If you read yesterday’s Web Favs then you saw the post about Quilting Gallery. I have finally gotten up the gumption to submit one of my original designs to a quilting contest! Let me be the first to tell you there are some seriously talented quilters in this contest and their Jelly Roll quilts are AMAZING! Head on over to the voting page and cast a vote for your favorite – if it happens to be Cobblestone Roads I would love that!!!
Have you heard of Me & My Sister Designs? I bet you have and you may not even realize it! They are the designers behind fun lines like Amelia, Ready Set Snow, Dilly Dally, and so many more.
I had the opportunity to interview Barb and Mary recently and here is what we chatted about:
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| Barb & Mary |
Barb & Mary: We find inspiration for our fabrics everywhere … sometimes it’s a small flower on an old scrap of fabric or a greeting card. Most of the time it just comes from doodles. Mary used to use graph paper to sketch out our patterns. Now she does most of it on the computer.
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| Barb’s Favorite Fabric Design |
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| Mary’s Favorite Fabric Design |
Barb & Mary: Thank You! I think the playfulness comes from the original doodles. The flowers start out very primitive with simple shapes and that helps to keep them whimsical and playful.
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| A bundle of their first group – Pedal Pushers |
Most everything is a joint effort. We usually get together 3 or 4 times a week and either sit in front of the computer, test sew, or tweak fabric ideas. But after the initial pattern pages are written … Mary does all the computer graphics by herself.
Our designs are simple so lots of time the process is too. Sometimes we actually cut up fabric, but most of the time we just start with a square on the computer screen, chop it up and put it back together. We have been doing this for so many years now it comes naturally.
Barb & Mary: Orange Slices is one of Mary’s all time favorites! Pinwheels are my favorite block … so I like Spin Cycle! I love making half square triangles! We got in a faze where we were naming all our patterns after food. Had to stop that! I think we were naming them before lunch!
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| Orange Slices – Courtesy of Me & My Sister Designs |
Barb & Mary: To be honest … no we do not miss owning the shop. We do miss the people! But not the hard work of being a shop owner! Owning the shop taught us a lot about the quilting business and provided us with contacts. Even after selling the shop we kept in contact with our Moda sales rep Ron Wiggins, who mentored us with the shop and with branching out into fabric and patterns.
Melissa: As sisters, do you find that working together has made you closer? From your website it seems like the whole family is, in some form or another, involved in your business – does everyone also sew and create with you?
Barb & Mary: I can’t say that it has made us closer. We have always been good friends, except for a period of time when we were in high school! Hated each other for several years. Mom used to threaten to lock us in a room together to see who came out alive! But after college and when the families started to grow all that luckily disappeared. Four of the five sisters quilt. My son and daughter in law stuff patterns and Mary’s daughters both help with the computer work and graphic design. They help teach us new things on the computer everyday! Both our husbands build the props for our market booths. It really is a family run business!!!!
You may be wondering…what are Barb and Mary giving away?!? One charm pack of Amelia and one charm pack of Dilly Dally! There will be 2 lucky winners for this giveaway!
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| Image Courtesy of Fat Quarter Shop – also available for purchase there! |
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| Dilly Dally – Image Courtesy of Old Country Store Fabrics – also available for purchase there |
How can you enter?
1. Head over to Me & My Sister Designs and tell me what your favorite pattern is – one entry!
2. Head over to Me & My Sister Designs blog – say Hi & Tell them that we sent you! – come back here and tell me that you did. – one entry!
3. Go like us on Facebook – come back here and tell me that you did – one entry!
That is 3 possible entries! Woot! We like to give these great prizes to our faithful Brother Lovers so make sure you are a follower!
For an additional entry – blog, facebook, or tweet about this giveaway.
This giveaway will run from August 29th to September 4th – a winner will be announced on September 5th – Labor Day.
Good Luck!
It has been forever and a day since I shared a recipe on this blog and I think it is time for a new one! My world famous taco salad…ok, so it isn’t world famous, but maybe after this post it will be 🙂
It is the perfect dish when you are looking for something quick and easy.
Summer time seems to be when I want to spend very little time in my kitchen. This recipe takes me 30 min start to finish to make – less time if you buy precut onions and shredded lettuce (which I didn’t do).
Ingredients:
How To:
Brown your ground beef with your onion and garlic – drain fat
Add in Green Chiles, Kidney Beans, Frozen Corn, Taco Seasoning, water, Salsa (I eyeball it – about 3/4 of a cup), Taco Sauce (eyeball it again – about 3/4 of a cup) – stir together, bring to boil, reduce heat and cover for 10 minutes.
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| Yummy Taco Salad Goodness! |
Make your plate:
This meal takes me less than 30 minutes to make – and while it seems like there are a lot of ingredients – it is really light and satisfying.
Enjoy!
I told my bff just before Christmas last year that one of my goals for this year was to make a Christmas quilt out of all the vintage Christmas fabric I have from the late 80s and early 90s. Here is my first block:
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| I’m just so lucky! |
I used 3 Christmas fabrics that I already had cut from a project that never happened last year.
I used two 12″ squares of the white stars, one 10 inch square for both the green and red.
Cut your fabrics:
From the white cut four 3.5 inch squares
From the white cut four 4 inch squares
From the red and green cut four 4 inch squares each
Start making your Half Square Triangles (HSTs)
Pair your fabrics up as follows:
Two pairs: 1 green square with 1 white square – right sides together
Two pairs: 1 red square with 1 white square – right sides together
Two pairs: 1 red square with 1 green square – right sides together
Using a fabric pen or pencil draw a line down connecting opposite corners, sew with your 1/4 inch foot on that line in both directions,
Next, cut along the line and you will end up with two matching triangles.
You should have a total of four triangles from each pair set of fabrics. For more detailed instructions on Half Square Triangles please see my Chevron Block Tutorial.
Iron your fabrics flat and layout your rows matching the picture below.
Sew your rows together. Press the seams from the top row to the left, second row to the right, third row to the left, and bottom row to the right – this will make it much easier to line everything up when you finish sewing your block.
Once all rows are completed pin them together at the seams:
This will ensure that your blocks line up properly (believe it or not I never pinned my blocks until the last month or so when I decided that perfection does sometimes matter!)
Sew your rows together and voila!
Sorry for the dark pictures, the weather has been typical rainy Washington weather and I haven’t been able to get outside to take any natural lighting photos.
Cutting and all, this block took me less than 30 minutes to make! Good luck!
Thank you so much to everyone who entered my giveaway! I had a record 85 entries! I couldn’t be more excited to celebrate my birthday by giving away something to our readers.
The winner of the name my machine contest is…
Thank you so much for entering Heidi, I absolutely love the name Sadie! I will be sending you an email shortly and so you can let me know your wallet preference your mailing address.
Now without further ado, the second winner, being picked by none other than Mr. Random Number Generator is…
Pam said…
Congratulations Pam! I will be sending you an email as well for your mailing address.
Thank you to everyone for the birthday wishes!
Heidi@TheCraftMonkey said…