[upbeat music]
- Welcome, everyone, to The Great Wisconsin Quilt Show.
[audience clapping]
My name is Maday, and for the next hour,
I'm going to take you on a tour of all of my work.
This is a likeness of me, but it was not created by me.
It was created by a friend,
so it's kind of a fun thing to share.
My website is sustainabletextiledesign.com.
You can always reach me at tinyquilter@gmail.com.
It's the only tiny thing about me, my email address.
We are here to talk about curves in art quilts.
So, every quilt is an art piece.
Every single quilt that you create has memory imbued in it,
so it is true to the maker's abilities, practice, and past.
Curves live all around us.
They are found throughout nature and in our homes.
They delight and entertain us all day long.
They're soft, easy to look at, organic,
and make us feel comfortable with our surroundings.
All beautiful things.
Ice cream, a Culver's sculpture,
Ferris wheel, nothing has truly sharp edges
unless, of course, you break the glass,
which we would never do.
This is a painting.
So this was in my home for a couple of years.
I love curves; they make sense to me.
So, tools of the trade.
A sewing machine in good working order.
Full disclosure, I use a Janome 9450.
A rotating mat, so that when you cut your pieces,
you don't have to go around your table, right?
The mat is there to help you.
Fabric scraps is just what I like to use,
is how I communicate what I want to say in my work.
I always use cotton thread, quilting needle 90/14 or 12,
scissors, pins, but my friend truly is a glue stick,
especially when I'm teaching a class.
It makes people feel more comfortable,
and it also hurts less than a pin.
Templates are always optional.
Most importantly, give yourself patience,
give yourself grace, and practice.
The tools of the trade, continued.
I always use a Janome 1/4 inch foot and plate.
It has no guide to impede piecing.
You can see much better.
It has a slim design, which makes it very smooth
going around the curves.
Again, a rotating mat.
Comfortable rotary cutter.
Most of us have a 45 millimeter.
I urge you guys to have 28, 45, and 60.
Match your rotary cutter to your templates for best results.
And of course, the glue stick.
I like to use Bohin; it's a French company.
It works really nice, it's not super sticky.
And again, exercising some patience.
And always take a deep breath.
Fabric selection.
So I get a lot of questions about fabric,
and you can see it behind me.
I do not buy a whole bunch of fabric
for a particular project.
My tagline is "sustainable textile design,"
and that is exactly what it means.
I do not have a large stash in my home.
In fact, I have friends that just bring me scraps.
Sometimes I buy scraps from designers.
But let's talk about mixing textile substrates.
So, what it means to mix textile substrates.
We have knit and cotton, we have quilting cotton,
we have linen, canvas, which is yummy,
denim, which I use upcycle, cotton and linen is a blend,
linen and canvas is another blend.
And this sample here, which again,
you can see the different types of fabrics
right here in a small space.
This is "Burst the Bubble."
A lot of my quilts are double-sided.
So let me see if I can show you.
So this is also quilt-as-you-go.
And I'm gonna tell you and all your friends
and all my friends,
that quilt-as-you-go doesn't really save you time.
[audience laughing]
Who remembers the cassette player?
A cassette player? Anybody?
Right?
So it's an ode to childhood and joy and connection
and those beautiful memories that we make along the way.
Right?
This is flannel, so, talk about mixing substrates.
I have quilting cotton, I have canvas.
Canvas and cotton, you name it, I have it all.
Why mix them in the first place?
Well, it's fun.
It gives you greater flexibility in your design choices.
It's a more sustainable approach to making.
It encourages you to use whatever you have available.
Sparks creativity and innovation,
provides beautiful texture,
increases your sewing experience,
learning about needles, your sewing machine,
different techniques.
So it really does force you to learn,
which is why we are here today.
Things to consider
when you are experimenting with substrates.
I like to use a light spray.
There's also a spray that is quite hard,
it makes your fabric really stiff,
and it's called Terial Magic.
You can also find it here in the Janome booth.
Use a larger needle; I like to use 90/14.
Take your time piecing.
Test your fabric for excessive stretch
if you're unfamiliar with different substrates.
Color combinations.
You can see, and everyone can see, virtually or in person,
the amount of colors that I like to use.
This is more control.
It has a really soft gray background.
In here, I have linen, things that feel like denim as well.
It's all about mixing things to get different results.
It's called the sweetheart curves.
They're very small in comparison to some of the things
that you're going to be seeing here today.
So there's a lot of linen in here.
As you can see, there's some fraying.
I know you guys will look at the back.
That's totally fine; I'm not worried about it.
But I want you to feel the different things,
so I am gonna pass it around.
If someone doesn't want to touch it,
please know that you're not offending me at all, okay?
Who is your audience?
Who are you creating for?
The things that I create for myself are vastly different
from the things that I create for a class or a public setting.
What do you want your work to say?
Do you want it to be peaceful?
Do you want the tones to be soft?
Do you want it to be saturated?
Do you want it to be strong, right?
Or just, you're using the scraps you have.
That works as well.
What scale are you using?
From four inches to eight,
to 12, to 12 1/2.
So, from small to large, what scale are you using?
Mix your shapes.
Should you worry about a theme?
If you worry about a theme, more than likely,
you're going to have to purchase fabric for this,
which makes it less sustainable, as we all know.
Are you thinking about the placement, or is this improv?
So as you can suspect, my style is improv.
It's always improv,
unless I'm doing something structure for a sew-along,
which I lead often, or I'm teaching a class.
I can teach people how to match points.
But my specialty is to teach people how to be free
in the creation of their work.
That's what gives me the greatest pleasure.
Is this a stash busting project?
Are you using templates, or is this template-free?
This sample here was cut with AccuQuilt.
I have been teaching AccuQuilt for 10 years.
I travel and teach.
When Nancy's Notions was open,
I used to work there as well, teaching AccuQuilt club,
so it's very close to my heart,
and it also makes it a lot easier to cut.
Examples of saturation.
So, saturation is my favorite way to create.
When this piece was being brought to life,
someone said to me, "Wow, I would hate to be,
to come home drunk to this."
[audience laughing]
And I thought, "Well, it's a good thing
"you don't live with me,
because my house is infused with colors just like this."
Not the walls, but...
What I wanted to achieve with this was a lot of saturation,
lots of floral, lots of happiness.
So the picture that you see on the screen
is actually from Wollersheim Winery.
It was super cold that day.
I forgot my coat,
even though I was reminded at home that I should have one.
So I had to use this quilt as my coat,
because it was truly, truly cold.
This is all hand stitched, right through.
It is a true honor to be able to sew by hand
once the top is compiled.
So when you use a lot of saturation,
I think it is harder to find all the shapes.
There's over 900 shapes in here.
This arch here is completely pieced,
so there's nothing solid.
And yes, I used AccuQuilt to cut it
because it would be impossible to be this exact
this many times in a row, right?
So I am not associated with AccuQuilt.
I use it because it is one of my true loves,
and it makes my life a lot easier.
Introducing solids and lighter background.
So, yes, this is still saturated.
Using a lighter background,
using solids in your background, tones saturation down.
Adding texts, fabric with text, is one of my signature looks.
I use it on everything.
And if it is Christmas and text, I use it even more, right?
So it's all about having joy present
in the work that you create.
If you take yourself too seriously,
you will never finish a project.
Let me say that again.
You will never finish a project
if your goal is perfection, right?
So this is complete chaos of perfection, okay?
Completely.
So, mixing curved pieces to invite movement.
As you can see in this piece here,
I have a few blocks that are wedding,
wedding ring quilts, and then I also have circles,
and they come in different shapes,
different configurations in here.
I used both AccuQuilt
and generic templates to create this.
So this one was actually featured
in a magazine from the UK last March.
It is all about saturation.
I would've loved for you to see it.
It has 910 pieces.
It's called "Halo" from Jen Kingwell,
so that's the templates that I used.
She is one of my favorite artists alive today
from Australia.
And I created this in April of 2020.
So I cut everything by hand.
I was very meticulous.
I would not have been able to do this
without my rotating cutting mat.
And the one that I use is just round.
Included in here I have sashiko hand stitched panels
that I just cut up, block printed panels,
which is Indian printing blocks with textile ink,
and I used my stash.
It is insane.
So this quilt is right now at a gallery in Door County,
so this is the reason I couldn't bring it today.
Pops of yellow, so of course I had to find a yellow door.
And this is Circus World Museum in Baraboo, Wisconsin.
Mint chocolate chip.
I love this quilt so much.
It took me quite a while.
But when you look at it,
especially looking at the screen right now,
it has a broken glass feel to it.
Right? I don't know if you can see it.
I don't know if you get that impression from it.
The templates that I used are by Victoria Findlay Wolfe.
The template comes in a set of seven,
but I actually only used five pieces from it.
So I wanted to create something of my own
with my flair, with my taste,
and of course with the help of the templates.
So, have fun creating different shapes
from a set of templates.
Do not use them all; experiment.
It says in there, "See it in booth 633,"
but it's actually 533; I was corrected this morning.
Use lights on dark.
So you can still see a lot of the shapes,
but it is in the grade of your lights
and your mediums and your darks
that you really see the shapes in there.
Use rotary cutters to match the templates.
And this is a new class I'm going to be featuring in 2023.
So for me, to be this disciplined,
to use only three colors is extremely difficult.
[audience laughing]
So this, [laughing]
I think the title is going to be "The Opposite of Saturation."
I mean, I'm just gonna keep it as the title of the quilt.
It has grown since this photo was taken.
I absolutely love it.
I'm using shot cotton.
So because this hasn't been published by me,
the class hasn't taken place,
please do not share this on social media;
just keep it for yourself, okay?
It reminds me of the phases of the moon.
I don't know if you saw the moon last night,
but it was absolutely stunning,
and the sunrise this morning was spectacular.
So I decided that this had to be in there.
I'm using shot cotton.
So for shot cotton,
the warp and the weft of the fabric is different.
So it gives you, it's a solid,
but it gives you a lot of texture,
and it's really creamy, and it's almost like chocolate,
chocolate something, right?
And of course I have text, I have numbers,
and I have them so that people see it.
Creating balance.
Sometimes it's okay to create a piece
that is soothing, that doesn't say too much,
that it stands on its own with two or three colors.
But for me, that is extremely difficult.
So this is still a study.
I'm still not sure that it's gonna stay at three colors.
Exploring harmony.
This is a piece that was very special to me.
It's called "Woman in the Woods."
I did cut out the person holding it out of privacy.
She is my dental hygienist, whom I love.
You don't find that too many times,
so I decided to give her
one of the biggest quilts I've ever created,
and she works in Baraboo.
She's a wonderful person.
So, controlling the palette.
There is transparency.
Some of the tones in there make the fabric disappear
and melt into one piece.
Adding bronze, right?
Some of you would call it bronze,
other people would call it burnt orange.
I don't know.
But I love this earth tone in there,
and including a little bit of blue,
so just a little bit of something, right?
And also mixing your lights, your prints, your solids
to create a sense of harmony.
When you look at this, it doesn't look as crazy as...
This.
Or even this, right?
There's just more of a soothing presence to this.
And whenever you throw pink
into a quilt, a tapestry, or a garment,
it's always going to be,
depending on the degree of pinkness,
it's going to be just beautiful.
And of course, I did use AccuQuilt to cut this.
So, exploring more harmony.
These were quilts that I have gifted.
I created these in 2013, 2014.
I have grown a lot since then,
but I think it's always good to remember where you started,
where you came from.
So when you control the palette, you emphasize the shapes,
the shading, the transparency.
Who is your audience?
So two of these went to children,
and you can see the playfulness in there.
One of them went to my boss.
And I don't gift a lot of quilts,
so it has to be someone really, really special
for me to give my work away and part with it.
But I always urge you, when you leave today,
use colors that you are not comfortable with.
If you continue creating with the same level
of comfortableness that you are doing now,
you're never gonna get out of your comfort zone.
So I urge you guys to spice it up.
To shock the block is my favorite expression.
So, curves in every day are design elements.
This is also a class next year; it hasn't been published.
So if you take a photo of it,
please use it for personal use only.
It's created with denim, specifically worn denim,
which gives you the greater flexibility to create with,
'cause you have very soft tones, you have the inside pockets,
you have that natural, worn-out element
that only happens when people actually use their clothes
instead of wearing it today,
putting it in a closet for one year,
and never seeing it again, right?
But I wanted to show you, and the reason is in here,
is that you can create beautiful curves using denim.
So don't be afraid because it's too thick or it's too thin;
just go with it, just give it a try.
And of course, there's me being goofy,
but the reason that picture is there
is to show you that I save all my scraps
of things that I make.
And of course, it says "hardy champion,"
which as an immigrant woman, I feel like a hardy champion.
Yes.
So right in here to the right, it's just a test piece.
It has four curved pieces in there,
and that's why I included it in my shirt.
And here is probably one of my favorite things
that I've created in the last two years.
It has a lot of movement, it has a lot of fabric
that other people would've deemed to be ugly.
So there is no ugly fabric.
And I don't cut things too tiny to not make 'em ugly.
There's just simply no ugly fabric
because the amount of effort that takes to plant cotton,
make, grow, water it,
the labor that goes into it, the people that work with it.
So before we even buy it,
the cotton is already imbued with memories
of all the people that have worked
on this piece before us, right?
So it's that sustainable element to creating.
When you're creating your own freeform curved pieces,
make sure that you're giving yourself space.
You don't have to throw all the pieces on the floor,
but make sure that you see it all.
Make sure that even if you don't see it all,
you separate it in groups,
from your lights, your medium lights,
your dark, and so on, right?
So that when you're ready to pick from each bundle,
you don't have to overthink it, you just do it, okay?
So orange, red,
pistachio, which is one of my favorite colors,
or avocado, whatever you wanna call it.
Probably always in my work.
This is soft.
It's all hand stitched.
And the one thing that I wanted to tell you about
is there is a product, it's called Birdie, like a bird,
Batting, and it comes with the batting and the flannel
stitched to themselves, right?
And then you can add it to the back
so you don't have to have
the batting separate from the backing.
I decided to just use the flannel.
The flannel was created
so that you also put a backing on it.
That's way too much.
And to hand stitch it, that didn't make sense.
So Birdie Batting can be ordered
through the Janome booth, if you want to,
that's where I work full-time in Baraboo,
is Ardyth's Sew-N-Vac Shoppe, and I'm gonna pass it around
because I want you guys to feel this.
This is extraordinary.
I'm really proud of it, and my only,
it's called "Cell-Entitle,"
and cell as in the cells in the body, right?
I created this in a very particular 2020 time period.
So it's called "Cell-Entitle."
And I want you to see crazy things
that I add for my binding.
So I make binding,
and whatever comes together comes together.
There is really no theme for my batting
to correspond to a piece.
So I'm gonna pass it around so you can feel this.
And this is Birdie Batting.
So I use a lot of different textures of thread as well,
and I like to use 12 weight,
and 12 weight, you can use in your sewing machine
and it will give you crazy texture.
Here are examples of how I cut freeform.
And you can see from here,
I don't know if you can see the cursor,
but in here, I started with a scrap on top
and I cut whatever I could from the pieces.
And here, I have four layers,
so you have four fabrics.
So you can mix, you see over here
we have one, two, and three.
You take a piece from each one of these,
and you can see it down here, one, two, three, and so on.
I created this just to show you the shapes,
and I pinned it,
because I don't know where the work is going,
so I don't want to decide yet.
I wanna have more strong, pungent colors in there.
This is a little bit too soft,
but I wanted not to scare you away today, so.
[audience laughing]
I think this is the most freeing way to cut your curves,
because when you do this, no one else in the world
will have exactly the same shape that you have.
It's almost like it has your unique
fabric cutting DNA, right?
No one else in the world can do it like you,
and the piece, no one could possibly do it like you
if they try to reproduce it, right?
So I think it's just a wonderful thing to try.
They can be small, they can be large.
Just give yourself room to experiment
and to learn something new,
no matter where you are in your learning experience.
'Cause every day is a learning experience.
And this is the beauty of collaboration, okay?
This was created by six of my students in the same workshop.
Six people contributed to this.
And that is the magic.
That is the thing that excites me the most
about teaching and guiding people.
I'm not even a teacher, I'm just a guide.
And it is a fabulous way to get to know each other.
When you can actually do this,
put the piece on the floor at the end of the workshop
and say, "Whoa, we did this.
We collectively worked on it."
And then the hard thing became, who created what,
when we were picking it up from the floor.
So I gave my students a package.
And that's the other thing I do for my workshops.
I give students fabric
so that they don't feel that they have to buy one more thing
to come to my workshop.
And I'm very proud of that.
I will never have a stash that way, so.
[audience laughing]
So in here, I want you to see the negative spaces
that were created by pure accident.
That little bit of black fabric in there
really brought it home, or a dark blue.
I had people that had driven four hours
to come to this workshop.
And of course, it's a great honor
that they chose me to be there.
So, six people contributed to this.
There is abstraction, there is harmony,
there's visual interest, there's movement throughout.
It is important to always have a little pinch
of solid fabric in your work.
But everything works together, and that is the beautiful thing
about the work that you all create,
that everything will work together.
And this piece behind me, which everyone can see from home,
is the medley of six different workshops that I teach.
It is impossible to have six different tapestries,
especially because this is stitched twice by hand, by me.
Okay, so this is purely scrappy.
There's playfulness, we have cats, roller skates,
Alice in Wonderland,
things that you would never put together.
There's a creative freedom.
And every fabric has a chance to shine.
You have batik,
and this was created in the same workshop
as the picture before, but she had to leave early,
so I still wanted to honor her work and her contribution.
And she's not done yet.
Batik.
If you use the right batik in your work,
it can really make it iridescent.
There's something about it, and I absolutely love that.
So here's another collaboration after a workshop, right?
I wanna show you with the cursor if you can see it.
Just the movement, right?
And then there happened to be dancing fabric in there.
And if I had to give it a name,
it would be "Dancing Queens" over here.
You have solid, you have squares.
So this is the thing that I invite you the most
to try in your work.
Do not limit yourself
to only curves when you do curved piecing, okay?
Does everyone understand what I'm saying?
Do not limit yourself only to curves in your work, okay?
This is the work of three students
from my June 2nd workshop.
It's completely improv, completely scrappy.
We have straight piecing.
We used two-inch squares,
and when I gave it to them at the workshop,
they were like, "What?
I thought we were doing curves today."
Yes, yes we did, and yes we are.
Transparency, contrasts, again, mix colors
like solids, and prints, and linen,
and denim if you have it.
But this is the work of three people,
and it looks like the same person created it,
and it looks harmonious to me.
And here you have scale.
So very tiny, very tiny curves.
Can you all see it?
Right here?
These guys are maybe two and a half inches, three inches.
So this was supposed to be a queen.
[laughing] I'm so funny.
This is how big it ended up being,
so it's not gonna be a queen.
This is already a queen right here. [laughing]
So text, linen.
These are flour sacks that have been around
for, like, 30 years.
Just indigo dyed.
This was was indigo dyed by an artist here in Madison.
Her name is Jen Falkowski and she teaches indigo dyeing.
So I buy my scraps from her whenever possible.
Old jeans, block printing.
This here, I don't know if you can see it.
And I will show the people at home.
I don't think it's in the screen here.
But this one here was from
a container, you know, a frozen food container.
It had a strainer,
so I washed it and I block printed on it.
So I use things that I have at home,
things that are plastic, that I have no choice
in knowing what's in the package to begin with,
and try to give it a new life
and bring it to the workshops to try.
This here.
I have ripped jeans up here.
This was worn by a farmer.
The binding came from my grandma's apartment
before she moved away.
So, every work that we create is imbued with memory.
And the best way to honor our memories when we create
is to not use a seam ripper.
[audience laughing]
Right?
Poof, revelation.
So, no seam ripper for you guys
when you're creating your curves.
Whatever happens, happens.
If it doesn't look good, you cut it again
and we create something new with it.
So if you look back to tools of the trade,
there is no seam ripper listed in that list.
I do not use it;
I do not encourage the use of seam rippers.
They're dangerous, very dangerous.
And they just kill your creativity,
absolutely remove it.
And the joy is, poof, gone.
Don't use a seam ripper.
Use your stash, swap with your friends.
Purchase remnants.
The best gift, to me, is a bag of scraps, plain and simple.
Introduce different shapes.
Try improv; don't overthink it.
Try mini curves, even if you try just four.
Just give yourself that little homework assignment,
one afternoon, two hours, 45 minutes, 15.
Just do four tiny little curves, and then you're done.
You never have to do it again if you don't want to.
Ah, and here's my newest.
So this is a workshop in 2023.
Have fun, try color combinations that are unfamiliar to you.
Mix and match piecing techniques in your work
to draw attention to key elements.
Welcome solids into your sewing practice.
Not a lot, just a little, right?
I'm gonna draw attention,
if you can see it on the screen right here.
There is a thing in there that is so, so tiny,
it's maybe half an inch,
and it is a square in a square, right?
So this was supposed to be a giant log cabin.
And then I created a bojagi panel
for a quilting show that I was teaching in June.
And then this became something else.
A friend gave me scraps.
I have fabric in here from Denise Schmitz,
who is a wonderful designer on the East Coast.
I just got the package, so I put it in there.
I have playful fabric.
So I wanted to create a piece that had all of the elements
that I have been talking to you about.
So it has bojagi Korean patchwork,
it has a log cabin element towards the top right-hand side.
It has curves.
But also the one thing that I haven't mentioned to you is,
make sure that when you are creating a piece,
you have enough space for your eyes to rest.
Right, 'cause sometimes saturation of color
can be a little much, especially if you're not used to it.
So create space within your work
where your eyes can naturally rest, right?
And have that, take a deep breath moment.
So this is an experiment and a project
that I'm working for the new year,
and it's called "Whole Person."
And it might have some text and it might have some appliqué,
so it really delves into what makes us whole
as creative people, as human beings,
so it's an exploration of that.
And the thing about curves is,
it transcends anything that we can make.
If you look at a tunnel,
which I showed you in slide one or two,
if you look at bridges across Europe,
they're not triangular; they're curved.
Because curves to me are the strongest structures to create.
And you can always, when you create it at home,
try to pull on it and see what happens.
Do use a 2.2 stitch length just by, you know,
don't use a five stitch length
because otherwise it will come apart really fast, right?
But just give yourself a chance to pause and create
and tune out all of the noise from the outside world.
Grab a bucket of scraps and focus on creating only from it.
It's a practice that I do often.
Accept the work that naturally comes out.
So remember, we don't have a seam ripper,
we don't worry about the seam ripper, it doesn't exist.
So welcome the work that intuitively comes out.
If you try to force it, it's not gonna work.
You're gonna spend five hours and it's not going to work.
Fabric can only last so long
when you remove the stitches, right?
There's not a lot of do-overs.
So be kind to yourself and the creative process.
Don't be so harsh on what you create,
what other people create.
Worry about only your creative journey
and where it has taken you from.
I hope that you guys are motivated to try something new.
Invite friends from your guild
and maybe create a challenge in the wintertime
when things seem to be a little bit slower
after the holidays are finished.
Create beautiful, colorful chaos
and let go of any expectation that is holding you back.
We all know how to make
half square triangles already, right?
How many people here have done curved piecing before?
Okay.
And you love it.
[audience laughing] All the time?
Ehh.
I love it all the time.
I remember that the first thing that I was really
worried about was half square triangles,
because everyone that I heard around me
wanted to have just beautiful, perfect points.
And if you think about how many other beautiful things
that are perfectly perfect are there in our lives,
there's always a little thing, there's always a flaw, right?
That's the same thing that we should be welcoming
into our creative practice
and always giving us space to make mistakes
and to be graceful to each other,
but mostly to be graceful to us, right?
We never teach a child to sew and say,
"Boy, you did all of this wrong," right?
I mean, do any of you say that?
You probably won't tell me, but.
[audience laughing]
We don't.
So one of the things that I have learned the most,
I think, from raising my one daughter,
is that when she was going through 4-H
and her work was being judged,
the judging wasn't very kind, right?
So I hope that in the future, we do better.
If we are teaching a child how to sew,
or we're teaching your best friend
who has a stressful life and a stressful job,
I hope that you can bring gracefulness into that practice,
and gentleness,
and just be good to each other through sewing.
But just spice it up.
Don't be afraid to make these mistakes.
So one of my things that I always say in my workshops
is shock the block, right?
It's introducing a color that is going to throw away
everything you have been planning.
I urge you to use it, to shock it,
because it might be something truly unexpected.
And then to learn to live with it.
There are things that happen in everyday life
that we cannot control,
so why should we try to control so much of our work?
And that's just a question, right?
And apparently it brings us back to harmony,
exploring harmony, which I think is good,
I think is good in everyday life, in our sewing,
in our painting, whatever it is that we decide to do.
And now I wanna thank you all for being here.
I'm very grateful to the Quilt Show
for having us here together,
like, the first time in three years,
so this is a big accomplishment.
I hope you guys have a lot of fun.
[audience clapping] Thank you.
[upbeat music]