Scoops: 2012 Calendars We Want (and Need)!

There’s nothing like a new calendar to kick off a promising start to a new year and that’s what we’ve got for you today. Why settle for using your local Realtor’s annual bribe on your fridge or the Hallmark store handout when you can indulge in your passions? Trust us when we say that there are plenty of choices to quiltify your coming year. And if quilts alone aren’t enough for you and you need a chuckle or a deep sigh of manly bliss on display, we’ve got that covered too (even if the boys are not)!

The Q.S.M.A.S.B.C.

by Megan Smith Dougherty, AKA The Bitchy Stitcher

$19.95

Kicking off our list, is our own Megan’s incredibly wonderful and heartfelt self-published effort, the Quilter’s Shirtless Man and Spicy Burrito Calendar for your daily viewing enjoyment. What started as a snarky joke on Megan’s blog (story here) has turned into a method of helping her brother and his family as he endures treatment for brain cancer. Knowing some of the back story here, let’s just say that she had an enthusiastic response to her call for shirtless men donning quilts and holding burritos. Who would have thunk it? Now ladies, these guys are supposed to be like real guys, the guys many of us come home to, who have lots to offer in the squish department. If that doesn’t suit and you’d really rather have some beefcake, well, take a look at:

The Men of Starry Night Hollow

by Kimberly Rado and the staff at Starry Night Hollow quilt shop in Encinitas, California

Two years ago, our great friend Kim got the idea to make a quilter’s calendar to raise money for prostate cancer research and awareness. Hmmm…. Quilts and prostates? Sounds like we need some yummy hunks to bring these two things together. And here, for the third year, is Kim’s The Men of Starry Night Hollow calendar. Filled with month after month of some dreamy looking local guys (in past years, Kim’s managed to get more than a few firefighters on the pages), but this year Kim managed to get us a real, doggone quilt celeb to grace her wonderful calendar. Welcome to Mr. September, fabric designer Brandon Mably! We don’t what she said or did to convince our fun-loving Brit to go all out for the cause, but we’re sure happy he did. But don’t discount our other choices cuz there’s some good looking quilt-covered manliness here. Oh, and did we forget to mention that Kim’s included a free pattern from one of the featured quilts?

For those of you who are a little more traditional in your sensibilities, we’ve got that covered as well:

Award-Winning Quilts

by Martingale & Co.

$14.99

It might have been hard to pull away from our last two choices, but the eye candy found on this calendar and the others to follow eased our pain more than a bit. Martingale’s annual Award-Winning Quilts offers us some of the top winners from the International Quilt Association’s 2010 show. Folks, these quilts are some of the best you’ll ever see and each month offers us inspiration and wonder from quilters like Sharon Schamber, Pat Holly and Becky Goldsmith. It’s a nice stand-in for those of us who couldn’t see them in person.

 

The Art of the Quilt

by C&T Publishing

$13.99

With selections from some of C&T Publishing’s most popular authors, these quilts come complete with instructions for recreating them at home. This could become an awesome self-guided challenge for the new year if you’re looking in that direction. But even if that’s not in the cards for you, the pretties you’ll get to see each month will still inspire your other creative endeavors. With quilts from Sandy Bonsib, Kim Schaefer and Sue Beevers, you won’t get bored.

 

Quilt Art 2012 Engagement Calendar

by the American Quilter’s Society

$13.95

Quick: What’s better than 12 or 13 quilts covering your upcoming year’s calendar? How about 54 quilts doled out one each week instead? AQS has produced this calendar for more years than we can remember and it becomes part of our permanent quilt archives at the end of each year because it’s a wonderful reference to what’s been shown at recent AQS shows, which means it kind of marks the trends within our little world. If you’re the type who likes to write out your day’s plans, there’s plenty of room here to do this, and it means you’ll always have your quilts close at hand, so to say.