Wendy Butler-Berns is a fiber artist and lecturer known for her "scrapbook" quilts created using picture image machine appliqué quilting. She teaches 25 quilting workshops per year around the country and has a passion both for quilting and teaching others to quilt. As a result of her outstanding teaching, she received the 2009 Jewel Pearce Patterson Scholarship for quilting teachers. Butler-Berns draws inspiration from themes of exhibits and memories of her family and travels. In addition to teaching workshops, she shares her skills through books, TV appearances, and online courses to instruct students internationally in quilting techniques.

1. Dual
Passions
By
Jenny
Whitford
Family
&
Friends
staff
As winter thaws and spring begins to bloom, many people pack away coats, hats, gloves and quilts in
anticipation of warmer weather. Though most consider spring and summer a time to forget about the warm
quilts they once needed, Wendy Butler-Berns, fiber artist and lecturer from Lake Mills, couldn't imagine
packing them away. Butler-Berns' "scrapbook" quilts are much more than just a way to keep warm.
Butler-Berns, who uses a picture image machine appliqué quilting technique to create art quilts, teaches
nearly 25 quilting workshops per year, each lasting from three to six days, with between 15-25 adult
students. This year she will hold workshops in Missouri, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Kentucky, New
Mexico, Arizona, Virginia, Ohio, Wyoming, North Carolina, Minnesota, Michigan, Texas and California.
Although she has been sewing since fourth-grade 4-H, she didn't get involved with quilting until she joined
the Art Quilt Alliance in Chicago in 1993. With that group, she began creating machine-stitched traditional
quilts and quickly discovered her passion for the "out of the box" appliqué style. Then it wasn't long before
her educational background in therapeutic recreation inspired her to take her love for quilting and share that
with others.
As a teacher, lecturer and artist all in one, she describes herself as being torn between her love of quilting
and her love of teaching quilting. She said, "Sometimes I feel like the English teacher who loves her
students and is passionate about teaching them, but who really wishes she also had the time to go and write
a novel."
Because of her dual passions, she purposes to use every opportunity to grow not only as an instructor, but
also as an artist. Even though most quilt exhibits come with a predetermined theme, she makes a point not
to let that confine her own ambitions. "You can participate in all these challenges and maybe never focus
on your personal goals. So I meld them together -- I find a way to apply the theme to something that is
meaningful to me," she explains.
She said her designs are inspired by both the theme of the exhibit she is creating it for as well as things she
has seen, such as photographs she has taken or places she has been. Many of her quilts are created with her
family in mind, such as the quilt "Climb Every Mountain," which she fashioned after a picture of her
husband climbing Mount Shasta in California. The theme for that exhibit had been "Name That Tune," with
Butler-Berns using a song from "The Sound of Music" to inspire her. She said her favorite quilt was for an
exhibit with the theme "Imagine That" and is titled "Pure Joy," which she designed based on a picture of
her daughter Emily leaping in the air one day when she was 15 years old. Butler-Berns loves the youthful
exuberance that is displayed by her daughter and depicted in that quilt. "She was leaping in the air just for
fun, just because. I think that is something we as adults are afraid to do, because we worry what others
think of us. And we shouldn't care about that," she explained.
Along with providing an outlet for her creations, quilt exhibitions offer her the opportunity to connect with
other quilters and market her workshops. She said, "One of the best things about this (quilting) is the
connection you have. You meet someone at an expo and you instantly know you have something in
common. And you get to talk about that, talk about your love for quilting."
Teaching has provided her the chance to quilt in unusual places and overcome unique challenges, including
one class she taught on a cruise ship. "We were down in one of the rooms on the ship trying to sew and the
boat was rocking back and forth. It was a challenge, but it was so humourous! And we survived," she
exclaimed.
Butler-Berns' love for teaching classes extends from her love for people, as well as for her art. She says, "I
love being able to encourage students and hook new students into the quilting world. And letting them find
their own voice."
She describes her students as "confident beginners," meaning they know how to sew and have done some
quilting but are unfamiliar with appliqué quilting techniques. "When teaching, I like to say to my students,
'You just gotta jump in and complete something.' Yes, there will be a blooper. Sure, something with
stitching will be wrong. But you have to overlook that and keep moving to learn and get technically

2. stronger." Although the majority of her students are older adults, she says the home decorating aspects of
the niche often draw in younger women as well. According to Butler-Berns, quilting is a $3.8 billion
industry and expanding every year.
During her 20 years of quilting, she has created nearly 500 quilts ranging in size from miniature "postcard"
quilts to large bed-size quilts, all of which can be hung and displayed.
Butler-Berns said she loves using machine appliqué technique because it gives her the ability to incorporate
a variety of textures and embellishments into her quilts. Her quilts take anywhere from four days to three
months to complete. The majority of her quilts are stored at her home in Lake Mills, while some travel on
exhibit and a few have been donated to charity auctions.
As a result of her outstanding teaching, Butler-Berns was the 2009 winner of the Jewel Pearce Patterson
Scholarship for quilting teachers awarded annually by International Quilt Market. The award provided a
scholarship which paid for her to attend a 10-day workshop at the International Quilt Market and Festival in
Houston, Texas. Butler-Berns said she chose to take classes which would highlight unfamiliar techniques
and help her expand her repertoire. She said although the classes were difficult, she felt learning something
completely unfamiliar helped her understand how her students must feel when they are learning new
techniques from her.
Following the workshop, she taught the skills she learned to her students and then curated an exhibit of 12
quilts, three of which were her own. The theme for her exhibit was "Out on a Limb." During 2011, that
exhibit traveled to a spring festival in Cincinnati, Ohio, and summer festival in Long Beach, Calif., then to
the Wisconsin Quilt Expo in Madison.
She has made appearances on "The Quilt Show" with Alex Anderson and Ricky Tims, "Quilting Arts TV"
on PBS, "Sewing with Nancy" on PBS and "Quilting for the Rest of Us" podcast hosted by Sandy
Hasenauer.
She also offers three different e-courses on the Craftsy website, each of which include six hours of video
instruction. She said when she filmed the classes, the camera crew from Craftsy came to Lake Mills for
eight days to record in her home. Through the online courses she is able to instruct students all over the
United States as well as internationally in Canada and Australia. Students who sign up for the classes have
unlimited access to the videos that never expires.
She is the author of the book, "Photo Album Quilts," which shows the reader the steps Butler-Berns takes
to create her picture image machine appliqué quilts. She gives a detailed guide for those who would like to
emulate the style with their own quilts.
Butler-Berns will be featured in Madison Contemporary Fiber Artist's spring exhibit, "In Living Color," at
the Pyle Center in Madison from April 21 through May 31, with a public reception on Friday, April 25.
Butler-Berns lives in Lake Mills with her husband, Tom, and cat, Kika. She and her husband have three
children, Greg, Christopher and Emily.
For more information about Butler-Berns' teaching schedule, to contact her or view a gallery of her quilts,
visit www.wendybutlerberns.com.