Caribbean Cruise

Ana Buzzalino grew up in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where sewing was part of her life at an early age. She took dressmaking classes and art classes while in school. In early 1983, Ana moved to Calgary. A couple of years later, while walking down the street, she saw a “blanket” on a window and went into the store to enquire about purchasing it. She was told that it wasn’t for sale, but that she could learn how to make her own. She signed up for a beginner’s quilting class that same day, and she never looked back. The rest, as they say, is history. Ana has been teaching quilting since 1986 and has taken numerous workshops with renowned quilt and fiber artists throughout the years to improve her skills. She has also attended several classes at the Alberta College of Arts and Design. Ana has been a teacher on a variety of quilting techniques for the past 30 years. Ana’s present focus is on Art Quilting, incorporating different elements of surface design, such as fabric painting, mono-printing, screen printing and hand-dyeing. Ana is a frequent contributor to Quilting Arts Magazine and Quilting Arts TV. Her work has also appeared in the American Quilter’s Society Magazine, in A Needle Pulling Thread, and in Modern Patchwork, as well as in 101 Patchwork Projects and Quilts and Quilt Scene. Ana has also worked on 2 workshop DVDs with Interweave/F&W. Ana’s quilts have won several awards at local and national shows, and have been juried into major International shows.

Pat Delaney began sewing when she was five years old by creating doll clothes. A graduate of the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, she completed a rigorous program of study in fashion design, in addition to numerous courses in color theory and drawing. Currently, Pat focuses on creating quilts and teaching these skills to other quilters. Her quilts have been displayed in many regional, national, and international shows, and she has won numerous awards and recognition for her work from every major quilt organization in the United States.

Pat’s quilts have been shown on the Discovery Channel and published in the Boston Globe, Country Living Magazine, and the Brockton Enterprise. They have also appeared in Quilter, Quilt, Quilters’ Newsletter, American Patchwork and Quilting, and on the covers of American Quilter Magazine, AQS Catalog of Books, and Quilting Foundation Piecing. Her quilts have appeared in six editions of the Quilt Art Calendar.

Gyleen was born in Philadelphia, PA but grew up in Taiwan and Japan. She obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering at Drexel University and opened Colourful Stitches in 1999. Those formative years in the Far East developed her love for simplistic artistry. She began needlework at the very young age of four and has since pursued artistic expression in drawing and quilt making. Her quilts blend colour, pattern and texture to provide a contemporary essence to traditional quilting. Her strength as a quilter is demonstrated by the infusion of engineering tools and techniques to simplify visually complex quilts. Her written works center around Haiku poetry, Quilt project books, patterns and magazine articles and of course the crème de la crème, children’s books. As an artist, she has achieved “Best of Show” recognition; as a writer and publisher, she has achieved award winning status with Quilts: Unfinished Stories with New Endings. Gyleen has appeared on The Quilt Show and Lifetime TV promoting finishing antique quilts and the new spirit of traditional quilting. For Gyleen, quilting is the passion which colours her world as her writing journey continues.