By the time you read this .....

I will be here!!!!

This is a picture of 2 years ago, my first time at the Houston Quilt Festival, this was the banner that greeted us quilters flying in from all over the world just behind the immigration booths on your way down to the luggage belts at Houston Intercontinental Airport, isn’t that wonderful? Can you imagine something like this just behind our customs guys at Schiphol Amsterdam Airport before you reach the luggage belts….noooo…  but this is Houston, a very welcoming town, I love it!!

I packed my bags a few days ago, suitcase full of gifts and Dutch seasonal (Sinterklaas) goodies for the friends I will be staying with:

In the pink package, one pincushion for my friend, enjoyed making it so much made one for myself as well, although I don’t quite understand how they turned out to be different sizes..

I will be staying in a wonderful old neighbourhood of Houston called The Heights, look:

 

 

 

Yes, this is Houston also. And within the inner loop too, just 15 taxi minutes from downtown and the Convention Centre. Most visitors, also those visiting the Quilt Festival will not see much else than downtown, high rises, freeways and shopping malls, but there is so much more to this city.

And of course I have this to look forward to:

I hope to come back with lots of nice pictures for you (although at many of the booths and some of the exhibitions picture taking is forbidden, but I am sure there is still enough to be photographed), see you in a bit!

 Phyllis

Jacob's Ladder update and Antwerp

As you probably already have seen here, the Feathergirls got together again for some stitching on our FW quilts.

What is it about FW’s and soup??

Although not finished on the day – too much chatting – I did finish these six blocks later on

All my blocks now look like this

With it being the mid-term school holidays not a lot of stitching is getting done this week. Having a teenager around the house sort of ruins your daily schedule. Yesterday was a nice day, shopping in Antwerp and enjoying this

Seeing this

 

 

 

 

A strange sign on the door of a shop that was closed…

because of “work”…

And because of the lovely weather, we had dinner on one of the terraces, on Oct 23, can you believe it?!

 

 

Not bad at all!

Phyllis

Meet Blanche

First of all an update on Phebe, I finished and attached the first of the applique borders (or ‘frames’as Di Ford calls them in her pattern). I don’t know if I will do more of the little flowers on the corners, it looks like I could do some more, but once the next frame is attached to it, this will be a thin frame so I will have a look at it at that time.

Then: some of you may already have noticed her in the pictures in this blogpost.

Sunday week ago (October 7) was my birthday and DH surprised me with this beauty. Actually, I saw her on the internet a while ago. At the time DH suggested I might want her as an early birthday present, he figured with my maiden name (White) I should really have a white Featherweight too, and who I am to contradict such a wise man??

She arrived in a familiar box,

tightly wrapped,

in her pretty case

carefully unpacked

She works like a dream, and we bought her here, same place as The Duchess. Of course she needed a name, something a bit more frivolous than the classy Duchess and so because of that and her colour I decided on Blanche.

I think we’ll have much fun together, The Duchess, Blanche and I!

Phyllis

 

An evening with An Moonen

Last weekend the QuiltersPalet quiltstore in The Hague celebrated their 5^th year anniversary. They celebrated in style, with lots of reductions etc. and they invited An Moonen, an authority on antique Dutch quilts to hold a talk about the history of Dutch quilts.

An, former curator of the Open Air Museum in Arnhem, wrote three books and  lots of articles about the history of Dutch quilts and brought some antique Dutch quilts with her to show us. I loved listening to her (history was one of my favourite subjects in school anyway), she had so many interesting things to tell (and a great sense of humour!), I found it fascinating, I learned new things, historic facts not just about quilts, but also of other cultural facts and historic events.

Here is An, signing a copy of her latest book, A History of Dutch Quilts, for one of the attendees:

And below some of the antique quilts An brought to show us:

Needless to say, I had a great evening.

We were surprised by Evy and Petra, they gave us a voucher for the amount we paid to attend the talk. Also, when you bought something (at wonderfully reduced prices) you were given this template (with the name of the QuiltersPalet engraved on it) with a pattern.

Thank you very much, ladies, I will use both with much pleasure!

Phyllis

Second Featherweight Day

Yesterday was the second Featherweight Day at Atelier Bep in Hall and unlike the first FW Day in June this time the weather was beautiful.

We arrived in the morning sunshine.

We were greeted with coffee and carrot cake and we quickly set up our machines, because like last time Bep had a organised a workshop for us, we were going to make a sweet scrappy bear (Bep’s example on the picture). A first for me.

Busy, busy, busy… we with making our bears and Bep with making her by now famous Singer Lentil Soup …

for our lunch

Caro gave a show and tell of her antique quilts, she also showed us a quilt she made from old blocks

More sewing in the afternoon..

And in the other room…

The end result, a small army of scrappy bears basking in the afternoon sunshine!

It was a lovely day, great seeing ‘old’ quilt friends again and making new ones. A big “thank you” to Bep and her family for their hospitality, it was wonderful.

Phyllis