Difficult Students

Like most people these days, I have more than one job. I have my passion which is my pattern company, Larkspur Lane Designs, but to pay my bills until I hit the "big time", I teach for a local sewing machine dealer. I love my job, but some days it can be really hard. Each month, I have to come up with 3 new projects to teach. Each class is supposed to run about 2 hours. This means the projects must be small, but how many pillows and embroidered towels does one person need! I do get to teach more involved projects that can be more than one class. I get to choose these, so I get to learn a new project or technique as well as my students.

Most of the time my students are really open and try very hard to keep up and follow my directions. But recently, I had a student that I wanted to ask why she signed up for a class when she obviously didn't want to do this particular project. From the moment she walked in, she wanted to change the design. I have done this class at least 6 times and made at least 5 samples, so I know this design inside and out. This lady refused to listen to instructions and ruined about a 1/2 yard of fabric before she would let me show her how to cut it. She then asked me how we were going to finish the project in two sessions when she and her friend weren't even finished cutting their fabric. I reminded her that I had said earlier, she didn't need to cut all of her fabric at once. At this point, she looked at her friend and said, "Let's finish cutting our fabric."

I gave up at that point. She's coming back for the second class next week, so I think I will have more to tell you then!

Oh Christmas Tree

Well, it was so easy to add a photo yesterday, so I'm gonna do it again! This is addicting.

This is a redesign of a quilt I did for Quilt It For Christmas 2008. I simplified the design a little bit and changed the fabrics. This is a just a drawing at this point, although I have the fabric ready and waiting for me when I have the time. After the magazine came out last August, I was vending at a quilt show, and had a lady walk up to my booth and blurt out, "I hate that star!". Well, I was shocked, but I agreed with her, because I had already told the editor of the magazine before I sent the quilt, I wasn't happy with the way the star looked in the original quilt. I sent extra fabric along with the quilt in case they wanted to applique over the center block, but they published it "as is". And I have had a lot of requests for the pattern, so I guess it wasn't all that bad.

Jumping In

Well, I'm going to try and keep up with this and add things regularly. I am new to this, so I hope you'll bear with me as I try to figure this out. This will be my first attempt to add a picture, so I'm going to cross my fingers and hope this works! This picture is a block that I am working on called Carson's Star. My son Carson sat beside me as I worked on it and made suggestions about color, scale and orientation. I am really happy with the way it turned out and plan to make 8 more in different color combinations. I will post another picture, if and when, I ever get to that point and maybe a few along the way.

I'm baaaack!!!!

Wow, it took me awhile, but I finally fiqured out how to get back into my blog! Can they make this stuff any more difficult?

Anyway, lots of stuff has happened since my last post. I was published in Quilter's Home magazine for the first time last year in the March/April issue. As soon as it hit the stands, I was contacted by an editor from another magazine under the same corporation and was published 3 more times last year. So far this year, I was published in the March issue of Quilter's Home and I have to say, its just as exciting as the first time! Now I just need to find the time to sew out all of the designs I have saved in my computer so I have something to sell when people see my name in a magazine. I wish I could sew as fast as I design.

I also met a wonderful designer at a local quilt show that I hit it off with right away. Her name is Kourtney Kenzie and she is a force to be reckoned with! She lives about 3 hours north of me and opened her own quilt shop, with her friend Melanie Barrett, in Pittsfield PA. I swear, there is nothing this girl can't do. I'll put her website address in a future post as soon as she it set up.

I did my first Trunk Show/lecture in about 4 years in Beaver PA and actually enjoyed it. I am very shy by nature and have a difficult time standing up in front of a roomful of women who have probably been quilting 4 times longer than I. The ladies were so nice and made me feel so comfortable.

This is starting to sound like a Christmas Brag letter (which I hate), so I'm going to end for now, but with any luck, it won't be 3 years before I post again!