VCQ in Virginia Beach

A few weeks ago the Virginia Consortium of Quilters held our November meeting in Virginia Beach at the Resort & Conference Center on the Chesapeake Bay side of the city.  We had 88 people attending for a day of workshops and the annual business meeting.  Workshops included playing with paint sticks, a 10-minute block class, a wool project, an angle play project and a miniature mystery, as well as Come Quilt with Me. Here are some class show and tell pictures.

My friends and I stayed over an extra night to play tourist a bit; Sunday turned out to be a gorgeous sunny day, 71 degrees.  We had breakfast at Pocahontas Pancake House in VA Beach city, walked along the beach and climbed the Cape Henry lighthouse, the first lighthouse built in the US which was in operation from 1792 to 1881.

 
 

New Hampshire Garden

On the day we visited friends at Squam Lake, we drove on to Holderness and stopped at an Artisan Center.  After a bit of shopping, we wandered the adjacent garden and I took these photos.  It was a lovely spot.

More From Quilt Camp 4

I'm home now from quilt camp (while Elizabeth remains in NH through most of August) and have gotten most of my stuff put away, so I can try to keep the momentum going. Here are some things I worked on in the last week.

 The 2 pieces above and below are both scarves that were ice-dyed; the fabric is layered with ice cubes on top and the dye powder is sprinkled on top of the ice.  As the ice melts, the dye soaks into the fabric, so the results are somewhat of a surprise, depending on the colors used and number of layers.  These 2 were layers in the the same "parfait".  Both are screen printed. 

The blue/turquoise piece above was an attempt at using tapioca as a resist, following instructions in a Quilting Arts article by Lisa Kerpoe.  After applying the tapicoa and letting it dry, I used thickened dye rather than liquid dye; I think I would have had better results with liquid dye.  The tapioca was difficult to wash off, and there were large areas of white when I was done.  I ended up spraying the whole piece with blue and turquoise dye.

This yellow piece was a sunprint from last year - not very inspiring - so I printed it with an orange.  Much better!

I decided I wanted to see what some of my dye colors looked like individually, so did these 9 half yards on the last day.  A bit backwards, I admit, but I started off with ice dyeing and mixing colors, so wanted to see them separately.

On our last day we had a lovely lunch at Caste in the Clouds, in the Ossipee Mountains overlooking Lake Winnipesaukee. 

Quilt Camp 4

Greetings from New Hampshire!  My friend Elizabeth and I are in the midst of "quilt camp 4" at her summer house on the lake.  We've had limited internet access so this is the first post.  Weather has been beautiful, we escaped Northern Virginia just before the big storm hit that knocked out power for days.  We have been creating and relaxing, enjoying nature...except for the bear that visited this morning!  Here are a few pictures from the first week and a half.

 This fellow decided to take one of the bird feeders as soon as Elizabeth put it out this morning.

 First round of ice dyeing, a t-shirt and 2 half-yards of fabric.

 This was my big project for week 1; screen printed, stamped and stenciled on duck cloth, 1/2 yard.

 Ice dyeing, round 2. T-shirt & 2 scarves this time.  

 A carved rubber stamp to represent grass for another project.

 Sun printing.

 A beautiful sunset on the lake.

 A walk in the woods at Castle in the Clouds.

 A visit with friends at their camp on nearby Squam Lake.

 We paddled the canoe into the nearby creek in search of dragonflies and other pond life to photograph.

First attempt at breakdown screen printing.  Results of 2nd round are better, photos later!

Messy Studio

After preparing for our Celebration retreat, coming home and hauling in all the bags - but not unpacking them - and then spending most of the week working on thermofax screens for some new projects, it was time to clean up the studio.  What you can't see in this photo are the bags on the floor surrounding the perimeter of the room.  So after working on some projects all day today, I finally unpacked the bags and got most of it put away.

Here are the goodies from the retreat - most gifts, a few purchases, and some from a generous friend.  The Celebration committee worked really hard at making everyone feel special, had fabulous door prizes and lots of little gifts for everyone.  Not to mention the great classes, vendors, lectures, and other events like silent auction, raffles, AAQI competition, show & tell.  A good time was had by all!

MLK Jr. Memorial

Seeing the cherry blossoms also provided an opportunity for my first visit to the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial. It is very impressive. Since it was getting dark, I didn't spend as much time as I might have otherwise, so I look forward to going back.

Cherry Blossoms

Visitors flock to the Tidal Basin every year to see the cherry blossoms in all their glory.  This year was no exception, in spite of the blooms being 2 weeks early due to the unusually warm weather.  Afraid that I would not get to see them before they were gone, I made the trek Friday after work and got some photos as the sun was setting.  While I didn't get to linger long, it was worth the trip.

Leaves

A few days ago, I collected some fall leaves while out for a walk. After pressing in a phone book to flatten them, I pulled them out today and took photos, with the intent of turning them into thermofax screens.

Marvelous Mushrooms

Found these marvelous mushrooms in the woods behind my house today.  I have never seen such large clusters or all the ruffly edges.  They are quite firm, not nearly as delicate as they look.

Hurricane!

We survived Hurrican Irene with lots of rain, and leaves and twigs scattered everywhere.  Power flickered but stayed on, thank goodness.  So I was able to get in some quilting time.  I added borders to 2 of my quilt camp pieces, got them sandwiched with backing and batting, so they are ready to be quilted.  Also played a bit with some printing.

Above is a piece called Color Theory.  The primary and secondary color rectangles were hand-dyed and textured with paint sticks, and fused to the background.  Next, some hand stitching to highlight the color theme.  The other piece I worked on is for a challenge, so pictures of that will have to wait.

 These are some pieces I dyed earlier this month; some half yards and an assortment of other linens and crocheted pieces.

My husband's been growing okra in the garden but nobody eats it!  So it seemed like the perfect thing to use for making some vegetable prints.  The cross-cut pieces make a nice little flower shape.