Interview

INTERVIEW WITH CHERRI HOUSE
This month we're interviewing pattern designer, Cherri House, of Cherry House Quilts and talking about inspiration, design, and running her business with her daughter.

Like Cherri's style? Try out this free EQ6 project on her website called Magic Blocks.

Lessons & Classes

ANDREA REVEALS ALL: KALEIDOSCOPE COLLECTORS MONTH 8
In Month 8, Andrea unveils her “super-secret, mystery side-sewing project” for owners of Kaleidoscope Collection CD. If you're just starting, see Months 1 - 7.

Check out the quilt Margaret Gray made for her son based on Andrea's Lesson 2.

PREVIOUS MYSTERY QUILT STORIES AND LESSONS
Learn EQ5 or EQ6 by working through our two different Mystery Quilt series: If you are just joining us, start here with Skylights Episode 1 and Skylights Lesson 1.

Then work through the EQuinox mystery, starting with EQuinox Episode 1 and EQuinox Lesson 1.

Show us your quilts! Have you made one of our Mystery quilts? We want to see your quilt or top. Email us a photo and we'll post it in our mystery gallery: Skylight mystery quilts, EQuinox mystery quilts

ARE YOU TEACHING EQ?
If you are teaching EQ classes, don't forget to let our webmaster know the date, time and location of your classes so we can list them on our website.

EQ CLASSES
Want a hands-on EQ class? See who's teaching, what's being taught, and where. We've just added some by RaNae Merrill, Sheila Williams and Andrea Bishop... as well as the October 2009 EQ classes of Barb Vlack & Mary Ellen Kranz at Quilt Festival in Houston.

ONLINE SPIRAL CLASSES BY RANAE MERRILL
RaNae Merrill has new online classes starting in June and July. You can use EQ6 to draw her spirals if you wish. See more info on her classes here:
Spiral Crash Course - June 6
Combining Spirals of the Same Shape - July 4

News

NEW SPRING PRODUCTS SHIPPING
Amy Butler Softwares, Quiltmaker Volume 6, and Stash 20 Spring 2009 are all available and shipping. Check them out!

WHAT IN THE WORLD IS ANDREA WORKING ON NOW?
She's drawing Allover/ Filler quilting stencils for Volume 7 of Quilting Designs: The Quiltmaker Collection. Sneak peek at how she draws them here on our blog. Vol. 7 comes out in Fall of 2009.

Volume 6 was new last month. Here's the link again if you didn't download the free EQ6 project of Vol. 6 quilting stencils.  You'll find the stencils on the Stencil tab in the Sketchbook.

Show us your work

EXHIBIT IN OUR NEW EQ QUILT GALLERY
Andrea has started a new "EQ Quilt Gallery" on our website. Show your designs to the world: send us a photo of your quilt, along with your EQ project containing the EQ design for this same quilt. Tell us a bit about you, your quilt, your designing, whatever. List your website or blog if you have them. Help us show off your designing whether you're a quilting professional or this is your first quilt. Send them to penny@electricquilt.com. We love seeing what you're making and knowing more about you.  

VISIT OUR BLOG
New EQ-related blog topics are added almost daily. Let us know if you post EQ stuff on *your* blog so we can link. Also, send us info about what EQ stuff you're up to. We love to brag about you! Send an email to penny@electricquilt.com and tell us your EQ news.

Inspiration

DAILY EQ-DESIGNS BY JUDY BUTCHER
We like visiting Judy Butcher's blog often just to see what new EQ quilt she's designed for the day. Judy says, "By the way, the Empty Baskets quilt is the first of a series five designs which will be included in a free project file which will be offered on the 30th of May."

DAILY EQ-DESIGNS BY GLYNIS THOMPSON
Want more inspiration? Glynis has a blog too where she posts daily EQ designs. Check out some of Glynis's latest work.

IT'S A JUNGLE OUT THERE
When EQ6 Appliqué author Angie Padilla tells us to go check out someone's work, we listen. Angie pointed us to an EQ6-related blog by an art quilter in Brunei. Anne's Creative Threads blog is full of gorgeous pictures, colors, and ideas. From geckos to palm fronds, and even bird of paradise flowers ... you should look at Anne's works in progress on her blog and finished gallery on her website. Wow.

Clubs

WANT TO START YOUR OWN EQ CLUB?
Download our "Planning an EQ Club" PDF file. See what you need to get started, how to organize and get topic ideas. The Mystery Quilt would make a great club project.

ClubEQ REMINDER
ClubEQ is a free monthly challenge organized by EQ-author, Barb Vlack. To participate, send in a project with 1-2 quilts to penny@electricquilt.com that follow the challenge theme and ClubEQ rules. Imagine getting 50 to 100 quilts for just submitting one. May's challenge is almost over - submit your "What's Cookin'?" challenge entry and recipe. This month in addition to all the quilts, participants will get a PDF of all the recipes submitted.

Support

ASK EQ THE MOUSE!
Long-time mascot, EQ the Mouse, invites you to submit EQ questions for his column "Ask EQ." Email questions to Tech Support. Put "Ask EQ" in the subject line. He'll answer your question, and perhaps you'll make his monthly Q & A column. Read it here.

MAIL-LIST FOR MAC EQ-ERS
Are you running your EQ on a Mac? Then you may want to subscribe to the free EQonMacs Yahoo group, run by Sheila Williams. For more information, contact Sheila at Sheila@SheilaWilliams.com.

EQ FORUMS
The new EQ Forums are up! Visit the EQ Forums and register, then you can ask questions and get answers from EQ staff, authors and other EQ users right on the EQ web site.

TECH SUPPORT
A reminder that you can see answers to our most Frequently Asked Questions right on the EQ web site. See EQ6 questions here. See EQ5 questions here.

EQ6 UPDATE
If you own EQ6, download and install the free EQ6 Update which makes EQ6 run faster and smarter. You'll know you're updated if in EQ6 you click HELP > About EQ6 and see "Build 2."

Contests

NEW CONTEST: EQ – HAIKU!
Write an EQ-Haiku – you may win a prize. We'll choose our favorite 5 haiku. Each of the 5 winners will receive a free Quilting Designs CD of their choice. And we'll print all the haiku in our next newsletter.

What is a haiku? It's an unrhymed verse most commonly with three short lines:
Line 1 - 5 syllables
Line 2 - 7 syllables
Line 3 - 5 syllables

The challenge of Haiku is to convey meaning and imagery in such a short form. Possible subjects of EQ-Haiku: quilts, EQ, software, computers, sewing.

A sample EQ-Haiku from EQ the Mouse:
Penny's desk my home
Her monitor my window
EQ quilts await

Enter as many EQ-Haiku as you'd like. Send your EQ-Haiku to: penny@electricquilt.com. Entry deadline: June 19th. So do it now!

NEW AMY BUTLER CONTEST
Amy Butler is celebrating the launch of her Amy Butler's Softwares CD with a contest. For more information visit our blog: Mid Mod Contest

JUDY BEST WINS OUR STASH 20 CONTEST

Last month' s contest celebrated the 20th edition of our STASH fabric CD, and asked for submissions from anyone who owned all 19 previous STASH programs. We had one winning entry: Judy Best, from London, Ontario, Canada. Judy wins a free copy of STASH Spring 2009.

Congratulations Judy! It's in the mail! And thanks from all the fabric scanners here at EQ who have scanned over 102,550 pieces of fabric.

Fabric

DOWNLOAD MORE FREE FABRIC
This month's download is "Focal Prints." Choose either to download a Library file or a Project file. Be sure to follow the easy steps provided. Then vote for next month's fabric.

NEW CONNECTING THREADS FABS AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD
Connecting Threads has made some of their own fabric collections available especially for EQ6 users as Library files. Find the collections here.

1) Download the file to your Desktop. Extract the zipped file (right-click, then click "Extract All").
2) Place the .FAB file in your My Documents\My EQ6\USER\ folder on your hard drive.
3) Open EQ6 and your fabric library. The collection will appear in your "MY LIBRARY" folder.

NEW MODA FABS AVAILABLE TO DOWNLOAD
Moda has new fabrics available to download as jpeg files, ready to be opened in EQ6.

1) Visit Moda's site, click any brown dot in front of a fabric name, download to your computer (remember where it goes).
2) Go to LIBRARIES > Fabric Library > Import > From Image Files and import the fabric.
3) Add the fabric to your Sketchbook and use it, or save the fabric in My Library (see pages 143 and 144 in the EQ6 User Manual) to use in future projects.

If you need complete steps, EQ the Mouse addresses them in one of his Ask EQ columns.

Freebies

FREE APRIL JOY PROJECT FROM CAROL CLASPER
Sometimes simplicity surprises. See how Carol played with half-square rectangles. Then download her EQ6 project, and try your own variations by rotating and flipping blocks.

FREE PROJECTS FROM REGINA GREWE
Regina, a German EQ designer, offers wonderful patterns to download as EQ6 projects. Bookmark her site and check back monthly to get new patterns from her on-going series on Birds. 

FREE MYSTERY BOM FROM GUDRUN
Gudrun, from Belgium, has started a Mystery Block of the Month for 2009 that she would like to share.
Here is Block #1
Here is Block #2
Here is Block #3
Here is Block #4
Here is Block #5

FREE BALTIMORE BLISS BOM & THIMBLE QUILT FROM SINDY RODENMAYER
EQ6-designer Sindy Rodenmayer has a beautiful new appliqué block pattern for you each month in her 2009 BOM. Get 'em while they're up, because these block patterns don't stay up all year.

Sindy also has new free patterns perfect for batik or Japanese fabrics.

FREE QUILTED DESKTOPS & CALENDARS
Carolyn Laukkonen offers you a series of quilted desktops to choose from. Choose a favorite, or switch them monthly. Download onto your computer desktop. Find complete instructions on her site.

Or check out the beautiful calendars from Diane Anderson designs just for you.

FREE VIEWERS
Want to see a self-running show of your own EQ projects? Download a free project viewer:

Download "EQ6 Show" if you have EQ6. It will show any EQ3, EQ4, EQ5 and EQ6 projects you've made.
Download "EQ5 Show" if you only have EQ5. It will show any EQ3, EQ4 & EQ5 projects you have made.

FREE EQ6 WEB BUTTONS
Show your EQ spirit by adding an EQ6 button to your web site!

DO YOU HAVE FREE EQ PROJECTS OR PATTERNS TO SHARE ON YOUR WEB SITE?
Let us know and we'll list you on the Project Sharing page. Just email our webmaster with the necessary links and information and ask for your site to be considered for inclusion on that page.

Next Month...

COMING NEXT MONTH
* The results of our EQ-Haiku contest

* A new contest