Yoko Saito's Houses, Houses, Houses!

When I posted about my stack of new birthday books, Debbie asked me to tell you about Yoko Saito's Houses, Houses, Houses! first. I've been dragging my feet because although the book is fabulously gorgeous eye candy, it has me thoroughly intimidated.

This is not the kind of quilting book that I'm used to, one of those books that shows you pictures of pretty quilts and gives you easy instructions to follow so you can make your own. There's actually a note at the beginning explaining that "in many countries, rather than learning from various books, quilters study under a single master, spending years progressing from simple techniques to the extremely difficult...This book was written in its original language, Japanese, by a master quilter....We have done out best to make the directions for each project easy to understand if you have some level of quilting experience..." Then it goes on to suggest that "intermediate or advanced quilters will be more comfortable working on these projects." Did I mention that I'm intimidated?

The book was ordered sight unseen after I'd seen an online preview that showed several of the bags. I LOVE the bags! One is inspired by Mrs. Olseson's general store from little house on the prairie. Another features rooftops like the ones in the chimney sweep song from Mary Poppins.

The pouch in the middle of this image zips up one side... I knew that learning to install zippers was going to come in handy!

The quilts take my breath away. There are just so many houses with sooooo many amazing little details. As if that isn't enough, there's a section on how to convert your own photographs into applique house patterns.

Don't expect me to make any of these projects soon. I'm currently so frazzled that I'm not tackling anything harder than nine patch blocks from 1 1/2" strips. One of these days, I'm going to want a bigger challenge and when that day comes I'm going to be very glad that I have this book in my quilting stash.