Kentuckiana Longarmers Gathering

This past Sunday was a gathering of longarm quilters in the Kentuckiana area.  The meeting was at Harriet's home in Madison and the weather was perfect for a Sunday afternoon drive.  This group has close to 30 members spread on both sides of the Kentucky/Indiana border.  They always have a program that includes demonstrations or discussion of new techniques or tools.

Harriet had prepared a demo of a trapunto technique by loading batting as her backing and then using washaway thread to stitch around her design.  While she trimmed the batting away, we watched a HandiQuilter video about two different trapunto techniques.  She then showed us how to use a bright fabric underneath the trapunto to get a wonderful shading effect - something I've added to my list of techniques to try in the near future.

Harriet working on the trapunto piece...

You can see the center has been trimmed but there's still some trimming to be done around the edge.  But the bright orange flannel yields a lovely, soft color underneath.

We also talked about different tools that were recently purchased, including some with some with scalloped edges and some arcs from DeLoa's Quilt Shop.  The nice thing about the arcs are that, unlike several curved rulers I already own, both the top arc and the bottom arc are the same radius.  And then we got to the high tech tools - available from your local Dollar General Store!

These "templates" were among Harriet's selection of fun shapes.  There were lots of different leaf shapes and sizes - great for a freehand leafy border or panto on the fly.

The drive was lovely.  Although this summer has been exceedingly dry, the trees were starting to turn and there was quite a bit of color coming out.  I was afraid that the lack of water over the summer would result in very muted fall colors.  There was one tree in North Vernon that was spectacular - a tall maple tree that was full of color.

This picture doesn't do these trees justice - they were a beautiful orange.

And then there's the maple tree in my back yard - just starting to turn and about as pretty as the rest of the scenery on the drive to Madison.

So now it's back to quilting.

Cheers!
Margaret