I’m happy to say that our new Ready-to-Go!® Blank Canvas Books are getting a lot of buzz. On this week’s episode of Fiskars TV, Fiskateer Cheryl Waters is doing a fun little project featuring a canvas book she’s called “Birds of a Feather.” Check it out here (then click on “This Week’s Episode – Birds of a Feather”). While you watch the video you can download the Instruction Sheet, which includes additional photos of the process.
The way she uses spray inks and acrylic paints with stamps on the book, make for a super easy project. This could be done with kids, and I’m always looking for fun stuff to do with mine.
Canvas books accept all kinds of media quite easily. Because the canvas isn’t primed (coated with gesso or other type of base product), acrylic paints and inks will slightly absorb into the weave giving the pages a nice textural feel. I love how the pages can be sewn, and I’ve been sewing like crazy onto the soft memory book I’ve been making for my daughter Emma.
Emma's Canvas Book
It’s all about her fourth year, and I’ve had fun printing photos on fabric and stitching them into the “story.” There are so many projects I have in mind for canvas books that it’s hard to pick which one to start next. I have to say, that this is one of the nicest things about these books—you can get started right away. There’s no need to take the time or figure out how to sew up a book yourself.
This week we’ll be giving away a Ready-to-Go!® Blank Canvas Book and a selection of fun paints and other products that will work great on a canvas book to one lucky blog reader. All you have to do is leave a comment below that briefly describes your idea for a canvas book project. On Monday morning (March 9), we’ll pick one commenter at random and announce the winner shortly afterward. Good luck!
*Note: Comments will be closed on Monday, March 9, at 9am PST
Many quilters make quilts for good causes—at risk babies and kids, women’s shelters, returning soldiers, and more. This is the first of what will be a series of postings about groups, organizations, and individuals who quilt for a cause.
TheAlzheimer’s Art Quilt Initiative (AAQI) is a grassroots, volunteer effort to raise awareness and fund Alzheimer’s research through art. It was founded in January 2006 by quilter Ami Simms whose mother was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2001. The group is a registered nonprofit corporation with tax-exempt status—all profits are used to fund Alzheimer’s research. So far the group has raised $277,000.
Two of their efforts are:
A nationally touring exhibit of quilts about Alzheimer’s Alzheimer’s: Forgetting Piece by Piece. It contains 52 quilts each interpreting Alzheimer’s in some way. So far, more than 190,000 people have seen this exhibit and it will continue to crisscross the country until 2010. A book and a CD of the exhibit are available for purchase.
An on-going auction and sale of small quilts Priority: Alzheimer’s Quilts, so named for the urgent need for research dollars. They are small works of art no larger than 9” x 12” and are auctioned on the first day of each month, sold outright on the Internet, or sold at selected venues across the United States.
C&T Author Becky Goldsmith is one of the many quilters participating in this effort. Her quilt Trying to Hold On is part of the Alzheimer’s: Forgetting Piece by Piece traveling exhibit. Becky says “I gave a great deal of thought to the kind of image I would use in my quilt and decided that I would approach the quilt as if I had Alzheimer’s. I knew that if diagnosed, I would still quilt, but over time my sewing abilities would diminish.
“I used a traditional appliqué block for the quilt (a simplified version of one of the Aunt Millie’s Garden blocks). The center block is as perfect as I could make it. As I moved away from the center the shapes, colors, and stitching become much less precise. I didn’t use a pattern for the border. I randomly pulled scrap fabric from a pile and haphazardly cut stems and leaves. I used heavy black thread for the border appliqué. It’s almost hard to look at… but I believe this is one of the most interesting quilts I have ever made.”
Visit the Alzheimer’s Art Quilt Initiative website for more information about this important, on-going effort and learn about how you can make a quilt, make a donation, and spread the word.
Well, the randomizer has been run, and we’ve got a winner for our February Design Challenge. Congratulations, Kim! We’re putting together $100 worth of C&T goodies to send your way. Enjoy!
Thank you so much to everyone who participated. We’ll post our March Design Challenge within a few days, but to give you a clue…what’s sweet and rhymes with “schmupcakes”? Hmmm…..
To celebrate our new website design we needed a party, so we planned a potluck lunch. Because we’d recently been discussing the foods we remembered from when we were growing up, we decided that would be the theme for the potluck.
Imagine our surprise when most of the foods that people brought were sweets and desserts: ants on a log (peanut butter on celery with raisins), Nilla wafers, Ho-Hos, apple turnovers, dirt cake (crunched up Oreo cookies, chocolate pudding, and cool whip), chocolate wafer cookies, animal crackers, mini-donuts, chocolate frosting on saltine crackers, jello, and chocolate milk. As “main dishes” we had taquitos, mac ‘n cheese, and noodle pudding. We also had Triscuit crackers and cheese-in-a-can.
Great fun, but I don’t think we’ll do that one again…
We’re all familiar of movie trailers, those great little previews that give us a sneak peak at an upcoming flick. Well, one day the question was posed at C&T said, “Why don’t we make book trailers?” What a great idea! Here was an opportunity to interview our authors, show highlights from the book, and post the videos on the internet for every one to see.
The only problem was we had never made a book trailer before. How do we do it? This is where the superstar production team at C&T steps in. Trust me, when I say superstar, I mean SUPERSTAR! Within a short amount of time, a few key people learned how to film, edit, record sound, add music and create incredible book trailers all from inside a cubicle. So with out further debut, I am pleased to present our very first book trailer starring Design Explorations for the Creative Quilter.
A fabricaholic of yesteryear, from the Clues in the Calico Club online archive.
Now up at the Clues in the Calico online club: everything you ever wanted to know about antique chintz. Members can read about its exotic history (including several stints as a contraband item), how to identify it, clues that will help you date antique chintz quilts, and how to shop for reproduction chintzes. As always, Barbara leavens her facts and dates with fascinating tidbits of social history that help bring old quilts and fabrics alive.
Lutradur. Is it fabric? Is it paper? Actually, it’s neither. Some call it the, “magic in the middle.” I call it AMAZING! Lesley Riley‘s recent book, Fabulous Fabric Art with Lutradur, includes two sample sheets of this amazing mixed media product and, for me, it was love at first touch. I could fold it, I could burn it but I couldn’t tear it. How odd. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever created with and I couldn’t wait to get my paints out and play on it.
Autumn Field, by Lesley Riley
I have to say, in browsing Lesley’s book, I was amazed at the amazing number of fun techniques she covers. I decided to read through the book first, so I sat down with it one rainy weekend day and after just the few pages, I couldn’t take the anticipation any longer. I jumped up, ran to my studio (aka. my kitchen) and whipped out my paints. WOW! The next thing I knew, I had blown through the two pieces that came in the book and I started jones-ing for more. Luckily, as product development manager at C&T, I had some extra samples in my box of goodness that I’m in the process of working on for C&T. After those couple of pieces were gone, however, I had a dilemma. Now what am I going to do? I wanted to start a bigger art piece but I had no more Lutradur. So sad.
Guess it’s a good thing, I had this product on the development block, and I’m happy to say my desire for more product will soon be fulfilled. C&T is now going to be selling Lutradur in packages of 10 sheets that will include 5 sheets each of the regular weight 70 gram and the 100 gram heavyweight. Yippee!
I can hardly wait to get back to my projects and share this fun, funky new product with all my artist friends but I’ll have to wait until Mid-April, which is when the product hits the warehouse.
C&T Publishing is a group of quilters and crafters dedicated to publishing products tailored to our audience. This blog is where we break away from book schedules and marketing campaigns to focus on what drives us to be creative and how this creativity manifests itself in our every day lives.
I’m happy to say that our new Ready-to-Go!® Blank Canvas Books are getting a lot of buzz. On this week’s episode of Fiskars TV, Fiskateer Cheryl Waters is doing a fun little project featuring a canvas book she’s called “Birds of a Feather.” Check it out here (then click on “This Week’s Episode – Birds of a Feather”). While you watch the video you can download the Instruction Sheet, which includes additional photos of the process.
