An Evening With Latifah Saafir

Last night I attended a lecture presented by the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild featuring Latifah Saafir the founder of the Modern Guild first based in L.A. and now with many international associations.  This was her first time speaking outside of the U.S.A so her first International Appearance!

 What Is Modern Quilting.  It is different things to different people.

 Latifah started sewing very young as she is part of a large family of mainly sisters.  She has one brother and is second in birth order.  She trained as a Mechanical Engineer and started quilting in 2008.  Her mother sat her and her sister on mom's lap and showed them how to make clothes from about age 6 or 8.  At age 15 she was regularly taking library books out on quilting!  Below is the first quilt that inspired her.

 Here is her version.

This quilt was done with bias binding stitched onto the background.  She uses bias binding for all her quilts and took left overs to create this design.

 The stack seems small, but there are some amazing quilts to be seen.

This was a Medallion quilt she designed for a book it was created in wedges and sewn together.

 Based on a traditional block she made triangles from rectangles.

 Latitudes made from bias binding.

 Love this one again featured in a book.

 First she machine quilted the background and then added the applique and bias binding.

 A peek at the back, you can see the loops of the bias.

 This was designed to feature her new fabric line called Grafic by Latifah Saafir Studios for Hoffman.  It will be available in June and was their best seller at Quilt Market!

 Latifah grew up in L.A. and many of these images hold special meaning to her.

 Love the colours and images.

 Explaining about her process.

 That's a pigeon.

 This piece was just back from the quilter and not yet bound!  Love all that texture in the different blocks.

 Her dress was her feature fabrics and she is talking of the significance to her of the images.

Glam Clam one of the workshops she is teaching.  You can find it on Craftsy!

Another Glam Clam in different colours.  She lays them all out and starts sewing from the top down.

 This Glam Clam is going to be a BOM!  Love all the secondary shapes.

 Hexi Glam Clams.  Apparently little children and people over 80 see them as women's panties. I also see it as a Sting Ray!

 Pieced Mole Hill are done paper pieced, with allowances to make larger curved squares if you want to include a fussy cut motif.  Love all the shades of beige and white backgrounds.

 A Blue, Black, Cream version as a top.

 Molehills one of the classes she is teaching while here.

 Good & Plenty a design that will be a freebie from her via Hoffman Fabrics featuring the new fabrics.  We all got one of the postcards.

 Grid quilting on the background.

 Show and tell is over but she is kindly answering some questions.

 Laid out for a closer look.

 Latifah talking about some of the patterns and rulers she designed.  She had some for sale and generously donated some as door prizes.  The guild contributed to her Kickstarter program and they received a lecture, one of the workshop and door prizes as a reward.  She is also setting up a program to teach children how to sew and make quilts.

  A closer look at some of her quilts before everyone crowded around.

 Love all those greys, tans, beige and a bit of turquoise backgrounds.

Thanks Latifah and Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild for a lovely evening.  Wish I was a member and could have taken a workshop. Here is a link to Latifah's blog and website.  Here is the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild Blog  One last link to Vancouver Modern Guild Facebook page.

If you get a chance to go to a lecture with Latifah I would highly recommend doing so!

Gwennie Inspired Medallion Quilt

I love tulips and have always wanted to make a basket quilt so when I saw a post on Lori's Humble Quilts I decided to draft an idea.  Here is her post about the project.

 I then enlarged it and darkened the faint pencil lines.

 I made some applique templates and chose my fabrics and them interviewed two backgrounds.

 Both have lovely script on them.  I decided to use the wrong side of the basket fabric to show the inside of it.

 Then I laid out my pieces to approximate the finished block size of 16" to see how long to make the bias stems.

Then I tucked a possible fabric for the handle.

 I decided to use the darker background and started stitching.

 Friday evening I had finished the block.  I realize I didn't make the lone dropped petal.  I'm still thinking of adding it or may add several more.  I can't wait to see what is suggested for the next border.

Thanks Lori for pushing me to go ahead with this idea.  I love my Windblown Tulips in a Basket.

Whew! Just made it!

I can't believe I waited until the last minute.  I started working on these baskets almost as soon as Dawn Heese shared the patterns.  Picking out this cute grey wool and the blue plaid for the baskets and tacking all the pieces down.

 All I needed to do for over two weeks was do the decorative stitching on the pieces.  Don't you love the wool I used for the strawberry basket?  I found it at Value Village quite some time ago.  It is a Wool Felt Skirt made in Japan!  I knew it would be perfect for a basket.  If you check Dawn's post here you will see she gave the basket a scalloped edge, perfect for this hem edge of the skirt.

 I also changed colours of the flowers in this block.

 Saturday I started stitching on the Strawberry basket.  I used 12 Perle cotton on the grey as I didn't want the stitching to overpower the delicate eyelet look to it.  This morning I finished the little black seeds on the strawberries.

Then I started onto the blue basket but last night I put it away for the evening. The last bit was stitching the light blue stripes and the darker blue on the basket.

 Then this morning I read Dawn's newest post and she release the new baskets today!  So I quickly finished them off.  Here are the pair side by side.

 Here are all my baskets to date.  I'm loving this project and having a bit of fun with the embellishing stitches but not going overboard. I'm happy to say I've printed off, traced and cut out the newest set of templates for the next two baskets.  Now to decide on wool colours.

Saturday Finish and Happy Mother's Day!

First I'd like to wish my dear Mother a Happy Mother's Day, this is a picture of her on her 90th birthday last year and in just a few weeks it will be her 91st!

 Under my needle last week were the latest applique blocks of the Sarah Fielke Happy Days BOM.

 Adding some tulips, one of my favourite flowers to the mix.

 And the finished block with a little heart cut out on the yellow blossom.  I chose the blue heart in memory of my dad who passed away 28 years ago on Thursday.

Here it is beside the block I finished earlier in the week.

 The four large applique blocks together.

Here are all my applique blocks to date.  I need to start cutting and sewing the pieced blocks.  but I'm enjoying all the hand work.  I also have to finish off my wool baskets and catch up on my Sue Spargo Bird Dance Blocks.

If you are able, have a lovely Mother's Day with your mom or someone who takes time to mother you.  Not all Mothers are ones who gave birth to you.