Raffle Quilt winner

The drawing for the raffle quilt was yesterday September 12h at the East Helena City Building and Adam Pople of Big Sky Montana was the lucky winner.

Artist Raffle Quilt and the winner was?

Over the last month I have donated my work to a variety of causes, and in the process thought about how artists well-known or unknown are always donating to one cause or another. Our work is raffled, auctioned, given away for door prizes, etc.  The raffling or auctioning of artwork is not unusual at all.  As part of my consideration of this topic, I learned that in Montana, an individual can raffle almost anything, as long as the value is under $5,000. There is no limitation on the purpose for such a raffle.  So, I have decided to raffle one of my own works in order to raise money so that I can continue to be an artist. I have made a beautiful quilt just for this purpose.  The raffle has already begun, and the feedback has been interesting, ranging from "wow that is really cool, I want 5 tickets"  to "who would want to buy a raffle ticket from you?"  I'll bet that if this same quilt had been donated to a non-profit (where I could only deduct the cost of materials and nothing for my time and expertise) and the non-profit raffled it, no one would likely wonder "who would want to buy a raffle ticket" for it. They would do it for the fun of it and the possibility of winning and to support the cause. Yet I wonder how many folks bidding on art or buying raffle tickets for art for a 'Cause" ever stop to wonder if the artist is benefiting in any way?

How often are you bidding on a doctor's services, the car mechanic, the groceries, gas or any other thing not art, a car a bike or some tangible item that some one had to buy from the store or car dealer?   Maybe some items were donated but not all by any means. 

I spent a week consulting with "the Gambling Guy" at our local state gambling control division office. He was very informative, answered all my questions and has even taken the time to review my Facebook posting to be sure I covered all the right information. The gambling laws involved in a raffle are interesting. A raffle by an individual in Montana has to be intrastate.  In other words, while I have tons of artist friends who live all over, many of whom would probably buy a couple of tickets, and vice versa if they conducted a raffle of one of their works, I cannot conduct my raffle other than in Montana.  Montana residents and people who are visiting Montana can purchase tickets but out-of-staters cannot.  I cannot sell raffle tickets over the internet, via credits cards or pay pal and mail orders must be from folks with a Montana mailing address. 

As a result of this raffle I may make enough money to live on for a year and continue to create beautiful fiber art,  or perhaps I will only make enough to cover the cost of materials.  That is part of the fun of this.  And, I love, love, love doing something that gets an "Oh, my, that is really outside of the box" reaction, or "why don't artists raise money for themselves?"  or "I might have to try that after I watch to see how it works for you." 

Facebook Posting 

"This is the offical raffle quilt.  It is roughly queen-sized, and has a burgundy minky-fur back.  Designer fabric was used for the flowers and the border, vintage muslin-ish fabric for the flower backgrounds, and wool batting inside. The drawing will be conducted on September 12, 2013. The winning ticket will be drawn by the East Helena Police Chief. (The time of day is to be announced, since crime investigations comes first, raffle drawings later.) Tickets are $10.00 each.The sale of raffle tickets is limited to the geographical confines of the state of Montana. Tickets may be purchased in person or through the mail if accompanied by cash or check (made out to Montana Quilts) and you have a MT address. No tickets can be sold over the Internet. The item being raffled must be worth less then 5,000. The applicable statute is Montana Code Annotated section 23-5-413."

The blocks made from designer fabric 

Liking it with the dark green and yellow.

The Lulu dog giving her 2 cents on how it looks. This was my first choice with a yellow green batik to set the blocks together. It sat around for weeks waiting to be finished.

Wondering why I do not quite want to finish it?

Replaced the batik with a soft green which is also used on the border and now it is ready to be finished.
This is one of the very few quilts I have ever ripped out.

Quilted

Quilted

Minky fur backing. The binding is on and it is now officially ready to raffle. 

The raffle quilt was won by Adam Pople of Big Sky Montana.

The winning ticket was drawn on Sept 12th 2013 by the local Police Chief Dale J Aschim.

Amethyst Quilt and Grandmothers

Today as I was working on finishing up some of my Grandmother's quilt blocks I realized I was sewing my whole life. Not just my life after I got here but my life that led up to me being. There are pieces of material from when my mother was a kid, the clothes I remember my Grandmother wearing, my favorite p.j's as a little girl, the dresses made for me. My Grandmother was a remarkable and ordinary woman. She survived the great depression on a farm in the wind blown high prairie of north Montana, 30 miles north of Gildford just below the Canadian border. She raised chicken, grew her own food, canned it, pickled it, preserved it, stored it for the winter. She also quilted with scraps, not this stuff we do now, but real scraps, card board templates and all pieces cut with scissors. I still keep some of the cardboard templates made from cereal boxes. The fabric in the container still smells like my Grandmother, the templates have her hand writing on them.

Last week I pulled out some of my Grandmothers scraps to do blocks in conjunction with a block of the month quilt I am working on. Of course there are a multitude of unfinished works in this container. Dresden plates, traditional blocks of all sorts and this damn Amethyst block. Florence Vande Sandt was born Feb 4th 1905, in Arthur N. Dakota, her parent moved to Montana in 1906 to the middle of no where, which is where my Grandmother stayed until 1957 when she moved to town(I bet the population was a booming 200 back then), Gildford MT. There have to be at least enough Amethyst blocks to finish two quilts maybe more. She had a quilt just like it on her bed, I loved that quilt and I do POSSESS it now. I use it when I feel really sad, or really happy. I use it when I want to feel my Grandmother close to me, I love that quilt, it reminds me of everything I loved the most about my Grandmother, and there are a multitude of things. Home made soup, gardens, sewing, long hours conversation and card games, love always plenty of love and time, she always had time, chocolate cup cakes with homemade chocolate frosting. Some days I am sure everything I know that matter I learned from my Grandmother.

Back to the Amethyst blocks, I spent hours looking for the block on google - no one seemed to have a picture of an actual finished quilt. There are picture of blocks started which look of the same time period as my Grandmothers. For some reason I do not think anyone knows how to put it together any better then I do. For the blocks I have a 4" diamond cut in half length wise will work, the blocks are pretty wonky but it doesn't matter I will  sew them any way, this is not a quilt about perfect or precise unless one is only thinking of warm wonderful memories and love is always perfect. The quilt my Grandmother made used whole diamonds to put it together, how she did it but she did.

Pile of Amethyst quilt blocks

My attempt to use whole diamond to sew them together. 

I find it works much better to use half diamonds.

Amethyst blocks.

The Amethyst Quilt made by Florence Vande Sandt. 

Amethyst Quilt made my Grandmother Florence Vande Sandt.  Some of the blocks in this are feed sack fabric. The age range of fabrics seems to be from the 30's through the 50's. I love the yellow. 

By appointment only

All my work is more or less in one location and for the next few days I am open by appointment. 406.449.3694.

There is so much. 

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Montana-QuiltsParker-Snowe-Fiber-Art/124107787653607

Christmas and non traditional holiday socks

Tis the season for socks and I have been having a blast making socks, turtles in paradise, Sunbonnet Sue in woolens, doggie paws and what ever strikes my fancy at the moment. I've made a few tradition socks as well.  However I see no reason to stick to a color theme at all. After all dogs don't care what color their socks are and it is winter so I am sure Sunbonnet Sue loves her woolens. So many sock ideas and so little time.

Doggie Paw socks

More doggie paw socks one with a shabby chic flair

Socks 

Sunbonnet Sue in woolens

Turtles in Paradise socks

A woolen doggie paw sock

A Christmas Sue, shabby chic, and X-mas by the sea. 

New little table runner pieces and the never ending studio floor mess.

Really I love my studio floor it is my pallet, always full of ideas, colors and fabric. I don't think I would know how to use a design board. Of course I have 4 of them, all full of stuff, stuff to think about until later, maybe even 5 years later or with nothing at all, they work well for that. But the floor is such a lovely place to lay things flat, look at from several angles and not even the dog walks on the fabric, just around it. I meant to do holiday table runners and this is what got done instead.

Just a little table center piece or one could hang it on the wall. 

Maybe this could come close to being a holiday table center piece out of flannel.

All those projects just waiting!

WIP for a customer who wants her butterflies in a wreath.
For sure a holiday kind of piece.

I experimented with decorative stitches in dark thread. 

Quilted table runner, not for any holiday coming up soon.

The Studio floor is almost visible and City Scape's II is almost done.

I keep thinking the studio floor will become visible again, but perhaps it will always be a work in progress just like so many quilt projects are. I did finish another City Scape's top and I may even know how I want to quilt them now. Both of the City Scape's are made using the scraps of star quilt strip ends, then adding yellows and oranges for the lights. The sky is scraps as well.  I love thinking of new ways to use scraps to do projects out of the ordinary for me. 

City Scape's II almost done.

City Scape's I and City Scape's II tops complete.

The studio floor is visible more then less.