Meadow Mist Designs News

I have some great news to share with you today!

1.  Blogger's Quilt Festival

My quilt Use Your Illusion was nominated for Viewer's Choice in the Blogger's Quilt Festival over at Amy's Creative Side.  You can go to the Viewer's Choice category and vote for your three favorite quilts. (Thank you so much in advance if if you think mine is one of your favorite three and decide to vote for it!)

My quilts are also in the Small Quilt category (Plus Plus) and Original Design category (Use Your Illusion).

2.  Kona Pineapple Block

My paper pieced quilt block Kona Pineapple was highlighted by Craftsy in their Weekend Warriors: 8 Free Paper Pieced Block Patterns blog post.  The Kona Pineapple pattern has now been downloaded over 2,750 times just this month!  I am blown away by this.

3.  Plus Plus Quilt by Izzy @ Dizzy Quilts

My wonderful quilty friend Izzy has made a super cute quilt using my two-tone version of Plus Plus. I love the colors she used and her pieced back incorporating more plus signs, you can check out more pictures (including the awesome pieced back) over at her blog Dizzy Quilts.

4.  Broken Frames Quilt by Anna @ Fresh Dew Drops

Another quilty friend, Anna, has made such a wonderful lap size version of my pattern Broken Frames using a charm pack of Bartholo-meow's Reef.  I just love the soft colors she used and the wave quilting pattern.  You can see more of her in-progress pics over on her Instagram account @freshdewdrops.

Thanks for taking a look!  If you make anything using Meadow Mist Designs patterns, I would love to see them.  Please add them to the Flickr Group "Meadow Mist Designs" or share them on social media with the hashtag #MeadowMistDesigns.

Craft Fair Preparations

I have a whole bunch of finishes to show today, 27 in fact.  I have an Etsy shop that in addition to selling my quilt patterns, has pincushions, thread catchers, and the occasional quilt.  I have thought about attending a craft fair before, but I was afraid that the market for handmade pincushions would be too small.  

My friend Laura (etsy store MzSweetpeaStudio) is participating in the Village Square Art and Craft Show in Highlands, North Carolina on June 20-21 and she invited me to put some pincushions and thread catchers in her booth.  Sharing a booth sounded a whole lot less scary and more fun.  I said yes and prepping for the craft show.  (Which came at a great time because my Etsy shop has gotten pretty low on handmade goods.)  Here are the new finishes I have made for the craft fair...

16 combined cathedral window pincushions.  (Remind me not to made to make so many at one time ever again, each step took forever...)

6 modern quilted pincushions (I just love the stag with the glasses!)

5 cathedral window pincushions, I just can't stop making these.

I will be listing all of these handmade goodies in the Etsy shop over the next few days.  I hope that if you are in the Asheville area, you will stop by the Village Square Art and Craft Show in June.

I will be posting after the craft fair to give my thoughts on whether it was worth it, what sold, what did not sell, and my learnings.

I am linking up to Link a Finish Friday, Whoop Whoop Friday, Thank Goodness Its Finished Friday, Finish It Up Friday, Fabric Frenzy Friday, and Show Off Saturday @ Sew She Can.

Mystery Quilt 2015 Coming Soon!

I am very excited to announce that the next Mystery Quilt is going to be kicking off on June 4th, the first Thursday of June!  The pattern is drafted, tested, reviewed and ready to go!

The mystery quilt-a-long will run from June 2015 until March 2016 with a set of directions revealed the first Thursday of every month. The mystery quilt will finish at approximately 72" x 72", a very nice lap size.

The directions will be posted to this blog (and can be found in the Mystery Quilt tab above), given out in hard copy at both the Foothills Piecemaker's Quilt Guild (Greer, SC) and the Greenville Modern Quilt Guild meetings, and e-mailed to the mystery quilt distribution list.  The e-mail is great because I can mail out a much more friendly to print version of the instructions.  Want to be added to the e-mail list?  Simply add a comment to this post (with your e-mail if you are a no reply blogger) or send an e-mail to me at cheryljbrickey (at) gmail (dot) com.

June's instructions will be fabric requirements including yardages needed and some helpful hints to pick fabrics and colors.

New for this years's Mystery Quilt:

1.  Button - I have made a button for the mystery quilt :)  If you decide to join in on the quilt-a-long and have a blog I would love it if you posted the button.

<a href="http://meadowmistdesigns.blogspot.com/p/mystery-quilt.html"><img src="http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t75/c_kaminsky/MMDmysterysmall_zpsve8rhrx7.png"></a>

2.  Prizes - We will have prizes!  I am still working out the details, but we will have at least one, hopefully two-three prizes to giveaway at the quilt reveal in March 2016!  ( I will post more details as the prizes get finalized.)

3.  The Un-Mystery Quilt - Want to join in the fun but making a mystery quilt is not your thing?  If you would like to see the final pattern to decide whether to join in, or to help pick colors; simply e-mail me and I will send you a sneak peak (the only rule is that you have to keep the design completely to yourself as to not spoil anyone else's surprise).

I hope that you are planning on joining me for a fun mystery quilt!

Nuanced Neon Mosaic Contest Entries

A few days ago, I saw on my Bloglovin feed that Stitched in Color was having another fabric mosaic contest sponsored by Mad About Patchwork.  Rachel gives a theme and some inspirational photographs and then you get to go play, creating different fabric bundles from the fabrics in Mad About Patchwork.  I may have ordered a bit too much fabric the last few months so I hoped that making digital fabric combinations would satisfy my fabric tooth without having more fabric arrive at my house (you can have a sweet tooth so why not a fabric tooth?).

The theme was Nuanced Neon.  For my first bundle I went with the colors I think about first when I think neon: bright, warm, saturated colors.  I added some slightly more muted warm shades for balance.  I think that these fabrics would look great in a quilt design with some strong geometric shapes on a crisp white background.

For my second entry, I focused more on the "nuanced" part of the theme.  I first selected some bright neon blues, because a bright neon blue is not the first color I think of when I hear neon.  I then paired the neon blues with some low volume prints, most of which had a blue component to tie into the neon blues.  I think that the prints, as arranged below, would look awesome as a repeating plus block in a quilt.

I hope you enjoyed my interpretations of Nuanced Neon and will hop over to Stitched in Color's blog to see the other gorgeous entries.

2015 New Quilt Bloggers: Sign Up Now Open

Last year I participated in the 2014 New Quilt Bloggers Blog hop hosted by Beth @plum and june. I am so thankful to Beth for facilitating the group discussions and blog hop; I learned so much and met such wonderful women. These women have become my teachers, students, confidants, quilting bee mates, pattern testers, supporters, and most of all my friends. 

In addition to making new friends, the hop was a great way for me to improve my blog and get more involved in the blogging and quilting community. This year, a group of alumni are going to work to host the 2015 New Quilt Bloggers Blog hop, and I am thrilled to be a part of the mentor team.

Today, I am so excited to announce the details on how to sign up to participate in this year’s 2015 New Quilt Bloggers Blog hop!

2015 New Quilt Blogger Blog Hop Sign Up

If you are interested in participating in the 2015 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop and have been blogging:

1. mainly about modern quilting*,
2. for less than 2 years,
3. writing at least 4 posts a month,
4. are willing to agree to be actively involved in the blog hop through visiting and commenting on the other blogger’s hop posts,
5. and have or are willing to open a Facebook account to participate in the group discussions,

Please visit and fill out the 2015 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop Sign Up Form.

*Modern quilting to you is modern quilting to us.

Note: We will accept 100 participants for the blog hop this year. The sign up form will be available until May 31, 2015, or until we reach 100 participants.

2015 New Quilt Bloggers Resources

If you look at the top of my blog, you will see a new tab just for the 2015 New Quilters Blog Hop. I am going to keep this tab up to date with links to all of the different advice posts for the hop so you can find them all easily during and after the hop.

When the blog hops begin, each of the mentors will be hosting a group of blogs and we would love for you to follow along and check out the new members of our online community. If you don’t already, please think about visiting / following / checking out the co-hosts for this years blog hop.

Yvonne @ Quilting Jetgirl
Stephanie @ Late Night Quilter
Terri Ann @ Childlike Fascination

I am looking forward to meeting all of the new quilt bloggers and learning some new blogging tips!

Blogger's Quilt Festival - Spring 2015 - Two-Tone Plus Plus

It's that time of the year...twice a year during quilt market, Amy over at Amy Creative Side hosts a Blogger's Quilt Festival.  We are allowed to link up two quilts to the various categories and have the opportunity to visit and be inspired by other blogger's wonderful quilts.  I was so excited to be highlighted in March in one of Amy's Blogger's Quilt Festival Features.

My second entry to the festival is the Two-Tone version of my Plus Plus pattern.  My post about the quilt and design can be found here and I am entering the quilt into the Small Quilts category.  

For the two-tone version of Plus Plus, I made the baby size using Kona white and Kona silver and a red print from Maritime Modern from Riley Blake for the accent plus.  I originally was going to use a dark gray binding but when went I to use it, it just did not look right.  I tested many, many other prints and colors until I tried this new Lotta Jansdotter print (from her new collection at JoAnn's).  The mustard yellow print worked perfectly.

I really had fun with the quilting on this quilt and went with some really dense quilting. In the background, I quilted swirls using white Aurifil thread. For the plus signs, I used my longarm ruler for the first time on my domestic machine (which actually was easier and more fun than I thought it would be). I designed the line pattern in the plus signs to be continuous so I only had one start and stop per plus sign and used matching color Aurifil threads for the quilting.

 My other entry Use Your Illusion is entered into the Original Design category and can be found here.

Here are my entries over the years:

Fall 2013:  Pi Quilt
Fall 2013:  Pink Broken Herringbone Quilt

Spring 2014:  Kona 2013 Quilt
Spring 2014:  Improv Quilt Two

Fall 2014:  Oh The Places You'll Go
Fall 2014:  Vintage Star

If you have stopped by my blog for the first time from the quilt festival thank you!  You can find some of my finishes, tutorials, and my new mystery quilt-a-long (starting in June!!) on the tabs at the top of the page.  

If you would like to follow my blog, here are some links for some different following options: Bloglovin, Email, Instagram.

Blogger's Quilt Festival - Spring 2015 - Use Your Illusion

It's that time of the year...twice a year during quilt market, Amy over at Amy Creative Side hosts a Blogger's Quilt Festival.  We are allowed to link up two quilts to the various categories and have the opportunity to visit and be inspired by other blogger's wonderful quilts.  I was so excited to be highlighted in March in one of Amy's Blogger's Quilt Festival Features.

My first entry to the festival is Use Your Illusion which I designed as the Modern Quilt Guild's free quilt pattern for March for all of their members.  My post about the quilt and design can be found here and I am entering the quilt into the Original Design category.  

I came up with the design for Use Your Illusion when I was playing with idea of echoed diamonds in EQ7 and then started randomly erasing some of the lines.  I loved the resultant effect with the partial and full geometric diamonds set on negative space.  The quilt reminded me of the 1990's Guns 'N Roses song "Use Your Illusion", so that is how it earned its name.

Abby Latimer of Latimer Lane quilted this quilt for me.  This is the first quilt I have ever had long arm quilted and Abby did such a wonderful job.  I wanted a curved quilting pattern to contrast with the straight lines of the piecing, but I wanted the curved quilting to be precise (my quilting with my domestic machine always has an organic, more random feel to it).  I picked out a figure 8 pattern that I think gives the quilt texture without taking away from the piecing.

This pattern is totally paper pieced which gives such precision to the quilt top. It is a lot to paper piece, but the paper piecing is very beginner friendly and the paper pieced paper templates are designed so that all of the seams within the quilt top nest for perfect points and less bulk.

Here are just a couple more pictures of the finish.  This is one of my favorite quilts I have ever made, thanks for taking a look!

My other entry Two-Tone Plus Plus is entered into the small quilts category and can be found here.

Here are my entries over the years:

Fall 2013:  Pi Quilt
Fall 2013:  Pink Broken Herringbone Quilt

Spring 2014:  Kona 2013 Quilt
Spring 2014:  Improv Quilt Two

Fall 2014:  Oh The Places You'll Go
Fall 2014:  Vintage Star

If you have stopped by my blog for the first time from the quilt festival thank you!  You can find some of my finishes, tutorials, and my new mystery quilt-a-long (starting in June!!) on the tabs at the top of the page.  

If you would like to follow my blog, here are some links for some different following options: Bloglovin, Email, Instagram.

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day and 100- Blocks Giveaway Winners

Thank you all so much for entering my Sew Mama Sew and 100 Blocks Giveaways.

Without further ado, the winner of the 12-piece Kona fabric bundle was number 78, which was Kay.  Congrats Kay, your bundle is on the way :)

And the winner of the 100 Blocks Volume 11 magazine was number 145, which was Renata A Little Bit Country.

It was interesting to hear about everyone's quilts on their to-do list and bucket list.  The most popular bucket list quilts were a double wedding ring quilt and a storm at sea quilt.  The double wedding ring quilt is definitely on my bucket list.

Thanks so much again to everyone that entered!

Anniversary Improv Table Runner

I have a quick and fun finish to share with you today. My Aunt and Uncle are celebrating their 50th anniversary soon so I thought that a handmade table runner would be the perfect gift.

I have always admired by Aunt's art, she has been creating longer than I have been alive.  Growing up, we had many of her ceramics and mixed media paintings in our house.  Based on her art, I thought she might appreciate some improvisational quilting.

For the color palette, I decided on using mostly blue and green solids I with a black print or two. I also included typewriter fabric (Cotton & Steel's Black and White collection) because it was just too cute not to.

I improv pieced a couple of green and blue strips then started playing around with them to see how to fit them all together. I added in some stripes of essex linen in black (I love the texture it adds) and some shiny Cotton & Steel to add some sparkle. 

I used a serpentine stitch on my Bernina for some quick quilting, marking the first line down the center and then using the edge of my walking foot for spacing each additional line.

I finished the runner with some gray binding I had on hand (that I was originally going to bind my two-tone Plus Plus quilt with) and after binding, the runner finished at 15" x 48".

I just need to make a label and get this runner in the mail :)

Just as a reminder...

I have two giveaways going on right now, one for the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day for a 12-piece fat quarter bundle of Kona cottons and a second for a copy of Volume 11 of 100 Blocks magazine by Quiltmaker.

Also, I will be kicking off the next mystery quilt on the first Thursday of June
(June 4th), all of the details can be found in the mystery quilt tab above, I hope you consider joining in!

I am linking up to Link a Finish Friday, Whoop Whoop Friday, Thank Goodness Its Finished Friday, Finish It Up Friday, Fabric Frenzy Friday, and Show Off Saturday @ Sew She Can.

Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks - Volume 11 - Blog Hop

Welcome to my stop on the Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks Vol. 11 Blog Tour!

I am so excited to have a block called Outlined Plus in Volume 11 of the 100 Blocks magazine.  (I previously had my block Sewing Triangles included in Volume 10.)

I have a little obsession with plus sign blocks, they are so classic and versatile and thought this block was a cool spin on the concept.  I had a little fun playing around in EQ7 playing around with some quilt designs to give you some ideas on how the block would look in different arrangements and colors.

4x4 block arrangement using some RJR Cotton Supremes

4x5 block arrangement using April Showers by Bonnie and Camille for Moda

1x4 block arrangement with negative space using Jungle Ave by Sara Lawson for Art Gallery Fabrics

 1x4 block arrangement with negative space using fabric by Lotta Jansdotter for JoAnn

Make sure you stop by Quiltmaker's blog, Quilty Pleasures, for some great prizes and a complete list of blog tour participants! 

Thank you so much for stopping by, I hope that you have a chance to check out some of my recent finishes and come back to check out my new mystery quilt-a-long starting in June :)  If you would like to follow my blog, here are some links for some different following options: Bloglovin, Email, Instagram.

Now on to the Giveaway:

Quiltmaker's Magazine has generously donated a free issue for a giveaway!  This magazine drawing is open to everyone-international included.  The magazine will be shipped directly from Quiltmaker's.

To enter, just leave a comment telling me one quilt you plan to make this year. 

The giveaway will run for 1 week, until 8pm EST on Wednesday May 13th.  I try to respond to each and every comment I get on my blog, but with giveaway posts the numbers are usually too great to do this.

If you are a no-reply blogger, please leave your e-mail address.

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day - May 6th, 2015

Welcome to the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day!

This is my fourth time participating in the Sew Mama Sew Giveaway Day.  I love Sew Mama Sew (I became a Sew Mama Sew Contributor last year) and I enjoy spending a few many, many hours entering giveaways and finding new wonderful blogs each SMS Giveaway Day.   

So onto the giveaway....who wants some delicious Kona solids?  How about a 12-Piece Blueberry Thicket Fat Quarter Bundle of Kona cotton solids by Robert Kaufman?  I am such a fan of Kona cottons, they have such a great feel and so many colors.

For those who are new here, here is a little about myself (for those that are returning, thank you!).

My name is Cheryl and I am a chemical engineer/patent agent by day and a quilter at night.  I have a wonderfully supportive husband who allowed me to turn the guest bedroom into my quilting room, an almost 8 year old son and 5 year old daughter.  I love designing quilt patterns and doing quilty math which allow me to combine my quilting skills with my engineering and technical writing backgrounds.  

In addition to my blog, you can find me hanging out on Instagram as MeadowMistDesigns.  I sell my patterns and sewing accessories on etsy (as Meadow Mist Designs) and patterns on craftsy (craftsy also has a couple of free patterns).

I hosted a free Mystery Quilt-a-long in 2014/2015 and I am getting ready to start the next one in June!  I hope you will consider joining in!

Below are some of my recent finishes in the past few months...

Now on to enter the giveaway!! 
This giveaway is open to everyone, everywhere in the world and is for one (1) Blueberry Thicket Fat Quarter Bundle which includes 12 fat quarters of Kona cotton solids. This giveaway starts today (Wednesday May 6th) and will run until Sunday May 10th at 8 p.m. EST.  (To lower shipping costs, the fabric bundle might be shipped disassembled.)

To enter:
1. Leave a comment, any comment. If you would like a topic, I would love to know one quilt that is on your bucket list to make.

2. My followers, old and new, get an additional entry. Please leave a second comment letting me know how you subscribe.  (Here are some links for different following options: Bloglovin, Email, Instagram )

Note: If you are a no-reply blogger then please include your e-mail address. If I can not reach you, you can not win.

Thank you so much and I hope that you will decide to follow my blog and join me on my quilting, sewing, and pattern writing adventures!

PS - On normal posts, I try to respond to each and every comment and visit the blogs of those who comment, but on giveaway posts I unable to due to the high number of comments.

* Giveaway now closed, thanks for entering! *

RJR Cotton Supreme Winner and Plus Plus Pattern Sale Ending Soon

Thank you all who stopped by and took the time to check out my post about RJR Cotton Supreme fabrics and my new Plus Plus pattern!

Without further ado the lucky winner of a bundle of 27 different RJR Cotton Sumpreme solids is number 295:

Which is Susan, congrats!

Just as a reminder, Plus Plus is now available in my etsy shop.

Have a wonderful weekend!