Please join me in welcoming guest blogger Margery Newman as she shares with us the new Milwaukee Art Museum and quilts from the "American Quilts: Selections from the Winterthur Collection" exhibit. Thanks Margery for sharing this fabulous exhbit with us.

I had the great pleasure of leaving my home in what some people this summer are calling the Baked Apple (NYC) for a day, and heading out to Milwaukee where I visited the Milwaukee Art Museum and the exhibition "American Quilts: Selections from the Winterthur Collection". The show is on until September 6.

I was excited to see selections from one of the finest collections of early American quilts when my car pulled up to the Museum and I beheld the jaw-dropping futuristic architecture.

And inside, the museum was just as stunning! That’s Lake Michigan you see out the window.

In the Museum lobby, the signage for the exhibition shows a detail of an appliqué counterpane quilt by an unknown maker from around 1800-1825. It’s influenced by Indian palampores (a type of hand-painted and mordant-dyed bed cover made for export) and features birds and a butterfly cut from fabrics printed by John Hewson, a Philadelphia calico printer who learned his trade in London.

Here’s the quilt in its full vibrant glory depicting a tree in flower with curling branches and heart-shaped leaves. It’s so unique and feels to me like the tree of life. (Photo credit: Maker unknown, Appliqué counterpane, 1800–25. Cotton, 100 x 92 in. Courtesy, Winterthur, Museum purchase with funds provided by Mr. Samuel Pettit in memory of his wife, Sally Pettit)

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I thought I’d try something new here at the Quilting Gallery, Share-It Tuesdays! I’d love to see what you’ve been working on lately. Share your recent quilting-related projects by adding a link to your blog post below.

Over the weekend, I got caught up on Bradie’s Summer Star Sampler quilt and got back to working on Rachel’s Pinwheel Sampler quilt. This quilt got put on hold a couple of months ago, but I’d really like to finish it this summer.

Here’s my Block 6:

See blocks 1 to 5 here.

I also cut out Blocks 7 and 8 as well as the sashing, cornerstones, scrappy binding, and top/bottom border fabrics.

I was inspired by this quilt here, to add top and bottom borders of squares. The quilt should finish around 56″x68″.

So, what have you been working on?

I made some changes last week to the Quilting Bloggers directory. For each blog, you’ll now see the latest 3 blog posts. I’ve also added integration with Facebook, so you can “Like” blogs here and share them with your friends on Facebook.

If you’re blog is not showing the latest posts, there are generally two reasons: (1) your blog’s RSS feed is broken or does not exist; or (2) you are not using the Title box in your blogging software. See this post for blogger/blogpost help.

Interesting fact: Of the 4,338 blogs in the Quilting Bloggers directory, 3,393 are blogspot web addresses (does not include domains hosted at blogspot). More than 78%. ‎236 are WordPress.com blogs or 5%.

More than 200 blogs were removed from the directory as they no longer exist.

You can help keep the directory up to date. If you see a blog that is no longer relevant or is broken, you can click the little cloud/comment-like icon that appears on the right side of the blog title. Enter the info on the next page, then I’ll get a notice to check it out.

Hope you like the new changes!!