Helen Frost began teaching quiltmaking in 1974 and has taught at guilds and conferences across the country and in Europe. Although she is best known for her innovative strip-piecing methods, her first love is hand appliqué. She is also a hand quilter, and next on her list to quilt is a top that has been basted since 1981. Helen is an amateur magician and incorporates tricks for quilters in her act. She and her husband live in Tucson, Arizona, and have a son and three daughters. They share their home with a dog, a rabbit, and too many cats.
Blanche Young is a familiar name and face in the world of quilting. She has had a life-long romance with fabric and sewing machines. Blanche has been teaching quiltmaking since 1970, after having worked for a dress factory and major sewing machine companies. By applying time-saving cutting, sewing, and construction techniques to her quiltmaking, she developed innovative methods that have made complex pieced patterns quicker and easier. Blanche is the author or co-author of ten books and many patterns. Over the years, Blanche has taught and lectured all across the United States and in Japan and Norway. She has been the Featured Artist at numerous quilt shows. In October 2001, at Quilt Festival in Houston, Texas, she and her daughter Helen Young Frost were two of the six women chosen for a Special Exhibit entitled: Women Who Challenged Quilting. Blanche is a true pioneer in quilting. A prolific quiltmaker, Blanche makes several dozen quilts each year. She has donated more than sixty quilts for fundraising purposes to quilt guilds and groups across the country. Blanche moved from California to Hurricane, Utah, in 2001. She has seven grown children, two dozen grandchildren and eight great-grandchildren.
