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Archive for the ‘Road 2016’ Category

Rebooting Your Creativity

Friday, August 14th, 2015

It’s back to school time all over the country. Evidence of this is all the school supplies showing up aisle after aisle in retail stores. You don’t have to have someone in your household going back to school to utilize these great supplies – especially when it comes to your quilting creativity.    

Our friend, Jacquie Gering, recently pointed out in an article for the Modern Quilt Guild’s August newsletter, that school supplies can be a great source of creativity.Jacquie Gering Head Shot

Says Jacquie, “There’s something special about newly sharpened pencils, virgin crayons, and crisp empty notebooks. Back to school is a time for fresh possibilities and new experiences…As a creative person, I get stuck staring at a blank design wall wondering if I’ll ever come up with a new idea. I feel stale. That’s where the newly sharpened pencil and crisp empty notebook comes in… They seem to inspire a new attitude for a new year, and remind me to open my mind to the ideas I know are stuck inside.”download

Sometimes, all it takes to reboot your creativity is to participate in a specific project. Unlocking creative ideas can come from planning and making a quilt to be submitted to Road to California 2016’s Quilters Showcase, or following through on a quilt challenge like the Road 2016 Bag Challenge or Tiny Quilt Challenge.screen shot 2015-04-29 at 102029 am

The Modern Quilt Guild is looking for creative ideas for their 2016 Quilt of the Month series.quilt-of-the-month

Twelve new quilts, that are original ideas that have never been published before, will be chosen to be shared with MQG members.  Submitted designs should have a challenging creative element (like a color study, new technique, or unique structure or piecing — they want their members to learn new things and challenge their skills). Most importantly, they want to see the vision behind the design. A visual guide to the quilt submission — a sketch (using your fresh back-to-school notebook and pencil) or a computer-generated design – however way best shows the quilt as close to the final product as possible.  Designers retain all rights to their quilt patterns, and the MQG will compensate winners for the right to first publish the pattern in their MQG newsletter and on their website. For additional information and submission rules, you can go to the MQG website.

A new school year or committing to a specific quilting project are great ways to reboot the creativity within you.

How do you reboot your creativity?

 

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Road 2016 Bag Challenge

Tuesday, August 11th, 2015

Have you caught the latest handbag trend?  Here’s a way to join in — and possibly earn a great prize!!ByAnnie.com bag challenge

Road to California, ByAnnie.com and ByAnnie’s Soft and Stable, have partnered to sponsor the Road to California Bag Challenge. Cash prizes and merchandise totaling $1,000 will  be awarded for purses or bags made from Road’s 20th Anniversary Commemorative Fabric, designed by Alexander Henry Fabrics.  

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Bags or purses can be any size or style, uniquely designed or made from a pattern and can include other fabric, embellishments, hardware, or stabilizers. Entries will be juried and the winners, along with a few additional selected entries, will be displayed at Road to California’s 2016 show.

What are the prizes being offered for the Road to California Bag Challenge?

Best of Show: $400 Cash Prize from Road to California.

1st Runnerup – $300 gift certificate from ByAnnie.com

2nd Runnerup – $200 gift certificate from ByAnnie.com

3rd Runnerup – $100 gift certificate from ByAnnie.com

The deadline for the contest entry is October 1, 2015. Rules and the official entry can be found on the Road to California and ByAnnie.com websites.

You can order the exclusive Road to California 20th Anniversary commemorative fabric online at Road’s store.  The fabric is a limited printing and will not be reprinted, so be sure to order early. road_bags_small

Looking for ideas to design your bag? ByAnnie.com featured some great bag designers on their blog who shared their expertise and inspiration. Check out these fabulous designers including Annie from ByAnnie.com,  Kat from StudioKat Designs, Trisha from Trisha Jane, Sam from Hunter’s Designs, Marcea from Abbey Lane Quilts, Ginnie from Wonder Woman Quilts, Nancy from Pink Sand Beach Designs, and our very own Carolyn Reese.

Good luck. We can’t wait to see what you come up with.

 

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Quilting Friends

Friday, July 31st, 2015

Friendship Day is August 2, 2015 – a wonderful reason to celebrate the friends in your life.

Road to California 2015 – 20th Anniversary Show was the perfect place for friends to come together and enjoy over 1,000 quilts on display, 18 special exhibits, and over 700 merchant booths.

 

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Modern quilters Michelle Barbee and Megan Evans met at the LA Modern Quilt Guild. They encourage each other with their modern quilting projects.  They all had “a fun time looking at all the quilts and shopping.”

 

 

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Meet Cecilia, Joan, Carolyn, and Ann. These four friends quilt at Grace Lutheran Church in Upland, California. They have been going to Road together for the past 10 years because “we have fun.” They enjoy seeing Eleanor Burns, the quilts on display and buying batting for the quilts they make for their church group. Last year, their group donated 154 quilts to various organizations. They’ve started making dog beds out of the scraps from their quilts and are donating those to local animal shelters and to homeless people with pets. As Carolyn said, “We don’t waste anything!!”

 

 

 

 

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Donna Nordstrom and Joanna Larmore started coming to Road 17 years ago as young moms looking for something to get out of the house and enjoy doing something together. Since then, Joanna moved out of state, so their annual trip to Road is a way for them to reconnect. “It’s our refuge every year to do,” said Donna. Added Joanna, “We get to see the future of quilting at Road.” This year, not only did they enjoy the show for three days, they also participated in the Marcus Brothers Textiles Challenge.

Patsy and Cherie live in the high desert north of Los Angeles. They met in a knitting group and belong to the Tehachapi Quilt Guild. They’ve been coming to Road together for the past 7 years. Last year, they took their first bus trip as part of their Road experience, led by the Traveling Quilters. Patsy said it was “an excellent tour” and another “nice” Road feature.

 

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Terri and Ann came to Road from Northern California. Terri has been quilting for 20 years and Ann for 10. Terri remarked, “We come to Road to get inspired,” and “To see the quilting,” added Ann. 

Every day is Friendship Day during Road to California. What could be better than sharing the “Best in the West” experience than with people who are just as passionate as you are with quilting? Bring a friend January 20 – 24, 2016 to the Ontario Convention Center for Road to California 2016.

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2016 Road Faculty: Meet Kimberly Einmo

Tuesday, June 16th, 2015

Kimberly will be teaching three classes: 3006C Lone Starburst; 4006C Perfect Pinless Pinwheels; and 5005C Mystery QuiltKSEinmo-Studio-1a-262x300

Kimberly Einmo is used to being the only girl in the family. Growing up with two brothers, today, she is married and has two sons. How did Kimberly, the only quilter in her family, first get interested in quilting? Kimberly remembers it this way: “My mother had grown up in the depression era and hated anything to do with sewing. But she had the wisdom to know I should have some basic sewing skills ,so she signed me up for some sewing classes when I was seven years old at the local Singer Sewing shop in Massillon, Ohio. I loved sewing from the start and it wasn’t long before I was making many of my own clothes. I joined a 4-H group when I was eight years old called “Buttons and Bows” where I learned even more about garment construction and crafts such as Christmas stockings, tote bags, and holiday décor items.  I would enter my garments in the county fair every summer and I loved winning blue ribbons! For Christmas, when I was 10 years old, my parents bought me a sturdy Singer sewing machine that had zig zag and hem stitches which at that time, were quite a big deal! They also surprised me with a cabinet to hold the machine. Those were the best Christmas gifts I ever received! I still have that old Singer machine. However, it wasn’t until I walked into that quilt shop in Alexandria in 1991 when I realized you could piece blocks and quilt on a sewing machine.” Even though Kimberly can piece and quilt by hand, she loves sewing on her sewing machine so much more.KE-Variable Pinwheel Lonestar block with watermark

An award winning quilter, designer, and author, Kimberly has written five books. She also hosts four popular online classes with Craftsy.com and has appeared on several television and radio programs.

Kimberly has taught all over the world with her farthest class being in the Czech Republic where she has taught several times for the Prague Patchwork Meeting. What does she like most about teaching? Getting to know her students personally. Kimberly enjoys meeting meet each and every student and finding out a little bit about their life and why they like to quilt.

Once, when Kimberly was teaching, she had a scary experience. She was teaching a class on a Friday night at a quilt store. The store was actually closed, but the front door was unlocked. A man walked in to the front counter and told the shop owner that he had a gun and had just committed an armed robbery and that he wanted to turn himself in to the police. Kimberly overheard the conversation and grabbed all her students and locked them in a tiny bathroom while she called 911. She kept an eye on the shop owner and the man while the owner talked  very calmly to him. The police arrived and took the alleged robber. Kimberly remembers it was an incredibly tense situation. Afterwards, she and her students all giggled from nervous energy about having crammed so many women in a tiny bathroom!

What is Kimberly’s best quilting tip?  “Take your time and be very accurate as you cut and sew. Accuracy is oh-so-important to achieve great results.”KE-Fire and Ice with watermark

Kimberly hopes her students come to her classes with an open mind and are willing to try new things.  She always encourages her  students to step out of their box to learn something new. Kimberly has a personal goal to make every class she teaches a “stress-free” zone.  She wants her students to leave her classes knowing they learned a lot, accomplished a lot of actual sewing, and to go home feeling relaxed, happy, and refreshed from a great day in the classroom.KE-Magical Blocks Out of the Box

You can visit Kimberly at her website:www.kimberlyeinmo.com

 

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