Finally, A New Website

I finally made myself a brand-new website, it is at JulieZacconeStiller.com  , please go and take a look. It doesn't have everything I've ever made, just the more recent stuff.
Let me know what you think!
I'm torn on whether to keep my old website up, it doesn't work for me very well, and it is impossible to edit (which is why it sat there unchanged for so long!). But there's so much written on there and all those pictures.

PIQF Purchases

PIQF was great this year, so many familiar faces, new and old quilts. Noticed lots of birds and squids (?!) on many quilts. I didn't upload any of my quilt pictures this year, sorry.
And it's always a good excuse to buy some new quilting supplies because there are so many vendors all in one place.

I always have to get something Halloween related since the show is around that time and I'm in the mood, this time it was these great vintage Halloween postcards printed on fabric

A new ruler for shapes I hardly ever use, the Hex n More by Jaybird Quilts, I've been wanting to try block making with them. There are a lot of quilt designs that use this ruler and I'll have to pick one.

 Fun fabrics that I don't have a specific use for, just really liked them, especially this last torn newspaper collage print.

A swivel clip d-ring that I need to make a new bag at some point.

Wool thingies to take with me to China because they're lightweight and fun colors.Big felted balls.

As well as smaller ones. And wool circles, why not?

Note From The Management

Big News: I'm moving to China for a year with my husband, and I've set up a blog to capture all the day to day living in another country stuff. If you're interested you can check that out here at Travels With Scissors.  So far it's just pre-trip countdown activity.

I'll still be posting quilting and art related stuff right here. Yes, my sewing machine and related items are traveling with me, I didn't think I'd be able to last a year without them you know? It will interesting to see how and if living in another country influences my work. I can guess at how some things will be affected, but I'm imagining there will be other changes that I won't notice until after I'm back. Blogging has always been about documenting my process and evolution, so that will continue.

(All of the above assumes that I can figure out how to get past the Great Firewall and all that assorted fun stuff.)

Deciding what to bring with me to work on has been a real challenge, and I know that I'll be wishing I had one thing or another. But having to make do and figure out another way to get something done will be a good exercise and hopefully a good learning experience.

Screwy Explanation

Why the big gap in posting between September and November? I had this hardware removed, from my hip.


Don't look at the picture if you don't want the gory details!


And I guess it's taking longer and longer for me to come back to myself after surgery, part of getting older, and so many general anesthesia I think. Having something coherent to say is a challenge for quite a while post-surgery for me so I just went quiet for awhile.


It's kind of cool seeing the hardware in person, after just seeing it on x-rays. It's very heavy for its size (titanium I believe) and utterly smooth. It's surprising that something so small could hold such a major bone together. Looking at it and visualizing how it was situated there on the outside and inside of my bone explains a whole lot of why I had such pain going on the last nine months. Like my surgeon said, some people can tolerate these plates and screws with no problem, and some can't.



Now to figure out how to use this in a quilt somehow. (And put off a hip replacement for as long as possible...)

Wooly Kaleidoscope

Hadn't used Kaleidoscope Kreator program in a while, hadn't installed it on my new laptop (well, new last year), so here's one using a picture of some felted wool balls I recently purchased.

Another Notan Challenge

Another small-group challenge, Notan again, expanding the square was our assignment, along with some embellishment. I looked at my favorite of the paper exercises we did last time and took note of what I liked and didn't like. Didn't like how it went off the page.This was the new one. Whoops! Off the edge of the page. But I liked a lot of the elements and how the design worked together. But I did not want to try and copy it exactly, so this was a warm-up.

I decided to try working with leather and chose a nice deep black, rough on one side and fairly smooth on the other.

 The first two cuts, and it looks like a christmas ornament or maybe a lemon. I used gluestick to hold down the pieces in place.

 I tried to take a picture at each step so I could un-do something I didn't like.

 First one

 And then another.

 Ahhh, almost off the edge.

 Another ornament on the side, or chili pepper I suppose.

 Partially quilted, not free-motion, so the spirals are very wonky.

 And all done. I think I'll add some hand-stitches in white embroidery thread in the center of the square.
I really wanted the square to still be there in my final design and I think I achieved that. And I didn't go off the edge!
Others in the group made some great things, here's a picture of all four of ours together:

 Dolores Miller on the upper right, Maureen Lardie on the lower right, and Geri Patterson-Kutras on the lower left.