Ruru Embroidery

My daughter Mandy has been working on some embroidery designs and she recently made a quilt for a friends baby shower. Mandy loves embroidery and uses her design skill to create original designs, then she gets me to help her work out the design of the quilt and of course I get to quilt it. Here is a photo of me finishing the quilt on the long arm and a close up of the finished quilt.

Ruru is the Maori name for a NZ native owl, also known as a Morepork. Mandy has more designs she is developing featuring more native birds.

In the studio the ladies have been working on some original Christmas advent calenders that have personalised photos of their families. Its been a really great project, and a lot of work. I will try to remember to post some photos of the calenders soon. We get so busy during class time that I never take photos!

The Button Tree.

I wanted to share a photo of the button tree my 3 year old grandaughter made with me a while ago. She has really started to develop her ability to sew and with my help she spent nearly 2 hours straight creating this button tree for her mum. She chose every button and placed it exactly then she chose the thread and cut it. I had to thread the needle and return the needle to tie a knot, but she did the rest.

EV has spent alot of time in my studio since she was born and she has declared that when she grows up she wants to be "a sewing lady". Here are a few photos taken by EV while playing in the studio.

EV's how to crochet.

Check out my new assistants demo on crochet, we teach them young around here.

Exciting News AMQF 2012

I am thrilled to announce that I am on the list of teachers for AMQF 2012 in Adelaide September 28th to 1st October. My class is the Forest Tapestry that you can see on my first blog photo.

Be sure to check out whats coming up at the festival and get your name down for the Ricky Tims class!  I was fortunate to do his workshop at The Houston Festival in 2009 and you will gain so much from such a fun and informative day.

Please tell all your quilty mates about this fantastic event which is only on every 2 years. We are having classes for all types of machine quilting and those with domestic machine skills have not been forgotten.

Starry Starry Night

 

This is another one of my personal designs, Starry Starry Night. I went a bit overboard with the crystals on this one! But it really is a quilt that I'm never tired of and I love teaching it. Yes, it is all pieced.

Mystery Quilt for August - Drunkards Path

The Mystery Quilt for August was a Drunkards Path in Red and White. I usually try to precut for the mystery classes so when everbody arrives they can get stuck into sewing. I sometimes cut for days, I even cut in my sleep.

Jeannie cutting up a storm for the girls.

The curved drunkards path blocks were cut with my new Go! Fabric Cutter. It makes my cutting life alot easier! But we didn't get a photo of that, just the Jeannie cutter.

I wish I was as ordered as my pupils!

I think everyone achieved great results with this mystery quilt.

The Quilt Genie Studio

Welcome to The Quilt Genie blog, from my studio where it all happens. I plan to post updates on our creative endeavours and share a little bit of the life of a quilt genie.

Here's a photo of my most popular pattern to date.

Forest Tapestry

I loved designing this one based on the beautiful native fern, an symbolic emblem for NZ. I wanted to represent the 4 stages of the fern's life, from the first unfurling of the koru fronds through to the last dying leaves. Its quite popular with tourists visiting NZ and with locals who want to send a quilt overseas to family and friends that has a flavour of NZ.