The circle quilt I started working on earlier this month is almost finished. I quilted the right side with horizontal straight lines, and the left side with vertical lines. I debated for a while if I wanted to finish it with a narrow black binding, or with a facing. I decided the facing would make it look more ‘arty’ and less ‘quilty’, so that’s what I’m going to do. I think I will call it ‘Circular Thinking’.
I already have an idea for my next circle quilt. Here’s a design I made with MS Paint, and the fabrics I will most likely use. I want this to be an art piece as well, so I pulled out some of my most ‘arty’ fabrics.
And, if that’s not enough about circle quilts, I’ve made a couple of new sample blocks for my Circles Circles Circles workshop, where I teach the freezer paper pattern technique that I used/will use for the 2 quilts above. I will be teaching a workshop in November, and another one in January – dates and locations are listed on my Workshops page.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
I started designing a new circle quilt a couple of days ago. I created a basic design in MS Paint. I picked some contrasting colors without really thinking about the fabric I had on hand.
I wanted to use a combination of woven or woven-looking fabrics and fabrics with circle designs. Of course, the colors I picked in MS Paint were not in my stash, so I changed my color choices based on fabric that I have on hand. To no one’s surprise, the only piece of woven fabric big enough for the circle was – chartreuse! I had to subdivide some of the sections because I didn’t have enough fabric, but I like the changes I’ve made. This was my first design pinned to the wall.
I liked the general concept, but thought it needed some more accents of color. I’m going to add a narrow strip of violet, a wider strip of the black batik with multi-colored circles, and black binding to outline the circle. The fabrics are just pinned in place right now, and more changes may occur to me before I sew it all together.
Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other creative projects to inspire you.
A couple of days ago, I started cutting diamond shapes to use in the ‘Water’ quilt. Today, I sewed three rows together – to figure out if the size I had cut would look good when sewn together. I also experimented with pressing the seams – press all seams to the same side, press to the side alternating the direction for each row, or press open. I decided pressing all the seams open worked the best for me. And, I liked the finished size after sewing.
Now I’ve cut a lot more diamonds in a variety of fabrics. At this point, they’re arranged on the design wall in no particular order. I’m happy with the mix of dark and light fabrics – giving the impression of sunlight reflecting off the waves. I plan to add more fabrics before sewing the diamonds together. (The lower rows are the ones that have been sewn together.) I’m keeping the curves next to the diamonds on my design wall, to make sure they work together, even if I don’t use exactly all the same fabrics.
In other news, I’ve finally created a page on my blog with the descriptions of all the workshops I offer. This should make it easier and simpler for guilds inquiring about my workshops, and for me when describing what I offer.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
Now that all my immediate deadlines (to enter quilts in shows, and to send quilts to shows) have been dealt with, I can pick up where I left off on ‘Water’, the second in a series of collaborative quilts I’m making with my sister Anne. (You can see ‘Fire’, the first of the series here.)
We’ve decided to make ‘Water’ the same size as ‘Fire’ (which is actually 22 by 57 inches, despite what my sketch says). The color palette will be blue with bits of bright contrasting colors, and the design will be horizontal strips with curvy piecing, with a large contrasting vertical curve the length of the quilt. We’re each going to work independently on the side sections, then when we get together again we’ll arrange them on the design wall and decide what to do with the center section.
I started with some curved piecing, mostly in various shades of blue but with some green and purple as well. That piece is currently 13 x 31 inches. I may add more to it, or start a separate piece with wider or skinnier curves. Until we get together, I don’t know for sure which of my pieces will make it into the final design – I expect that some of them will get chopped up.
I wanted some other shapes that looked like water but weren’t curves. I remembered seeing some quilts which used diamonds for water, to great effect. One artist who does this is Jan P. Krentz. I’ve seen a couple of other very impressive diamond art quilts on the web, but can’t figure out who the artists are – found on Flickr and Pinterest. (If you know who made these quilts, please pass their names along so I can give them credit.)
My diamonds are about 2 inches high, so the finished size after sewing them together will be about 1.5 inches. I’m going to use more fabrics than what’s on my design wall right now, but I wanted to see the effect (which I like a lot), and I should probably sew some of them together to make sure I like the finished size before I cut too many more. This going to be more time consuming than the curves, but I think having the same fabrics with the two different techniques will look great.
Anne tells me she has a huge pile of blue fabrics in her studio and has been thinking about surface design ideas that will work with our theme. She said when she has something to show, she’ll send me photos so I can post them on my blog.
Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other creative projects to inspire you.
I’m afraid there’s nothing on my design wall right now (although there are plenty of quilts being designed in my head!), so I have nothing new to show, but I do have some news.
I’m very happy to say that my quilt Off-Center was accepted for inclusion in Black to White 2015 at Quilt! Knit! Stitch! in Portland in August. So it’s heading out in the mail.
Another one of my quilts, Swoop has been travelling for almost a year – first for photography for the sixth annual issue of the International Quilt Festival: Quilt Scene magazine, then on to International Quilt Festival/Houston for the special exhibit Tactile Architecture 2014, which also showed at IQF/Chicago in the spring. I love it when I get a quilt back that’s been traveling, and it looks as good as, or even better than, I remembered it! It’s great to have it home again!
And, I updated my About the Artist page to include a widget showing my most recent Instagram posts.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
This week I made a border for the June assignment of the Vancouver MQG Round Robin project. There are 11 of us participating. We each brought our own starting block to the February meeting, and we each left with someone else’s project. Each month, we receive instructions for the next step – adding one to four borders, with a specific theme. We take the project back to the next meeting, and pick up another person’s project for that month. At the January 2016 meeting, our quilt tops will have been added to by each participant, and we will get our own quilt top back. Until then, the projects are stored in plain paper bags, so that the progress on each quilt top will be a big surprise at the end.
In order to maintain the secrecy, I generally can’t show photos of the border I am working on, because I often include some of the original fabrics, or the color palette is very specific, and a photo would spoil the secret.
The theme this month is Stars, and our assignment is to add one border. As it happens, this month I’m using all fabrics from my stash and the colors are not specific to the project, so I don’t think anyone will be able to guess whose project this belongs to. I used a paper-pieced pattern for a wonky star that I designed several years ago.
Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other creative projects to inspire you.
This week I have two completed quilts to show you.
I finished my entry for the Black to White (BTW) challenge and submitted it for jurying. I used the freezer paper pattern technique I taught my Circles Circles Circles workshop and finished it with my facing technique. I’m really happy with how this looks. It’s 37 x 37 inches, and is titled ‘Off-Center’.
The second is the fiber art piece made by my sister Anne and me. Together, we experimented with a variety of surface design techniques and constructed blocks of fabrics. We used some interesting materials for embellishment, including old coins, nylon net and a piece of gridded non-slip rug pad.
It’s been almost finished for some time, but this weekend I finally got the binding sewn on. We’re going to enter it in the La Conner 2015 Quilt & Fiber Arts Festival in the Fiber Art – Created Textiles category. The size is 22 x 57 inches, and it’s titled ‘Fire: an Element’. Anne and I will be making more pieces together for an Elements series.
I’m also going to submit several of my own quilts to the La Conner show, but haven’t decided yet which ones.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
On June 2, I hopped into Janet‘s car, and we set out for Lethbridge Alberta to attend the annual Canadian Quilt show and conference – Quilt Canada. We had a somewhat cloudy and rainy, but uneventful 2-day drive. As we drove through the Crowsnest Pass into Alberta, the sun came out, and we arrived at the University of Lethbridge to hot and sunny weather.
We spent a wonderful few days there – meeting friends, viewing quilts, attending workshops and events. I didn’t take many photos, but if you check Instagram for hashtags #quiltcanada and #quiltcanada2015 you’ll get a sense of the fun and activities we enjoyed.
On June 7, we started driving back to New Westminster BC with the intention of stopping in Grand Forks for the night. However, just out of Cranbrook near Moyie Lake, the battery in Janet’s car just died. Fortunately, we were on a downhill slope and Janet was able to pull the car over to the side of the road. Also fortunately, we were in an area with cell coverage. We called BCAA, and in less than an hour, Van Horne Towing came to our rescue. They towed us back to Cranbrook, installed a new battery for us and we were back on the road again.
The delay meant we couldn’t make it as far as we had hoped, so we spent the night in Castlegar. The next morning, we were told about the Castlegar Sculpture Walk. So we spent an hour or so viewing some amazing sculptures before resuming our journey.
Our favorite was V Formation an interactive, moving metal sculpture – see a video here. Our second favorite was Bad Hair Day a bronze statue of a burro. If you are ever in Castelgar, I highly recommend a tour of the sculptures.
Meanwhile, back at home, I’ve been working on my entry for the Black to White (BTW) challenge. It’s almost finished, which is good because the deadline to submit my entry is this Friday.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
It’s been a busy couple of weeks since I last posted.
On Sunday, I taught my Circles Circles Circles workshop for Vancouver MQG. It was a technique workshop to design circle blocks, and to sew curves and circles with flat seams. I provided lots of samples of circles designs, but did not provide full-size patterns to the participants. Instead, I taught them how to design their own circle blocks. And look what they came up with! Some of these blocks were still under construction when this photo was taken, and some of the participants created even more blocks after this photo was taken. I was so impressed with their creativity and productivity!
I’ve also been designing my entry for the Black to White (BTW) challenge. It’s probably no surprise to anyone that my design includes circles. Here are a few ideas I ‘sketched’ in MS Paint. You can see how my design evolved.
As I always say in my workshops (and to anyone who will listen), it’s important to view all the fabrics on the design wall before sewing any of them together. Here’s my design wall, with all the fabrics selected except the corners. I’m using the freezer paper pattern technique I taught in my workshop.
In other news, my entry to the SAQA Benefit Auction has been posted – it’s on page 5, but while you’re there, take a look at all the wonderful entries. And if you’re interested in how some of these quilts were made, check out the SAQA channel on YouTube, where short videos have been posted.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
‘Autumn Leaves’ is the theme of the current Quilting Arts Magazine reader challenge. I love the colors of fall foliage, and I often take photos of leaves and trees with the idea I will someday use them as inspiration for a quilt.
I reviewed my collection of leaf images and found this one taken several years ago. The colors are fabulous – the Sumac leaves are a glowing fiery red-orange color, which contrasts really well with the blue-green foliage in the background. Using Picasa, I boosted the color and contrast, and cropped the photo. Then I printed the image on fabric.
I used a dark pink thread to outline the edges and thread-sketch the veins of the foreground leaves.
Then I layered the quilt, and free-motion quilted the background with a teal thread. The foreground leaves, stitched before layering, are slightly raised from the background, giving the quilt some dimension. The quilt is only 8 x 10 inches and I thought a 1/4 inch binding would overwhelm it. So I decided to see how narrow a binding I could make. I used a single fold binding and stitched it so that only 3/16 inch shows on the front. I’m very pleased with the effect.
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many creative and inspirational projects.
