Happy New Year to Everyone!

I still haven't made any resolutions but I plan to make more art quilts and loosen up and have more fun doing it. Sometimes I think we get so focused we forget how much fun it is to play. I recently got a chance to go to a regional SAQA meeting in FL and they asked us to bring a dozen or so ATC's. I barely know what those are: Artist's trading cards. So I asked and yes make them from textiles, size of a regular business card, 2.5 x 3.5 or paper, or mixed media. Just enjoy the process. One good piece of advice is to make a larger quilt sample and then slice it up to the smaller sizes and bind the edges as desired. That's quicker than one on one for each one, especially since I made them all the night before. It was such a freeing exercise! We could set up an ATC trade via snail mail here in TN/KY. Is anyone interested?

If you can get to the area northwest of Knoxville, TN, Clinton to be exact, a well established quilt shop is going out of business due to the death of one of the partners. I just found out, the sale starts 12/31, but they want to sell off everything as quickly as possible.

726 Clinch Avenue, Clinton, TN

Sale at Quick Qut Quilts – 50% off all fabric, patterns and notions in the Sale Room and 40% off all regular price fabric, patterns and notions. Thursday,  December 31, 10 AM – 4 PM, and Saturday  January 1, 10 AM – 4 PM. Due to the  current situation, all payments must be made in cash or by check.

This is an opportunity to stock up on a lot of fine fabrics.
I also thought I would mention there are a LOT of fabric shops in this area, so if you come, check out these. Times and distances are calculated from Morristown, TN courtesy of SAQA member Tina Sams.

Stitch ‘N Time Fabric Outlet

2223 Broadway Dr, Bean Station TN

865-993-2357

12 min, 8 miles

The Cherry Pit

115 Bruce St, Sevierville TN

865-453-4062

55 min, 37 miles

Holloway’s Country Home

3892 Cosby Hwy, Cosby TN

423-487-3866

45 min, 40 miles

Garden Quilts

215 Rivers Edge Ln, Sevierville TN

865-365-1436

60 min, 40 miles

The Pattern Hutch

926 Centerview, Pigeon Forge, TN

865-428-1361

65 min, 45 mils

Tennessee Quilts

114 Boone St, Jonesborough TN

423-753-6644

65 min, 54 miles

Mountain Stitches by Susan

601 Glades Road, Gatlinburg TN

865-436-0077

70 min, 56 miles

Sewing Machines Etc

8419 Kingston Pike, Knoxville TN

865-690-7770

57 min, 57 miles

Gina’s Sewing Center

10816 Kingston Pike, Knoxville TN 

865-966-5941

62 min, 62 miles

Discount Fabrics

2030 Old Hwy 25 E, Tazewell, TN

423-492-0422

43 min, 34 miles

Iva’s

1020 Old Knoxville Hwy, Sevierville TN

865-428-8008

51 min, 36 miles

The Sewing Center

716 Parkway, Sevierville, TN

865-365-1408

59 min, 38 miles

Dizzy Divas Fabric Shop

5404 Millertown Pike, Knoxville, TN

865-474-9921

44 min, 44 miles

Magic Cat Quilt Shop

206 Clovefield Ln, Knoxville TN

865-579-4402

55 min, 48 miles

Mammaw’s Thimble

4319 Papermill Dr, Knoxville TN 

865-588-8818

53 min, 51 miles

Sewing Bee

107 E Jackson Blvd, Jonesborough TN

423-753-7399

66 min, 55 miles

MidSouth Sewing Center

7240 Kingston Pike, Knoxville TN

865-249-6381

57 min, 56 miles

Pappy’s Quilting Place

3426 Sevierville Rd, Maryville TN

 865-980-0950

85 min, 60 miles

Don't forget to contact me with all your quilt news for TN/KY and show us what you are working on, we would love to see it! Also, remember our regional call go to saqa.com for the Regional Response to Marie Webster Quilts due January 6. Also, are you a JAM? Apply to be a juried artist member by January 1, 2016.

Hope to hear from you soon!

Sharon Buck
buckhotelcarsonsprings@gmail.com
sharonbuckart.weebly.com

Fall Fun

Back in the olden days, once the harvest was in it gave the ladies more of a chance to gather together and quilt. Today I stopped by a hand quilting group and participated for a while. I am not much of a hand quilter but what a great social occasion that afforded our ancestors. Plus they were creating much needed bed coverings and expressing some of their inner artist.

Hope you are having a productive fall! I would love to see what you are working on. Please email me about your projects and we can post them here.

Wasn't the SAQA auction the greatest? You can still participate!!

Do you have a special pet? Maybe we should do  little pet art quilt! This is Cocky Doodle Doo and he is oh so cocky!

Hope to hear from you all soon!

Sharon Buck
www.sharonbuckart.weebly.com
KY-TN Regional Representative SAQA

Isn't that gorgeous? Read on for some summertime news from our fellow member and JAM Nysha Nelson. Its some of his Zentangle.

My Zentangle® Experience

I first heard about Zentangle from other quilters who saw me stitching and suggested I might like it. Then, rooting around the internet looking for inspiration for continuous line quilting patterns I saw various things related to Zentangle. I was intrigued.

In the Fall of 2013 I went to Road Island to become a Certified Zentangle Teacher. At the time I thought I was using loads of patterns in quilting and in mixed media work. One thing I learned at my certification was that I had not been doing things in the Zentangle Method.

Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas, founders of Zentangle talk about the “method” that is Zentangle. A method of creating pattern that is easy and can be meditative… I am a calm person and thought I ‘got’ that part of the experience. When it was explained however and I experienced it first hand I was blown away. I had to share it! Something that is creative, that anyone can do, that requires almost no tools and takes only a few minutes. PERFECT!

Then I started practicing  Zentangle almost daily. Just fifteen minutes at the beginning of a work day and I found I was able to concentrate longer, was more focused and I was able to do work that was more accurate. Partly because I had left behind things that weren’t work after my fifteen minutes tangling and partly because I was conscious of my breathing.

While the method of Zentangle needs to be tweaked into continuous line quilting it’s spirit is quite simple to add to my quilting practice. I consciously breathe at the beginning of a quilting movement. I focus only on the mark I am currently making, not the last one or the next one — the one I am making now! My work has improved as a result of just fifteen minutes a day.

 

 

Above you see more of Nysha's beautiful work. He is featured in the April/May edition of Quilting Arts Magazine and also has three segments in the current Quilting Arts TV Series 1600. 

 

Let me know what YOU are doing too! We love to read about what folks in the KY-TENN Region are working on and creating!

Wonderful Opportunities in Chattanooga

Mark your calendar, September 16-19 2015. That's American Quilt Society week in Chattanooga! Can't wait to check out all those beauties. Looking for some volunteers to man a table for SAQA to tell everyone about our great group. Please contact me at buckhotelcarsonsprings@gmail.com if you can come and help for a few hours.
David Taylor's swan with babies quilt is just so awesome. Look at this video where he tells us some about his process:
I have to admit I have been too intimidated to try entering an AQS show but what the heck? I think I will try....
Maybe this video will give you the inspiration you need too!
Sharon Buck
KY-TENN Regional Rep SAQA
sharonbuckart.weebly..com
etsy.com/worldinaraindrop

2015 Benefit Quilts

Hi All,
Its that time of year again, time to make a 12" x 12" benefit quilt for the SAQA Benefit Auction. This is my third year and I have really enjoyed the process. I hope you all will consider trying it this year; you really do get more out of it than you put into it. Here is the quilt I did for 2013:

 Its called "The Story of the Mustard Seed."

      This one from 2014 is "Life In Our Family."

                      And for 2015 I have "Beach Conversations - Newport."


You can read more about the process on my blog sharonbuckart.weebly.com  I would like to put up art quilts from all over the KY-TN region so send me your pictures and your news and lets liven up our blog!

Happy Valentine's Day

Hope this great red and pink themed day is inspiring your creativity. Here is a cute heart from member Kathy Loomis. She says,  "I make abstract art -- usually with a needle but sometimes with a pen, brush or camera, scissors and glue, pliers and wire cutters, whatever is there. I have a husband, two sons, seven sewing machines, a big messy studio and lots of other people's art. Life is good!" She has more information about making these hearts and a tutorial on her blog at artwithaneedle.blogspot.com

I will be gone for a week to a hubby themed event involving tractors and fly wheel engines and no internet or cell phone service so if you email me, it will be after the 22nd before I will answer back.

Here are some inrpirational reds to celebrate Valentine's from the garden.

 This Lobster Claw Heliconia usually blooms in the summer; its a thrill to see it in February for Valentine's.

 Silk Tree Blossom is so beautiful!

Berries on one of the Butterfly Bushes

Happy New Year! by now you know how its going to go with those New Year's Resolutions or revelations or wishful thoughts or maybe you have already lost 10 pounds!! I mean who doesn't resolve to eat healthy, work out, lose weight, oh blah blah blah!!
Well I am excited because I just finished my entry for Southern Accents and its signed, sealed and delivered. If you are anything like me, you have a tizzy fit when it comes time to get that artist's statement ready to go and have mercy on me, getting that perfect photo... so its done now! for good or evil! Oh, maybe I am not supposed to admit this!
Seriously, there are a lot of great shows coming up. Southern Accents is open to TN and to all of us in the southeastern region and the deadline is coming up fast, its Thursday, January 15. The only reason I am not my usual 11th hour self is because I am going to a Flywheeler event and will be without technology for a week. More shows include Wild Fabrications with a deadline at the end of this month, PAQA South on February 20, Balancing Act on February 28 (this is a big SAQA show open to all) and Sacred Threads due March 9. And here is a tip on a show that is not listed on SAQA, if you are a member of DAR they have a big show coming up with textiles having a deadline of February 1 and other arts and crafts deadlining on February 15. You can read all about it on their website, DAR.org and if you cannot find it email me and I will help.
Let's have another great artist review like the one on Jane Burch Cochran. Please send me your info or pictures of some of your current work and we can all inspire each other.
Blessings on 2015 and all of you!
Sharon Buck