70273 minis – Jeanne Hewell-Chambers

8 small quilts

Quilters love mysteries, right? For you non-quilters, a mystery quilt is a fun way to make a quilt from patterns (a.k.a. clues) dribbled out as you go along. You don’t know what the final quilt looks like till the last steps of putting it together.

Well, just this morning, I woke up in room 106 of the Comfort In in Montpelier, Idaho (yes, The Engineer and I are on a road trip going from the Utah Quilting and Sewing Marketplace in Sandy, Utah last weekend to the Northwest Festival of Quilts in Portland, Oregon this-coming weekend – May 11 and 12, 2018) and bless goodness if I didn’t hatch a mystery challenge for The 70273 Project the minute my eyes opened! Here in The 70273 Project Tribe, we celebrate and champion differences, right? So our Mystery will be . . . well, different.

small quilt, white base with two red X's

back of a postcard

If you choose to participate in The 70273 Project Mystery Mystery (and I sure do hope you will ’cause this is gonna’ be fun), here’s what you do:
~ Make and send Minis (The 70273 Project version of a fabric postcard). As many as you can and want to cause I need A LOT of them. Of course I’ll need a Provenance Form with your Minis. (Note: Though you can if you want to, you don’t have to send them individually. You can put them all together in an envelope and we’ll call that a bus trip.)
~ Send picture postcards (or photos, if you can’t find postcards) of landmarks in the area where you live.
~ Send me stories about something that’s quirky and off-the-beaten path about your area. Do y’all have an unusual ritual or celebration that happens every so often? Tell me about it and send photos or postcards. Is there a landmark that you take visitors to see? (Like the geyser in Soda Springs, Idaho that Sandy and Marvin Martin took us to see yesterday, for example.) What would we find on a brochure in the rack in a hotel lobby? Introduce me to your hometown by way of its landmarks, celebrations, statues, small museums – anything that would be on a billboard or in a brochure rack in the hotel lobby. And don’t stop with just one ’cause I know wherever you live is interesting.

four old geysers standing in front of a geyser

Bonus points if you email me photos of your Minis, photos of your picture postcard (or just photos that we’ll call postcards), and your stories before licking the envelope and putting the stamp on.

Start sending as quick as you can, send as many as you can, and don’t stop till I tell you to.

And last but not least, check back here often for more breadcrumbs cause more will be revealed as we go along.

~~~~~~~

Other places to gather around The 70273 Project water cooler:

Shop with Amazon Smile and support The 70273 Project (US only).

Subscribe to the blog (where all information is shared).

Join the English-speaking Facebook group – our e-campfire – where you can talk to other members of The 70273 Project Tribe.

Join the French-speaking Facebook group – our other e-campfire – where you can chat with other members of The 70273 Project Tribe.

Like the Facebook page where you can check in for frequent updates.

Follow the pinterest board for visual information.

Post using #the70273project on Instagram. (Please tag me, too, @whollyjeanne, so I don’t miss anything.)

And if you haven’t yet made some blocks, perhaps you’d like to put some cloth in your hands and join us.

Or maybe you’d like to gather friends and family, colleagues or students, club or guild members, etc. together and make a group quilt.

SaveSave

A Mini Made by Cindy Cavallo

A Mini made by Kim Monins, Jersey, Channel Islands U.K.

Just in time for #GlobalBlockDay and Blockapalooza, a new way to make quilts: fabric postcards which will be called Mini Quilts or Minis for short. The spark for this idea goes to Jennifer Lario Moya who tucked the cutest mug rug into a batch of blocks, and one thing led to another, and here we are talking about how to make Minis.

A Mini made by Pam Patterson

To keep things creative to make and visually interesting to look at, there are some familiar guidelines/rules and some new guidelines/rules:

Minis must be made of fabric.
Minis are 6″ x 4″ / 15cm x 19cm – that is 6″/15cm wide x 4″/10cm tall. Think landscape or horizontal orientation.
Minis must have 3 layers: a top, stiff middle; backing. Top and backing must be fabric.
The top must be of white or slightly off white background, just like the quilts.
Backing fabric can be whatever you choose, though many of the samples made by veteran postcard makers feature a light colored backing fabric so it can be made to look like a postcard.
Include as many pairs of red X’s as you like on the front of the Mini, but they must be presented in pairs, just like in Middlings, and each pair of red X’s will be considered a commemoration.
You must tell me on the Provenance Form how many pairs are in each Mini (so I don’t have to count!). You may send one Provenance Form with a batch of as many Mini Quilts as you want to create, and each Mini Quilt must have a note attached telling me the number of commemorations (pairs of red X’s) on that particular Mini.
Please no words, numbers, names, drawings, or symbols, etc. on the front – only pairs of red X’s.
Feel free to write a note or a favorite quote or make a drawing on the back, but say it with me: not on the front.
Embellishments (beads, lace, ribbons, textured fabrics etc.) are welcomed.
Edges must be finished in red or white.
If mailing them as postcards, check with your local post office for mailing regulations. (See notes below for more info.)
Even if you mail them in envelopes, please get the Minis hand canceled so that when they’re displayed, viewers can see how far they traveled.
Remember that the backs will often be displayed, so don’t write anything (like your address) you don’t want the world to see.

Another Mini made by Pam Patterson

Minis Made by Jennifer Lario Moya

PLANNING COMMITTEE
Thank you and thank you big to these people for teaching me about fabric postcards, making samples, and helping me figure out how to turn them in to Minis for The 70273 Project:
Betty Hedrick
Carolyn Katzoff
Chantal Baquin
Janet Hartje
Jennifer Lario Moya
Kim Monins
LindaMarie Davinroy Smith
Margaret Andrews
Marjorie Holme
Pam Patterson
Suzanne McCarthy

From Pam Patterson

From Pam Patterson

From Kim Monins

From Cindy Cavallo

MAILING

Just mailed my postcards. Because they are fabric, the postal service was going to treat them as a parcel and put one of those ugly stickers all across it, even after I specified “hand cancellation”. After I said WAIT! the post lady did not apply the sticker. I explained to her I needed it to really be handcancelled (stamped with a stamper.) Since the post office rules did not allow that, we came up with a plan for her to handcancel the fabric and then mail all three postcards in a mailer. It cost $3 and something cents to mail all three that way. Mission accomplished. ~ Pam Patterson
The US post office will mail postcards without envelopes only if they’re thinner than 1/4″. ~ Marjorie Holme
I don’t know a lot about the French Post Office, I probably wouldn’t send it except inside an envelope. ~ Chantal Baquin
Fabric postcards are an art form in themselves. postal art. That has gone thru the post in a normal way, with a PO cancelled stamp. ~ Kim Monins
If I put my fabric postcards in a clear envelope, my local post office made me put the stamp on the envelop and wouldn’t take time for hand cancelling. ~ Janet Hartje
Clear envelopes protect any embellishments like beads etc. I have occasionally mailed in a clear envelope but get thE PO to hand cancel the stamp before sealing it. So it’s ‘legal’ AND looks like it’s made its journey! ~ Kim Monins

A Mini Made by Kitty Sorgen

TECHNIQUE

I’ve made a bunch of fabric postcards. As long as it’s less than 1/4″ thick, it mails with regular first class letter postage. I usually use the thick double fusible pellon, like is used for fabric bowls. I fuse plain muslin to the back and draw a traditional postcard back design with half for message and half for address. On the other side I fused my collaged/embroidered/stamped fabric piece. I prefer hand stitching so I usually buttonhole stitched the edges…most people use a machine stitch zigzag over the edge. It’s best to secure any embellishments, like buttons, well. Smaller things can be trapped under a layer of netting or tulle. ~ Marjorie Holme
Minis need a tiff middle which can be interfacing, buckram, Pellon or the like. ~ Kim Monins
Just as on blocks, red X’s can be painted, embroidered, hand stitched, appliquéd – apply them any way you choose.

I think these Minis will add much visual interest to exhibits, and they will fit into spaces where big quilts won’t. We welcome experienced fabric postcard makers, those who’ve been meaning to make fabric postcards, and those who never thought about it before, but adopt a why-not attitude and dive right in. We welcome Minis and look forward to seeing many of them on social media as you post on 14 October 2017, Global Block Day! If you have anything to add, please leave a comment or email me. And hey, thanks for telling all your friends ’cause I know you’re popular.

SaveSaveSaveSave

SaveSave