New Products from the Chicago Quilt Festival

I discovered several new products at Quilt Festival last week. Although not brand new to the market, they were new to me.

Kaleidoscope Kreator allows you to create beautiful, one-of-a-kind kaleidoscope designs from your own photos with just a few clicks of your mouse! You can then print the designs on fabric using a product such as EQ Printables fabric sheets and incorporate them into a quilt. I have had this programme since Version 1, but Version 2 along with the new template packs and a project CD were all new to me. Be sure to check out this website if you enjoy creating memory quilts as much as I do.

Fusible thread from Superior Threads has all kinds of uses including binding and applique. Look here for some great tips on using this product.

Because I use a lot of lace and trims in my memory quilts, I was very excited to see the new products that are available for dyeing lace. There were several booths at Quilt Festival selling paints and dyes for fabric and lace. I bought this set from Sara's Bloom along with 3 different brushes. This technique of dyeing lace will be perfect for my newest pattern, Portraits in Lace, because it will allow me to dye the lace to match the fabrics.

As always, way too much fun stuff to try and not enough time!

Another New Pattern!

I have just put the "official" photos of my newest pattern (Portraits in Lace) on my website. The pattern will be added to my shopping cart later this week. These little quilts can be hung on the wall in the "normal" way, with a hanging sleeve on the back, or they can be hung on the Ackfeld hangers that you see here. Ackfeld has a wide variety of these hangers that are perfect for small wall hangings.

A Photographer’s Dilemma

My photographer, Glyn Davies, had a real challenge this morning. He was photographing my “Portraits in Lace” quilts for the cover of my newest pattern. When we hung the quilts on the wall, there were large shadows behind them because of the wire hangers I used to display them. So Glyn came up with a very high-tech way of photographing them. Using duct tape, a piece of string and a 4-foot length of dowel from Home Depot, we suspended the quilts from some metal poles that were in the studio. My job was to hold the string at just the right angle, so the wire hanger would stay straight.

Glyn is now working his Photoshop magic to remove the background from the photos, and by tomorrow, I will have some wonderful pictures to put on my pattern cover!

And now I have to figure out how to photograph these quilts?

Glyn Davies, quilt photographer extraordinaire!

Notice the high-tech equipment we are using. The string was especially important!

Watch for the finished photo coming soon!