Vacation

I have just got back from  vacation.  As usual we spent time in  our home in Germany, just on the border with Alsace, France.  I had hoped for better weather, but the first week was very rainy and cold.  The last few days, however, were sunny and warm, just in time for us to leave !  I only stitched on one of the days, because we were finishing up some things in the house, going to wine festivals, and generally sightseeing.  Although I do not want this to turn into a travel blog, I thought you might enjoy some photos.  I love the style of houses in this region, so here is a selection of Southern Wine Route homes and Alsatian ones.

And just for luck, some lavender stuck in our old barn door.

Boutis Exchange Pierrefeu du Var March 2014

The next boutis expo of Lei Roucas dou Barri will take place on the weekend of 8 and 9 March 2014

Every second year, there is an exchange of boutis pieces.  The other years, there is a challenge to create an original boutis based on a theme.

These are the rules for 2014:

Boutis in white cotton sheeting, batiste, silk, linen etc ......

Stitching and Stuffing:  white or color

Size:  8 x 15 cm (no smaller, no bigger) - approx. 3.15 x 5.9 inches

Shape:  flat or with volume (eyes and antenna how you wish)

Examples:  pincushion, scissor case, frame, lavender sachet, heart, .....

There will be a jury to avoid "unequal exchanges" which will check stitches, quality of stuffing, size according to the rules.  Butterflies which don't fit the criteria will not be shown.

For the 9th Boutis expo, the organizers are counting on the competence and earnestness of each individual to have an exchange worthy of the name, respecting the rules, which are there simply to ensure that the items shown and exchanged are of equal quality in research, harmony, precision, originality and fineness of work.

The theme is  A BUTTERFLY



The Association protects beautiful pieces - to give or exchange a boutis is to design and make it as one would wish to receive it.

Three of us from here are definitely going to take part.  In other years we have exchanged hearts, and small pouches.  There is plenty of time to think of a design, and I am looking forward to doing this again.

Le Boutis Ouvrage Divin

On Friday, just in time for our lovely long weekend, I received a parcel from Lou   It was a delightful book that I recently read a review of in the Fil Blanc, and know is very hard to get now.  I asked her if she would send me one if she could find it, and honestly, I did not hold out much hope - but, here it is !!  Thank you Lou, I love it.

The book does not have patterns, rather it is a selection of pieces from the author's collection with information about their provenance where available, size, and materials used.  My favorite is a lovely wedding vanne, made by a young girl in Draguignan, who lived in extremely modest circumstances.  Sadly, her fiancé did not return from a war in 1870, and her vanne was put away.  Later in life, due to financial constraints, she was forced to sell the piece to one of the families she worked for as a laundress.  I am not usually a very sentimental person, but I found this story very touching and thought of the sacrifice involved in buying the materials and spending many hours stitching this glorious design, after a long and laborious work day.

I was thrilled to find that I actually have the pattern for this piece in my collection of all things boutis, and so it is now on the list for "someday".  It is large and will be quite a lot of work.

Quilt Finishes and Works in Progress .....

I have been trying to get some items finished recently, so I can concentrate on what I really want to work on.  It bothers me to have so many projects in progress, and typically I don't like to have more than two or three going, mostly because then you don't see much progress on anything.  So here are a few finally finished !

This is the 2012 Christmas mystery from Country Quilts and Bears - lovely fresh star made of a jelly roll and white Kona cotton - it is quilted in red and green with a Christmas lights pattern (quilting by Marlene Hooten)

This one is another Christmas mystery,several years older - also quilted by Marlene.  Have to add the snowman's eyes !

Another Christmas mystery - bells and poinsettias.  Love this one !  The quilting is great with blue and brown poinsettias, goes well with the background.

 It was hard to keep the quilts draped on the chairs outside - it is a lovely sunny day here but very breezy and everything was slipping down.

This quilt has a sad, sad story.  Made several years ago, pattern was Prairie Flowers by Barbara Brackman.  I handquilted it with a wool batt.  My daughter liked this quilt and "borrowed" it for her apartment.  Meaning well,she washed it and put it in a hot dryer - well, you can guess the rest.  I really didn't know what to do with it, it was totally misshapen and you couldn't lay it flat.   I was ready to throw it away, but I had spent a lot of time appliqueing the blocks and borders,so I decided to try to rescue it.  It took me a week to rip out the quilting, and wash and press the top.  After that, it didn't look bad, so I took it to Marlene to quilt with a cotton batt.  So here it is - restored !

 Still have to put a new binding on it.

 Here are a few more Flower Garden blocks, I have finished 13 now.

 Inspired by a miniature quilt I saw at a quilt show, I drew a simple pattern for an applique basket, and am using a charm pack of French fabrics to make a scrap quilt.  Janet had more of the background and gave me that, so I am thinking of making this as big as I can, not repeating any fabrics.  It will be a true "charm" quilt, so I will be collecting French provence fabrics for some time !  All those so far are Valdrome charms, then I will use Olivades and Souleiado, depending on what I have.

Having got these things done, I really want to get back to my boutis.  I haven't made any progress on it for quite some time.

Retreat at Dayspring

 For the last 10 years, our Guild has spent a weekend at Dayspring in Ellenton as a quilt retreat.

The property belongs to the Episcopal diocese and has a small chapel with Florida roof.

 We have a large well-lit room to sew in, and meals are provded.

The retreat committee this year put on a lovely tea party for us on Saturday night with delicious cakes and fruit.

In the middle of the property there is a lake facing the dining room where you can see the fish jump.

I did quite a lot of piecing on a new quilt, and took my Featherweight to do it on.  I wanted to get more familiar with this old machine and knew there were others present who could help me if I ran into problems - and of course I did !  Nevertheless, the Featherweight is a real pleasure to sew on, makes a lovely straight stitch and is small enough that you can still talk to the people sitting opposite !  Every year I think I will get so much done, and take far too many projects.  It's fun being able to choose what you want to work on !  And also this year I did quite a lot of shopping - one of the shops nearby had a sale, and I was able to buy some more of the Winterthur museum's John Hewson prints.  

Pinterest ???

  Since I had been hearing so much about it, I looked at Pinterest this morning - of course on my favorite subject, boutis.  I was astounded to see some of my own photos from this blog.  Some ladies had the courtesy to cite the source, and I thank them for their honesty.  Others simply copy blog photos and pin them without showing where they came from.  I recognized photos that I know belong to other people and were copied from their blogs.  Is it just me ?  Is no one else bothered by this thoughtless copying ?  I do have a note in the sidebar saying please do not copy content, but I suppose we have all become so used to open use of images that no one thinks twice about it and no one bothers to ask.
Maybe I am overly sensitive, but I have decided to no longer post photos of my antique pieces, or my own original or adapted designs.  What are your thoughts on the matter ?  Please write me comments, because I really want to understand other opinions.  So here goes:  should we assume that everything we show on blogs is no longer ours ?
UPDATE:  There are a couple of things that individuals can do to prevent this happening.  One is to watermark photos, although this can also be manipulated.  The other is to block photos from being pinned, and Pinterest has a html code to enter under the section of your blog template to do that.  Apparently, Pinterest requires that users obtain permission before pinning images, but clearly no one actually does it.  Even if Pinterest is blocked on a blog or website, people can still copy google images and de-identify those.  So the bottom line is this:  the only way to prevent copying of images is not to post them on the web.