Four Stars

Frayed Edges met on Monday and it was a super fantastic day. I'll give it a big thumbs up and four stars!

Frayed Edges is my small art quilt group. There are just four of us. Me, Kate, Kathy and Sarah. We connected through Art Quilts Maine, the state-wide art quilts guild. We were all really looking for a smaller group of artists who we could really connect with and it has turned out to be an absolutely amazing group.

We spent a good bit of time preparing for our show at the Little Dog Coffee shop. Kate and I will be hanging the show tomorrow night. (Yikes!) We discussed pricing in depth. I've come to the conclusion that -- for me at least -- one of the most important tools in pricing is discussing it with others. We all feel confident and open enough with each other to be honest and come to numbers that feel right. As Sarah has posted on the QA list, an important determination is how much you are going to feel happy selling it for. In some ways, this supersedes all that stuff about cost of materials and time, price per square inch, blah blah blah. We're all fairing new to selling our work. I think we ended up with very fair prices that as we become more successful we will be able to raise. It was also helpful to compare the pieces between us that are similar and then price them in the same range. We have 32 pieces to hang and they range in price from $30 to $650.

Actually I'm pleased to report I sold one of my fiber collages. My friend Anne came over for dinner on Tuesday so I gave her a "preview" and she bought Transform. She said she "just loved" it and I was thrilled to sell it to her.

Several months ago I sent a small piece to Somerset Studio to be considers for publication in their upcoming issue that has the theme "portals." I was rejected. But the piece is back in time to hang in the show. It felt a bit unfinished and needed something. You know how small quilts risk looking like potholders or placemats? The Frayed Edges had the PERFECT idea to mount it on a wooden shingle. I would have never come up with this on my own -- another immeasurable benefit of a small art quilt group. Benjamin and I went to Home Depot yesterday where I found an unbound pile of cedar shingles. I asked if I could have a couple and the gal in the orange apron said, "I don't see why not." I was able to dig through for one that was the right dimensions and had some interesting wood grain. Free! Even better. It looks really great now. I'll post a picture later. (The link above is before I sent it off.)

We also had a great lunch. I made Rachel Ray's Ham and Rosemary Scones. And we had Hannaford brownie bites for dessert.

Kathy shared some of her hand dyed fabric all beautifully packaged in cigar boxes. We all felt so lucky! And she was glad to share with friends who appreciated her generoristy. (You know how some people just don't get it about FABRIC!!! Well... we all did lots of ooohing and aaahing and fondling because we LOVE fabric.)

And we also did a notebook cover swap. We used the pattern from the last issue of Threads to make beautiful covers for 5 x 8 mini legal pads. They were all different and stunning and now we each have something to make notes in during our little get-togethers. I should have taken pictures of the notebooks. What was I thinking? Next time.