Carli The Quilter

A tool bag for my Arborist son. Made from med weight cotton duck fabric bought when I found a close out sale at Capital Iron shop in Sidney back in January. Things that are small but important like assorted sized wedges, clippers, etc are needed and its easy to lose them in deep grass or heavy ground cover. I am for sure opening my Etsy shop this summer. Hoping you are well and sewing away. Happy Quilting, Carli

I love my sister and she is my all time best support in quilting. I started this quilt center more than 5 years ago, in our lovely woodland riverside property of Northern B.C. I absoloutely love hand piecing, hand embroidery and hand embellishment. This began inside with the heart applique on the rich rust colored satin. Along the way, a little of this and a little of that, I made my way. I have come to realize that I do mostly improv in all my quilting! Easy peasy heart shape filled with strips of a favorite color group. Then I cut the satin fabric away and began filling the surrounding area with crazy bits and stitching. I love taking my quilt tops outside to experience the wind and sun for themselves. This quilt is an easy beginner to crazy quilting block. 

I upcycled all sorts of fabric into my "Beach House Crazy Quilt" and it was selected for the 2013 Quilt Market "Oh, Canada" exhibition in Houston and LA. When I began this blog back in 2007, I wanted to educate about reusing cloth, now called "Upcycling" of all types of fabrics that we didn't normally see in quilts. I love the to play with color, texture and style. But believe it or not, but in 2007, I struggled to have anyone see anything I wrote about upcycling and I did have to make the concession to including more new fabric. This gorgeous table runner sports Dresden Plates handmade from scraps of all ages of printing, some as far back as 1980. These scrappy Dresden Plates sit on a light blue background which is new organic 100% cotton while the backing is upcycled curtain material. Myrtle and I made matching bags from a pattern she purchased and it was so much fun! And so as you read this most auspicious post, start think...

When I first  moved to Telkwa many 14 years ago now, I met up with some wonderful ladies who quilt and I participated with one Round Robin quilt exchange with them. We all met one evening and as we distributed our brown paper bags going around the room and I handed off my quilt to the person on my right and we began. Each participant's name was entered into a ledger of the event to keep track of who would be the next participant for your starting block. As I have posted before, I made this quilt top with 5 or 6 other quilters in a Round Robin. Its a tough project to find and design a finishing border for it because its so "WOW -ish" you know? It has languished like many others in a bin waiting for me to get on with it! But I didn't due to life getting in the way of quilting. Well I've made some progress on this quilt, in the form of a graph paper design for a border. More on that later. I made this block when I received all the var...

This year has been uplifting, heart felt, stressful and challenging. Moving causes change. And we all know that the only person who loves a change is a baby! When I made this baby quilt, I didn't know that sewing fabric strips together and cutting them into strings was called "Chinese Coins" or something like that. Quilting or not, we are constantly learning all the time. Playing with my fabric and threads are all I really need to be happy, but not healthy.  This post on Dec 31, 2017 is my New Year Eve reflection on 2017 and the last decade of my growth. Healthy lifestyle is just as important as what we play with to enjoy life.  I took the 2 week challenge of Low Carbs High Fat with Dietdoctor.com. I have started back to my routine of rising early, off to the pool and home again for breakfast. All, any of us can do is to go forward, not become stagnant.  Update on LCHF lifestyle change. I've lost 3.5 lbs and 7 inches on my waistline! I...