Flood Quilt donations...

 Longarm quilting donation quilts for the Calgary Flood  - Quilting for Calgary. 

In between summer holidays, entertaining children without electronic devices the whole day long,  and the regular daily grind,  I'm hoping to keep one every 2 days kind of goal.   I seem to have figured out a system to get about 3-4 hours in a day now. :-)

 My overall spiral freehand - using small medium and large spirals

More spirals..

 Loop de loop and double loop de loops...

 Pantograph work...

 front of pantograph quilting...

 practicing my smaller swirls which turn out into small spirals.  Will continue to work at this.

child keeping me company, and cozy.  ;-)

I bought another bunch of thread, and I think I have finally nailed down my favourites to buy future bulk.   I decided to buy more of the So Fine by Superior line. 

Kathy at Tamarack Shack referred me to a company in Canada called  Erie Quilt Art , a supplier to longarm quilting businesses.  

Of course, the choices are overwhelming, and I had no clue what colours to start out with.    So I called Gail at Erie Quilt Art and told her my predicament.   I said I needed to stock up on So Fine threads - send me xxx amount of the more popular colours.  I also mentioned that  I was working on charity quilts for the Calgary Flood.   After giving her a budget of what I wanted to spend,  she also convinced me to try some Magnifico by Superior as well.   On top o her great help, she offered to send me extra thread as a donation for the Calgary Flood longarm quilting.    I was thrilled by her generosity, as well as her knowledge.  Will be ordering from her again for sure! 

I'm extra happy to have yet another Canadian supplier to work with.

 As well,  I think I am a convert to Magnifico thread -  it is very similar to Glide Thread, but slightly less sheen and a smoother thread.  Gorgeous stuff.

Where do you get inspiration from?

  I often go to the library and loot the shelves in different sections.

 Zentangle doodling

motifs, artwork from different cultures

The obvious - tile, mosaic, architecture books.
Not so obvious -  search under motifs, doodling,  _____art work, continuous line drawings, specific subject matter.

On my most recent longarm project,  it had a Navajo inspired theme.   So I searched for a few books on  Southwestern art to give me some ideas.

Where do you get your inspiration from?  Do you take photos of everything where you go?   Do you organize them and actually sit down and sketch them out, or do they sit in your photo file?   How do you take your inspiration and make it into something tangible?

I have completed a custom quilt and am really really impressed with how it came together.  Of course, I know every flaw in it and hope they won't be picked out.   In the grand scheme, for one of my first custom jobs I am proud of it.   Can't wait to share it with you, but the owner would like to show it in a few shows first.  One of the hard parts of my job is not being able to share!