Astronomical Quilt at the Houston Festival

For those of you who are just tuning in,

during her time on the International Space Station,
Astronaut Karen Nyberg hand-peiced a very cool star block...

... and then invited all of us quilters everywhere to contribute our own star-themed blocks to be combined with hers into a big global community space quilt to be displayed at the International Quilt Festival in Houston! (<3 <3 <3 <3 <3) If you haven't yet, you must watch the video invite.

In the end
the project received 2,260 blocks! 
They had to make 28 panels to fit them all!
How fabulous is THAT!

To my extreme delight, they chose to put my block in the main panel (of the 28)
just a few blocks over from Karen Nyberg's! (When I found this out, I pretty much squealed and ran around my apartment like a little kid.)

Here's Astronaut Nyberg at the festival with the finished piece!

Astronaut Karen Nyberg with the completed Astronomical Quilt!

This picture makes me grin so big, I can't even deal with it! :) 

Astronaut Nyberg's block is the red white and blue one in the center, and mine is just to the right..
well, mine looks like this:

more deets/pictures here

I really wish I could've gone to visit the festival, and seen all 28 panels, but sadly that just wasn't in the cards for me. 

Luckily, my friends Emily Klainberg and Deborah Bingham were in attendance, and were kind enough to send me some pictures! (Thanks so much you guys!!!)

There's my block! And there's Astronaut Nyberg's!!!

all-over star quilting in the mix

Furthermore

the festival posted a gallery on the website of 48 of the Astronomical Blocks along with the correspondence that accompanied them. There are some really amazing letters and stories - you gotta check it out! I can't recommend enough!

Here are a few of my favorites:

This one is by Ilana Spanier. 

The seven points commemorate the 7 astronauts of the Columbia Space Shuttle.

Astronomical Block by Ilana Spanier

This one is by Dana Saxon, PhD, it's the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram! So cool!

Astronomical Block by Dana Saxon, PhD

This next one is by Marianne LaFarge. I love the view of Spain!

Astronomical Block by Marianne LaFarge

And this last one is by Jan Meredith in honour of her father who worked on instrumentation on Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo.

Astronomical Block by Jan Meredith

There are really a lot more. You've just gotta check out the gallery and read the letters. Very cool. 

Once again, I'm so glad that I got to contribute to this project. 

Space exploration and the amazing explorers who do the exploring are a great source of inspiration to me. When I made my block, I felt like I was writing a thank-you letter for that, and I'm sure that's true for most, if not all, of the 2,260 quilters who participated. 

Thanks for reading!

All the best,

Reyna

Astronaut-Quilter Karen Nyberg sewing aboard the ISS <3

Karen Nyberg, Ultimate Hero (also: my own personal Space Race)

First of all, in case you're totally out of the loop, and don't know about Karen Nyberg yet, let me fill you in rull quick:
She's an astronaut! AND... a quilter!!
So basically I file her under "Ultimate Hero" in my book.
(I love space exploration so much it hurts!)

During her time onboard the International Space Station, she hand-pieced a star block, and now she's invited all of us (that means YOU) to send in our own star-themed blocks to be combined with hers into one big global community space quilt!

I'm SO excited!

The completed quilt will be displayed at the 40th Annual International Quilt Festival 2014.

The MUST WATCH video:

Okay!

Here's the official announcement with all the important details!

You will notice that the deadline for entry is on August 1st, so I'm really posting about this VERY late. But it is not too late! Drop everything and get sewing!!

Even I will be cutting it very close. Despite the fact that I've had this project on my calendar for 6 months, as with everything, I will be scrambling to get it done at the last minute.

To be fair, I've done a lot of brainstorming and drafting in all that time! And perhaps having had all this time to brainstorm and draft is what has gotten me into trouble, because I have dreamed up a quite complicated 9 inches. I might be in over my head, and the clock is ticking!
It is my own personal Space Race, and so far, I've enjoyed every minute!!!

Here's a look at what I'm dealing with:

Ms Nyberg is certainly right about zip lock bags! So far, my nine-inch block involves twelve of them, and I'm not even in space!

Tiny stars... :)

Get sewing!
Thanks for reading!
-Reyna