DOVECOTE by Tina Givens

There’s never a lull in the beautiful fabrics our designers keep turning out, collection after collection. With such a great team of artists, you're bound to find a collection that suits your tastes and personality. Today, we highlight Tina Givens’ Dovecote.

“Flutter by in play feathered dove, Around your chamber of velvet, High in the sky. Your company is true and sublime as you dance Before mine eyes. My head soars as you fly and glide For love and in joy. I soften in thanks as I see thee graceful wing Allowing your beauty to rest upon. The air begins to soften, and pink blush on your wing Glitters by. Drift to slumber and stillness my love, the quiet of Your Dovecote in peace and joy.” Tina Givens

Tina explains the inspiration behind this collection. “I do find inspiration in all parts of my life. Being as busy as I am, I make sure I have a constant supply of imagery coming my way, whether in books, online or outdoors on my hikes. And came across an amazing image of a French pigeon with a sprout of amazing head feathers. I carried this image around me for the longest time, then forgot about my feathered friend.

One afternoon I sat on a quilt on the sidelines of the normal day activity of soccer practice for my John – I noticed a beautiful weathered Dovecote. This was a pigeon dovecote the nearby neighbors had apparently planned but it looked abandoned. As I sat there with intended paperwork for the 90 minutes in the late afternoon sun my attention focuses on a pair of doves who’d apparently made a home in the dovecote. They were darling and floated about, he left and returned and she playfully kissed him and took food indoors to her little brood. All the while my French pigeon had stirred my imagination yet again. Thus I wrote the above poem and sketched and played in color. Inspiration does come from everywhere. You just need to watch for it. “

Dovecote is arriving in quilt shops this month. Now it’s your turn to be inspired and make these beautiful prints shine with your creative touch.  Tina provides a place to start with her Framed Applique Art project available as a free download- Click Here!

 

 

 

Laminate Giveaway Winners!

And our Anna Maria Horner laminate winners are.. Emily C and Sarah Golden(crafty folk)!!

Please email Lee.wombwell@coatsplc.onmicrosoft.com your address so we can send each of you your laminates to get started on those fun projects!

Thanks to everyone else who posted- all were great comments!

One Million Pillowcase Challenge . . . Every Pillow case has a story!

How do you measure one million? One million seconds is 12 days. A million minutes ago was – 1 year, 329 days, 10 hours and 40 minutes ago.

To our friends at American Patchwork & Quilting and the 1 Million Pillowcase Challenge, it means the number of pillow cases made by quilters and sewers around the world, donated to organizations which serve those in need. It means perhaps, one million children may feel the love and hope in every stitch of that pillow case and carry it with them to brighten a day or lifetime.

As sponsors of the 1 Million Pillowcase challenge, we celebrate that your love of all things sewing has helped this worthy program reach over 500,000. Let’s not stop now! All PeopleQuilt.com offers free patterns for pillowcases. They asked people to vote for their favorite of the free patterns on a special Pinterest board and here is the winning pattern recreated on our blog and many others.

We joined forces with our friends at Coats & Clark to make our version of this adorable pillowcase. For the Pillowcase body and band we used FreeSpirit Beechwood Park by Jenean Morrison.

Adding to the adorable factor is the detail achieved with even more fabric and thread.
Train fabrics:
FreeSpirit Shelburne Falls by Denyse Schmidt, World Tour by Parson Gray, Notting Hill by Joel Dewberry, Designer Essential Solids

 Thread:

Dual Duty XP General Purpose Multi colors: 9325 Bowl of Cherries and 9343 Blue Clouds for Applique, Solids: 4310 Icy Blue, 5280 Parrot Blue

Of course our interpretation is more than a pillow case with a number, but a pillow case with a message. The train will keep chugging along to reach 1 Million Pillowcases . . . 1 million smiles, 1 million bits of love, 1 million stitched of your hands and from your hearts! Won’t you join us in stitching more pillow cases and be a part of one million reasons to give back? To learn more click here!

Sharing Our Love of Laminates-- A GIVEAWAY!

We love laminates! It’s hard to resist their easy-to-clean versatility and lovely drape. This week, we’re giving away some laminates to two lucky readers.

 

 

Each winner will receive a one yard cut of each of the three prints shown above. All three prints are from Anna Maria Horner’s Field Study collection. That’s three yards total to each winner!!

For a chance to be one of the lucky readers, leave a comment on this post by Sunday, August 18^th at midnight, Eastern Standard Time. We will announce the randomly chosen winners the week of August 19^th.

While there is no wrong comment, we would love to hear your favorite use for laminates. Good luck!

The perfect back to school fabric, Laminates!

As you prepare and organize for the Back to School chaos, don’t forget about FreeSpirit 100% cotton laminates like Field Study by Anna Maria Horner. They are perfect for so many projects and with such a large variety of prints available, you can get just the look you want.

While laminates can seem intimidating, there’s no reason to avoid them. Just keep these handy tips in mind:

• When using pins, keep them in the seam allowance. The holes they leave are permanent.  
• Use binding clips, vinyl coated paper clips or even bobby pins to keep two pieces joined together while you stitch. These tools do not leave holes. There will be times when you won’t have a seam allowance to hide holes from pins (topstitching, edgestitching, etc.) and these little tools will make a big difference.
• Do NOT iron. For best results, finger press the seams. If you must press, be sure to iron on the wrong side or use a pressing cloth over the laminate to protect the surface from the iron. Use a low heat to press.
• Use a specialized foot, such as a walking foot, Teflon coated foot or roller foot. If you do not have one, you can put painter’s tape on the bottom of your sewing machine foot. Painter’s tape will not leave residue on the foot and will help the foot glide smoothly across the coated surface.
• Use a slightly longer stitch and a sharp Universal 80/12 or a Microtex 80/12 sewing machine needle for best results.

Our laminates come in 54/55” (137/140cm) widths. Don’t forget to factor this into yardage requirements on patterns that do not specifically state yardage for wide widths.

Looking for ideas? We have a few suggestions.

Heather Bailey’s darling Jack & Jill lunch bag pattern:

   Link: http://www.heatherbaileystore.com/Jack-and-Jill-Lunch-Bags-p/mp005-jj.htm

 

Amy Butler’s Rainy Days raincoat pattern

   Link: http://www.amybutlerdesign.com/products/patterns_display.php?id=45

For a free pattern to make a laminate garment bag, check out Melissa Peda’s pretty project here.

 

   Link:http://100billionstars.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/Garment-Bags-in-Laminate.pdf

Be sure to come back next week when we share the love of laminates with a giveaway!