They're here and they are ready to go.

This afternoon I took delivery of a metric tonne of books, literally. The lorry driver didn't think his lorry would fit down our road (we disagree) but he did drag the pallet up to our gate on a trolley so it wasn't too bad. The books don't take up as much space as we had feared and are pretty neatly stacked in the hall. I am however hoping that I can sell a good percentage of them at the Festival of Quilts next week and clear some space again. I have spent most of the time since then packing books up to go out to all the people who have pre-ordered. There was a mad rush to get as many to the post office as possible. I think about 60 went out in the first posting although some missed the last collection from the post office as printing the postage seemed to take forever. It took so long that the car park closed locking my car in, so we had to walk home. Of course that means the car will need collecting tomorrow morning too. I will take a picture of a finished book for you tomorrow, but I am now exhausted I feel like I have been lugging book about all day. Oh yes I have.

All of my quilts for the show are now at the binding and sleeve stage. The weekend will be spent working on that. It isn't my favourite job, but the machine bindings aren't too bad. I do have at least three quilts that need hand sewn bindings, they will be more of a problem. Still at least the end is in sight. I think this is the time to make a list on a white board so I can rub them off as I complete them.

The sample quilt

Embarrassingly, the first quilt started for my book was the last one finished and photographed. You may remember seeing a bad picture of this quilt quite a while ago, but I thought you might like to see a good one. This quilt was very much made for my bed. I love the black and silver fabric in it, and I was determined to have a quilt with it in. I also wanted to check the quilt worked with as few as three fabrics. This quilt really divided opinions, but whatever others think, I love it, and it did good service as the book sample.

Exciting delivery

Well it's exciting to me, and I would hope about 10 others. The QuilTarT t-shirts have arrived. My regular Thursday night students who are responsible for the quilt in my book, have offered to come and help look after my gallery at the NEC. We thought some sort of uniform might be a good idea, and well with me that means t-shirts. I asked what they wanted to be called and they came up with QuiltTarT. I am thrilled with the shirts, and I hope my helpers will be too.

I guess this would be a good time to tell you what the design specification for the book quilt was. I had only been teaching the class for a term and I wanted to see how they thought it was going. At the Christmas party I was dumb enough to ask. I think everyone came up with a suggestion, or two,

• we should all work on the same quilt
• but we have to all be able to take it home
• we have to be able to use our own fabric
• we will be broke after Christmas so we can't buy any fabric for a
• while
• it's got to be a lap quilt
• it's got to be a single bed quilt
• it's got to be a king size quilt
• it has to be quilt as you go

OK that's an interesting list to start with then they went on to techniques they wanted

• Celtic knots
• half square triangles
• flying geese
• foundation piecing.

Just to round that off, it had to work for a lady who was going to join us the next term to start learning quilting and teach something to those who have been quilting longer than me.

I came up with a round robin style sampler quilt. It works well with three fabrics or a whole scrap bag full. It has places where beginners can fudge things to get back on track (actually the experienced ones used
this more I think). I like the fact that the center panel can be pretty much completed in 3 hours which is
the standard class length (for the weekly classes) where I teach. It means they leave their first class with something they can show off.

So if you see anyone wearing a black t-shirt that says QuilTarT you will know who they are.

Overwhelmed.

I don't know where to start, it's been a mad few days (it feels like weeks since I last posted but it's only 4 days!) and the title says it all. I guess I will start at the end. Thank you, if you think you might be due it, it's for you. If you think you don't really deserve it, you probably do or will soon :). I can't begin to say how much I appreciate all the support my friends are giving me with my book. Who says self publishing means less support?From the people who have helped me name it, design it and test it, to those handing out flyers where ever they go.

It feels now like my book as a life of it's own, and I am along for the ride. It's a very strange feeling, but not a bad one. People have told me publishing is like giving birth, so I suppose it should have a life of it's own. The strangest one I've noticed is my book being listed on Amazon in Japan! Don't know why but google found that as one of the first links to my book. Very strange.

I am just about keeping up with enquiries about it, but other email is taking me longer to get to. Bear with me and normal service should be resumed just after the NEC show.

Talks, classes and books

It's been a mad mad week. I hadn't anticipated the amount of excitement and orders the foreword to my book would generate. Having picked myself up off the floor and dug my way out of the emails, we've put the order form up on my website. The pre-order price for "Ferreting Around" is £12 which includes postage within the UK. For those further afield I will charge the actual postage cost, which appears to be £6 to any destination, I will double check that before I guarantee it. I will be accepting pre-orders until the 15th of August at which point the price will be £15.99. Payment can be made by a cheque drawn on a UK bank or by paypal. If you email me the request I will send a paypal invoice. Er, I think that is everything but if you have a question please do ask. I am still a little stunned.

I've also been out and about. Yesterday I had a lovely day out, I mean I went and worked hard, with Harben Oaks. I wasn't convinced by a morning talk (OK to be honest I am not convinced by mornings in general) but it actually worked very well. They are a very lively group and I was lucky enough to be speaking at their summer lunch. I was very impressed with lunch and spent far longer there than I had intended. It was a day well spent and I came home inspired and ready to work. So thank you very much Harben Oak.

Today I was back at Sprat & Winkle quilters. I did a talk for them earlier in the year and today was teaching a workshop. Again a fun and hospitable group. I was highly amused that they live up to one of my rules of teaching. The person who complains most about their fabric will manage the biggest success. She was thrilled with her work (a journal cover) by the end of the day, and had managed to really loosen up and go with the flow. I was also very impressed with how prolific one student was making not one but three covers in a day! I think though, having looked at several peoples work, my favourites are those using hand dyed threads. This group had several people who brought along really interesting fabrics which made wonderful, personal and utterly unique covers. I hope they will all use them for many years to come and hopefully make a few more.

Now I have an art quilt calling to me from the frame. I'd better get some more quilting done, and I might even have a really early night, well early for me anyway.

Very exciting news

Well I think it is exciting, and I hope some of you will agree. As you know I've been helping out a couple of friends with their new book Cancertown. I was really impressed when they asked a well known comics writer to write them a foreword and he did. In fact he wrote the a stunning foreword. I've joked all along that I was chasing them and learning from what they did, to assist in getting my book out. The foreword seemed like a particularly good idea, I like reading them, and I suspect I am not the only one.

The question was who to ask? I knew what sort of person I was looking for, but they are few and far between. It needed to be a quilter, who did both traditional and way out work. They needed to be technically great, but not afraid to break the rules. I pondered it for some time and wasn't coming up with an answer. When it did dawn on me, I didn't think I had a hope of getting the person to agree, they were just too perfect for the job and way too big in the quilting world to bother with my little book. I plucked up the courage to ask and knock me down with a feather they agreed! I still can't quite believe that Ricky Tims took time out to do this for me, especially as at the moment he is busy working not only on The Quilt Show, but also on his next music CD. Without further ado let me share with you what he has to say about "Ferreting Around".

Every now and again, a new talent emerges in the quilt world that transcends the ordinary and is instantly unforgettable. I witnessed this first hand at the Festival of Quilts in Birmingham in August of 2008 when an emerging artist's name was announced again and again as a winner. Not only were her quilts fresh and exciting, but so was the artist who stepped on stage to receive the awards. It was a thrill to see a young talent making her mark in the quilting kingdom. It is obvious to quilters worldwide that the general quilting demographic is of a ‘certain’ age. It is therefore exceptional to me when someone from a younger generation latches on to this timeless art/craft and puts a fresh spin on it. To this I say, “Hear, hear!” However, I have discovered that Ferret enjoys creating her work using a variety of quilting techniques, many of which are rooted in tradition. She does not fly in the face of traditional quilting, but rather she embraces it and includes it into her extraordinary ‘quilting toolbox’.

Ferret is young and talented. But being young and talented are not the qualities that I most have come to admire in Ferret. It is her enthusiasm and heartfelt desire to share her passion with others. Many artists have a selfish side—or at least they hoard a few secrets to themselves in fear that someone else might rise above them. Not so with Ferret. She has not chosen to write a book about shocking and unorthodox techniques. Instead she polled individuals to find out what they most wanted to learn. In turn she has authored her first book with you in mind. The techniques included here range from simple to complex, but in every aspect it is written with easy-to-understand language and presented with excellent illustrations.

I am honored that Ferret asked me to write a foreword for her first book (thank you, Ferret). I hope she will pursue quilting and fiber arts as a lifelong career. If she does, you are no doubt holding in your hand a collector's item for it will always and forever be—Ferret's first book!