day Blues

This is my second year participating in a block contest at Joseph Schneider Haus. Each year a call goes out for blocks to be submitted. Once received, judges pick their favourite to be part of a quilt that is raffled to raise funds for various projects and charities.
This year's theme was "Wash Day Blues", the 12" block had to include 2 different shades of blue including one blue print that was provided.
My entry, titled "Swirling Down The Drain" used 18 different blues and is a simple top stitched, curve piecing technique.
I was not in attendance when winners were announced this past Saturday so I unfortunately do not have a picture of the entire quilt to share with you but I am happy to say that my block was awarded a third place ribbon.
Left is a copy of my original sketch, as you can see, I had intended to applique little soap bubbles but never did get around to doing that.

And here you see the early stage of the block's progression.
Beginning tomorrow and for the rest of the week there is an abundance of quilt shows and related activities in the Waterloo Region during the Quilt & Fibre Art Festival.

The highlight of the week is the New Hamburg Mennonite Relief Sale

My Quilts Part 5

I am still having a little trouble here................but I think I might understand what I am doing wrong so bare with me, I'm sure I'll figure this out sooner or later.

In March of 2008 I saw a call for entry for a block contest sitting on the back table at guild. I thought that sounded interesting but the deadline for submission was just 3 weeks away. Oh what the heck I thought I'd give it a shot. This competition was being held at Joseph Schneider Haus in Kitchener and was called A Greener Planet. It had to be an unquilted block measuring 12.5" x 12.5", made of pre-washed cotton, it had to include at least 1 piece of green and at least 1 recycled fabric.




This is my interpretation of the theme. I called this Positive Energy.
The block has 3 sections depicting renewable energy sources, sun, wind and water. My recycled fabrics were a piece of denim from some torn up jeans and some very soft flannel from a blanket that had become a rag that had just about outlived it's usefullness.

The blocks become the property of The Joseph Schneider Haus Museum. The quilt that is made from the blocks entered is used for fundraising and other charitable purposes.

This block received a lovely ribbon for honourable mention................I am so very pleased!
The best part about entering these sort of competitions is the feedback you receive from the judges. The positive comments give you such encouragement while the negative ones help you to learn so much about your own work.

I have been having trouble trying to put more than one picture in a post or even putting the image where I wanted it. That is why I have a separate post for each of my quilts but I think I have this thing figured out now. I'll go back to an older post and see if I can successfully insert an additional image.