I was delighted to have the opportunity for a Play Day yesterday with Linda Waddle, a delightful artist/dyer/designer in Auburn, Ca. I spent most of the morning and early afternoon admiring and pawing her huge stash of hand dyed/stamped/screen-printed/painted/stenciled fabric collection.

Linda lives where you can see a full view of the Sierras from her back deck-not bad inspiration, huh? I have admired her work since I first saw it. Linda created “Helleborus” in 2005 I think, after taking a class from Hollis Chatelain and it won first place in Houston that year. When I first saw it in person at her local guild’s show, I was just dazzled by its beauty.

As you can guess from the pictures, Linda is beyond prolific-she has mountains of fabulous fabric-hate to call it “fabric” because really each one is a piece of art in itself. She says she can teach me how to dye like that-ha, ya think?

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For this piece she first created a Thermofax screen, and then used a discharge process to produce this work of art. She has a ton of these discharged pieces also.

I wish I had taken more photos. Linda also hand dyes wool and then designs patterns that use the wool. Sometimes when we’re lucky, she teaches classes at Tin Thimble in Newcastle.

It was so nice to have a play day. I’ve been working hard to prepare for two upcoming events. I’ll be presenting my qualifications on July 20 at the Northern California Quilting Council’s  Meet the Teachers Day, where there will be a room full of guild program chairs, shop owners and others who are looking to hire teachers and presenters. I hope they like me and hire me!

 I’ll also be doing a demonstration at International Quilt Festival-Long Beach during the Saturday Night Sampler on July 30. I’m going to be demonstrating “Ordinary Objects, Fabulous Fills”. That is all about looking at ordinary objects in your everyday life, finding designs in them that please you, and making those designs into free motion motifs.

 One of the richest sources of fabulous design I’ve found is…Kleenex boxes! Those Kleenex people must have a talented staff of design people to come up with those pretty boxes. Here is just one example of a pretty fill using the Kleenex motif as inspiration.
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I’m going to have a Give Away at my table-a whole cloth table runner. I have just started it so it doesn’t look like much, but I’m going to quilt the heck out of it with some beautiful threads and it will be gorgeous! You’ll have to come to my table and sign up to win-so make sure you stop by the Saturday Night Sampler if you’re at Long Beach!