Our First Big Reveal

Well today is the day of our first reveal in my Fifteen by Fifteen challenge group. The theme was LINES. If you go to this link you will be able to see all of our wonderful quilts interpreting the theme as well as our profiles.
Click here to go to our blog
Now I can post my quilt here since I don’t have to keep it a secret any longer.
My quilt is called Time Zones. If you go to our blog you can read the statements we have made about our quilts. This was so much fun and it it really exciting to see the site with the different interpretations of the theme. I am so glad that I joined this group. I better get busy on the next theme with is GATHERING and is due by the end of March.

Thanks for reading.
Chris

Which Background to Choose?

I have my blue flower pieces cut out and fused together. Now I have to pick a green background. I posted all my choices at Quilt University to ask the opinion of the instructor and my fellow students. At this point is it narrowed down to these 3 choices.

Background 1

Background 2

Background 3

They are all different and I keep going back and forth with which one I think works best. What do you think?

Thanks for reading.

Chris

Way Ahead on this Challenge

I cannot believe that I am a month ahead on my next 12 inch by 12 inch challenge. The word is BLUE and it is due near the end of February. My husband one day said I should make a quilt with blue cheese. So I thought about it and decided that might be worth trying. The question was how to make “blue cheese” fabric. I decide to try flour resist and blue fabric paint.

You spread flour paste onto fabric and wait for it to dry. Once it dries you crunch it up to crack the flour and then paint over it and then allow that to dry for 24 hours. After that you wash out the flour and heat set with an iron.  Here is a picture of the painted fabric from the front and from the back while it was still wet.

 




And here is my challenge quilt called “Still Life with Blue Cheese and Figs.” I washed it after it was quilted to try to give the blue cheese texture.


After I made the quilt my husband said that he was only joking about making a quilt with blue cheese! Oh well too late now….
Thanks for reading.
Chris

A Busy Start to the Year

I have a few things that I am working on. In December I joined a second challenge group called Fifteen by Fifteen. Every other month a theme word is given we have to make a 15 inch by 15 inch quilt. The group has a blog with our profiles and our quilts when they are revealed. The link to the blog is http://fifteenquilts.com/. Our first reveal will be near the end of January. The theme was LINE. I cannot reveal my quilt yet which I finished yesterday, but here is a sneak peak.

The idea for this came from my husband. This is only a small sliver of the actual quilt.

I am currently taking a class called Flower Power with Susan Brittingham at Quilt University. Here is the sketch of the flower I will be working on. This one will be a blue-violet flower with a yellow center. I am really into contrasting colors these days. You can see that in my 15 by 15 challenge too since that one is orange and blue.

I have not made many flower quilts. In fact I have only made one other flower quilt of daisies years ago called “Crazy about Daisies” since daisies are my favorite flower. Here is a photo of that quilt.

This morning I stitched down the pieces in my grayscale forest quilt that I think I am going to name “Lions, Tigers and Bears…Oh My.” This was made from fabric that I dyed last fall in an Elizabeth Barton class at Quilt University.

I also decided that I should pull out a project and finish it this year. I really enjoyed the hand quilting that I did last year when I finished my husband’s “Scotland the Brave” quilt. I was able to take the quilt with me to Pittsburgh when I had to help out my sick parents. Here is the completed quilt.

I am thinking that I might have to do that again this year so I am looking for a hand project. I started an Hawaiian quilt years ago. That is the project that I will finish this year. I have about 1/4 of the appliqué done. I will have to get out the instructions on needle turn appliqué to refresh my memory on how to do it. This was started in another Quilt University class a long time ago.

Thanks for reading.

Chris

I Never Would Have Thought it Was Possible!

We have spent a lot of energy keeping our two cats separated. The old black and white cat has always been a nasty, mean, biting kind of cat. The young tabby cat is the sweetest cat you ever want to meet. We were afraid that the mean one would hurt the sweet one. So for 3 years we have been keeping them separated.

We finally decided before Christmas that we should let them hang out together to see if they could possibly get along. Well they do get along. Here’s the proof.

Chowder and Meeko hanging out near the tree

 Meeko and Chowder napping together

Chris