Holly Blog

My Favorite Things...184...More Dress Up

With references like this so easy to download off the internet, it wasn't difficult to be inspired...

We started with Ric's version of Le Roi de Soleil (the Sun King). He came up with this fabulous wig based on pictures of hairstyles from that era.  There are over sized disposable plastic beer cups taped to the skull cap part of his wig under all of the paper curls...

Ric's daughter Erica is responsible for all of the make up. The "neck injury" is a reference to the guillotine's effect during the French Revolution...Ric's cape is a combination of a scalloped collar cut with piking shears, and dozens of ruched paper strips on the front of the cape. The little epaulets on the shoulder area of the cape were placed there to make his movement easier.

Next is Patrick, vogueing for the camera just after his make up was applied.

We made his breasts the same way as the skull cap for the wigs..."a la Martha".  Then we taped them to his Haz Mat suit.  You can see that his cumberbund is missing, but this gives you a good idea of how his garment was draped.  Believe it or not, this would have been much more difficult to pull off in fabric.  Newsprint has so much more body than most fabrics...we "pre-scrunched" the paper so that it was more pliable to work with as we did the draping.

Here's me just before the party, getting cinched into my party dress, by now you all know how much I love scalloped edges...

There are only a few pieces to my dress--the skirt with left & right over drapes in the front, the waistband that hid most of the unsightly details, the shawl collar & two paper rosettes to adorn the bottom of the shawl where it is taped together.  We scalloped the edges of my Haz Mat sleeves and created a cute little fold back cuff with rubber bands.

I'm so glad that Ric insisted that we all get into the spirit of Halloween this year and go "all out" with our costumes.  While I love Halloween, I have never been really big on actually participating in the spectacle of it all...It was a laugh riot from beginning to end.

Hope you all were as inspired by all of this as much as I was.

Back in two shakes...

;º)  H2

PS A new blog-a-thon is coming soon!

My Favorite Things...183...Playing Dress Up

It all started a couple of weeks ago with Ric telling me about a segment on Martha Stewart, where she showed an easy way to make a Halloween wig with a plastic bag, some tape and some paper.  Ric's a clever one, and before I knew it he was making the base for a wig.  As luck would have it, the wig looked very French...very Louis "something"...very Marie Antoinette.

That conversation lead to a discussion of the amazing paper dress competition that they have on Project Runway...(and the uber-amazing dresses that they made a few weeks ago).  You can replay the entire paper dress episode by going to myLifetime.com/ProjectRunway

We then started prowling the internet for pictures of Marie Antoinette-era costumes to have a better idea of what men and women actually wore back then.  We discussed doing flat paper-doll-like dresses, full dresses, and then we settled on dresses that would be a "facade", for comedic effect...We did not finish the back of our outfits.  Instead we let our "undergarments" show.  In this case, the undergarments that we used were Tyvek Has-Mat Suits, that Ric picked up a the local hardware store. These adult-sized "one-sies" were what we taped the paper parts of the costume pieces to. 

The whole process was a lot of trial and error, but we had a lot of laughs the whole way through.

I'll have more snapshots from our Halloween eve in my next few blog...Fromthe  ghoulish make up applied to our faces & necks by Ric's daughter Erica, close ups of our outfits, last-minute fans to complete "the look", etc...

So y'all come back now, y'hear?  There's lots more to show & tell.

Back in two shakes...

;º)  H2

 

My Favorite Things...180...When My "Dogs" are on the Coffee Table

Don't freak out, I don't let my dogs on the coffee table, that's just an expression for when I put my feet up on the furniture.  Yes, I have that kind of house.  It's been shabby and not-so-chic since before I'd ever even heard of Rachel Ashwell.

Right now though, I'm in CA, with the intent of working on several fun projects here (as soon as I get my brain back)...so I'm sitting cross legged on my friend Ric's sofa with my laptop on a pillow.  It's the most comfortable way I know to work.

We had an AMAZING market.  With the economy the way it is, I set my sights low (to avoid disappointment), but this market I was in the booth meeting new customers and writing up multi paged orders -- pretty much the entire time.  I did not get out to see Brenda Riddle (but she did drop by to say hello), Anne Sutton, or the "Moda Mob" (I must admit, I am a reduced to a syrupy mess around a lot of my design faves).  I did have some visitors come by though (a couple that I actually remembered to have a picture taken with). 

Pam Kitty & Elizabeth came by (all bright eyed and bushy tailed), and took this shot with me (looking "rode hard and put away wet") and Penny (the photogenic one on my left). We had a fun "chicken-fried-chicken" dinner that night with them and Penny's daughter Darci at the House of Blues.

I was also thrilled to see Tula Pink and her mom come by, (the two of them are so much fun), Rosalie from Melly & Me, (who is also a delight), Lynda Milligan of the Great American Quilt Factory, Cyndi Walker of Stitch Studios, Tricia Cribbs of Friend Folks, Gina Halladay & her quilting sidekick Kay, and Sheri Bignell of Freckleberry Farm...forgive me if I have left anyone out...I think it was the new Dolly Dresses 2 "Dolly Dress Up quilt" that made a lot of people who like bright fabric stop by. (Then I swooped in like a spider in her web to meet people who I am a fan of.)

Here's a picture of the "bright side of the booth"...

 

The red bordered "Dolly Dress Up" quilt will be in McCall's Quilting magazine in the April 2010 issue (newsstand February).  It's a panel that is made to look like it's all applique'd.  People seemed to really like it. All of the dresses are in place, so it's the perfect on it's own or with lots of fun embellishments, I designed the panel and the applique' embellishments and our quilting maven Cheryl Winslow of Starshine Quilting whipped up for the booth a few days before market, (and those are her hugley popular & adorable little dresses all over our booth).

I'm planning another Dolly Dresses holiday event in December with some quilting buddies...more on this very soon. 

Lots more to show and tell tomorrow ladies...

Back in two shakes...H2

My Favorite Things...177...Good Food & Friends

Decided to take a little business trip to California, before the onslaught of market preparations.  Much to my delight, I was able to have a delicious lunch with two of the funniest blogging quilters I know...

I call them "Elizapam".  We met in Mill Valley, which IMHO is pretty much the cutest town in Marin.  With it's little parks, turn-of-the-century shingle style cottages, and a storybook downtown, a girl could fall for the place...

It's too bad we had to "pinkie swear" about some of our next up-and-coming projects (lots more soon).  We gabbed for several hours, only to call it short when East Bay traffic patterns caused them concern.  (They graciously offered to come to my side of the bay, as I am again staying in Marin county with my old buddy Ric, who I have mentioned before).  It was great seeing you girls!

Over this past weekend, I saw a really fun arts & crafts exhibit called "The Box Show" in Point Reyes Station.  The show has become so popular, that they have to hold a lottery for open spots. It was so much fun.  Each artist got a box to do anything they want with. Here's a few examples of some of the projects they showed...

This soft sculpture was made by Mollie Lounibos.  I just loved her birds, and wherever did she get that wood textured fabric?

Don't you all want a box made of Blue Willow china?  It's by Pattie Grey.

Simon Jeremiah did this homage to Joseph Cornell, one of my favorite 3 dimensional collage artists.

It's magazine quilt season right now, so I'll have lots more to show and tell when I get back to the studio.

Back in two shakes...H2 @:º)

My Favorite Things...143...Precious Penny!

Is it just me, or is this the most adorable block?  So simple, and yet so precious...

This little ensemble was made by one of my most favorite people...Penny Sturges of Quilts Illustrated.  After practically twisting Penny's arm (into writing patterns) 4 short years ago, she is now consistently on Checker's Top 20 Pattern List...no small feat.  Penny's new blog is up and running so make sure to visit and cheer her on.  Can't wait to see you at market, Pen.

Back in two shakes...H2

My Favorite Things...141...Queen Elizabeth!

It looks like a lot of us are channeling our "inner school girl" with these jumper style dresses, don't you think?  This really is like "Playing Dress Up"!

This one's by the always clever Elizabeth Scott of The Late Bloomer...

If you aren't familiar with Elizabeth's blog yet...(where have you been girl-friend?), you simply must visit.  She she slices, she dices, she's an applique' expert...the girl's "got it going on"!  Make sure to check her blog archives, she has all sorts of inspiring photos from trips (large and small) and she is BFF with Pam-Meow ...and those two are always up to something fun!

Take it away Elizabeth.

Back in two shakes...H2

My Favorite Things...136...Little Sweeties!

My next guest is one of my favorite quilting friends.  We share a love of so many things. Brenda's formal schooling is also in design, so we tend to have a "mental mind meld" (that would be an M3, right?) when we discuss quilts and other design related topics.

So here's the second block in our series, isn't it just so "Brenda"?

Make sure to go on over to Brenda's Little Acorns blog and check out what she's previewing from her new fall line.  Actually, if you haven't seen it already, you ABSOLUTELY MUST see her own unique doll dress quilt called Betsy's Closet that she just made with all LakeHouse fabrics (mostly our Doll Dress fabric)...Bren's outdone herself again!

It's just so fun to see each designer's personality come out in their work, don't you think?

Back in two shakes...H2

A Dozen Darling Designer Dolly Dresses   LakeHouse Dry Goods Doll Dresses Collection   Fabric Frolic

My Favorite Things...132...Catching Up!

I have been whining about my camera (and it's lack of performance) for a while now.  Thanks to Gina and Penny, I think that I may be on the right track now with my new Canon G9.  It's got an anti-jiggle feature...which has been a problem for me since I started taking pictures with my Kodak Instamatic "back in the day". 

Just about the time my camera started giving me nothing but aggravation, I got a mystery package in my post box...I was baffled.  I opened it in the parking lot at the post office...Wee hoo! it was a Pam Kitty bag!  It's been a heck of a long time for me to keep this secret, so here it is...

Turns out PK is not only a "stunt sewer" for the industry's finest, she's also a wiz with electronic embroidery gadgets, ric rac and the picking out the cutest combinations of fabric EVER!  In the meantime, I know that I am a little late to the party, because Brenda, Elizabeth and Monica all have blogged about her fabulous bags already...(and each one is cuter than the next!)

Now that I have a camera again, let's play catch up.  It's like Pam knew exactly what I needed...

Here's TWCTB* bag again with some of our new Doll Dress Collection fabrics. This new collection was inspired by some antique doll dresses that I have collected over the years, and was designed to blend with the Cherry Baby collection that we introduced at Fall 2008 Quilt Market. I'm loving how that black and white bag looks with the new fabrics, don't you?

As a matter of fact, here's a little sneak peek at a quilt that I designed and my own stunt quilter Cheryl Winslow made for McCall's Quilting.  It's scheduled to be in the April 2009 issue, which will be on your newsstand in February.  BTW, for those of you who like circles as much as I do, Cheryl's long arm "signature" is her circle quilting.

The new swatches for the Doll Dresses Collection are live on the LHDG site, so swing by and take a peek.  The first wave of this fabric is due to hit the stores in October.  Some of my favorite designers are already toiling away with some of the sample yardage that we just got in from overseas, more on these projects as they become available.

Lots more to show and tell--yet another magazine quilt, a new doggie (lots of pics & a story to got with her that will will rip your heart out) and a special event here on HOLLYBLOG.

Back in two shakes...

;º)

H2

* "the world's cutest tote bag"

My Favorite Things...131...Dover Gardens

Most of you know by now that one of my all around favorite people-quilter-animals lovers is Brenda Riddle of Acorn Quilt & Gift Company. 

For Fall market, she did the most delicious quilts made of LakeHouse fabrics in her book "Simple Things & Small Joys"...

One of my favorite quilts was her pastel version of Dover Gardens made with the Pearl version of La Grand Rose...

I liked this quilt so much that I tinkered around on the computer and came up with this Heron version using our new La Grand Jardin fabrics from Spring market...

I did this darker version too, it's so dramatic.  Something about this quilt reminds me of Colonial Williamsburg, I don't know why...

Do you have a favorite? 

Back in two shakes...H2

My Favorite Things...118...Display Design

I have many photos and stories from Spring Quilt market this year, so I'll try to intermix them with pictures from our booth, in my next few blogs...

Let me cop to this right upfront...I took a big risk and made the decision to try a new booth layout for this market.  There were some really neat things about what we did this time, but this was not my finest hour, design-wise...With all of the challenges that we've had in the past six months, I am just glad that the booth came out as good as it did.  You will be able to see for yourself...and I'll give you my self-critique, too.

Here's a view from our front aisle...I just loved the off white tables and benches we bought at IKEA ...they were really comfy, & were a great way to show extra quilts and tote bags...The chain quilt called Black Cherry on the middle bench was in McCall's Quilting May/June issue, the kit is being sold by Fat Quarter Shop...I just love it, (if I do say so myself). The pink bordered quilt on the left is made with our new Little Lady collection.  It's my Jill version of my new Jack & Jill Quilt due out at the end of July.  The cute-as-a-button Cherry Preserves quilt on the back right is by Elizabeth Scott.

My biggest design mistake overall, was the openings at the corners...

It was great that people could walk up from behind and see our fanciful tiered display tables...

But the exposed poles were an eyesore...

And because of these openings at the corners, the products in the other booths to the back and sides of us became part of our display...If I had thought to use something like scrim, that would have done a world of good to "tone down" the visual distractions from other exhibitors...But then again, people wouldn't have been able to enter our booth from the back corners...to grab a cupcake, or touch the samples...

I've still got lots more pictures, so I'll be...

Back in two shakes...H2