Still Working on the Landscape…

I am still working on the landscape. It is amazing how long something so small can take! I have added more trees in the background and rocks in the stream. There are a lot more trees in the background, but since they are so small I will have to add them with thread rather than fabric. This is definitely a landscape that needs thread painting and quilting to create the details.

Chris

Working on a Landscape Challenge

Today I am working on my landscape challenge for the Learning Fiber Arts Yahoo group. We have to pick a photo and turn it into a black and white photo and then use the black and white photo to create the landscape. So we have to pick colors that we think will work rather than using the original photo as a guideline.

The photo I picked is one that my daughter took with her new camera over Christmas break of a stream near my BIL’s house. I thought I would give it to her if if comes out good enough. I plan on doing lots of thread painting and free motion quilting. I need lots of practice doing that!! The size of the scene is only 8 inches by 10 inches. I have barely started the process of creating the scene and I have a long way to go. Hard to say at this point if I am enjoying the challenge. Don’t tell Shirley!

Don’t forget to check here on Monday, February 2 because I will post the name of the winner of the Book and templates to make a Grandma’s fan quilt.

Chris

SNOW DAY!!! YEAH!!!

We are having terrible weather in NJ today so I don’t have to go to school. We were looking at the weather maps yesterday in my Meteorology class and I told my students that we would not have classes today. I am so glad I was right. Now they are going to think I really know what I am talking about!

I decided to work on some Valentine’s day postcards. This one I made for my daughter. She just went back to MIT on Monday and I miss her already. Come to think of it I did not really see her too much while she was home since she mostly hung out with her boyfriend.

The Geisha is from a photo she took with her new camera when we were visiting my parents in Pittsburgh earlier this month. The Geisha was on a sign on the side of an old building in downtown Pittsburgh. She seems to really like taking photos of signs. The cat is our crazy cat, Meeko. Why is he crazy you ask? He puts all kinds of things in the toilet…socks, paper, DD’s hair things. He pushes his water dish around the kitchen and he chases my husband around the house. I decided to sew seed beads to the background fabric to jazz it up.

I made this very pink one for my husband. I think I will send it to his work address so that he is really surprised. Both of these cards were really simple.

Chris

Book and Template Give Away

I made a Grandma’s Fan Quilt years ago for my DD.  She wanted it made out of blues and she picked out the fabrics.  I was cleaning out my closet and found the book and the rotary cutting templates stuffed into the back of the closet.  Since I don’t plan on making a second quilt I thought I would give them away.  Here is the pattern book called “Fan*tastic.”  Apparently the TV show “Quilting from the Heartland” must have done a show or series on this pattern. None of my TV stations have ever carried this show.  Currently I am not able to get any quilt show.  This saddens me since I used to walk on the treadmill while watching “Simply Quilts.” I would learn something and get inspired while getting my exercise!

You can see that the thick pink laser cut templates already have “sandpaper squares” attached to them so they don’t slip while you cut the pieces.  You will need a small rotary cutter to do the cutting accurately. 

So I will send you the book and the templates if you are the winner.  All you have to do is make a comment and I will randomly pick a name on my mom’s birthday which is February 2.  It is also Groundhog Day.  I forget if the groundhog is supposed to or not supposed to see his/her shadow.  It is all nonsense since Punxsutawney Phil has only been correct less than 30% of the time.  You could toss a coin and do better with your forecast for the rest of the winter!!  On February 2 I will post the winner’s name and you can claim your prize once you send me your snail mail info.

Here are some photos of the fan quilt I made my DD.  This was the only quilt I sent out to be machine quilted.  It was just sitting around not getting finished so I figured paying someone to quilt it was better than having it just sitting in the closet as a UFO. 

 

I don’t remember who  quilted it, but they did a great job quilting feathers, fans in the white blocks, etc.  I think the person was just starting out and did not charge very much to do it either. Unfortunately I won’t be giving away the quilt with the book.  But if you were ever thinking about making this beautiful quilt here is the chance to win the pattern and templates for free.  There are some great ideas for wall hanging size quilts in the book.  There is even a stocking and a tree skirt pattern if you only want to do a small project.

Chris

More Projects Done…a very productive weekend!

Project
22 Maple Leaf Blocks	Done
Square Dance Quilt Top	Done
Secret Sister for February	Done
Challenge for Small Quilt Group	Done
Challenge for Learning FA
4 landscape postcards	Working on
2 postcards for exchange	Working on
Quilt “Scotland the Brave” quilt

I am beginning to see the “light at the end of the tunnel.” I can’t believe how much progress I have made with my project list.

The challenge for the Small Quilt Talk yahoo group was to make a small quilt from beginning to end in one day. Obviously it had to be a simple design so I picked a 4 patch on point. I just used some “repro” fabric scraps that were in my stash and I completed the quilt today. I am guessing that it took about 6 hours. The size of the quilt is 10 inches by 14 inches and is machine quilted. I guess I could have made something larger and more elaborate, but since I have never done a challenge like this I was not sure how much I could get done in one day.

Here are some photos of the quilt. The second photo shows where I am going to display it with some of my cloth dolls and my antique girl scout tin on the bottom of my quilt rack.

Chris

The Beginning and the End

I finished piecing my square dance quilt yesterday. The quilt ended up being 12 blocks by 15 blocks. That means I had to hand cut 180 blocks out of the original top. I have not hand cut pieces for a quilt since I first started quilting 20 years ago. I think that it came out pretty good, but working with so many bias edges on the outside of the block is a bit disconcerting. And there are still bias edges at the outside edge of the top!

Here’s what the top looked like after sewing of the 6.5 inch blue and white squares together.

Here’s what the top looks like now after cutting out and sewing the 180 square dance blocks together. Each square dance block ends up being 4.5 inches.

I think after I quilt it I will just bind it in a light blue/white fabric. My goal is to use up what is in my stash and I will use whatever I have. It probably will turn out to be more than one fabric for the binding. I also plan on piecing the back of the quilt to use up even more of my stash. The back will be a whatever I can find sewn together…..no planned pattern.

Chris

Asian Quilts

My dear daughter loves all things Asian from video games, to animated films, to food. She even took Chinese for 2 semesters last year at MIT. I can’t even imagine trying to learn a language like Chinese. I had a hard enough time learning Spanish and Latin in high school.

Here is a photo of her that her boyfriend took over Christmas week.

She hates having her picture taken even though she always looks great in the photos.

She loves Asian things so much that I have made her 2 different quilts with an Asian theme. The first one is called “Japanese Garden.” I made this from a pattern in New Zealand Quilter for her high school graduation. Here are some photos of the quilt.

I fused the circles onto the black fabric and satin stitched the edges. I also fused the many hexagon “cherry blossoms” and used invisible thread to stitch them onto the quilt. Here is the beautiful label that I made for the back of the quilt.

The back of the quilt was pieced so I could use up the Asian fabrics so it is just as interesting and beautiful as the front. When she has a wall large enough to hang it I will have to sew a sleeve onto the back.

I also made her a smaller quilt showing a temple scene from Japan. The pattern comes from a series called “Postcards from Japan.” This quilt currently hangs on her bedroom wall.

We are planning to go to Japan on vacation this summer. DD has been begging to go to Japan or China for years. Now that she has a digital SLR camera I am sure she will take some wonderful photos while we are there. I hope to make her a quilt of one of her photos.

Chris

My Project List for the Next Month….Yikes!!!

Looks like I will have plenty to do during the next month. Here is my list.

Project
22 Maple leaf blocks	done
Square Dance Quilt Top	working on
Secret Sister for February	done
4 Landscape postcards
2 cards for exchange
Challenge for small quilt group
Challenge for Learning FA

“Look to see to remember to enjoy.” (What my art teacher use to say.)

Chris

Windows Live Writer

I think I found a software to make posting photos and editing posts in blogger a lot easier. When you upload a photo to your blog in blogger the photo always ends up at the top of the blog. I don't know about you, but I find this really annoying. With Windows Live Writer you can insert photos and video where you want them. You can work on your blog from your computer without being on the blogger site. The software will connect to your blog and publish your post for you.

Check out this free software. I created this post in Window Live Writer.

Windows Live Writer

Here is a small quilt I gave away to my BIL and SIL for Christmas. It is called Under a Purple Moon.

As you can see you can insert the photo and even tilt it if you would like to. Pretty cool!

Chris

Life's a Dance

I am finally working on my Square Dance Quilt from a class I took in my Learning Fiber Arts yahoo group back in December. I had a bunch of blue and white squares from an exchange and I wanted to use them up. Finally after getting the squares sewn together, I added the royal blue border yesterday. I think you are supposed to introduce a 3rd color in the border so the blocks won't blend in with the border, but I did not have anything large enough in my stash and I wanted to use up that royal blue fabric. I thought about buying some fabric for the border, but decided instead to use up something that may not be perfect, but will be OK. One of my goals this year is to use up something I already own instead of buying more fabric. I can't figure out if my cat Meeko approves or disapproves of this....


This morning I started the tedious process of cutting up the top to create the "dancing" blocks. I am making a lap size quilt instead of a small wall hanging size so there are a lot of blocks that must be cut out of the pieced top. I created the template and started to trace it onto the top. The trouble with blue and white is finding something that will show up on both colors. I started using blue pencil on the light blocks and white pencil on the dark blocks. This seemed too much like work and not really too accurate as I was tracing the template. I decided to try a different approach by making a freezer paper template and ironing that onto the top and then cutting out around it. I have been careful not to cut too far into the fabric as I go around the corners so I don't snip into what will become the next block. This has been working out great. As I cut each new block I add it to my design wall. I think it is coming out pretty nice. It is taking on a bit of the "blended quilt" look. I just need to remember to be careful when I sew the new dancing blocks together because there are tons of bias edges. I don't want to end up with a wacky, skewed square dance!

Cheryl and Shirley, thanks for a great class! It is hard to believe that you can start with squares and end up with a fun tessellating quilt. Escher would be proud.
Chris

A Blast from the Past

In a couple of my yahoo groups we have been discussing memories of art work that we did as kids. These discussions have brought back a lot of great memories for me. I remember getting a toy sewing machine for a Christmas gift and sitting in my bed at night with the candle in the window on and sketching out ideas of things to sew. As I recall none of those ideas ever worked out, but it was fun sketching them while the rest of the house was asleep. I still remember the feeling of being the only one awake when the house was so quiet. It was great!

I remember making chains from gum wrappers, potholders and mittens. In high school I was obsessed with painting cats. We had tons of books of photos of cats and I used to paint them on canvas and give them away. I wonder how thrilled the people that got them were. I only have one of them left at this point. The canvas for the dog and cat was 11" by 17" and only cost 75 cents! I guess that was expensive back in the 60's. In college I was into painting nebulae (gas clouds in space where new stars are born.) I still have one of those hanging in my office. I gave a lot of those away for gifts as well. I wonder how many hit the garbage cans over the years.

When I was a freshman in college back in the 70's I was into constructing small boxes and then gluing black and white photos from magazines on the boxes as a collage. I still have one I gave my mother for a gift. She recently gave it back to me. You can see images of people that were in the news at the time among the photos. Some of them I do not recall, but I do see Paul McCartney and JFK. I also found some words to add to the collage as you can see in the photos. I wonder what my mom thought when I gave this to her as a gift! It was probably something like !!!!??? hippie.

It has been fun thinking about doing art as a child and what a thrill it was getting a new box of crayons or paints. Eventually this all lead to making quilts. I still do some painting, but I concentrate my efforts on quilting. This is where I find my creative soul these days, but it was fun to think about the childhood that lead me here.
Chris

Yeah...22 Maple Leaf Blocks Done!!!!!

I am done with the maple leaf blocks. Near the end I was making some mistakes so it took longer than it should have. I ended up with some wonky half square triangles. I think I sewed on the cutting line and cut on the sewing line....or something like that. These squares could not be used and I did not have enough of the leaf fabric to cut more blocks so I had to start all over and make the block over using a different fabric. This did not just happen one time, but happened two times. How could I let that happen twice???? I think I was just weary and was not thinking too clearly when I was sewing last night. I had to use 8 different fabrics for the leaves and 3 different creams for the background so this was a real stash buster. I have had some of these fabrics for a long time. And I threw away the scraps since I am not a scrap saver unless the piece is big enough. My waste basket is filled to the brim with scraps....a very good feeling.

But at least they are done and this project has been taken off of my project list. Onto the next project...
Chris

Maple Leaf Block Exchange....What Was I Thinking??

Signing up for this block exchange sounded like a good idea back in November. But as we all know thinking about doing something and actually doing it are two different things. I have experienced this so many times during my life. Ask me about the gigantic doll house that sits on my dining room table unfinished. I don't know what I was thinking when I bought an elaborate kit to make a doll house. I should have bought a kit to make a small one rather than one that has an extension and a front porch with a gazebo. I should have bought a small house to make into a quilt store. That would have been fun.

At any rate the maple leaf exchange is certainly not quite the project that the doll house is and we do need a new lap quilt. I thought that this would be good incentive to make one. Our current lap quilts are really starting to fall apart. They have had their share of use and abuse.

I have to make 22 of these maple leaf blocks for the exchange. We don't have to make them all the same so it is a good way to use up pieces in my stash. I have only made 13 blocks so far and I am starting to get weary of making them already. The blocks are 12 inches finished so they do use up a lot of fabric...and that's a really good thing. I am sure I will be happy when I am done and I will be thrilled when I receive all the blocks from others in the exchange. However, right now I just want the project to be over!!! I think I have signed up for too many exchanges in all of my groups and I am starting to feel the overload.

At least I can't eat when I am working....

I think tomorrow I will make the rest of the blocks and listen to some music while I make them. I did not listen to music today. Maybe that's why the project became tedious. Time for an attitude change!


Chris